Chapter Three: Again

Sliding her blue eye-shadowed lids down over her eyes, Penelope stood still just for a moment: could this seriously be happening again? AGAIN? Her pink razr phone laid open in her right palm, the little green symbol showing that she was on a call was still displayed in the right hand corner. Her eyes slid back open and she glanced slowly to the left at the small gleam of light peering underneath her paint-peeling apartment door. Drawing in a quick, shaky breath, Penelope’s eyes stayed locked on the image of the two feet on the other side of the door that were spreading a shadow across the yellowed laminate entryway. Her breath was quickening with each second that ticked by.

Knowing that her present phone call was now irrelevant, Penelope willed herself to use both hands to methodically close up her phone. She couldn’t help but pause a moment as the image of her and Shiloh, her only friend here in Philadelphia, glowed brightly on the face of her phone and then faded as she held down on the power button. Even the phone call from Asher that she’d been waiting for couldn’t interrupt this next conversation. Tossing the phone into the basket of blankets that she kept next to the sofa, Penelope turned on her purple Converse heel, faced the two shadows that had not moved a millimeter, pursed her lips into a tight line, took in a deep slow breath, and walked confidently towards the door.

She grabbed the dented brass colored handle of the door and pulled up to free it from catching as she slid the deadbolt back as well as the latch-lock above it. Letting the door drop back down into place, her shaking fingers slid the chain lock to the left and pulled it from its catch. No longer pausing out of indecision, she grabbed the door handle and jerked the door open.

She hadn’t expected him to have changed.

She hadn’t expected him to be out of uniform or unshaven.

She hadn’t expected his hair to be black.

She hadn’t expected the slight smirk on his face reaching up to meet the slightly reddened scar on his right cheek. After all, this was supposed to be her game, her play, her chance to call the shots. But then again, he was the one that found her. Penelope allowed a slight smirk to inch up her right cheek and meet her own slowly healing red scar.

Keeping her eyes on Hatchet’s hands buried deep in his jeans pockets, she let her body fall and lean against the door frame and allowed her fingers to toy with the tarnished silver bracelet she still wore on her right wrist. He was the one that wanted to talk, so… let him talk.

“Well, Pen… it’s been a while,” Hatchet acknowledged as he strode past her into her living room and took a seat at the little card table she’d been using in her breakfast nook. Penelope kept her eyes focused on the sheetrock in the hallway, where just yesterday there had been a rather obvious gash just above the chair rail line. It appeared that someone had tried to fill it in with Elmer’s glue. Probably one of the kids playing tag downstairs on the playground. Funny that the mind of an eight year old truly conceives that simply filling a huge hole with glue might keep the whole world from noticing the imperfection. Penelope leaned across the hall and with her partially blue fingernail, picked out the strip of dried glue from the gash, and threw the chunk on the ground.

She turned around again, and sauntered into her apartment, instantly unable to avoid meeting Hatchet’s eyes as she rounded the corner to her kitchen. Out of habit, she rolled her eyes and blew a puff of air out of her mouth as she went to the fridge and got out her half filled bottle of water. Taking a long draught, she could feel his eyes boring into her as he patiently waited for her to acknowledge that he was there. Rather than delay the unavoidable, Penelope finally looked him straight in the eye across the counter and replied:

“Yes. Yes, Rick. It’s been a while. And rather than catch up on pleasantries, why don’t we just get down to business so that you can go do super important work saving lives and whatnot and I can continue picking the three month old polish off of my fingernails?”

Hatchet paused for a second, his eyes lingering on her nails, chuckled and replied, “Yep – I knew that you wouldn’t have changed. That was for sure. But, since your nails apparently need quite a bit of work, I’ll do my best to be quick and thorough.” His gaze shifted up to her face and the cocky expression melted off and was replaced by a look of compassion:

“Pen… Asher isn’t going to call. He’s never going to call you again, actually…”

The rest of Hatchet’s words started to just blend together as Penelope tried to focus her eyes on his lips so that perhaps her mind could keep up with what he was saying, but it was no use. She had done it again. She had killed someone else. Well, she hadn’t really killed Asher herself, of course, but it was no matter. She might has well have pulled the trigger, might as well ahve thrown his body in the Delaware, and might as well have walked away without remorse. Oh, but she did feel remorse. She had used Asher knowing that there would be more risk for him than for her, and now she was to blame for his death. Asher. Chace. Sean. Jonathan. Their faces floated in front of her mind as she started to inadvertently tune back into what Hatchet was saying…

“and I’m being serious. You should just get out of here. You haven’t interacted with anyone except for Asher, so nothing will pop up on the grid. I won’t even report that I found you. I’ll just go back to LA and fake like it was a dead end here. It’ll be easy. Okay, Pen? Hey… Penelope?!?!”
Penelope’s eyes snatched up to meet his. Her light brown eyes glowing a bright amber, “Yeah, sure Rick. Sure. I’ll just get out of here. I’ll just pack up and go. Done it before. Heck, I’ve done it so many times I can’t even count. But it’s not a dead end Rick. Philadelphia is exactly where all of this started and I’m not leaving until I get everything worked out. Whatever, Rick. Did you really think that I’d just bail and move off to Albuquerque or something? And for your everlovin information, Asher is not the only person that I’ve… what did you call it… ‘interacted’ with here. So, it’s not a dead end. It’s not an easy tie off.” Penelope grabbed at her water bottle and twisted herself around facing the fridge again.

She had to get Shiloh out before they both met the same fate as Asher.