Penelope Prim

by Robert Scott Leyse

  “Penelope,” Stuart says softly, unable to remain silent. “I’m your friend, I’ll do...”

  “Hush!” she breaks in with a shriek, wringing her hands in the air again, tears welling into her eyes. Moments later, as she wipes the wetness from her cheeks with the backs of her fingers, her lips tremble and the expression in her eyes wobbles, and Stuart becomes deathly afraid. “Stuart, I pity you,” she says, lowering her voice to a whisper—a whisper that doesn’t seem like a whisper, on account of her excited rapidity of speech. “You’ve fallen for a bad woman—a haunted woman—a cursed woman! It’s like there’s a bottomless pit inside me that wants to swallow me! There’s an undertow in me, a direction I don’t want to go in but can’t stop going in! There’s unfriendly energy in me that wants to get rid of everything else, wreck the things that make a chance of security possible, and make me helpless and afraid all the time! When men want me it’s like my feelings are trapped in dark tunnels…like they’re being attacked, wrung tight, taken over by cruel things—things cruel to me and the man! There’s no compromise and I might lose my mind someday, become stark staring mad! The specter of murder-suicide haunts me! I’m telling you it shadows me when I’m with a man! Sometimes I think I could shoot a man and then shoot myself!”

  Did she really say what I think she said? Stuart asks himself, by way of desperately hoping he’s misheard. But there’s no doubting what Penelope said: she enunciated the words clearly enough and is extremely disturbed. Her face is pallid, strained, distant, as if she’s stranded in a state of mind rife with peril; her eyes are unfocused, wavering, scattered, as if afraid to see; her body’s enveloped in scampering-to-hide tension and muscles appear ready to flee from her bones, as if she’s expecting the Furies to appear. And she’s shivering as if the room’s a freezer even though the heat’s turned on high. She keeps darting her glance in unpredictable directions and shuddering, as if shrinking from urges to do something rash or dangerous or outright deadly, and Stuart can’t help but think a gun might be close-by and picture her lunging for it. Any second now! Any second now he might need to spring from the bed, wrest a gun from Penelope’s grasp, and subdue her! Have the emotions in the room really become this volatile, so that the very air’s as if being slashed to bits by an electric charge? Is Penelope really under the influence of suicidal urges—murderous urges? Is this really the woman he’s fallen for? Is she still the same person? Do her inclinations still belong to her? Who, or what, is inhabiting Penelope’s head?

  “I told you your Penelope’s bad!” he hears her say in a tortured voice, visibly willing herself to articulate the words, still shivering profusely. “Murder-suicide, a twin killing, bad girl and poor boy dead in bed! Now you know! And now get out of here! Out! Out! Out!” Raising herself on her knees and lifting her head high, and either indifferent or unaware that the dresses she’s draped over herself are sliding from her body, rendering her naked again, she screams, “I swear to God I’ll bash my head against the floor if you don’t get out of here!”

  Every tendon in Stuart’s body erupts, casts him from the bed—in a second he’s at Penelope’s side, pulling her onto her back, gently but firmly holding her down. “Why on earth do you want to hurt yourself?” he cries incredulously. “Everyone respects you, thinks highly of you, looks up to you—you have a good job, a wonderful place to live—you’re beautiful. And stop berating your beauty, it’s a gift—you’re a miracle, as kind as you are stunning—you’re a shining light, an example and inspiration to others, a positive and beneficent person in every respect. You keep telling me I don’t understand? I agree: I’m completely baffled, none of this makes any sense to me. Why are you allowing phantoms to chase you, why are you dreaming up enemies, why are you hounding yourself? If you don’t want to be with men, fine; if you don’t want to be with me, fine; if you want to be left alone, fine: that’s your right. But, please, stop taking it out on yourself! You have so much to live for and I don’t understand why you, of all people, are speaking about throwing it away, mentioning guns!”; then, lowering his voice, inquiring in very gentle tones, “Do you have a gun, Penelope? Where’s the gun? Please tell me if there’s a gun, Penelope.” He’s caressing her forehead with one hand while pressing on her breastbone with the other, gazing into her troubled eyes, dreading the chance that she does indeed have a gun.

  “You don’t want to find out!” she yells, struggling against his hold, her eyes ablaze with outrage. “Here, listen a second: the last man who restrained me like this didn’t walk standing up straight for days! Better not let me get a good kick in, I’ll get you where it counts! The legs you admire will propel my foot straight to the target! If I get my hands on it I’ll tear it off!” She’s gazing between his legs none too kindly, still seeking to escape; but then her eyes suddenly soften and she whimpers, “Sorry, Stuart, I…I’m not a good person, I told you that, this is the proof. I don’t want to be putting you through this, don’t want… I liked being friends with you and am…I just…” Her voice faltering, she closes her tearing eyes and ceases to struggle, becomes absolutely limp.

  “Penelope, listen to me,” Stuart hastens to say, emboldened by her apology. “You’re not hurting yourself as long as I’m around, OK? You’re not hurting yourself, period—I’m not going to allow it and you’re absolutely not going to allow it. Do you understand? We’re going to get you some help, OK? I’ll stay with you and see you through this, I’ll do anything I need to do. We’ll get you some help and all will be well. You’ll see you’re not a bad person, not by a long shot. You’ll see life is yours for the taking—that you’re flat-out entitled to unbounded happiness and enjoyment, as are all good-hearted incredibly kind bright people. You’re a sweetheart through and through, it’s a fact and that’s that.”

  “Help?” she scoffs, ceasing to cry and opening her eyes, regarding him with a mocking expression. “What sort of help do you propose? What reaches inside a person and makes bad directions disappear? What changes things that devil a person into harmless fluff? What makes the undertows and dark places go away? A magic incantation? Is that what you have in mind? Am I an experiment? Do you think you can push buttons in my feelings and automatically make me the happiest person alive, as if I’m a robot who can be programed? Snap your fingers and Poof! the poor woman’s problems are gone and she’s delirious with joy? Right, poor piteous me! Your special project, charitable contribution, good deed for the day! Your reason to feel immensely pleased with yourself, as if you’ve climbed Everest or conquered a country! Pathetic!” Her eyes are as hard as diamonds, glinting like bright light on steel, glaring at him such that he feels as if he’s being stabbed in the chest. Then he hears her hiss, “Didn’t I tell you to keep your eyes and hands off me?” as she rakes her nails down the length of his right forearm, furiously writhes. “Get your hands and eyes off me and get out of here or I’ll scream loud enough to get the cops here! Believe me, the neighbors will hear loud and clear and get them here fast! I’m counting to…”

  Not doubting for an instant Penelope will make good on her threat, Stuart places a palm over her mouth, whereupon she screams so vehemently it swells the skin of his fingers, inundates his hand with heat, imparts vibrations forceful enough to shoot up his arm, even if the volume’s effectively muffled; nor does she cease seeking to claw him, cease glaring with wishing-him-dead eyes, cease thrashing about. As he’s preoccupied with pinning her to the floor and avoiding her nails Stuart’s wondering if and when her mania will end and realizes he’s never experienced such stress before, in any situation—never been as scared, disoriented, mentally and emotionally taxed before—plunged into such tumult nothing seems wholly real and it’s as if he’s caught in an oppressive dream. Then he’s aware of addressing Penelope in a firm even voice, feeling it’s requiring all his strength to intone the words: “Sorry, Penelope, but you’re stuck with me. I’m staying—staying as a friend—and there’s nothing you can do to change it. You’ll stay on your back, where you can’t harm
yourself, until you’re calm. I don’t want to be doing this, it’s the last thing I want, but I’m going to keep you here until you’re calm. What sort of friend would I be if I released you, while you’re talking about harming yourself? Sorry, but I can’t in good conscience…”

  “You think I haven’t been through this before?” she interrupts with ice in her voice, having seized Stuart’s hand with both of hers and wrenched it away from her mouth (Not difficult for her to do, as he isn’t about to press too roughly to keep his hand in place, risk bruising her lips or otherwise injuring her.); then, becoming stock still and radiating restrained rage, “You think you’re the first and only one I’ve tussled with, somebody special? You think poor Penelope’s going to off herself because of you? Pah! Get this through your vain brain: the only problem’s you! When you’re gone I’ll be fine and dandy—sitting on top of the world! Now, for the last time: get out of here! And don’t worry, I’m not going to scream for help like a baby, that was a lie. I don’t need to scream for help, because I know you can’t sit on me all day! I’m neither a wisp of a woman nor out of shape and crazy people are strong, so I’ll outlast you and be up on my feet before you want me to! So you’d better get out while you can, before you’re in way over your head!” Emphatically brightening her eyes, she fixes them upon his—her eyes are as good as saying, You haven’t seen anything yet!

  What’s Stuart’s immediate response? Momentarily drifting apart from the strife, seemingly rendered blind to Penelope’s rage and deaf to her warning, he finds himself marveling at the depth of feeling and force of will in her eyes—so beautiful and beguiling and elusive they are. Her eyes are unlike any he’s gazed into before: it’s as if he’s on the cusp of being introduced to a new world of untold emotional riches, as vital and deathless as forces of nature—as if he need look no further for the fulfillment of every dream he’s ever had. Her eyes are as dazzling as the stars on a clear moonless night on a remote mountaintop, far from civilization’s obstructing lights, and likewise birth delicious vertigo, as if the unchartable vastness of existence is stirring to life in his breast. But Stuart isn’t allowed to marvel for above a few seconds, as another slash of Penelope’s nails, in this instance half-circle-wise on his belly, jolts him back to the fact she’s against him, breaks the spell. “It’s what I already told you, Penelope,” he manages to say from between gritted teeth, steeling himself against the sting of the gashes, while striving to straddle her waist, seize her wrists, halt the scratching. “I can’t leave, it wouldn’t be right as long as you’re...”

  “As long as I’m what?” she cuts him off again, her tone impatient and acidic; but then she smiles and laughs, playfully squirms against the floor, freely offers her wrists to him, says, “Go ahead and pin me—I think it’ll be fun.” No sooner is Stuart wondering why Penelope’s reversed emotional direction, including the chance she’s become too unbalanced to sustain anger or anything else, than she strikes his left shoulder from the back none too gently with her knee. As he pitches forward onto his hands, just managing to avoid tumbling onto his side, she spins from under him, rights herself onto hands and knees, and scampers towards the closet, seizing at the dresses on the floor and throwing them behind her, so that one of them wraps around his neck. Coming to a stop in front of the closet and whirling to face him, she raises a cautionary hand and says matter-of-factly with an expressionless face, “I’m not going to be held down again, Stuart. Don’t do it again or you’ll regret it, I’m only saying it once. And don’t speak, either. I’m speaking now and you need to keep quiet and listen.”

  “Fine,” Stuart snaps, giving way to annoyance for the first time as he removes the dress from his neck, wads it up, and throws it over Penelope’s head, “You speak, I’ll listen. But I’m still not going anywhere until you convince me you’re not going to hurt yourself, period. I don’t care how many times you scratch and kick me—how many times you playact being nice and then whack me.”

  “I don’t need to convince you of anything!” Penelope shouts, her face instantly losing its blank expression, convulsed with rage. “How dare you presume I owe you explanations when I’m in my apartment and you won’t leave! I don’t care if you think I’m in a bad way, too excited for my own good—it’s none of your business! My life’s mine, not yours! Listen to me: men and their clinging fake-helpful ways make me sick! Men presuming to think they’re the guardians of my well-being and protecting me, when they’re the one thing that’s wrong! I’m so weary of it! I’m weary of you—yes, you above all else!—and if you don’t get out of here…! Listen to me,” she repeats, lowering her voice and speaking very slowly, her words dripping with venom, “Now that I have requested that you exit my apartment and you have refused to do so you are officially a trespasser in the eyes of the law. If you do not exit my apartment immediately I will call the police and inform them you assaulted me in my place of residence and press full charges.”; then, her voice rising to a scream again, “Out, do you hear! How many times do I have to say it? No garbage about conscience, no garbage about what’s right, no garbage about poor pitiful me, just out! Out, for God’s sake!”; then, in the space of about five seconds, she’s clasping her head, falling onto her side, writhing on the hardwood, screaming louder, “Out, Stuart! Out, or I don’t know what I’ll do! Out, or you really will have a mad woman on your hands and I won’t be able to answer for myself! Won’t be able to think of you as anything but an unwanted intruder, enemy who’s harassing and persecuting me, and act fittingly! Stuart, I’m not kidding! You don’t know me like I do, what I’m capable of, how nasty and violent I can be! I’m not exaggerating, not bluffing! I’m telling you there’s a demon in me and you’re in serious danger!”

  At the sound of Penelope’s concluding words, spoken far too heatedly and persuasively, Stuart finds himself prodded to his feet, as it were half-involuntarily—rapidly crossing the room, locating his clothes, putting them on. As he does so he’s aware of angry noise and movement to his right—objects being thrown, fabric being torn, furniture being shoved, cries rending the air—and pictures of guns and knives and mayhem burst into his head. Then he’s hearing the words You’re in serious danger! echo in his ears—words that induce a counter-echo of God only knows what she’ll do! in his thoughts—as he commences walking and soon finds himself in the living room, approaching the front door. Then he’s in a hallway, the walls of which appear to be converging a few yards ahead of him, on the point of barring his way, crushing him. Then he’s in an elevator, surrounded by gleaming brass, as sharply clashing angles of brightness assail his eyes and his thoughts splinter into shattered patterns devoid of words. Then he’s on a sidewalk, glancing about like one who’s just awakened from a harrowing dream, unsure of where he is, what he’s doing...

  Stuart hasn’t traveled two blocks before his panic begins to dissipate due to the eye-soothing open spaces of the streets and view of the sky—the touch of the cold gusting wind, energy-dispersing act of walking at a brisk pace—and he’s recalling Penelope as she was when he departed, berating himself for leaving her alone. “She was trying every means to be rid of me, get me to lose my nerve and crumble,” he reflects. “When one approach didn’t work, she tried another—a simple matter of playing the odds, stringing tactics together, casting lines until the bait landed in the right spot. That bit about me being a trespasser and she pressing charges, then her frenzy—she didn’t restrain herself, was wrecking her room as if it belonged to someone she absolutely detested, wailing like a banshee! Very dramatic and unnerving for sure, but that’s no excuse! How could I allow myself to fall for it—get scared, lose sight of the big picture, dash out the door? Very weak and cowardly of me to abandon the woman I love—yes, love!—when she might need me the most, regardless of how much she denies it! I don’t believe I bolted without more of a fight, it’s as if I was under a spell! When Penelope said You’re in serious danger! and her eyes flared that way and the air became hot and pressed against me and it was hard
to breathe and the room turned into a hostile place that wanted me gone! How did she do that?”

  What’s to be done? Should he retrace his steps to Penelope’s building, phone 911, say she’s suicidal, see to it emergency personnel’s dispatched without hesitation? Surely, she is a danger to herself and needs intervention. But, no—it would be a futile endeavor: he knows exactly how she’d behave, what face of deception she’d put on. He knows the moment emergency personnel arrived she’d call out, “Just a moment, please!” or some such in a reassuring voice and then hastily dress and comb her hair, after which she’d open the door with a questioning smile—that she’d be the very definition of self-possession, as at the office, and easily convince them she was in no need of their services. She’d look straight at him in their presence and state she’s mystified as to why he felt they needed to be summoned, that she knows he means well but has misread the situation and become unduly concerned, or a variant thereof. She’d cheerfully bid everyone, including him, good day and dispense well-wishes and shut the door, never ceasing to smile: the emergency people would swallow her act hook, line, and sinker and he’d have no choice but to accompany them out of her building. In the end, he’d only succeed increasing her anger. And more to the point: she’d still be alone and at war with herself—still be a danger to herself.