4. Thunderclouds
The day before New Year's Eve, she became greedy again. When he asked her to dance.
Because Beverly was no longer frightening.
Instead, she was beside him, in front of a room of flames. Her doom. Her father, a coward, standing before the fireplace. Sheltered by shields of heat. And the man she looked upon now, the man at her side…
I want to take her dancing.
His hand, a hand he had set on fire. Locked in her own, squeezing ever so slightly. Thumb wandering to trail across her wrist. Calloused, careful hands. Warm and dry and smooth as amber.
I want… I want… her.
She loved his voice. Now more than ever, she adored his voice.
How his words rolled like thunderclouds across the room. And the sound of him thickened deliciously with the muttering of these words. Peter Lake wasn't afraid now. He was staring ahead, at the journalist, at the fire.
Yes.
And Beverly Penn wasn't terror. She wasn't even a scream anymore. A finite explosion. No. Beverly Penn was a lingering desire. Infinite, endless, shapeless. As pliant and painless as air itself.
Yes.
He looked at her now and she stared, and stared, and she couldn't believe that she'd once overlooked how handsome he was, in spite of his shapeless hair and his ashy skin. She was incapable of comprehending how he overlooked it, too, every day.
You're not dumb, you're not ugly.
As if he were trying to run away from his own beauty, the way he'd run away from everything else in his life. From tragedy to tragedy. Even in the shadows, with no light to tinge the darkness of his eyes. Now. Always. Peter Lake had never been ugly.
And she was his desire.
Of all women… All girls…
Oh god…
She'd grown restless later, when his restraint returned. She hadn't meant to be so blunt about it. But, at the same time, she was glad to be this honest. Because he needed to know.
I see you. Just you. What else must I see?
There was a lot for him to know. Endless things she wanted to tell him, but she couldn't unleash all of them at once. She couldn't scream. She couldn't burn him.
I like seeing you smile, too. Smile at me.
And his eyes glinted as she touched him. So Beverly let her greed consume her anew, and she went on her tiptoes and let their faces inch closer together. But Peter did nothing. He froze in place, and she became frightening again.
And Beverly left him in the hallway and spent the remaining hours of the day thinking of finding him again. Of putting an end to this torment.
No longer his, but hers.
His voice… His eyes…
You said you liked looking at me.
She slept and clutched the pillows and shut her eyes from the pool of starlight, there, over her head. The rings of fabric formed by the tent.
Can you imagine, then, even for a second, what it's like for me?
Oh, she couldn't. Beverly couldn't imagine. And that made her so flustered.
A sweet dizziness chained her to the bed. What did he think about? What lay beyond the foggy alleys of this invisible city? What secrets did he hide? She loved complicated puzzles. She delightfully dug into his every gaze, calculating, theorizing.
For me to look at you?
In this city she was brilliant and loud and gorgeous, a storm of hue, rolling over the skyscrapers. Consuming him. Mesmerizing him to the point that he couldn't even speak in her presence.
Beverly's heart thundered in her ears and she whispered, like he'd instructed her.
Castor, Pollux, Capella…
Because Peter Lake had stolen her pride, too.
The belief that she was fated to succumb to this fire in her chest. The peace she'd made with her doom. That there was no future left for her. Not down here, at least. Maybe up, somewhere, in the sky, with these burning drops of watercolor. The light that shone off the blackness of his gaze. Like butter on a pan.
Ursa Major, Ursa Minor… Peter…
He'd stolen her confidence in her theories. Her conviction that she was done in this world. Her readiness to set off and meet her end, at long last.
He'd given her remedies, medicines, cures. He'd given her lists. Ways to slow down her heartbeat.
He'd given her words of comfort. He'd given her an audience for her theories. A dancing partner. A thrill for the days ahead. He'd given her this fluttering excitement. These bubbles of joy. Rolling thunderclouds of desire.
And moreover, he had given her an anchor to this world.
Peter Lake was reality. A reality she had been ready to give up.
Peter, what do you think about, when you look at me?
Oh, curse him. Curse Peter Lake and his shapeless hair. His black eyes. His smiles and the map they revealed, there, on his face. His face…
Do you not see that I'm fading away, becoming more and more transparent, like frost bleeding out on glass?
She wanted to take this face in her hands. And to kiss it, piece by piece, to feel his warmth on her lips.
Is there no other woman you could have loved like this?
To finally convince him that he'd never been ugly or stupid or worthless.
A healthier woman? One with plentiful years ahead of her?
That he was her favorite person in this wintry limbo. A candle in the wind. A flag in the snow. He was her safety.
Oh, my love… My sweet friend…
For so long she'd wandered a storm and been beaten about by the wind. She'd let the lashing frost slash at her arms and she'd waited, waited forever, to be hooked and whisked off her feet and carried away into the closing chapter of this boring, death-ridden tale.
Curse you, Peter Lake…
But now here he was. Now. His arms wide. His voice warm. And she didn't want to go now. She didn't want to go…
Curse you for not cursing me sooner…
She had so much to do. So many things to tell him.
In her dreams he lay back in a grass-pooled field. White-green, cool, because the warmer seasons were mere fragments of fantasy. And she didn't remember them, so she invented whatever she liked.
A cold, silver spring. Bees of frost. Birds of glass. A meadow, as soft and creamy as her mattress.
Now I can't go in peace… Now I'm afraid of going…
And she lay atop him, and he laughed, and his laughter was a coin spinning on a table. A glimmering twirl of gold. Small and rusty and wonderful. And she spoke, and spoke, for hours, and she told him everything.
Now I want to stay, and I can't stay…
She kissed him, touched him, and she let him touch her. She held him close to her. She felt anchored in his arms.
If it's true that you'll save me, then… please… please, save me, so I may stay with you…
And the sky was bright blue and completely empty. And she would tremble and he would become concerned and she would drag him back to her, over and over again.
I want to stay with you forever…
And he kissed her too. Her neck. Her mouth. Her chest. His hands, his fingers… God… God…
Castor, Pollux, Capella…
She was cautious, even as she slept. She was gentle. And by extension, so was he. She'd never dreamed of something so physical before.
Ursa Major, Ursa Minor, Polaris…
And, in all honesty, she enjoyed it very much.
Oh… Ohh…
More than she'd ever be comfortable with admitting.
Oh…
And she didn't regret a single moment of this fantasy. In fact, she woke up feeling more motivated than ever. She heard herself play that morning, the crickets hopping, the frost glimmering, and she'd never heard anything as beautiful as the music she was creating.
She was buzzing with bliss. She was alive. She was brighter than the sun itself.
And then she looked at Peter Lake. The way he looked at her.
Because every moment was precious to her. A final chance to look at him. To hear him. To want him. And to know… to know he wanted her, too.
Do you dream often?
After thirteen years, Beverly Penn finally grew fond of this chapter in her story. She wanted to linger in this storm a little longer. To stare at the page. She didn't want her tale to end anymore.
Oh, Peter…
She wanted to dance with him.
If only you knew my dreams, too…
Author's Note: To anyone who is here today, thank you for reading.
(...) Yep, this is still a prologue of sorts. Just fragments of "A Star in the Lake" from Beverly's perspective. I promise I will only write one more chapter about this, and then the plot of Part 2 will begin. Again, I think it's important to list out what she's going through for the continuation of this story to make sense. The more I write from Beverly's POV, the more potential I find in every single detail of her character. She's fascinating. In the same way Peter is fascinating to me, whenever I write from his perspective. When you put yourself in the shoes of a character, you inevitably fall in love with them, and their endless possibilities.
So, yeah. This is basically Chapters 52-57 of "A Star in the Lake," Beverly edition. And I made her very bold here, as you can see. I think that it makes sense for Beverly to start having these thoughts about Peter in Chapter 53, when they confront Penn. I can definitely visualize Peter's voice becoming thicker, sulkier, unintentionally more attractive, and for Beverly to see him in a more sensual light. The same thing happens to him in ASITL, in the same moment, too, because of Beverly's purple dress. I wanted Beverly to also start having these wishes for physical contact, too. So... here she is.
In the movie, the moment she begins to see Peter in a more intimate light is (in my opinion) the "lists" scene, which is perfect in every way and no one can convince me otherwise XD In here, well, I changed it. Because these are my original scenes, after all.
I love the movie a lot, don't get me wrong: any changes I make in my own retelling is because I personally want to write about different things when talking about these characters, not because I devalue the film for what it is. I love it to bits and the movie means a lot to me. I think you already know.
And, oh, about the dream scene. Umm... yes. I don't regret a thing. XD
I'm convinced that Beverly would feel this way. Again, one of my favorite details in the film is the line she says when Peter joins her in the tent: "you're late." It's such a subtle way for her to say: "You've arrived in my life when I have little to no time left to enjoy this. So... let's enjoy it for as long as this lasts." And so the love scene follows. It makes sense.
In my retelling, I didn't add the "you're late" line because I instead wanted to branch it out into different details and scenes and lines. Ie, Peter and Beverly kiss on a staircase in my version (Jacob's Ladder, "you're late," he's literally meeting her when she's going up to Heaven).
And, here, Beverly laments about the fact that Peter has made her afraid of dying, after she's made peace with her own doom for so long. Now she wants to live. These concerns are never spoken aloud in the movie, but I definitely believe she felt this way.
I'm very proud of this whole chapter. And I adore writing from Beverly's perspective. It's definitely a breath of fresh air. Because, sure, I love writing from Peter's POV and the tenderness I feel for him will never be topped, at least for the time being, but... it's nice to write from the perspective of a character who isn't as constantly depressed or self-conscious as Peter, you know?
For instance. In here, I give Beverly a "naughty" dream, the way I gave Peter one in Chapter 56 of ASITL. But, unlike Peter, who I put through shame and embarrassment as a result of this dream, because... I just think he'd act like that XD, Beverly just wakes up feeling no regrets and happier than ever :3 Best girl. I love her. I love them both.
I'll see you again as soon as I can. Once again, I thank you for being here and reading my stories. Thanks a lot.