Emergency Contact(43)
What if Sam was married now? Jeez. That would make him about as tragic as they came. An impregnated Lola was his hamartia, or fatal flaw. Oh God, or maybe Penny was the tragic hero and Sam was her flaw. She tried to refocus on the assignment.
Trouble was, Penny had to admit she only knew Sam because he was going through something. It was the classic fish-out-of-water scenario. Sam was a stranger in a strange land made up of millions of Penny’s text messages.
It was bizarre how much time he had for her. Suspicious. He hadn’t mentioned family or friends other than Lorraine. Maybe he was in the Witness Protection Program. But that made zero sense, since Jude would be too much of a liability. Jude who just that morning complained that Sam was avoiding her.
Sam had to be slumming to be talking to her this much. He was cooler than Penny empirically. It was opportunistic of Penny, as a tree frog, to take so much of Sam’s time.
She vowed not to text him for the rest of the day.
Mallory was lying on Penny’s bed with her shoes on when Penny got home from class. Jude was getting out of the steamy bathroom.
“Hey, P!” Jude’s face lit up and she gave her roommate a hug. She was warm and wet. “Oh my God, I have so much to tell you!”
“We’re going to get coffee at House,” said Mallory, rolling onto her back and pulling at the gum in her mouth. “Come with?”
“I can’t,” said Penny. “I have to write.”
“Didn’t you write this morning?” Jude flung her towel on her bed. She was such a naked person. Penny reflexively turned away. “You were up at six a.m. or something. That light was driving me crazy.”
“Sorry,” said Penny. “I didn’t get very far.”
Penny’s phone beeped in her bag.
Mallory rolled her eyes.
“Why? Because you were texting your new boyfriend?” Mallory nodded toward her stuff.
“Mal,” said Jude.
“Clearly she’s boning someone,” Mallory insisted. “She’s worse than I am with that thing.”
Penny’s cheeks flushed.
“I know you’re private, Penny, but it is obvious,” said Jude. “And it’s great. Isn’t that why you broke up with Mark?”
“Not exactly,” muttered Penny.
“Not exactly. I can’t hang out. I’m Penny, little miss serious writer with a shady new boyfriend I won’t talk about.” Mallory sat up with a dare in her smile.
“Whatever, Mallory.” Penny turned back to her laptop.
“Forget it,” she said, arching her eyebrow. “Come on, Jude. Shady Penny doesn’t want to hang out with us.”
“Do you want anything?” asked Jude, throwing on a romper. “An Uncle Sam treat?”
Penny shook her head.
“Want to have dinner later?”
“Maybe,” said Penny.
“Well, make an effort,” said Jude. “We have so much to catch up on. Like, how I’m a freshly minted art history major who dropped her shitty marketing pre-reqs.”
“Whoa, that’s amazing!” exclaimed Penny. “And your dad’s cool with it?”
“Not exactly,” said Jude, rolling her eyes. “Mostly he shit-talked Mom’s trip to Europe, since she’s hate-posting it all over Facebook. I guess he’s finally paying attention to her.”
“I need coffee,” whined Mallory, tugging on Jude’s arm.
“Okay, okay,” said Jude. “Catch you later?”
Penny nodded.
As the door slammed, Penny could hear Mallory in the hall.
“I don’t know what you see in her.”
Mallory could throw salt all she liked. There was no way Penny would go to House and let Sam see her. That would ruin everything. Sam would take one look at her and be like, “Yikes, never mind.”
Instead of writing, Penny snack-crastinated. She chewed a Lactaid, then grabbed a jar of Nutella and pulled out a heaping spoonful. She placed it in the middle of a cereal bowl and dumped a mini bag of Cheetos into it. She carefully dipped a twiglet into the hazelnut smear and popped it into her mouth. Then she checked her phone.
SAM HOUSE
Today 2:02 PM
Do you know what the simulation hypothesis is?
And when she didn’t respond immediately: Hello?
unsubscribe?
Is this thing on?
So much for not texting for the rest of the day. She wrote: Jude and Mal are en route He texted back immediately Here?
Yeah
She dipped another Cheeto.
Are you coming?
Hell no
Penny typed without thinking.
Ahhahahah thanks a lot
It’s not that they’d explicitly discussed it; they just knew.
Is it crazy that we don’t hang out?
Penny’s hand hovered over the keypad. Neon cheesy flavor crystals fleeced the thumb and forefinger of her non-texting hand. A brown-orange lichen she couldn’t wait to scrape off with her teeth.
Hang out?
She was stalling.
There was no way she’d allow him to see her do 97 percent of her normal daily activities. She was a monster. A monster who was flat as a board with no ass. In fact, the only thing she had going on in the curves department was an enormous cystic pimple on her chin that hurt when she touched it. Yeah, no.