When Sam and Penny cross paths it s less meet-cute and more a collision of unbearable awkwardness. Still, they swap numbers and stay in touch via text and soon become digitally inseparable, sharing their deepest anxieties and secret dreams without the humiliating weirdness of having to see each other.
In no time, college Penny would be as adored as Celeste. Granted, she'd have to get a lobotmy to keep it up, but maybe the exchange rate was worth it.
Not that she was ugly. She simply had one of those faces where the features were crowded into the middle like a too-big room with tiny furniture.
That night Penny read Maus twice and cried. She knew then that she had to become a writer.
Instead she'd spend time preparing for her future, living in books until the exciting part of her life would begin. Things would matter then. In fact, everything would be different.
People were odd. Sam loved and loathed that about them. Fiction was fine, but real life was the true freak show.
He'd called her under the guise of being some knight in shining armor, and then, yeah, he'd barfed on her.
As if her text bubbles had spent a late night in a speakeasy.
