Unsure what to say, but hoping to reassure him, I let my body lead and shift to stand between Penn’s thighs, gasping as his hands brush over the strings of my bikini. He holds on to me while I cradle his face in my hands, staring straight into the eyesthat have seen me better than anyone—not just this week, but since we were kids.
He looks nervous and hopeful and lost, and like he wants me to see him, too.
“Stay here as long as you want,” I tell him. “And promise me that you’ll keep pursuing that stupidly perfect dream of yours, okay?”
He nods, his features softening. “Only if you promise to hold on to yours, too.”
I nod back, not quite sure what my perfect dream really is just yet.
Penn kisses me. But then, as if he can taste my doubt, he pulls back. “Maybe we shouldn’t do this. I really don’t want you to regret it.”
A pang in my chest. “I don’t regret any of it,” I tell him. “It’s just, we’re blurring all these lines, and crossing them, and…” My voice cracks. “I’m scared.”
His smile is small and affectionate, his voice laced with relief. “Me, too,” he says. “I’ve been scared all week, Ruby, and I was terrified today, by how much it hurt me to think you might not feel the same.” He swallows hard, his eyes searching mine. “I’m afraid of how big this feels, you and me. Because it’s impossibly big. Almost…unsurvivably big.”
Penn lets out a quiet, nervous laugh, but that’s exactly how it feels. Like I might not survive this. Like, if I’m not more careful, I could lose the person I’ve always been.
Fear and longing fight inside me. “I know what you mean,” I whisper.
“You do?”
I nod, and we press our palms together, both of us watching asour fingers intertwine. Penn kisses my knuckles, then looks at me. Softly, he says, “Ruby, this probably isn’t the right time. Or the right place, but…”
Our eyes lock, and thunder crashes inside my chest.
Penn wants to tell me how he feels—it’s right there, in his wide-open stare—but he’s right. This isn’t the right time, and certainly not the right place. Because what he’s feeling, it isn’t for me. Not the real me. Not all of me. I have a whole other life; we both do. Twenty years of pain and joy and heartbreak and memories that I don’t want to lose.
This is a game I cannot lose.
If I have any hope of protecting my heart, and Penn’s, then I need to start thinking more rationally again. Put some space between us, the way I should’ve done much sooner. And I can’t let him say what he wants to say right now, because I don’t know where that confession might lead, and I really don’t want to regret this.
I kiss Penn before he can say another word, but he pulls back, studying me.
Slow resignation settles over his features. He doesn’t call me out on it, but he knows I stopped him from talking. He knows what I’m doing. What I’m thinking.
That this has all been too much, too fast.
Because a kiss was never the answer. And falling in love with him wasn’t, either.
20
Yes / No / SOS
If I excelat anything, it’s throwing myself into my work. And crying in the shower.
Across the next four days, I do plenty of both.
Theo and I all but live at The Disco Diner, working quickly—in the dark—to direct the staff, stock up on supplies, and ready the space for our 2000s party. Thanks to the blackout, we have even more to accomplish than we originally planned, but we manage, and Penn helps when he can. Although I want nothing more than to be around him, I assign him tasks that will take him away from the rink, and away from me, hoping to slow down my feelings and speed up our chances of a real future.
And I try not to swoon when he goes above and beyond.
Penn meets with the owner of Madre’s—Ryan’s boss—and convinces him to serve food at the event in exchange for signage, an official sponsor title, and the chance to be the first local restaurant to partner with us on a regular menu item.
He asks three of the Curly’s bartenders to work the event probono in a show of community support, then posts flyers in the window of every shop that will let him. He also invites all his friends—which, for Penn, means everybody he’s ever met.
When he isn’t out working on behalf of The Disco Diner, Penn’s at Curly’s. We’re ships passing, which is for the best, but the distance backfires—it only makes us want each other more.
One night, while he’s working a late shift at the bar, I’m tempted to slip a note beneath his door: HI. PROMISE YOU’LL STILL LIKE ME IN EVERY OTHER TIMELINE? YES / NO / SOS.
