Her mother could have saved Timothy, and she refused. She left him instead of going back. She left them both in the first place. If she’d stayed rather than dragging Peter deeper into the cave, Timothy would still be alive.

The door to the hallway edges open, and Jane starts again, catching at the covers. Her mother’s face peers through the gap, and Jane’s first instinct is to turn away, refuse to talk to her. But at the same time, questions crowd her tongue, and there’s no one besides her mother that Jane can ask.

Her mother enters, closing the door softly, and sits on the edge of Jane’s bed. Her expression is drawn, tired. She looks smaller than the woman Jane saw in Neverland, the woman she imagined a figure out of one of her mother’s own fairy tales.

After a moment, her mother takes Jane’s hand, and Jane allows it. They sit in silence, her mother stroking the back of Jane’s hand. Like the objects in her room seeming strange and familiar at once, her mother seems both close and miles away.

“Why?” It’s the only question Jane can manage, out of all the choices tumbling through her mind, and her mother looks stricken the moment Jane speaks it aloud.

She drops Jane’s hand, and looks up, meeting her eyes. Jane pushes, feeling for just a moment vindictive and cruel. Timothy’s death is her mother’s fault; her mother should know that. And if her mother accepts the blame, if she lets it hurt her, then perhaps some of the ache in Jane’s own chest will ease just a little bit.

“What happened? Why did Timothy die? He wasn’t hurt at all, and then you took Peter away, and…” Jane’s breath hitches. She’s run out of words. If she speaks again, the tears will come, and she’s done with crying. She presses her lips together, holds her mother’s gaze, and waits.

“Oh, Jane.” Her mother reaches as if to touch Jane’s hair, but lets her hand fall.

Even in her anger, Jane regrets the missed contact. She wants to lean into her mother’s hand, be petted and told everything will be okay. Lines at the corners of her mother’s mouth and eyes drag her whole face down, making her look years older than Jane has ever seen her. Jane regrets her question, but she will not take the words back. After so many years of secrets, she has the right to know.

She expects her mother to resist, to put her off, or spin another pretty lie like her stories of the Clever Tailor and the Little White Bird. Instead, her mother folds her hands carefully into her lap and straightens her spine.

“I’m sorry, Jane,” she says. “You deserve the truth, and I always should have given it to you.”