Chapter 22 Hey There, Dorothy
Hey There, Dorothy
I’m lost in the moment, floating. Something stronger than adrenaline pumps through me as blood rushes into my ears, my limbs tingling and weak. I can’t hear or see a thing. All my senses soften as one sharp truth comes into focus: Me and Penn. He knows. I told him.
“Hey, are you okay?”
Penn’s disembodied voice is trailed by his familiar touch. His warm fingers brush across my cheek, and as I reach up to cover his hand with mine, I’m nearly blinded by a sudden rush of light. I blink, and blink again, and finally, I see him.
In fact, Penn is all I see, his face filling my vision.
But then he pulls away and a white stucco ceiling comes into view, along with a rather ugly wooden fan, and I’m no longer floating. I’m sinking, actually. Into a bed.
“Oh my God,” I whisper, unable to move as I stare up at the ceiling. “What is this place?”
Penn laughs. “C’mon, my place isn’t that bad.”
Wait. I’m at Penn’s place? In his bed? “But how…we…”
“Are you feeling alright?” Concern slips into his voice. “I mean, that was a hell of a fall, Wynne. Quite the way to cap off your birthday.”
A ringing starts in my ears. My heart races, thrashing against my rib cage.
My birthday. I did fall.
And now I’m back. In reality.
I look around the room, trying to get my bearings, clocking the details one at a time like I’m reading labels in a children’s book.
The walls are white. The duvet is navy blue.
The sheets are a dark plaid. Penn’s baseball caps hang on hooks set over a wooden dresser, and he sits beside me on the bed, handsome and sleepy in a white T-shirt and flannel pants.
Euphoric, I sit up too quickly, Looney Tunes stars twinkling across my vision—again—as I sway, struggling to stay upright. Penn reaches for my upper arms, steadying me, and his face comes back into focus. His hair is a little shorter than I expect, his scruff a little longer.
His eyes are exactly the same.
There’s a smirk in his voice. “Slow down, will you?”
It’s what he said to me in bed days ago, teasingly, his voice a guttural rasp. As we stare at each other now, eye to eye, I’m back there, held by him.
Still in a senseless trance, I press a hand to Penn’s cheek. His gaze remains steady, his lips parted, and when he sets his hand over mine, I wait for him to lift it. To kiss the inside of my wrist.
But he doesn’t. Penn lets out a breath of a laugh, his face scrunched up in confusion as he sets my hand on the bed. “Tequila’s a hell of a drink, huh?”
My brain struggles to catch up to the moment.
Right. We don’t do that here.
Another voice, a soft echo somewhere in the back of my mind, says: Yet.
I swallow hard and push my hair behind my ears. It’s long again. And when I look down at my nails, they’re painted ballet-slipper pink. I take a breath, glance up at Penn, finally conscious enough to feel embarrassed by how intimately I just touched him.
With very real heat in my cheeks, I shrug. “Wait till you meet Rum Ruby.”
Penn laughs, a light jingle, and I can see it: how we’ll find our way back to each other.
Then he shoves my shoulder, flattening me back against the bed.
Okay. So we’re not quite there yet.
As I lie there, stupefied, a starfish in his sheets, he sighs and says, “Stay there, Sleeping Beauty. I’ll go find my reinforcements so you can get out of here.”
Time is meaningless to me now, so it may be two or two thousand minutes before Bridget and Ryan rush into the room.
At the sight of them—Ryan still in his ridiculous hamburger-print button-down and Bridget in her silky green halter top, both looking worse for the wear—I turn weepy. It’s them. Real them.
I open my arms, overwhelmed. “You’re here!”
They exchange a look.
I gesture again for them to hug me, and when they realize I’m serious, they oblige. Bridget crawls into the bed while Ryan sits beside me, studying me.
“I love you,” I tell him, still crying. “And you’re—you’re okay.”
He huffs out a laugh. “Are you?”
I put a hand to my chest, nodding. “You guys, I had the wildest…” Trip is the word that comes to mind, but that doesn’t capture it. Neither does journey, which I simply can’t bring myself to say, lest I sound like a contestant on a reality show.
I look around, wondering where Penn’s gone, and my gut hollows out. I can’t stomach the thought of what we shared being anything but real. Because it wasn’t a dream. I’m not sure of much, but I’m sure of that.
For believability, though, I use the word anyway.
“I had the wildest dream,” I tell them, fighting to tamp down all my mixed-up emotions.
“You were there, exactly the same,” I say to Bridget.
“And you, too,” I say, facing Ryan. “But your hair was long and swoopy, and you were wearing capri pants. With a scarf. You went to Italy, and you used summer as a verb.”
Ryan’s brows lift. “Italy, huh?”
Bridget cackles. “That’s what you got out of that?” Her laugh fades into a sigh as she shakes her head.
“Was Penn there?” Ryan asks.
“Nah. I’m only in her nightmares.”
I turn to the door, where Penn stands, grinning. “Hey there, Dorothy,” he says. “Let’s get you some sustenance before you break into song.” He carries over a makeshift tray full of food: two plates arranged on a massive hardcover book. “Eggs, toast, and—”
“And butter,” I croak out, looking up at Penn. “Did you already butter the toast?”
“Yes,” he says slowly, drawing out the word in confusion.
I nod, wiping away tears. “It’s perfect. Thank you.”
Penn avoids addressing my dairy meltdown, turning to Ryan instead. “So, are you a secret fan of manpris or what?”
Ryan presses a fist to Penn’s shoulder, bringing out Penn’s most mischievous, gratified smirk. The familiarity—of them, but also of Penn’s breakfast spread—has me clutching at my heart. I take a bite of toast, hoping carbohydrates will calm my frazzled nerves.
“Did she somehow knock into a tear duct last night?” Ryan asks Bridget. “I haven’t seen Ruby cry since she got a B-plus in theater.”
“It was Drama II. And I should’ve gotten an A-minus. I would’ve had a flawless report card that semester, but Mr. Jenkins didn’t appreciate the art of subtlety.” I turn to Ryan, tears filling my eyes again. “I’m so glad you remember that. We have so many memories.”
I chomp into my toast again, and the crunch seems to fill the silent room.
Bridget casts a warning look at Penn and Ryan, who seem afraid my head might spin all the way around at any moment. She pats my leg. “Yes, we do, Ru.”
Clearly concerned, she nudges the eggs toward me. As the plate moves, the book underneath it becomes visible, and I shift to read the full title: Starting a Business: Everything Entrepreneurs Need to Know (and What You’re Afraid to Ask).
I shove the dishes onto the comforter, crumbs flying, and raise the book as if it’s courtroom evidence. “What is this?” I ask, breathless, as I turn to Penn.
His face falters for only a second, and then he levels me with a look. “Yes, Wynne,” he deadpans. “I can read.”
That’s all he says, and it’s all I need to see when his nervous gaze drops to the floor.
He’s working on PennPals here, too.
—
Bridget leaves to grab our stuff from her parents’ house, and I finish my meal with renewed energy, invigorated by the realization that I know more about Penn that he could ever fathom. Likely afraid to leave me to my own nonsensical devices, he and Ryan stick around.
Penn sits at the edge of the bed. The old me would’ve probably snarked at him, insisting he leave.
In fact, I might have army-crawled out of this place, or done whatever necessary to escape the confines of his bedroom.
Instead, when I’m done eating, I lie back against his pillow, relishing in the cedar-citrus smell of his soft sheets.
Closing my eyes, I may as well be back in the mansion, curled up in Penn’s arms, my face pressed into his neck.
“Who are you texting with that smirk?” It’s Ryan, talking to Penn.
My eyes flash open.
With a laugh, Ryan asks him, “Is it that cute redhead you were talking to at the bar? Or her friend, the blonde?”
I bolt up in bed, eyes narrowed at Penn. “I thought you liked brunettes.”
They both turn, surprised I’m listening.
“I thought you didn’t care,” Penn says. Then he slants a look at his wooden nightstand, his lips lifting into a wry grin. “Ah, that’s right. I forgot. You’ve been pining all along.”
I follow his gaze, my breath catching at the sight of the crinkled slip of paper that Bridget must’ve left there last night.
The MASH game.
Penn thinks he’s got me. That I don’t know that he’s the one who’s been pining all along. Me, I never knew how I felt. But he did, a long time ago.
“Right,” I say. “Me, pining. Says the guy who remembers everything I’ve ever told him?”
Penn blinks at me, baffled. Ryan huffs in disbelief.
I look for some sign from Penn that what I’ve said is true. I wait for his cheeks to color, or to catch a glimmer in his eyes. I’m desperate to find any secret cues that his feelings for me already exist here, too.
But he breaks eye contact to face Ryan. “Her name is Katie. The redhead? That’s Katie.”
I gasp, sure he’s talking about the same Katie I know—Earl’s Katie. If he knows her here, too, then pieces of the timeline must match up, even if the actual events aren’t identical.
“And who is Katie?” Ryan teases.
“A friend,” Penn says, but he blushes.
Shoot. Maybe it’s a different Katie. Or it could be the same, nice Katie, but she could be someone different to Penn here.
I don’t know, because I don’t know what he’s been up to, and I can’t even get him to look at me long enough to gauge whether he truly doesn’t care about me or if he’s the one who should’ve aced Drama II in high school.
Everything I’ve eaten churns in my stomach. This isn’t the welcome home I’ve been waiting for, and I will not survive if I have to watch Penn fall for someone else.
Unsurvivably big.