I swallow hard. “It sounds special, Penn. I think Nanna would be really proud.”
“Thanks, Wynne. That means a lot coming from you.” He gives me a wry look. “My therapist says I ‘need to be needed.’ She might be right, but maybe I just like to help out.”
I have the strangest urge to put my arms around him.
“I haven’t told anyone else about the business,” he says. “Customers think I’m just doing odd jobs, and I am, but I have bigger plans. Someday, I’ll get an LLC. Learn how to use Excel. Make it all official.”
“You don’t have an LLC? What’s holding you back? Why not launch now?”
“Time. Money. Resources.” Earnestly, he says, “Please don’t tell anybody. I don’t want anyone at Curly’s to think I might bail on the bar. I need that job to keep everything afloat.”
“I won’t,” I promise.
He lifts his shoulder, uncharacteristically shy. “It’s no roller-rink restaurant, but…”
It’s better. Thoughtful and special, and a far bigger risk than I’ve ever been willing to take. Although, here, in MASHland, Penn doesn’t understand that. He thinks I’ve been brave, too. Even though he should know better than anyone that I’m not. Not when it matters.
I pick up a stick and scratch at the deck like I’m a kid. Like we really have reverted, somehow. We might be old friends, but sincerity is new for us.
Penn clears his throat. “Hey, Ru.”
I startle at the nickname that never slips out of him. “Yeah?”
“Do you still think about that night?”
I face him, surprised. He’s never asked me about that night, and I’ve never wanted him to. But some part of me knew, in coming here, that that might change. And maybe I’m ready for it. Maybe I need a little change.
A lump swells in my throat. “Yeah,” I whisper. “All the time.”
Penn takes a deep breath. “Me, too.”
It was a sticky night in mid-July, the summer before senior year. Ryan and I had been home alone, which happened often on weekdays, but rarely on a Saturday night. Dad was working an overnight shift at the hospital, and Mom was out of town visiting college friends.
Around nine, Penn walked through our back door, like he always did, and suggested we go to the boathouse. Lately, he’d been hanging out with new friends, and he’d invited them, too. It made me irrationally angry, Penn spending time with other people at our spot. For months, I’d been feeling like things were about to change, which made my chest ache. I wondered uneasily how much, and who, I might lose.
Surely, that fear is why—despite Ryan insisting he was too tired to go out, and despite the clear rule that we weren’t allowed to leave the house at night, certainly not without permission—I said yes. And maybe that fear is why I’d been drawn to Penn, too, who looked to me, surprised, his eyes flashing with something hopeful.
Ryan told me to go on my own, but I begged him to come with us.
On the way there, Penn teased me for the backpack I’d crammed full of snacks, drinks, and bug spray. Ryan’s EpiPen, too, which we carried everywhere. I was prepared, like always.
But two hours later, while Penn and I sat on the swings, arguing over, of all things, the best Tom Hanks movie, Ryan sat with the rest of the group at the boathouse, where he reached into another, identical backpack and pulled out a snack that had peanuts in it.
We heard panicked shouts for help, and I knew. Something inside me knew that Ryan wasn’t okay, and my ears started ringing. My limbs vibrated. My entire nervous system seemed to rev up, then abruptly shut down. Penn had to yell for me to get up, to follow him.
I’d helped Ryan through allergic responses before, but that night, I didn’t.
I sprinted to the boathouse, but then I froze. I failed him.
It was Penn who dug out the EpiPen. A stranger who called 911 while I trembled, wondering aloud what had happened.
What happened is that I did nothing but panic. All my life, I’d looked out for Ryan, or told myself that I did. But I didn’t. Not when he needed me most.
I’d broken the rules, and we all nearly paid an unthinkable price. After a few terrifying hours, Ryan was already cracking jokes, trying to make light of the night, embarrassed by all the attention but otherwise okay. I wasn’t, though. Not for a long time.
“That night changed me,” Penn says. “Like, completely.”
I don’t know if it’s the shock of talking about it, or being back at our spot, or feeling safe to speak because this isn’t my reality,but I face him and admit the truth. “I think about it every day. The guilt still sits right here,” I add, clutching my stomach. “And I still worry about him so much, Penn. I just want to wrap him in Bubble Wrap. Keep him safe forever.”
