By the end of the evening, their table had gone through four bottles of wine—although Penny suspected she’d consumed at least one and a half of them all on her own. She didn’t usually drink more than a single glass at a time, and she was definitely feeling the effects when Olivia drove her home.

It felt good though. The fuzziness helped dull some of her rage and humiliation.

“You want me to come up?” Olivia asked as she stopped in front of Penny’s Culver City apartment building. “I think I saw a space back there.”

“Not necessary,” Penny said, fumbling with the door handle. “Thanks though.”

“You sure? We could get in our pajamas and watch TV. Anything you want.”

Penny yawned and shook her head. “I appreciate the offer, but I’m just going to fall into bed and go straight to sleep.”

“Drink some water,” Olivia instructed as Penny hauled herself out of the car. “And call me tomorrow.”

Penny waved goodbye and headed inside.

The walk upstairs in the cold night air woke her back up, so she didn’t feel as sleepy by the time she let herself into her apartment. It also reawakened her anger. She gazed around the cozy two-bedroom space she’d decorated with cheerful floral patterns and overstuffed cushions, unsure what to do with herself.

Kenneth had never liked spending time at her apartment. He’d said it was too girly, and complained about all her throw pillows. They’d spent most of their time together either out at bars or at his place. Penny didn’t like bars particularly, but Kenneth did, so to bars they went. She’d spend the whole evening standing awkwardly at a high-top, nursing a fifteen-dollar glass of ten-bucks-a-bottle wine and being jostled by passersby as she tried to have a shouted conversation with Kenneth over the music. Then they’d go back to his place, have very brief sex, and fall asleep immediately afterward. And in the morning, Penny would make him breakfast.

She always wound up cooking for the men she dated, because the only other alternative was eating out, and it was difficult to eat healthy when you ate out all the time. Also because she liked cooking. At home, her mother was always in the kitchen making something delicious, so that was what home meant to Penny. But had a man she was dating ever offered to help her cook? No. They were so used to being waited on by their mothers and their girlfriends that they pleaded helplessness in the kitchen and let her do all the work. As if they were incapable of learning how to chop an onion or dice a tomato.

Just thinking about all the omelets she’d cooked Kenneth made her blood boil. Anyone could learn to make an omelet! All you had to do was watch a three-minute YouTube video! It wasn’t like it was hard. But he’d never bothered, because it hadn’t even occurred to him.

Penny had cooked for him and then she’d done the dishes and cleaned up his kitchen afterward. She’d even folded a load of his laundry once, because it was just sitting there in the basket getting all wrinkled, and the sight of unfolded laundry made her twitchy.

She was getting angrier by the second. Suddenly, more than anything, she wanted Kenneth out of her life. Right. That. Second.

She pulled out her phone, her veins coursing with righteous indignation and liquid courage. When she pulled up her Favorites she felt even more rage, because what was Kenneth even doing in the number one spot? Above her parents and her best friend? He’d never been worthy of that kind of honor. She angrily smashed her index finger into his face, wishing it was his real face instead of just a picture.

He answered on the second ring. “Hello, darling. You’re up late.”

“What’s her name?” Penny said, trying to keep the tremble out of her voice.

There was a pause. “What?” he said, choosing to play dumb. “Whose name?”

“The woman you were with tonight at Antidote.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, love. I’m in Portland.” He was a smooth liar, but then he’d have to be. Otherwise he would have gotten caught much sooner. “Did someone tell you—”

“I saw you, Kenneth. I was there when you came in.”

Another pause. “Shit.”

“Yeah,” Penny agreed. “That about sums it up.” She almost never swore, but she was tempted tonight.

“Listen, darling—”

“No, don’t you darling me. Who is she?”

“She’s no one. Just a coworker. That’s all.”

Penny snorted in disbelief. If tonight’s display was an example of how he behaved with his coworkers, his office must be a hotbed of sexual harassment.

“Look,” Kenneth said, at least having the decency to drop the darling, “the truth is my trip got canceled at the last minute. Things have blown up with this project and we’ve got a real disaster on our hands. I didn’t tell you because I knew I’d be burning the midnight oil all weekend and wouldn’t be able to see you.”

“Unbelievable,” Penny said. “You’re still lying.” He really thought he could talk his way out of this. That he’d feed her some story and she’d believe him, despite the evidence of her own eyes. How pathetic he must think she was.

“I don’t know what you think you saw, but I can assure you—”

“Stop it,” she shouted before he could gaslight her any further, the repulsive slug. “You know what, Kenneth? I’m not interested in anything you have to say. Now or ever again. You don’t have to lie about going out of town anymore. From now on, you’re free to see whomever you want—other than me, because we’re through.”

“Penny, please. Let me—”

She disconnected the call before he could finish the sentence.

Her phone started ringing again almost immediately. Remembering Jinny’s advice, she blocked his number and went to bed.

The next morning, Penny’s alarm went off at eight a.m., just like it did every Saturday. Her yoga class started in an hour, and she liked to get up and fix herself a light breakfast well before she started exercising.

Instead of popping out of bed with her usual enthusiasm, she rolled over and groaned. Her head was pounding, both from all the wine she’d consumed last night and all the crying she’d done in the bathroom at Antidote.

She definitely should have drunk more water before bed. In fact, she should get up and drink some right now.

Instead, Penny lay on her back staring up at the textured plaster ceiling without moving. A faded yellow water stain shaped like a snowman stared back at her.

Her limbs felt heavy, like they’d been encased in cement. The thought of doing anything made them feel even heavier.

Go on, get up. Have a glass of water and an Advil. Maybe a banana too. Then get dressed and go to yoga.

It would make her feel better. She knew it would. But she didn’t actually want to feel better. She wanted to wallow. Just for today. She was entitled, wasn’t she? She’d just broken up with her cheating boyfriend. If anything entitled you to wallowing, it ought to be that.

She typed out a text to her friend Melody.

I think I’m coming down with something. Not going to make to yoga today.

Penny tossed her phone down and went back to sleep.

She slept until noon, which she hadn’t done in months. Not since her last breakup. She stayed in her pajamas and watched a House Hunters marathon on HGTV all day, directing all her residual anger at the insufferable, underemployed couples on the screen who felt they should be able to afford a chef’s kitchen and whirlpool tub with the money their rich parents had gifted them for a down payment.

She didn’t even feel like knitting, that was how bad things were. Roxanne’s half-finished baby blanket taunted her from the coffee table. If there’d been any junk food in the apartment, Penny definitely would have eaten all of it. Instead, she had to content herself with toast. But she put butter and sugar and cinnamon on it so it’d feel like dessert. So there.

Olivia called in the afternoon to check on her. “Did you talk to Kenneth yet?”

“Yeah, I called him last night,” Penny said, pushing herself upright on the couch.

“How’d it go?”

“About how you’d expect. He tried to deny it, and then he tried to make excuses. So I told him to stuff it.”

“Good for you,” Olivia said. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” Penny brushed bread crumbs and sugar granules off her chest. She was on her fourth piece of cinnamon toast.

“Do you want me to come over? We could watch TV and order pizza.”

Penny didn’t want company. Having company might interfere with her plans to feel sorry for herself. “Thanks, but I think I’m going to call it an early night. Yoga really kicked my butt today.”

“You went to yoga this morning?”

“Yep.” Guilt burned in the pit of Penny’s stomach. She knew it was wrong to lie, but she wanted to be by herself. If Olivia knew she’d skipped yoga to stay home and wallow, she’d insist on coming over.

“That’s good. You’re really doing okay?”

“Sure,” Penny said, trying to sound like she meant it. “I mean, I’m bummed, obviously, but I’m better off without him, right?”

“You definitely, definitely are.”

“There you go. I just have to repeat that a few hundred more times, and by Monday I’ll have forgotten him altogether.”

“If you change your mind and want company, give me a call.”

“I will, thanks.”

When she got off the phone with Olivia, Penny called the nursing home where she volunteered on Sundays and canceled her shift. She could already tell she wasn’t going to feel like leaving her apartment tomorrow.

She was taking the whole weekend off. From everything.

On Monday morning, Penny lay in bed trying to convince herself to go to her spin class. Her limbs still had that encased-in-cement feeling, and she was completely drained of both energy and motivation. This was what she got for spending the entire weekend alone eating badly and wallowing in self-pity.

She knew better. She had her routines for a reason.

When Penny first moved to Los Angeles, after she discovered the boyfriend she’d left her perfectly happy life in Washington, DC, for was cheating on her, she’d fallen into a little bit of a depression.

Her degree was in chemical engineering, but she worked as an examiner for the US Patent Office and had applied for a telecommuting position so she could follow that rat Brendon to the West Coast. There she’d been, all alone in a strange new city with a broken heart and a job that didn’t require her to leave her apartment.

The thing Penny hadn’t realized until after she locked herself into a work-from-home position was that she needed a routine and regular social interaction in her life. She was a people person, and she didn’t do well cooped up in an apartment all day with no one but herself to talk to.

So she’d joined a gym. And a knitting group. And a book club. Signed up for a yoga class and a spin class and a weight training class. Started volunteering at a nursing home on Sundays and as a Planned Parenthood escort one or two Saturdays a month. And she made herself a rule that every single morning she had to shower, put on real clothes and makeup, and leave the house at least once. Which was when she’d incorporated the daily coffee breaks at Antidote into her routine.

Penny’s Monday spin class started in half an hour. She just had to brush her teeth, change into workout clothes, and get in her car. Once she got to the gym, it would get easier. Her competitive instincts would kick in as soon as she got on the bike, and there’d be music to cheer her up. The exercise would make her feel better about herself, and that would make her feel better about everything else.

With a bone-deep sigh, she threw back the covers and pushed herself to her feet.

An hour later, sweaty and humming a Jackson Five song, she let herself back into her apartment feeling at least fifty percent better. It had been Motown day, which was always a guaranteed mood elevator. Plus, she’d beaten her previous energy output record and helped her team take first place. So far, her plan was going well.

After a shower and a breakfast of yogurt and fresh fruit, she sat down at the computer in her home office and opened a new patent application. This one was for a composite shoe insole, and after familiarizing herself with the specification, she spent the morning scouring government databases for older patents and scientific journal articles pertinent to the technology.

When her usual break time rolled around, she was still in a pretty good mood, even after three straight hours researching methods of curing composite materials for use in orthotic insoles. But as she logged out and stretched her legs, a tremor of unease ran through her at the thought of going to Antidote.

It was the site of her humiliation. Hottie Barista would probably be there, and for once, she didn’t look forward to seeing his devastatingly handsome face. She still resented that he’d known her boyfriend was cheating on her and said nothing. He’d just let her go on seeing Kenneth, knowing she was going to get hurt.

Hottie Barista was kind of a jerk, as it turned out.

Far worse was the very real possibility she’d see Kenneth there. His office was just down the street, and he knew what time she went for coffee every day. If he wanted to force a conversation, Antidote would be a convenient place to do it. She’d half expected him to show up at her apartment over the weekend, but he might be waiting for today so he could ambush her in public, knowing she wouldn’t want to make a scene. That would be just like him.

She pondered skipping the trip to Antidote this morning. It wasn’t like she had to go out for coffee. She owned a perfectly good coffeemaker. She could take her break here at home. Surf the internet or watch some TV for an hour.

Bad idea.

Once Penny gave herself permission to sit around watching TV in the middle of the day, it would be difficult to go back to work afterward. She needed to leave her apartment and be around people for a while.

Fine. What if she went somewhere other than Antidote? There was a Coffee Bean not far away. She could go there instead.

But she didn’t want to change coffee shops. She loved Antidote. It was her Cheers, where everybody knew her name. Kenneth shouldn’t get to take that away from her. How was that fair when he was the villain? He should have to find a new favorite coffee place, not her.

To heck with Kenneth. And to heck with Hottie Barista too. Penny was sick and tired of rearranging her life to accommodate men. She was going to Antidote.

It was a beautiful April day when she stepped out of her apartment. The marine layer had burned off leaving behind a glistening blue sky and a crisp breeze. The walk to Antidote only took ten minutes. Her stride started out brisk and confident, but grew slower the closer she got to her destination. By the time she drew within sight of the building, she was dragging her feet like a recalcitrant toddler.

No one had seen her yet—it wasn’t too late to fake her own death and start over with an alias in a new city. Or maybe just find another coffee shop to hang out in.

Her mother’s voice popped into her head, telling her that was coward talk.

Penny wasn’t a coward. She straightened her spine and pulled open the door, determined to face both Kenneth and Hottie Barista with her head held high.

After all that, there was no sign of either of them. Instead of Hottie Barista, the new girl, Elyse, stood alone behind the counter, looking overwhelmed. Penny let out a relieved breath and got in line.

Elyse was small framed with short hair and big round eyes set in a heart-shaped face, giving her a pixie-ish appearance. “Did you want any syrup in your skinny vanilla latte?” she asked the woman in front of Penny.

“Vanilla…?” the woman replied, sounding confused.

Elyse had only started working at Antidote last week. She was young—a sophomore in college—and her only prior experience had been at the coffee stand on campus, which had apparently not offered a broad selection of authentic espresso drinks.

Penny was only twenty-five herself, but college students looked positively fetal to her these days. All shiny and new, untarnished by the pressures of adult life. It felt like a hundred years ago to her instead of only three.

It took Elyse nearly five minutes to make the poor woman’s skinny vanilla. She had to throw the first one out and start over when she forgot to use the sugar-free syrup. Penny waited patiently until it was her turn to order, in no hurry.

Elyse finally greeted her without enthusiasm. “Morning. What can I get you?”

“She always gets the same thing,” Caleb said, coming out of the kitchen with a tray of clean dishes. “Regular nonfat latte. Ring her up and I’ll make it.”

Penny froze at the sight of him. Six gorgeous feet of tanned skin and muscles topped by thick golden hair and a face so beautifully symmetrical it stopped you right in your tracks. Perfectly proportioned nose. Strong chin. Granite jaw. And then there was the matter of his eyes, which were a gold-tinged brown so striking it felt like they were looking straight into your soul.

There was a reason Penny’s knitting group called him Hottie Barista. The man was supernaturally handsome. He looked like he should be followed around by a key light and a menagerie of cartoon animals.

The first time Penny had seen him he’d rendered her so tongue-tied and breathless, it had been all she could do to blurt out her coffee order. But over the intervening months, she’d gotten more used to looking at him. She still deeply appreciated the view, but he didn’t steal the air from her lungs anymore. He was a part of the scenery now, like a majestic vista she was lucky enough to gaze upon every day.

His eyes sought hers, which in and of itself was unusual. He almost never made eye contact. Or smiled. Or made conversation. It was part of his mystique.

Penny was a naturally friendly person. Her open, sympathetic demeanor invited confidences wherever she went. She couldn’t get on an airplane or sit in a waiting room without hearing the life story of the person next to her, which was fine with her because she loved talking to people. She’d never met a stranger she couldn’t befriend—until Caleb.

Apparently, he was too cool to make small talk with her. All she’d ever gotten out of him was disinterested monosyllables and shrugs. It wasn’t like she’d been flirting with him either. She was aware that her chances with a man of his physical perfection were approximately infinity to one.

She liked to think of herself as pleasingly plump, like Nancy Drew’s best friend Bess, even though she knew there wasn’t any such thing as “pleasingly” plump as far as most people were concerned. Especially not in LA, where almost everyone walked around looking like runway models.

Penny had been fat all her life, and she’d tried everything to lose weight. Any fad diet or exercise craze you could name, she’d tried it, even though she knew better. She was a scientist; she knew bad data and specious claims when she saw them. But she’d been so desperate to look like everyone else, she’d ignored her own better judgment in her quest to be thin.

Until one fad diet too many had left her with a vitamin deficiency and borderline blood glucose levels that had caused a scary fainting incident and landed her in the emergency room her sophomore year of college. A very nice female doctor had sat her down and explained that she was doing more harm to her body than good, and she would be much better off eating a well-balanced diet and throwing her scale in the dumpster.

Ever since, Penny had been rigorous about eating healthy—actually healthy, not fad diet healthy. Once she stopped torturing her body with juice cleanses and extreme diets, her weight stabilized at her current size sixteen. This was the size her body naturally seemed to want to be, and Penny had made her peace with that.

Mostly.

The whole body positivity thing was still a work in progress. Moving to the land of free-range size 00 actresses had certainly put it to the test, but she felt like she was doing pretty well, considering. Penny was a big believer in the “fake it till you make it” theory. Pretend you have self-esteem long enough, and eventually you’ll actually have self-esteem.

Regardless, she had no illusions about her chances with a man like Caleb, so she was always careful to keep her overtures polite and platonic. She didn’t want him to think she was like all the other women who came into Antidote and tried to flirt with him—women whose overtures he ignored just as determinedly as he ignored Penny’s, no matter how attractive they were.

Maybe he was gay. Or had a girlfriend. Still, it had always bothered her that he was so determined not to talk to her. She was delightful, darn it. Everyone else wanted to talk to her. But no matter how many times she came in here, how unfailingly polite she was or how well she tipped, she’d always gotten the same bland indifference from him as everyone else.

Until he’d come into the bathroom to check on her Friday night. And now he was staring directly at her with those piercing eyes and his forehead all creased in concern. Like he was looking at someone who’d received a terminal diagnosis.

Penny felt the blood rushing to her cheeks and tore her gaze away, fumbling with her wallet. She could still feel his eyes on her as Elyse rang her up. Why was he just standing there? Wasn’t he going to make her drink?

“Your name’s Penelope Popplestone?” Elyse said, squinting at Penny’s credit card. “For real?”

Penny smiled reflexively and nodded. “For real.”

“Badass. That sounds like a character in a children’s book.”

It took Elyse three tries to swipe Penny’s card, and Caleb stood there the whole time. Just staring at her. It was unsettling. Finally, Elyse mastered the credit card machine and it spit out a receipt.

“Tables need busing,” Caleb told Elyse as she shoved Penny’s card and receipt at her. Elyse nodded and grabbed a rag, leaving Penny and Caleb alone at the counter.

Penny cleared her throat. “Can I have a pen?” Elyse had forgotten to give her one.

Caleb grabbed a ballpoint from the cup behind the register and held it out to her. He had neatly trimmed nails and callused fingers, like a man who knew how to use his hands.

Penny swallowed and took the pen from him, her heart thudding painfully in her chest as their fingers touched.

Stop it, she told herself as she clenched the pen. He’s just a pretty jerk. She scrawled the tip and her signature and thrust the receipt back across the counter.

“How are you?” Caleb asked before Penny could make her escape.

“I’m fine,” she replied without meeting his eye. Why did he have to suddenly be friendly today? She’d spent months fruitlessly trying to make small talk with him, but it wasn’t until she’d been rendered pathetic and pitiable that he was finally interested in having a conversation. Figured.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you what Kenneth was up to.”

Penny shrugged like she wasn’t still bitter about it. “It’s not your job to police my boyfriends for me.”

It’s your job to make my coffee order, she thought silently, wishing he would go and do it. He was the next to last person in the world she wanted to talk to right now—the absolute last being Kenneth.

“I could have warned you though.”

She forced a smile. “It’s fine.” She tried to imbue the words with sincerity so he’d stop looking at her like she was dying of a brain tumor, but they came out sounding flat.

“I didn’t think it was any of my business.”

“You’re right. It’s not.” She meant it to sound nicer than it came out. Really, she did. But at least it got her out of that awkward conversation, because Caleb finally headed for the espresso machine to start making her latte.

Penny moved down the counter to claim her usual spot toward the back. She would have preferred to sit at one of the tables on the other side of the room today, as far away from Caleb as possible, but she refused to give him the satisfaction of thinking he was important enough to make her uncomfortable. If she wasn’t willing to change her routine to avoid Kenneth, she definitely wasn’t changing it because of some barista she hardly knew.

“Morning, Penny!” Charlotte called out from the orange couch in the corner.

Penny swiveled on her stool, brightening. “Good morning!”

Charlotte was a regular at Antidote like Penny. She was a philosophy grad student with a wispy beard and a bright green streak in her blonde hair. Today she was wearing a polka dot dress with bright pink tights and green high-top sneakers, and she was surrounded by stacks of papers and books.

“Sorry to hear about your boyfriend.”

Penny groaned. “Does everybody know already?”

“Roxanne told me. You could do so much better than that guy. I always thought so.”

“Thank you,” Penny said. “I guess.” It wasn’t like there was a line around the block of disappointed lovers she’d rejected in favor of cheating jerks. The cheating jerks were the only options presenting themselves.

Charlotte seemed like she had a lot of work to do, so Penny turned back around and got out her phone. She’d sit here for fifteen minutes and drink her coffee, then she could go. That would be enough time to prove she wasn’t afraid to show her face.

Caleb brought her latte over a few minutes later and retreated without a word. Good, he was back to ignoring her. That was exactly what she wanted. For things to go back to normal.

He’d made a heart-shaped flower design in the foam today instead of his usual leaf, but she chose not to read anything into it. Hearts were a common theme in latte art. They were probably the easiest shape to make. Still, it was pretty. She swiped to the camera app on her phone to take a picture—but only because it would look good on her Instagram. Not because she was at all charmed or impressed by Caleb’s latte art.

As she was deliberating over the best photo filter, she heard the bell on the shop door ring.

“Penny, thank God,” Kenneth said behind her. “I’ve been trying to call you all weekend.”