40. Penelope
forty
penelope
Typing “The End” is a euphoria that never quite goes away. It’s one of those addictive highs that isn’t toxic to your system—sure, I might ruin myself in the process, but the hit at the end is worth the suffering.
Then why am I one hundred times more nervous as I finish out Finn and Delilah’s happily ever after? That’s a stupid question that I’ve known the answers to for months. It’s because their happily ever after isn’t quite their own. Instead, I took my second chance, enemies to lovers babies from the series I’ve been cultivating and turned them into a rendition of Anthony and myself, right down to the silly little poem I wrote when I got back from vacation and thought I’d found my one.
Finn and Delilah. Ant and Penelope. We are one in the same.
I cannot publish this book.
And yet, it is my greatest piece of writing to date.
I already know that Rafe and Paula are going to sing its praises, not only for the way that my craft has improved from book one, but because this story practically wrote itself—straight out of my memories, fantasies, and my current day to day, but nobody has to know that, right?
Only, people will know.
My closest friends know the story of Ant and me—hell, they helped me psychoanalyze some of the very same words of his that I penned into Finn’s character. Anyone who knows us will realize from the prologue that this story is a Penelope Barker Original. I don’t know if I can do this to Ant.
Not after all of the progress we’ve made. Not after the last couple of weeks we’ve spent together, in our state of not-quite-together-yet limbo.
Not after I just stocked our kitchen with pizza rolls and cheeseballs.
But I have a deadline to make. I have readers who have been waiting for this book since the beginning of the series. I have a team behind me ready to start marketing, and new contracts to sign once this book is officially on shelves.
I have too many people that I would be letting down if I didn’t publish it. So why should I care about the feelings of one person over all the rest?
“Did you do it?” he asks, lightly rapping on the French doors to my office. I told Anthony this morning that I would be finishing my book today, and he promised to stay out of my hair. When I turn and nod, smiling shyly with my shoulders scrunched, his face lights up.
Why should I care about his feelings over all the rest? It might have something to do with the cupcake on a plate that he brings in, the candle that says “Celebrate” flickering against the light in his eyes. But I kind of like the way his proud smile lights up his face a little bit more.
“Why is there a candle?” I laugh, turning my chair around to face him fully.
“It felt like the right thing to do!” he chuckles back, setting the plate on my desk amidst seven different empty cups from the week of writing. “I don’t know a song about finishing a novel though. I could sing you some Taylor Swift?”
“I think I’m good on the song front,” I wave him off, still smiling, then turn to the cupcake.
“Okay, but you still have to make a wish.”
I roll my eyes playfully, secretly loving this. The attention. The pride. The fact that, when I told him I needed peace and quiet today, he did so by running to Stop I want to watch him read it and see his big and little reactions. But not before I get the girls’ opinion on my other big deal for the day.
After we cheers with champagne to my eighth “The End,” I open up my email to show it to them.
It’s nothing new. Rafe and the team have been begging me to do events and signings since my first book hit the bestseller lists. But for the first time in my writing career, this one feels right.
“I need your opinions,” I say before passing my phone around. They all scrunch over the email, reading the same proposition from Rafe.
A Night with PJ Layne. New York City, NY.
December 22 nd .
“How and when do I buy tickets?” Claire asks.
“Are we driving or flying?” Lucy nods.
“I’m going to get my dad to babysit Hope for the weekend. I’m sure Sam would make a weekend out of New York with Mason. He’s getting a little emotional with Mase bringing up college visits.”
“I haven’t even said yes yet!” I laugh, clutching my chest.
“Why not?!” Claire insists.
I bite back tears.
Why not?
“Because…”
The excuses are there, right where they’ve always been, but they’re muted somehow behind friends who are already looking up flights and booking babysitters, and a man at home who wants to read my books to get to know me better.
“If I let PJ Layne’s mask drop, it’s not a secret anymore. The whole world will know.”
“As they should ,” Claire nods. “If this is about your job, Nathan already has your back.”
“And if it’s about the fear of leaving teaching, Pen, look at this empire you’ve already created,” Lucy adds.
“You’re brilliant at what you do.” Juliet, sitting next to me on the L-shaped couch, wraps her hand around my wrist. “Change is hard. Change is scary. But you’ll never know if it could be worth it if you don’t take the first step.”
Lucy, who is still holding my phone, hands me the device with the email facing upward. Their support means everything to me. So do Juliet’s words. I know she’s right—I have to allow myself the thought of failure in order to give myself the chance to succeed.
“Okay. Okay, I guess the world is finally going to know PJ Layne.”
Those words come out in a whisper of hope. Claire insists on more champagne, and as she’s filling glasses, I email Rafe back two simple words: I’m in . I text him that he can hold all phone calls for tomorrow morning, put my phone on Do Not Disturb, and settle in for a night with my girls.
Claire is finished with her social work program, and can officially begin applying at schools; Lucy and Aaron are thriving, but also neck deep in wedding prep; Juliet declines champagne, because she and Sam are officially “for real” trying to get pregnant.
“And Penelope is going to be worldwide news come Christmas time,” Claire says, to cap off our round of catching up. “Hey, how are things with lover boy?”
I tense at that nickname.
“ Anthony is fine. He’s at home reading his first PJ Layne, actually.”
“Which one did you give him? Please tell me you gave him A Whisper in the Light .”
“Abso lutely not,” I choke out a laugh. “He does not need that level of smut on day one.” I shake my head. “No, I gave him Nash and Aria.”
“Sweet little butterflies,” Claire says, swooning with her hand against her forehead.
“They were just so perfect for each other, ” Lucy agrees.
“I don’t know, Pen. If you give him A Whisper in the Light , you could be reaping the benefits.”
Juliet lifts her brow and reaches to our snack-cuterie table, dipping a chip into a bowl of queso. When I hesitate too long, they all sit up a little straighter, and I realize I’ve been made.
“Oh. Unless…”
“She already is reaping the benefits?”
“She said ‘he’s at home’ as in their home. Not her home where he’s just her annoying roommate anymore.”
They all talk over each other like a couple of Swifties trying to sort out a new theory. Finally, Lucy puts up a hand to quiet them.
“Put us out of our misery. Are you two together?”
My closed mouth grin is my answer. Luckily, we are at Lucy’s so there is no baby to wake with their ear piercing shrieks.
“Okay, okay!” I hold up both hands to stop the inquiring. “We’re not technically together , but we are… I don’t know, exactly?”
It comes out as a question, because I truly don’t know what Anthony and I are. We aren’t together, but we come home every night and cuddle on the couch until we decide whose bed we’re sleeping in. We aren’t in a relationship, but he texts me on his way home and asks what I want for dinner, and I started picking up his groceries on my weekly runs.
He isn’t mine, but when I blew out the candle on my cupcake, I wished that he could be.
I tell them as much, spilling all but the smutty details of our sordid affair.
“Well, what are you waiting for?!” Claire asks.
“Him to break my heart.”
I shrug at my admission.
“It’s what always happens. As soon as things start going right in any relationship I’ve ever had, they ghost me, or suddenly aren’t ready for a relationship, or I find out they have a girlfriend. I’ve never had a stable relationship. I’m always waiting for the other shoe to drop.”
“But you said he apologized, right?” Lucy asks. I nod.
“All I care about is that he’s treating you right this time,” Juliet says. “He broke your heart once. It’s our job to look out for you.”
“And I appreciate that so much.”
“You want him , don’t you?” Claire asks. I put my head in my hands, nodding.
“I do. And that’s what kills me.”
It kills me so much that I had to write it into a four-hundred-page novel just to get it out of my system. But they don’t need to know that much just yet.
An odd sense of calm settles over us as each of my friends navigates what to say next. I appreciate that they take their time. This situation with Anthony and me is a trapped maze that takes careful planning to navigate.
“Remind me,” Lucy begins. “After vacation, he told you he wanted to see you, right?”
“Yep.”
“And you guys made plans to meet up?”
“After texting for weeks when we got back,” I nod. Those few months wash over me, but I’m not afraid of the pain anymore. Something dulls the edges, like I’m finally allowing myself to leave the past in the past, to maybe start the healing part that comes with forgiveness.
“We made plans to meet up. I thought it was going to be the last first date I ever went on. I showed up early to the bar we agreed to meet at, figuring I could have a drink to calm my nerves. And then, he never showed up.”
“Because he patched things up with his ex-girlfriend, right?”
“Mhm.” I nod, then shake my head. “But she’s out of the picture. He ended things shortly after. She doesn’t want kids and he wants a big family.”
“And that’s when he tried to get in contact with you,” Juliet nods, recounting what’s been going on between Ant and me over the past year.
I nod.
“We’ve… we’ve talked things out. He’s really trying. We’ve both apologized and I…”
I can’t believe I’m about to say this part out loud. Usually, once I start talking about something, I jinx it. I once had myself convinced that I’d never tell my friends about a man until we got to the altar, just in case. But something encases these words like a firm foundation, and it feels so right letting them out that I think I might cry.
“Guys, I think I’m going to give us that second chance.”