42. Chapter Forty-Two
Penelope
The guys come back the first Sunday of January, and by that night, I’m parking two blocks from Hawthorne again.
It’s the same walk I’ve made a hundred times — the cold, the dark street, the text when I’m close, the side door, his hand finding the small of my back to move me past the third stair.
Except two weeks ago, I walked in the front.
Two weeks ago, there was nobody to hide from, and tonight Stanley’s laughing at something through his bedroom wall.
Hearing it makes me panic, so I hold my breath on the landing and jump into Percy’s bedroom.
In his room, with the door shut, he pulls me in and kisses my forehead and whispers, “Sorry it’s back to this.”
I nod.
“The break was nice.”
“It was.” I press my face into his chest, so he doesn’t see me start to crumble. I know what I signed up for. Winter break was two weeks of the front door, and now it’s back to late nights, and I chose this, and I’d choose it again.
“Come here,” I tell him. And I mean it.
He says it on a Tuesday night, which is the least romantic day of the week, in his room, with the lamp low and a game he’s not really watching on his laptop.
I’m at his desk, drawing with one of the pencils he gave me — I use them now, I gave up not-using them. He’s on the bed, and I feel him watching me, which he does, and I’ve stopped being self-conscious about it. I turn around to whisper something, and he’s got a look on his face.
“What is it?” I ask, concerned.
He doesn’t answer for a second. His jaw works.
“It’s nothing,” he finally replies.
“Really?”
He shakes his head. “No, not really.”
I grin at him. “Then what?”
“I ––” he begins, looking right at me. He blinks. “I love you.”
The pencil stops in my hand.
He doesn’t look away. His hands are still. He’s not anxious about it. He just decided to say it, so he said it.
I put the pencil down and cross the room. I take his face in my hands and brush his cheek. He looks up at me.
“I love you too,” I say it back, and I mean it more than I’ve ever meant anything.
He closes his eyes. Something goes out of his shoulders that’s been there as long as I’ve known him.
By March, we have a routine. He comes over after his shift on the nights the house is loud enough not to miss him.
He lets himself in now — he has a way of doing it quietly that I’ve stopped hearing.
I draw at my desk; he reads, or does the endless film study, headphones half on.
Neither of us talks for an hour at a stretch, and it’s the most comfortable silence I’ve ever been in.
Tonight, he’s watching me across the room.
“Do you have something you want to say, Deveroux?” I tease.
He grins, closing his book. “I notice you don’t come to the parties anymore.”
“Parties?” I question.
“The Hawthorne House parties.”
I tap my pencil. “Yeah. Why would I want to come to that?”
He shrugs. “Gianna comes now.”
“She does? I thought Benson said she couldn’t.”
“He let up.” He pauses. “She talks about you. They say they miss you.”
“Oh,” I mutter. “Yeah, I –– I don’t know.”
“It’s been a long time since you came to one.”
I nod. “Sure has.”
His expression softens. “You mentioned one time that Hawthorne had horrible drinks.”
I laugh. “Yeah, are they finally stepping up their game?”
He smiles. “I don’t know. You haven’t heard anything?”
I shake my head. “No, I haven’t.”
“So, will you come?”
I tilt my head at him. “And pretend I don’t know you.”
“Could be fun.” His mouth twitches. “Sneaking around in a room full of people.”
I blush. “I’ll pass.”
“Okay,” he says, picking his book back up.
Ivory comes through the door in April already screaming.
“London. Penelope. London. I got London.” She’s got her laptop open, the email up, shoving it at me. “The Bartlett. The actual Bartlett!” She squeals. “Do you understand, I have to defer nothing, I’m in, I leave in September—”
“Oh my God.” I’m up. She grabs me, and I grab her tighter. We’re both jumping and screaming. “Ivory! London!”
“I have to buy a coat. A real coat, it rains constantly, I looked it up—” She pulls back, holding my arms, her whole face lit. “I’m going to Europe. I applied to move to three countries, and one of them said yes!”
I’m so happy for her I could cry, but there’s another reason I feel like crying. She leaves in September. I’ve had her here with me for two and a half years.
“Hey.” She squeezes my arms. “You’ll come visit. You’ll draw buildings that are older than this whole country.”
I grin. “Yeah.” I nod. “Yes.”
“And you’ll be fine here. You’ve got—” she stops, and there’s a look, and she picks her words. “You’ve got your whole life figured out. More than me. You have since we were freshmen, honestly.” Her eyes flare. “What do you think dating will be like there?”
I shrug.
She lights up. “I can’t wait to find out. London boys, like are you kidding?”
She trots off happily, talking about all the things she’s going to do. And I listen while feeling a pang in my chest that this is coming to an end. I’ll really miss her.
Renata drops the Halvorsen set on my desk on a Thursday and says, “The client wants you in the meeting.”
I look up. Renata does not bring interns into client meetings.
“Me?”
“You caught the setback thing. You solved the north face. It’s your drawing on the sheet, you can talk to it.” She’s already walking away. “Wear something professional.”
I sit there for a second and let the smile overtake my face.
I intern in what my mother calls a storefront, and I finally feel like I’m being acknowledged for my hard work.
I text Percy under the desk — renata’s putting me in a client meeting — and he sends back of course she is like it was never in question.
I put the phone away smiling and get back to the sheet that’s got my name on it.
The group chat lights up on a Friday, and I watch it happen without answering.
Gianna: Girls night!! My place. Penelope, I mean it this time!
Gianna: It’s been months, girl. I’m starting to think you don’t love me.
I do love her. That’s the part that’s getting harder.
I type three different replies and delete all of them.
I land on the deadline lie again, the studio lie, the one I’ve worn so thin I’m surprised it still holds, and I send it.
Gianna sends back a broken heart, and I sit with the small cold weight of it.
Then Percy texts that he’s coming over, and the weight lifts, because it always lifts when he’s around. I put the phone down and go unlock the door.
We’re on his bed one night at the end of the term, close to summer, and he says into my hair, “The guys leave in a couple weeks. For the summer.”
“They’re all leaving?”
He nods. “Like Christmas.” His hand moves slowly on my back. “But longer. Three months.”
I go up on my elbow to look at him, and there it is on his face — the thing I feel too, the anticipation of it. We won’t need to hide anymore. We’ll have the whole summer together without being seen.
“A whole summer,” I say.
He smiles. “Yeah.”
I put my head back down on his chest, and I let myself imagine it. What if I don’t go back to Chicago? What if I don’t go on one of my mother’s extravagant vacations? What if I stay here with him?
It sounds like the kind of summer I want.