Penny

The night is a success. I throw myself into it like it is a new life. A new lie. I close off every thought I have of my father and my mom. I close off every thought I have of Simon.

I don’t feel anything.

I am cauterized and tempered. I am a machine.

I do everything Megan asks of me. I speak during dinner, explain how I set up my garden. I drink a toast with my staff. And I walk home in the moonlight, sure I am proud of myself. But I can’t feel it.

The locks on the trailer feel unnecessary. And I am glad not to have anything to hide anymore. The relief of that, I do feel.

My trailer is a mess. Simon and I left it a disaster. A map of what we’d done to each other. The wine bottle and smashed plate. The two glasses. The bed with twisted, sex-smelling sheets.

Steeling myself against the memories, I strip the sheets to put my life back in order, to erase the night I had with him. My ribs shake. The tears I held back all morning can no longer be controlled.

The sob racks me. It shakes me.

I crawl onto the bed, put my face in the pillow that smells like him, wrap myself in sheets that smell like us and cry myself to sleep.

* * *

I don’t go home to Los Angeles. Nothing about that condo feels like home. Nothing about that city feels like home. Instead, I drive north to San Francisco, where my only friend lives. Where my parents are buried.

And every mile away from Penny feels like it’s scraping off my skin.

The rental car is going to cost me a fucking fortune but I can’t be bothered to care. I can’t be bothered to care about anything.

But Penny and the devastation I brought on her.

Tommy finally moved out of the shitty neighborhood we found ourselves in after getting out of St. Jude’s. That’s probably Beth’s influence.

They’re renting the top floor of a house in a shady street where kids play. It’s nice. It’s what Tommy deserves.

What do I deserve?

Nothing, is the answer.

I sit in front of his house working up the balls to go inside. I’ll be accepted in there. Fed. Given a beer. Tommy will listen to my story and probably side with me. But I’m covered in lies like fleas and I don’t want to take them into his home.

My phone rings beside me on the passenger seat. For the second before I look at the number, my heart lifts because it might be Penny.

But it’s Tommy.

“Hello?”

“Is that you in the Cadillac?” I look up and see him in his front window. A big, wide shadow against the brightness of his home.

“Yeah.”

“You coming in?”

I’m silent. I put my head down on the steering wheel.

“Whatever it is,” he says. “We’ll fix it.”

“I don’t know if I can.”

“Come up, brother,” he says and the word compels me forward. Out of the car, into the house, home to my friend.

* * *

The weekend is a success. A brilliant one. Guests leave and make reservations for the next available weekend.

Sunday night everyone collapses. Including me. Finally too exhausted to keep myself up worrying about my parents.

About Simon.

Bright and early Monday morning, I finally sit Megan down and tell her everything. She listens with a kind of slack-jawed astonishment.

“The brothers? The farm?” she asks.

“A lie. And I’m sorry.”

“Well,” she says. “I met your dad so I get why you’d want to make up something different.”

That’s far more generous than I deserve.

“Is your mom…okay?” she asks.

“I got word from her lawyer that she’s being moved. Dad’s been arrested and denied bail.”

“Simon?”

I shake my head because I don’t know what to say about Simon. I don’t know how to explain how I can miss a man I never even knew.

When I tell her there’s no private investor, that I’m using my trust in an effort to turn dirty money into something beautiful, I can tell she’s mad. Not that it’s Dad’s money but that I didn’t tell her.

She wants to draw up some kind of repayment plan so that she’ll have paid for half of the renovations that came out of the trust.

The money doesn’t matter, but I agree anyway.

I leave the office and head to the front desk where I hear voices. The last of the guests checking out maybe. But the tone of one voice is so familiar it stops my heart.

My feet run without me telling them to and I see him. Wearing a broken-in leather jacket and carrying a suitcase.

He’s here, I think. He’s back.

Simon.

“Are you sure you want the room under the stairs?” Patricia at the front desk asks him. “We have better rooms —”

“That room suits me,” Simon says, pulling his wallet out of his back pocket.

“How long would you like to stay?” Patricia asks.

“What’s available?” he asks, and my heart clogs my throat.

“The room is booked for Friday so you can have it for the week.”

He nods, hands over his credit card and I walk down the stairs to stop him.

“Don’t run the card,” I say, and both Patricia and Simon look up at me. His eyes…those beautiful eyes, they light up.

For me.

“Penny,” he says like he’s just so happy to see me.

“If you’re here for forgiveness, you’re forgiven. You can go.”

“I’m not leaving.”

“If you want more information for your story about my family, I don’t have any. And if I did, I wouldn’t tell you.”

“I’m not writing the story.”

That makes me pause.

“Then what do you want?” I ask.

“You.”

I can’t stand it. I can’t listen to these words I want to believe but can’t. I turn and walk through the foyer, past the dining room and into the kitchen. My safe place. My safest place. I built it like a haven where nothing could hurt me. Nothing could touch me unless I wanted it to.

He follows me.

“You guys,” I say to my staff. “Can you give me a minute?”

They head out the backdoor, casting curious looks over their shoulder as they go. My staff will have stuff to gossip about for years.

“Why aren’t you writing the story?” I ask him without looking at him. Again I know he’s here like I have some awful Simon radar. I know when he’s here, I’m painfully aware when he’s not.

“Because trying to get revenge on your father has ruined enough of my life. Because it’s not worth it if it costs me you.”

“You don’t have me.”

“But I want to.”

“Simon —”

“No, let me finish. Please.”

My silence gives him permission and he crosses the kitchen to stand in front of me.

“Everything I told you, everything I said, except for the stuff about the foundation, it was true. It is true. I went into journalism because I wanted to do the right thing. I wanted to be the kind of person my parents would be proud of. And the darkness I saw in the world, it’s gotten to be all I ever see. It’s filled me. And I wasn’t lying about dreaming of you.”

“You dreamed of me because you wanted revenge.”

“I dreamed of you because you are the brightest thing I’ve ever seen. You were then. You are now. Two days away from you and I feel like I’ve lost all the light. I feel like my whole life after my parents died was this dark nightmare I just had to…survive. And then I met you. And everything…everything is better. Food. Air. Sunlight. You make everything better, Penny.”

I suck in a breath, but it shudders and rattles me and he takes another step towards me.

“I was lying to you. And you were lying to me. But in the middle of that,” he says. His fingers brush mine, where my hand rests on the table. I flinch. He pauses, his fingers hovering over mine. “I told you more about myself. More…truth. Than I’ve told anyone…ever.” His fingers touch mine again and this time I don’t flinch. I let him touch me. Carefully. Slowly.

His hand covers mine. Familiar and foreign all at once.

“It was the same for me,” I whisper and I can’t believe I’m doing this. I can’t believe I’m letting him close. Letting him back in.

I must be crazy.

“I told you things I thought I had forgotten,” I whisper. His fingers are laced with mine, now. Our palms touching and he’s pulling me closer.

“All I want,” he says. “Is a chance. To see if this is what we think it is.”

“What do you think it is?”

“Love.” The word sends an arrow through me. “I hope it is.”

“I thought it was love, too,” I tell him. “But then I found out you were using me for a story.” He winces. “And everything you’re saying sounds…right. Sounds good. But I can’t just trust you again. I can’t just believe you after you hurt me like that.”

“I know. But I’m here. This week. Next week, too. Every week it takes.”

His fingers brush my face and I wait for him to pull me to him. But he doesn’t. He’s just there. Waiting.

“I want you to write the article,” I say.

“Are you sure?”

I nod. “My dad’s cost us enough. He shouldn’t cost you that second Pulitzer.”

“I don’t know if I have it in me anymore,” he says.

“You should find out.”

* * *

He stays the week. Meets me every morning for breakfast in the kitchen. Spends the evenings in his room working on the article. After dinner, he comes out to my trailer. And we talk. We just talk.

And I feel myself falling into this place…I’ve never been before. He shows me the snow globe, tells me how his dad bought it when he was born and I fall a little more.

He tells about the foster father and how he died. He tells me about Bates and The Debt and part of me thinks, Simon admires the criminal.

“I owe him my life,” Simon says.

“I owe him, too,” I say, and it’s a strange realization.

I cook and I worry about the deer eating my peas. I think about brewing beer and Simon thinks about it with me. We hike up to the prospectors’ ruins. We drink wine by the fire.

He asks me if I’m going to change my name back to Tina.

“Tina wasn’t very happy,” I tell him.

“Penny is?”

“Penny is.”

On Wednesday night, Megan joins us by the fire. Bringing Maker’s Mark, two rocks glasses and the Dallas Cowboys’ cup from the kitchen.

I can’t imagine getting any happier.

Thursday night, he brings me the article to read. I read it sitting at my table in my trailer while he stands against the sink, looking more nervous than I’ve ever seen him.

When I finish the last word, I sigh and put the pages down.

“So?” he asks

“It’s amazing,” I say.

“It’s not too…angry?”

I shake my head no. He worries about that. About the darkness in him. “It’s smart. It’s concise. It paints the picture of man who values profit over people. I don’t think there is such a thing as too angry.”

“How do you feel?” he asks. “I don’t have to turn it in if you don’t want me to.”

I stand and put my arms around him; my head against his chest. I could stand like this, with him, all night. But he’s leaving in the morning and there are other things I want to do.

“Honestly, Simon,” I tell him. “It feels like a clean slate.”

“Yeah.” He nods. “That’s how I feel, too. Like I can go on now.”

“Me, too,” I whisper.

I kiss him. He’s kept his distance this week. He’s been polite and respectful. And I’ve been unsure and worried.

But not anymore. Not tonight. My hands curl around his neck and I open my mouth against his. Inviting him in. Urging him in.

“Penny,” he breathes against my skin. “Are you sure?”

“I’m so sure,” I tell him and he whoops loudly. Swinging me up into his arms to carry me into the bedroom.

“What if it’s not as good as we remember?” I ask and he drops my feet on the floor and starts working on the buttons of my shirt.

“Impossible. It’s gonna be better.” He’s kicking out of his shoes, tripping a little and I laugh.

“What if the secrets made it hot?”

He takes off his shirt and I’m done laughing. I’m on fire for him.

“The secrets didn’t make it hot,” he tells me, touching my arms, tracing my ink, looking in my eyes. “We did.”

And we make it hot again.

Twice.

* * *

The next morning, he checks out with promises to be back on Monday.

“Do you believe me?” he asks.

“Yes,” I say.

“We promised no more lies,” he says.

“I’m trying,” I tell him. He drives away in a beat-up Jeep and I do everything not to cry.

He sends flowers the next day. So many flowers my trailer is full of them. He sends Megan flowers.

And I fall deeper into this feeling.

It’s soft and sticky. It’s like spun sugar and whipped egg whites.

Monday morning after another successful weekend, I start to play the old game with myself. Convincing myself he won’t actually come back.

And that I don’t actually care.

But within hours he’s back, walking into my kitchen like he never left.

And I fall. I fall and I fall.

He teaches me to play cricket. Bobby grew up in England and he knows how to play, too, and suddenly, Simon’s got the staff playing in the field behind the house and he’s so happy I can’t stand it. Sometimes I have to look away so he doesn’t see me crying and think I’m sad.

He leaves every weekend, comes back every Monday.

“This is getting ridiculous,” Megan says. “I can’t keep charging him for the room.”

So he moves into one of the other trailers. And he writes. The articles on my father will be a five-part series. 60 Minutes already wants to talk to him about the story.

He has to leave for a week before Christmas and when he comes back there’s a big blond man and a beautiful freckled woman with wild hair with him.

“This is Tommy,” he says, clearly nervous. “And Beth. My family. And this,” he says about me, “is Penny. My girlfriend.”

I fall. I fall so hard that that night, lying in his arms in my trailer, I say; “I love you.”

Because there’s nothing else to say. It’s undeniable. There can be no more after this. I can feel no more for another person.

“I love you, too,” he says, kissing my shoulder.

And I was wrong. I just keep falling.