Contents
Copyright
Dedication
Title
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chatper Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
FisherAmelie.com
Penny in London - Chapter One
Penny in London - Chapter Two
All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system without the prior written permission of Fisher Amelie.
Fisher Amelie
http://www.fisheramelie.com/
First Edition: July 2016
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
Printed in the United States of America
To Dizzy Miss Lizzy.
Because we saved the best for last. I love you.
Chapter One
Ezra Brandon’s soul was older than his body. He wasn’t always like that, though. In fact, at one point not long before what Frankie and I badged as “the change,” he’d been fully entrenched in activities that would indicate his soul was exactly the age of that body, but circumstances being out of his control, the soul tired of parties, friends, and happiness. He adopted the cynicism of a forty-five-year-old man, threw it on like an old coat, and buttoned it up to his chin. It insulated him from the outside world so well that within a year of the adoption, he was forgotten by everyone at Endicott Academy.
But not by me. No, not by me. He was just as beautiful to me then as he’d always been.
“You’re drooling again,” Frankie said, startling me. My eyes popped open. I brought a hand to my lips to wipe away any evidence of her accusation but felt nothing. Frankie snorted then laughed. I threw a disparaging glance her way.
“Why you gotta be so rude?” I sang at her.
“’Cause. You’re an idiot. You’ve got zombie face again, and it’s so obvious people are gonna start wondering if they should intercede on your behalf. Report your Forrest Gump ass to social services or whatever.”
I laughed. “I can’t help it, Frankenstein. He’s so on the brink.”
“On the brink of what, Jupiter?” She turned Ezra’s direction and drank him in. She leaned in close and whispered, “The only thing he’s on the brink of is a sudden exclamation of ‘What’s it all mean!’ before jumping headfirst through that window.”
We both looked out the second story toward the looming earth below and gulped.
I shook my head. “He is not,” I argued.
Frankie pointed toward the front of the classroom where Ezra was sitting, his hands buried in his chin-length brown hair, knuckles white with intensity. Maybe she was right. Maybe just a little. I stared at him again.
Ezra was tall, taller than most guys I knew. Six foot two inches, one hundred seventy pounds is what his old published lacrosse stats stated. He had killer light brown hair, eyes so light green you felt like you could see right through him, and a smile so catching, I could still remember it despite the fact I, nor anyone else for that matter, hadn’t seen it for almost two years.
“Life is like a box of chocolates, Jupiter.”
I threw another annoyed look her direction. “Can you please let me ogle in peace, Lieutenant Dan?”
“No, jackass. The bell rang. Get your rear in gear or you’ll be late again.”
“Gah!”
My next class was clear across campus. I scrambled to get my stuff together, decided it was as intact as it was going to get, and hauled ass up the aisle, but when I turned to complain to Frankie for the thousandth time since the beginning of our senior year that it wasn’t fair to assign kids back-to-back classes that far away, I was abruptly halted by the very body I’d been ogling not thirty seconds before. We collided in spectacular fashion—papers flying, books crashing. My elbow met his gut, which made him grunt and double over, which then made his forehead punch my left boob, which made me die a million mortifying deaths within a second.
“I’m so sorry,” I told Ezra as I felt my face warm to impossible temperatures. I took a second to glance toward Frankie for some sort of best friend intervention but only caught a glimpse of her signature Jupiter’s-a-dweeb facepalm instead.
“It’s okay,” he said quietly, his voice like silk, the inflection of which swam through my head, tingling down each strand of hair all the way to the ends, and making me shiver.
I watched like an idiot as he bent to gather all my stuff for me. He stood, handing me the lot, offering a crooked smile when I stared at him like he was a betta in a bowl.
“Thanks,” I wheezed, taking all that had fallen.
He shrugged, hiking his bag higher on his shoulder, tucking his own fallen papers and books between his hip and the palm of his hand. “See ya,” he offered before heading out the door.
Before long, Frankie shouldered me. “Whoa,” she said.
“Whoa,” I agreed.
Chapter Two
Obviously, I was late to my second-period class, mostly because I was duh-duh-duh’ing the whole path there, though. As always after school, I went to Frankie’s because, one, Frankie’s house had real food, and, two, Frankie refused to step foot onto my property any more than she had to. My parents were eccentric people. Eccentric is being kind, really. They’re nutty, to be honest, but they were my little cashews, so I loved them. Frankie loved them, too, though she loved them as one admires an impressionist painting—from a safe distance.
I lived in an adobe UFO. My name is Jupiter, guys. It’s not that far of a leap, is it? It was painted a bright white, because, you know, we’ve got to be easily seen by the mother ship, y’all. Plus, how are you going to embarrass your teenage daughters if your flying saucer house isn’t the brightest white you can get it? We did live on the water, though, so as loath as I was to admit it, it was a pretty spectacular place to grow up.
“I can’t believe we’re graduating in three weeks,” I told Frankie as she fished a gallon of Blue Bell from her freezer.
She tossed it on top of the counter. “I know,” she said, her face turning a little pale.
I laughed. “What’s up, buttercup?”
She flipped the lid of the ice cream then went to the cupboard to get two bowls. “Nothing, I’m just a little apprehensive about leaving home in a few months. I don’t feel ready, you know, emotionally.”
Frankie set the bowls down on the counter and started to dole out a few scoops in each. When she was done, she slid me mine and I caught it with my spoon.
“Frankenstein, you got this,” I told her as she put the gallon away. She sat next to me, hooked her spoon into her bowl, and pulled out a heaping spoonful large enough for Tommy Jones, our high school’s seven-foot ba
sketball player who could gulp down a cheeseburger in one bite just because he could. I know because I was there. I saw it. You’d think he’d climbed Everest with the way everyone freaked.
“I don’t know, Jup. I don’t even know what I’m doing anymore. I can’t believe people are letting me decide what I’m going to do with the rest of my life when I can barely tie my shoes in the morning. I shouldn’t be trusted with that kind of decision-making. For God’s sake, Jupiter! I’ve killed at least three goldfish a year on average since the third grade because I forget to feed them.”
“First, let’s address the fish fiascos for a second by acknowledging the fact that any animal you possess should be only of the four-legged persuasion as they are the only kinds capable of letting you know they’re starving. What say you, counselor?” I asked.
“Agreed, your honor.”
“Okay, let’s proceed to problem number two. Will you shut your pie hole?”
Frankie eyed me with feigned disdain (that rhymes) and stuffed her mouth full of ice cream, which made me fall down across the top of the counter in laughter, which in turn made Frankie lose control of herself. Ice cream went dribbling down her chin.
“Ba! You look like a vampire with a cow fetish!”
“Shut it,” she said, swiping a napkin across her mouth.
I sat back down and sighed. “In all seriousness, Frank, it’s not a big deal you’re undecided about what your life will be. Go anyway, live a little, discover what you want, then decide.”
She snorted. “Easy for you to say, brat. You already know what you want to do.”
I shrugged. She was right. I knew exactly what I wanted to do. “Well, I got lucky’s all. Just wait, your time will come.”
I tossed my book bag onto the countertop and pulled out the pile of papers that had fallen when I’d run into Ezra that morning. I hadn’t had a chance to organize them since I’d been so distracted by the whirlwind of impending finals.
“I can’t believe what a friggin’ idiot I was this morning with Ezra.”
“I can.”
“Frankie!”
“I’m sorry but you’re a dinkus when you’re around him.”
“I know.” I sighed. “It’s just him, too, man. I don’t get it.”
“I get it,” she teased, getting up from her stool. “You, like, like him,” she sang. “Jupiter likes a boy!” She clutched her hands to her chest and opened her eyes brightly in mock idiocy. “And he’s dark and broody and misunderstood.” Frankie started skipping around her kitchen island. “Jupiter’s a cliché! Jupiter’s a cliché!”
“For the love of God, Frankie, I know, all right? I know! It’s pathetically stupid.”
She threw herself onto her stool and smiled at me, her chest panting from the effort of my ridicule. “What’s wrong with pathetically stupid, anyway?” she asked. “Pathetically stupid is real. It’s rife with adventure. It’s utterly fun. And totally me. It’s us.”
“To pathetically stupid!” I yelled, lifting up a spoonful of melting ice cream.
“To pathetically stupid!” she yelled as well, clinking her spoon with mine.
I started to shuffle my pile of papers, organizing them by subject into my folders, when I came upon a piece I didn’t remember putting into my folders that morning.
“Why would I put my acceptance letter to UW in here?” I asked no one.
Frankie yanked it out of my hand. “Because you like to stare at it? Because it’s so pretty?” she answered, petting it.
“I know I didn’t put that letter in there, though,” I said, confused.
“Maybe Mercury did it.”
“I don’t think so.”
“Maybe aliens did it!”
I snorted. “Shut up, fool.”
Frankie laughed. “Well, you must have accidentally tossed it in with your homework or somethin’. Was it on your desk?”
“Yeah, but—”
“Wait a second,” Frankie interrupted, her face drawing closer to the letter. “Dear Mr. Brandon?” she started reading. “It is with great pleasure we offer you admission to the University of Washington…”
My heart started pounding. “Wait, what?”
“Holy shit!” Frankie exclaimed. “Ezra Brandon and you are going to the same school.”
“Wait, what?” I repeated.
“No way!” Frankie said, dropping the hand that held Ezra’s acceptance letter onto the countertop. “That is so weird,” she said. She eyed me warily. “Did you know?” she asked, her brows furrowed in obvious disgust.
“No!” I insisted, meaning it. “I’m not that chick.”
“You swear?”
“I swear on our tickets to Bumbershoot,” I said, crossing my heart with my thumb.
“So you definitely did not know,” she said thoughtfully. “Dude,” she said, drawing it out as if in disbelief.
“I know.”
“This is so weird.”
“I know.”
“Well, what are you going to do about it?”
“Nothing,” I said.
“I don’t get it. You’ve liked this boy for almost two years and you’re not going to do anything about the fact that you’ll soon be sharing a school across the entire United States together?”
“Right. There’s nothing to do.”
“You’re a dweeb, Jupiter.”
“Yeah,” I said, too distracted by the strange coincidence to zing her back.
“Huh,” Frankie grunted after a few seconds of silence.
I looked up at her. “What?”
“I just, I have this idea.”
Understanding dawned on me. “No. No. I know what you’re thinking, and the answer is no.”
“Oh come on!” she whined. “This is it! This is the answer you’ve been looking for.”
“Absolutely not!” I practically shouted.
“Jupiter, it feels like fate!”
I laughed hysterically. “No way, Frankie. No way.”
“Listen,” she said, her eyes reflected a mischievous gleam, “your parents refuse to help you get to UW because they’re crazy—” she began when I interrupted her.
“They’re not crazy,” I insisted, though she was a little bit right.
They’d told me that college was only for brainwashed, corporate lackeys who sold their souls at graduation for a job at a desk and no sun when I told them of my acceptance to the University of Washington. So I basically had to do everything by myself, obtaining grants as well as a few scholarships to pay for my classes, books, and room and board. The only thing I hadn’t worked out was how I was going to get to Seattle since I didn’t have a car.
“Oh, they’re crazy all right, but let’s get back to this scathingly brilliant idea I just had.”
“Frankie, I can’t. It’s too much.” She smiled at me deviously. “Frankie! I’d rather kiss a dissected frog than drive the length of the United States with Ezra Brandon. I’d die of embarrassment every five minutes!”
“My condolences then,” she said and winked.
Chapter Three
I’d returned Ezra’s acceptance letter with an apology for the collision first thing that next morning. He took the letter with a shrug and tossed it into the bottom of his school bag, as if he hadn’t even realized he’d lost it. He threw a “see ya” over his shoulder and headed to his first-period class.
The last three weeks of school passed by so quickly it was unsettling. By the time we were done with finals and prom, my head was spinning.
“Jupiter,” I heard softly, someone shaking my shoulder.
I rolled over to see who it was. “Mercury?”
“Get up or you’re gonna be late.”
I took in the morning sun streaming through the round window above my bed and sat up abruptly. “What time is it?” I asked.
“Nine.”
“Nine!” I exclaimed. I glanced at my phone, only to discover I’d forgotten to plug it in the night before. “Oh my God!” I said, my voice rough
from disuse and anxiety. “I’m supposed to be there at ten! It takes over half an hour just to drive there, and Frankie will be here in twenty minutes!”
“Damn, and I’ve been up for hours,” she said.
“Why didn’t you wake me up?” I squealed.
I stood and ripped back the old vinyl accordion doors of my closet, yanking my robe and shower towel from their hook.
“I didn’t know you weren’t up yet!” she answered defensively. “I would have gotten you up if I’d known.”
I sighed. “Sorry, I’m just pissed. I wanted to do my hair and take my time looking nice.”
“Sorry, man.”
I ran to the bathroom, peed quickly, and hopped into the shower, washing my hair and shaving my legs in less than ten minutes. When I jumped out, I flipped my hair into a towel and cinched it tight, hoping it would leach out as much water as possible while I applied my makeup. I didn’t really have time for anything but simple so I swept on some mascara, eyeliner, blush, and a little lip gloss. When I ran to my room, I tossed my robe onto my bed and started to scramble through my underwear drawer.
“Where’s the underwear I just bought?” I asked myself. I tossed the garments from the drawer around the room but couldn’t find it. I even checked the top of my dresser but it wasn’t there. “I can’t believe this,” I said to no one. I hit the button at the front of my phone to check the time. “Cheese and rice!” I only had seven minutes.
All my stuff was in the wash, so I was forced to wear the only pair I could find. The pair everyone has stuck in the back of their drawers. You know, the pair you never wear because it makes you feel like a beached whale and you only really own because your granny gave you a pack for Christmas and also made you open them in front of all your cousins and aunts and uncles? Yeah, that pair. I grabbed a bra and tossed it on as well. A knock sounded on my door and it opened. I looked over to see Mercury.