“I dont remember because it never happened!” snapped Redford, fixing her with a stern, unwavering gaze.
The conversation fizzled out awkwardly, and they both turned away.
*Why lie?* thought Grace. *It was written all over his face.*
“Dyou want me to be your Peter?” eleven-year-old Alfie Redford asked Grace Sullivan, the classmate he fancied.
“Peter who?” She frowned.
“You knowfrom the story! The Snow Queen enchanted him, and Wendy saves him!”
“Wendy?” Grace scoffed. “Thats *Peter Pan*! Youre mixing things up!”
“Whats the difference? Wendy, Gracedoes it matter?” Alfie waved a hand. “Im askingdyou want me to be your Peter?”
She didnt. Alfie was scrawny, with ears that stuck out, and shorter than her. Rescuing him wouldve been easyshe was stocky, a head taller. But walk around together after? Embarrassing.
No chance. Besides, her heart belonged to Mick Dawson, the class troublemaker, who was lingering nearby, smirking at the exchange.
Grace straightened her ribbon and tossed her head. *Let him hear this.*
“Peter? Youre not even fit to play the crocodile!”
Mick burst out laughing. Alfie paled, shot him a terrified glance, and bolted.
The next day, in front of everyone, he got his revenge”Grace the Disgrace!” he crowed. *Revenge is sweet!*
What did you expect, Sullivan? Not every man takes rejection lightly.
Alfie mightve been slight, but he was sharpwit compensating for brawn.
Yesterdays humiliation had stunned him. Any boy wouldve frozen.
Soon, the whole class was howling*Grace the Disgrace!* It stuck.
At home, Graces parents soothed her. But weeks later, her father, exasperated with her maths struggles, sighed.
“That Redford boy was rightyour heads a proper mess!”
He even added, “Give him my regards.”
Alfie was to blame for that tooher father had never spoken to her like that before.
By graduation, childhood grudges had fadedfirst loves, petty squabbles, all forgotten. They even danced together once. Alfie had shot up, lean and toned from football.
Mick had been booted to vocational schoolstrict times back then. Long-distance love fizzled. Sorry, Mick.
Grace went to teacher training college; Alfie, bright as he was, got into Imperial.
Occasionally, they bumped into each other in their old neighbourhood, exchanging pleasantries.
Later, life scattered themmarriages, moves. Reunions dwindled to rare visits to ageing parents or awkward school gatherings.
Years turned boys into balding, beer-bellied blokes, girls into sharp-tongued matrons. Grace was no exceptiononce sturdy, now broad as a barn door, a headmistress by forty-five.
Alfie, though? Still trim. Still sharp.
Then came the wild ’90s. Graces daughter Zoey brought home a jobless fiancé*Were having a baby!*
The factory where hed welded shut, and now? Warehouses rented out for self-help seminars*because apparently, people cant grow without being told how.*
No demand for welders. *Sell coats at the market instead!*
Grace and her engineer husband scrambledshe imported leather from Italy; he became a courier. Respectable jobs didnt pay anymore. Capitalism. *You wanted ithere it is.*
By the decades end, things stabiliseduntil the crash.
Overnight, their dollar savings could buy a two-bed flat.
*Broke one day, flush the next.*
Finally, they could move Zoey and her struggling husband out. Grace returned to teaching*hard women like her were always needed.*
Alfie? Rarely seen.
At sixty, Graces husband left. *”You smothered me,”* he said. *”Im a person too.”*
*Thanks, self-help gurus.*
Zoey had her own life now. Grace was alone.
Work didnt fill the voidcolleagues werent friends.
Her granddaughter, glued to her phone, barely listened.
At seventy, retirement forced her out. No match for rowdy teens.
Now, she and Alfieboth back in their childhood homesmet more often.
His wife was gone. He chatted warmly with Grace, reminiscing.
Today, outside the shop, they fell into easy banterswinging between memories like a pendulum.
Back then, everything was bright. Life stretched ahead, endless.
“Remember when you wanted to be my Peter?” Grace asked suddenly.
Theyd never spoken of it.
“When did *I* say that?” Alfie frowned.
“Year six, maybe?”
“Me? Your *Peter*?” He barked a laugh. “Never happened. You dreamt it!”
Grace arched a brow. “So you remember the climbing frame but not *that*?”
*Selective memory, is it?*
“I dont remember because it never happened,” Alfie said firmly, his old eyes steady.
Maybe the mind scrubbed shameful moments clean.
Six and still wet the bednow *that* was embarrassing. But this?
If he didnt recall it, it didnt exist.
The conversation died. They parted ways.
*Why lie?* Grace thought. *His eyes gave him away.*
And Alfie?
Oh, he remembered.
The first rejection sticks.
*Serves you right, Grace the Disgrace.*
