by Bethany-Kris
That was part of her depression, she knew. The disconnect. Her lack of desire to talk or even be present. How she would much rather hide beneath blankets or in clothes that drowned her body.
Not soon enough for her liking, the second hand of the clock finally ticked down the last minute of her required therapy session. Another form would be filled out and sent to the social worker to say Penny and her guardians were doing all the work demanded of them to ensure her mental health and well-being.
But as she stood to leave, Dr. Tangler asked, “One to ten this week?”
She didn’t need to clarify what she meant. Penny understood.
“Eight.”
“That’s high on the scale.”
“Not the nine it was last week,” Penny returned.
“Do you have an active plan?”
“No.”
Not one for suicide, anyway.
“Self-harm?” the therapist asked.
It took every ounce of self-control Penny had not to rub at the black, long-sleeve sweater covering her arms. Even the denim of her skinny jeans itched overtop the scars she hid with clothing. The mere mention of her habit to cut was enough to make her want to do it. Numbness would follow—it was all she really wanted.
“Not lately,” she said honestly.
Penny couldn’t say how long it would last.
The therapist didn’t ask.
“I’ll see you next week,” the woman said as Penny left the room.
Maybe, she replied silently. She didn’t make promises and while she might not be actively planning another suicide attempt, she also didn’t plan for anything else, either. Wishful thinking, perhaps. Or it could just be her depression talking again.
That bitch never left.
And neither did—
“How did it go?” Roz asked the second Penny emerged from the office’s back hallway. She stood from the waiting room’s chair, offering one of her smiles. A warm, comforting sight. Like everything else about Rosalynn Puzza. She just ... drew people in—made them feel safe. Including Penny, but it was hard to trust that. “Okay, I hope.”
Penny shrugged. “Like it usually does.”
“I know you don’t like coming here but—”
“Required by the state and child services,” she interjected, parroting the same shit everybody told her. “I know, Roz.”
Plus, it kept her accountable.
Not that Penny would admit it. Then, people might think it was helping. Nothing helped.
Roz joined Penny’s side as they left the office, stepping out into a busy Manhattan sidewalk. Life bustled all around them, but she felt distanced from it all. Another day alive.
“I know things are going to be busy for the next month while we move into the new house,” Roz said, “but your seventeenth birthday is less than a week away.”
“And?”
A car pulled up for them.
She didn’t ask why Roz had drivers. Or why there were men with guns that kept an eye on the house. Never mind the fact that the last names of her guardians seemed to draw a sense of respect and caution everywhere they went.
“I thought maybe you might want to do something for it,” Roz explained.
“Not really.”
“Not even dinner?”
Penny sighed. “A day off therapy.”
Roz laughed lightly. “Sorry, one thing I can’t do.”
Right.
But her guardians tried to do everything else and that’s what counted. After years of people only hurting Penny, she finally had someone—two people, really—who seemed to actually care. She wasn’t used to that.
“I think I just want to sleep,” Penny said.
“Okay. But if you need anything, even while we’re busy moving, just tell me. We’ll make it happen, Penny.”
Yeah.
She knew.
They just couldn’t give her what she needed the most: everything to be gone.
THE THING ABOUT DEPRESSION? That shit was a cloud. Heavy, opaque, and constant. It followed Penny around, through days that turned into weeks, and melted into months. Time became irrelevant when she was fighting just to make it from one hour to the next.
Before she realized it, two months had passed her by. Two months on top of the two she had already been living in New York with her new guardians. She only came to that understanding because of the DA currently talking at the kitchen table of Roz and Naz’s new house.
“We were happy to be able to get this done and settled in such a short time—four months for a case like this is unheard of—so we were happy to agree to the deal with Preston Dunsworth considering the trail would have dragged on for possibly ... years.”
“Wait,” Penny muttered, stopping the DA from saying anything more about this deal they had settled out with her monster of a father and his horrible fucking lawyers. “Go back—so what you’re saying is that he’ll plead guilty to eighty-five counts of child pornography, right?”
“Yes,” the man across the table said.
Underneath, where no one could see, Roz’s hand squeezed tightly around Penny’s. An ache had settled deep in her heart. Despite the fact she actually hadn’t needed to see or speak to her father since this whole thing started ... every time she had to talk about him, or he was brought into a conversation, she felt ill.
She didn’t want to think about him anymore. He didn’t deserve a space in her mind.
So, why was he still there?
Penny couldn’t cut him out.
She tried.
“The deal says each count will have time served consecutively, and not together,” the DA said, like Penny was a fucking idiot and needed it explained to her again. She heard it just fine the first fucking time. “With the maximum penalty for each charge, that could add up to over—”
“Just shut up,” Penny said.
The man gave her a look. “Excuse me?”
“Penny,” Roz said quietly beside her. “It’s okay ... try to say what you’re feeling, and not just try to hurt someone else because we’re hurting, right?”
God.
Why did Roz have to be like ... that?
All the time, too.
“I think,” came the dark voice of Naz behind Penny where he leaned against the wall of the kitchen in their new—because a baby needed lots of space, apparently—home, “what Penny is not quite saying but wants to, is that it’s just the child porn charges, correct?”
“Yes, those are charges that will be impossible for them to win against.”
“And nothing for her.”
The man across the table stiffened. “Well—”
Naz didn’t allow the man to continue on with whatever in the fuck he planned to say before he added, “So, perhaps you could forgive Penny that you made a deal with the man who raped her, and sold her body for years, wherein he will plead guilty to everything but what he did to her. Because you see, the only reason why you were able to get the child porn and charge him for that was because she came forward ... she talked, again and again and again. You put her on tape, you made her relive trauma to stranger after stranger. You put her in front of therapist after therapist to see if she was lying. You promised justice would be served for her.”
“Sir—”
“And in fact,” Naz continued, “what you did was use her to get what you could from him, and instead of getting her abuser on the stand to admit to what he did to her, she instead gets to feel like everything she did was not actually for her own benefit. So yeah, I think you could empathize with why she needs you to explain again the choice you made. And without the attitude the second time around—go ahead, try it, Mr. Mahoney.”
The DA swallowed hard and stared at the wood grain on the dining room table they currently sat at. Roz squeezed Penny’s hand again, and she was eternally grateful for the support that she found in this house. It was strange to her in the way that those weren’t at all the things she had been expecting when she came to live here with Naz and
Roz.
Penny had become so used to being alone—to feeling numb to all and anything in her life—that now, it felt like she experienced too much when it came to her emotions, and she didn’t know the first damn thing to do with them.
She was getting better, though.
One step at a time.
It was terrifying.
“Trial would be long,” the DA murmured, “and drawn out. Media would be all over it—constantly. Penny would likely have to testify. No doubt in front of a packed courtroom, we’d be lucky if we were able to get a media ban approved by the judge, and certainly in full view of her father where he could stare at her while she retold detail after detail of his abuse. Which, again no doubt, would be for his pleasure, and certainly not for hers. So yes, I understand that on the surface, this deal doesn’t exactly seem like it is to Penny’s benefit—”
“Not one bit,” Penny replied sharply.
“But your other options will be far more traumatic. He will die in prison, and it might not be because he admitted to the things he did to you, but it will be because of the strength and courage you have shown time and time again to make sure he couldn’t do this to someone else.”
Penny let out a shaky breath.
Why didn’t that help?
Wordlessly, Penny stood from the table. Roz looked her way, a silent request for her to stay and finish the conversation. It reflected in the woman’s eyes, but Penny couldn’t do what she wanted. Right now, she just needed to be alone ... or something.
Anything but this.
Roz always told her that was okay, too.
To be alone.
To need time.
It was okay, and she could take it.
As she headed out of the kitchen without as much as a look over her shoulder, Penny heard the DA say, “We don’t need her agreement on the deal for it to go through, but I did want to let her know personally.”
“Right,” Naz snapped back, “because it is never about the victim, only the victory.”
“Or do you just have a personal problem with law enforcement, Nazio Donati, because of your own circumstances?”
“Get the fuck out of my house.”
Penny heard the front door slam shut minutes later, but she was already at the back of the house, sitting in front of the piano that taunted her on a daily basis. For whatever reason, she hadn’t been able to play it since she arrived in New York. It followed them from the penthouse to the large, three-level home in the suburbs.
Roz played.
Naz did, occasionally, even if it wasn’t perfect.
Penny, though?
Never.
Until right now. The urge thrummed deep, the notes taking shape in her mind the longer she stared at the glossy black smoothness of the piano legs.
Why now?
Why when she shouldn’t care?
Why did it matter now?
Good girls play for Daddy, she heard him say in her head. Oh, you missed a key, what does that mean? And then, Smile at the camera when you do that, Penny, they like it.
“Fuck you, fuck you ... fuck you,” Penny mumbled, rocking forward on the bench. “Just ... fuck you.”
She pressed the heels of her palms to her burning eyes as she squeezed them shut, willing his voice out of her head, and for those memories to burn. Maybe that’s what she had been looking for here, to take away all of that, but it was never going to go away.
Those memories would never leave.
It would never not be.
Her fingers trembled as she placed them to the ivory, the tune that came out of the instrument echoing and haunting through the halls of the quiet house as it matched the sounds she made when she cried.
And God.
She cried so hard.
The melody was so unlike what she had been known to play before—much darker, and deafening. A tune that had goosebumps racing over her skin and had her heart thumping hard against her ribcage.
It was pain.
Not pain she caused.
Not pain he made.
It didn’t come from a razor against her skin, and it didn’t hurt. It wasn’t brought on by wrongs done to her, even if memories helped to create the music. It didn’t leave scars behind, and it didn’t linger long enough to make her wish she wasn’t here at all.
It was pain put into music.
And it felt different like that.
Better like that.
For a long time, Penny had pushed music aside because it felt like a punishment. She had been put in front of a piano for her father’s desire, not because anyone thought she would be any good at it. Her talents had then been used to please others, before they turned it around on her so that when she misbehaved, they punished her with it, too.
By sending her away with the music.
And she hated them.
Hated it.
But this was none of that.
This was all her.
Why couldn’t everything else be like that, too?
THE WEEKS THAT FOLLOWED the DA showing up with news of the plea agreement with Penny’s father wasn’t ... good. Quite the opposite for her. She hadn’t known what she expected from finally putting her father in prison, but the emptiness settling deep within the pit of her gut certainly wasn’t it.
The darkness of the bedroom that belonged to her in the large home stared back at Penny. She couldn’t say how many hours she laid there watching the ceiling, but it was a few. A few more than she should. The dark shades she had pulled closed in the morning kept any light from coming in which meant she couldn’t even estimate the time by looking at the sky.
What did it matter?
She wished she cared.
It was the buzz of her phone that pulled her from the depths of dark, spiraling thoughts that always led her to a dangerous edge whenever she had enough time to indulge. Without even checking the text, she knew it was from Roz.
She was right.
The guilt that spread around her heart—like tentacles squeezing the blood right out of the beating organ—at the sight of the message was impossible to ignore. Penny knew why, too. She hadn’t even read the words yet, but she didn’t need to when the only thing Roz ever did was make sure her ward was okay.
All the time.
Whenever.
Roz cared more about Penny than even her own mother had. She worried about the teenager constantly even though she tried not to voice it too much.
Penny wanted to be good for Roz—desperately wished she could say she was okay and mean it every time her guardian asked—but she still hadn’t learned how to do that for herself, yet. How was she supposed to do it for someone else?
The actual text of the message made her feel worse when Roz asked, How are your classes today?
Not great.
Because she skipped.
Penny didn’t lie in her reply—a simple: Came back home early—because it was the only thing her two guardians asked of her. That she always tell them the truth no matter how uncomfortable or painful it might be. At least then, they could help her if needed. They didn’t want the truth to punish her for it.
Something else she wasn’t used to.
Okay, came Roz’s next reply. Not because of someone, right?
No, just her depression.
Penny only texted back: No.
It didn’t seem to bother Roz at all because her next reply, a far longer message, dropped the subject altogether. Not that Penny was excited to see the words on the screen, far too bright in the darkness of the room.
If you’re home and have time, then, would you look over the file from the lawyer? He sent it over a week ago, and he really needs you to sign it, Penny. I know you don’t care about the trust fund or restitution payment, but he does need to file it for the estate.
Her first thought was to say hell no. The very idea of taking money from her father and his estate fucked her up more than anything else in her life currently. She had been avoiding that file sitting on the
desk in the corner of her bedroom since Naz put it there.
She didn’t want shit from Preston. Hadn’t her father given her enough? Penny thought so.
Still, it had to be done.
Otherwise, the lawyer would continue to pester Naz and Roz, who wouldn’t say a thing to Penny about it because they didn’t push. But the file would remain on her desk where she had to look at it every day knowing the final payment for her innocence waited for her signature.
More blood money. Cash for her silence. At least this time, Penny was the one being paid.
Right?
Fuck.
She hated how morbid her thoughts could be sometimes. Another hell she couldn’t escape.
Penny didn’t bother to reply to Roz’s last message. Instead, she clamored out of bed, wishing she could just say where she was, and gathered the file from the desk.
Soon, she found herself in the music room downstairs. The one space that Roz designated as hers and Penny’s—even though Penny barely used it. The piano bench in front of the shiny, black Baby Grand seemed like a good spot to get comfortable while she flipped open the file on her lap. Before long, she had music filtering through the speaker on her phone. A song she had composed when she was only thirteen, but one of her favorites.
If hating something could be called a favorite.
Every key—each rising note—resurrected her pain because she could remember in perfect detail just how much agony had filled her heart when she created the piece years ago. All of her music was like that. A lot like her past, too.
The music helped, though.
In some ways.
She was able to lose herself in the sound of the music, and the notes coloring up her mind, as she flipped page after page in the file. The information about the trust fund and restitution payment from her father was as overwhelming as confusing as she thought it would be.
Then again, it was also clear.
One hundred million dollars. Delivered after her eighteenth birthday. Nine and a half more months. If only money could solve the rest of her problems, then Penny wouldn’t have any to bother her, right?
Bullshit.