AN~ This is a short chapter for a couple reasons: 1. I have the flu and am so tired. 2. I didn't plan on this chapter, but people reviewed and asked for a) Peter Pan and b) Daphne to lose a boyfriend via death. So YAY if you don't like character death or you like Peter Pan enough to not want him dead or you DON'T like Peter Pan and you don't want to read about him even if you know he's going to die, skip this chapter. (After this one angry chapter one sad chapter and then HAPPINESS!)
ALSO GUYS THIS FIC MADE IT TO THE SECOND VOTING ROUND OF ELLIGOAT'S BEST SISTERS GRIMM STORY OF 2014 CHALLENGE! Go vote for whichever story you think is best of the eighteen that are there. If you vote for me I'd be super happy but only do it if you actually think this is one of the best, ok?
The last person Daphne expects to meet in Arizona is Peter Pan, all grown up. She barely recognizes him, and he doesn't recognize her at all. It's been years, and she just saw him once, in his flying ship. But that twinkle is still in his eyes, the vaguely dangerous addiction to fun.
And when she tells him she knows about magic, they hit it off.
All right, so she's a bit homesick. She's made plenty of friends at school, but not a lot of close ones, and none of them know about magic. She misses her family, and she's missed Puck since the day he disappeared. Peter is a nice substitute. He makes her life exciting in the way she's wanted it to be since she got to college.
Sabrina can praise normalcy all she wants, but Daphne can swear that it's really hard to go back to safe and boring after years of adventure and fantasy.
Peter is kind of her way of filling in the gap. He's a daredevil times fifty, constantly trying to make up for the loss of his childhood wonder by doing more and more risky things. It's exhilarating.
For their first official date, they go skydiving.
It's terrifying. And Daphne's killed giants (or, well, Daphne's watched her older sister kill giants. But Daphne's fought in wars and faced down monsters and come out of it all still believing there's something good in the world so she's pretty brave thank you very much). And after they get to the ground safely, Daphne agrees that it was one of the most amazing things she's ever done.
That's how things go with Peter. It's one glorious rush after another. They do some sitting around and talking, sure, some eating dinner and watching movies and normal stuff, but ninety percent of the time it's big stuff. They go mountain climbing. They ski black diamond trails. They go white water rafting in the Grand Canyon. They go bungee jumping and they do something that's a cross between bungee jumping and skydiving, bridge jumping or something. They swim with sharks.
Peter is most definitely an adrenaline junkie, and Daphne's been around enough addicts that it should scare her a bit.
If she wasn't so busy learning how to fly a plane, how to do a barrel roll right next to Peter (who's forgotten how to fly somewhere along the line), then she might notice. But she's having too much fun. She's too high on the danger herself.
Her first year and a half of college is great, like that. She and Peter do scary things, and they love it. Her last relationship was steadiness, and she's had enough of that. This is excitement, and it makes her feel more alive than she's ever felt before.
Peter is the push she needs to get herself into big things.
Because Daphne doesn't want to admit it, but she's kind of a follower. Sabrina's the leader, the one who goes 'okay, this is what we're doing.' And it's not that Daphne can't take charge, it's that she prefers to have someone else to make the final decision, as long as it's not a really stupid one. It's easier. And now Peter's leading her off on these things.
And everything's great.
Which, of course, is why it all falls apart.
Daphne's in class when it happens, just a gen ed history course, and she gets a call that she's bored enough to take (history's way more exciting with Everafters in it, and she's taken Western Civ in high school. She's just got to get this out of the way so she can move on to more interesting courses). She heads out of the room and presses the talk button. "Hello?"
It's a hospital.
Apparently, Peter listed her as his emergency contact. On the one hand, this makes sense because the only family he's really got is the Darlings, who are all really old and living in England still, pretending to be normal. On the other hand, it would have been nice if Peter'd actually told her he was going to do this. He ends up in the hospital every few months because he's broken a bone or something, and she could have gotten some precautions so they'd know not to bother her unless he's actually-
actually-
actually seriously hurt.
Which he... is.
Good lord.
Daphne's out of the building and calling her roommate, Lauren, who has a car on campus, before it really registers that she's moving her feet. Phrases are swimming through her mind like head injury and major trauma and bmx accident and possible brain damage and Peter's hurt, Peter's not waking up, Peter's in the hospital, Peter-
Lauren's free, praise anyone who's listening, and she drives Daphne to the hospital like Granny would have and Daphne really doesn't need to be thinking about Granny now because Peter and Granny were a lot alike, Peter was going to take her drag racing next weekend and they were going to scream and press as hard as they possibly could on the gas pedal and love the rush of it just like Granny loved the rush of driving like a maniac and Granny died because she didn't care enough about her safety and Peter's-
No. No no no no nonono.
Peter will be fine. He's an Everafter. It takes a lot to kill an Everafter. Puck survived practically drowning. Snow was poisoned. They're fine.
Granny was an Everafter. Mr. Seven was an Everafter. Cobweb was an Everafter. They're all-
Daphne understands, suddenly, why Sabrina gets angry instead of feeling things. She wants to punch something. She wants to stab her fudging brain before she goes any further down this train of thought because she's scared and Daphne Grimm does not do scared.
Finally, finally the car ride is over, and Lauren guides Daphne into the hospital and asks for Peter because Daphne doesn't seem to be able to quite tell what's going on; it's like there's a disconnect between her and the rest of the world, but then they're in Peter's room and a doctor is talking at her, telling her things like coma and uncertain outlook and Daphne can't take this.
She doesn't know how much later it is when she comes back into herself and realizes she's shaking, but Lauren's looking at her like she's worried and Daphne gives her a smile that's as reassuring as she can make it.
"I called your family," Lauren says. "Your sister's on her way down. Your mom said she'd be here as soon as possible, but-"
Veronica has an important meeting tomorrow, Daphne knows that. And someone's got to stay with Basil. Eighth grade state testing's soon, and Henry's got work, and Daphne understands, but doesn't Sabrina have something important coming up soon? Daphne can't remember, and even though she feels bad, she can't bring herself to care because she just wants her big sister.
"I should-" Daphne starts. "I should call his mom. And the school, he won't be in for... Anyway, they should know, and I ran out, I have to email my professor, and-"
"You should have dinner," Lauren says. She holds out a bag of takeout and shakes it appealingly. "I had the hospital call the school. You're gonna have to call his mom, though. I don't know her number. But not until after you eat."
"Yeah," Daphne agrees, opening a container of fried rice absently. It should be her anyway. Wendy should hear this from someone she knows.
She eats without tasting anything, looking at Peter's still form on the bed, hooked up to tubes and so... lifeless. Like he's already-
Sabrina arrives a few hours later, and she and Lauren start arranging things around Daphne. There's some sort of couch-bed made up for her out of nowhere, and Lauren is telling Sabrina how to contact the school and tell them about the situation, and Sabrina calls Wendy while Lauren's in the bathroom, and Daphne's so tired she doesn't stop either of them, even though they both have things of their own to be doing and she should be able to do this herself. She can do this herself. She just... needs to breathe, that's all. She needs to breathe with Peter.
In... out. In... out. In... out.
The hospital is quiet, too quiet. The machines don't beep like they do on TV. It's just Peter's breathing and Sabrina and Lauren whispering worriedly in the corner, and sounds from the hallway.
Eventually, Lauren goes home, and Sabrina comes and sits on the floor next to Daphne's head. They breathe at the same rate.
Daphne doesn't remember falling asleep.
When she wakes up, it's afternoon, and Peter's still asleep. What wakes her up is the arrival of the Darlings (all of them, there are so many Everafters in this family and they've all adopted each other into relations, the Lost Boys who went home and Wendy and her children and her brothers who never really grew up and they're loud and obnoxious and so beautifully distracting like Daphne's own ragtag family of adopted people), who are talking to each other and doctors and Sabrina and Peter's sleeping form all at once.
One of the lost boys (Daphne doesn't remember his name) is sobbing, and Daphne realizes for the first time that she hasn't cried once. John is talking to the doctor urgently and Daphne catches the phrase life support over the sound of everyone else. She very purposely does not hear the next phrases, which sound too much like organ donor and brain dead for her to believe she actually heard them. Most of the lost boys are talking over each other about what they've been up to since they saw each other last, either to Peter or to each other. Wendy and Sabrina are bending over a stack of papers and talking, and Michael-
Michael sits down next to Daphne and says, "Thank you for staying with him."
As if there was anything else Daphne would do. She tries out a smile that surprisingly, doesn't break her face, and says, "I couldn't-"
"I understand," Michael says. "But still. We were a little worried letting him come out here all by himself- he's so thoughtless sometimes- and it's been a huge relief knowing he has someone here to watch out for him."
Fat lot of good that did. Daphne watching out for people never stops them from getting people hurt. It just- It just means there's someone there when it happens, and-
And now she's crying. She lets out these huge, gasping sobs, and Michael holds her and cries too, because Daphne did hear the doctor say brain dead and John was talking about organ donation and Daphne can't take it and Peter's going to-
She can't lose someone again, not so soon.
Knowing she can't take losing someone else doesn't change the fact that Peter never wakes up. Knowing Peter's liver or heart or whatever is going to save someone's life now doesn't make it any easier that he's gone.
The funeral is sunny because it's always sunny in Arizona, and Daphne feels like the sky's laughing at her. Veronica is there, and Henry and Basil fly in Friday night and don't leave until Sunday afternoon even though Henry has work and Basil has school. Basil liked Peter. He kind of took the place Puck left, and Basil adored him nearly as much as Daphne did, because as much as Puck would have hated to hear it, they were so alike it was like the universe sent her her own personal Puck to her Sabrina to make up for losing him, but then they took him away because laughing joking blonde boys full of life never stay forever and they're all hurting and it's terrible, the stupid funeral and the stupid gathering afterwards.
Daphne goes back to class just to have something to do with herself to keep from going crazy, and one by one other people go home. Sabrina's first, and Daphne's a little hurt and a lot angry. Veronica is last. Daphne shouts at Lauren, and Lauren puts up with it and cries because they've been roommates since freshman year and they're friends and Lauren was Peter's friend and she doesn't deserve for Daphne to shout at her. Daphne does it anyway.
Sabrina reappears a week after Veronica left and it becomes apparent that she was arranging something with her school so that she could take her classes and be here with Daphne, so Daphne shouts at her sister instead of at Lauren.
Sabrina takes the shouting and doesn't cry because she didn't know Peter like Lauren did and because she understands more what Daphne's going through and because there has never, ever been a time in Daphne's life when Sabrina didn't let her sister scream at her, not even before their parents disappeared. And when Daphne's all shouted out, Sabrina holds Daphne until she breaks down and weeps.