The Penn Friends Series Books 5-8: Penn Friends Boxset

by T H Paul

  It was only the eighth day of that new school year, midway through her second week, where everything exploded. Penny should have noticed something on the boys' faces as she walked in. Lads who she hardly knew were grinning at her. Students who were new to the college eyeing her up with an appreciative smile on their glowing faces. The girls, however, seemed less than impressed. Penny was called a slag twice before the first break. Each reference then followed with wolf whistles from the boys.

  By the end of the day, Millie had opened up to Penny. She’d been told everything by a former friend––someone in another college, in fact, who’d replied to a text Millie had written and passed on what she’d heard. Unknown to any of them, through a varied route of friends and friend’s of friends’ brothers, the story had been confirmed by those men and women around Clive Banks and his pub mates. Millie and Penny were now known to be the two schoolgirls who got done after the rave. The ghosts of legend and hearsay––as it had become––suddenly had legs, arms and all the other parts. Overnight Penny Black had become the class slag.

  Nothing was ever done or said in the open. If the teachers knew of the rumours and the accusations, they weren’t saying anything, nor giving special treatment to either Millie or Penny. Classes progressed as normal.

  But it was the references crudely concealed around the school that kept word spreading, some often very vulgar, others less subtle; Black the Slag. For the girls, she became more the outcast than before, and the boys were divided––some, most of which was written in the boy's toilets and therefore stuff she would never thankfully see, proposed she do all sorts of sexual favours for them. She was a bit of a cult hero for those that had no chance of getting a girlfriend. For others, she was a cheap slag. Any desire they might have had for her, any interest and fantasy about asking her out, had been trampled on by the rumours.

  It pushed Penny and Millie together all the more, each finding sole refuge in the other, though Penny could only see it did nothing to help the situation. The school had rapidly become hell all of a sudden, Penny, once again the subject of too much attention, at a stage when she had hoped things would have been different.

  3

  The sixth form should have been a different experience for me. The immaturity of secondary school was meant to be behind us; we were now young adults––and yet it was worse than ever. That first month was fast becoming a living hell. I hated what they were thinking about me. It wasn’t true. That wasn’t who I was, even if I had felt that. It’d been an internal, unspoken sadness, yet now they were all laughing at me. Some were calling my exploits heroic; others were just calling me a whore.

  I would show them.

  I also didn’t know how to handle Millie as the weeks went on. She was a good friend to me, probably the only real friend I currently had, but I couldn’t help but blame her for my current situation. I’d never said anything about the rave to anyone. Millie was the only person I knew who knew anything about it. She must have talked. She must have assumed, with her school year about to finish, and with herself about to leave, that there would be no harm in telling someone. None of her classmates knew me. She’d not given my name, that much I believe anyway.

  But she’d not considered that certain people don’t forget such stories. As soon as the dots lined up, we were exposed.

  I don’t blame her, as such. I just didn’t know if I should be spending all my college days with her. Mind you, having every subject together, and with no one else to eat lunch with, I didn’t have much choice about any of it. We’d started eating lunch away from college grounds by then, anyway. As Sixth-formers, we were allowed to leave the premises. With the rumours flying, that made that option a no-brainer.

  I’d never told Millie about my gift. She was a carrier of one of my gifts, and for that, I had once been very grateful. She’d been able to heal me. I had never told her the truth. That was something I’d only ever voiced with Joy.

  Would the anonymity of an Internet chat room give me enough space, enough freedom, to let those thoughts out again? Would speaking into cyber-space be as releasing as talking into the mind of Joy?

  Penny didn’t get back to the forums until the end of the week, her first month of the sixth form behind her. She had a quiet Saturday daytime ahead of her, only due to work at five that evening.

  A fresh cup of coffee sat on a table next to her, as she sat on her sofa, the curtains still drawn though it was already light outside. She was in her dressing gown. The day felt like a lazy one.

  Logging back into the system, she could see that she had since been granted access to the group she’d first requested just after signing up. She scrolled through the thread, though lost interest after only five minutes. By then she had spotted a few WAI usernames similar to hers––it figured they would be in the group as she was––and most of these were asking searching questions. Some seemed rather poorly written. She’d never considered that younger teens would be on such a website, though there had been no age restrictions. She just hoped they were careful. The site as a whole was far from child-safe. She was sure some forums were into some twisted stuff if anyone was to go searching.

  Penny noticed that often the responses to such questions were made by people with more enlightening usernames; Angel of Light, Positive192 as well as a whole bunch of WWJD1692 and various other number combinations. Penny had once been given a What Would Jesus Do? bracelet by a family which used to live on her street. She hadn’t thought about them in years.

  An hour later, Penny was getting into her first proper conversation, having roamed a little and landed on a private forum––she’d been given access almost immediately––titled why do I feel like this? There were various threads displayed, often people crying out for help. She didn’t want to start reading those posts. She got drawn into one, however, that asked the question do you have something you’ve never told anyone? She certainly had that. It was an active thread, and even as she read some of the past conversations, new content was appearing. The chat was live.

  User191001: There are plenty of things I’ve never told my folks.

  Rogue2017: You ever told anyone?

  User191001: Nope.

  Rogue2017: Sharing is caring.

  User191001: Believe me, you’ll think I’m a freak.

  Penny smiled at that comment. She knew that feeling. Penny could see a response was being typed. It felt as if she were somehow in the same room as these two people, nothing but a fly on the wall, her presence unknown, listening in on this private chat. It felt good.

  Rogue2017: Nothing but freaks and loons here, User191001. You must have learnt that by now, no?

  User123456: Too right!

  Another person had entered the conversation, the digits instantly recognisable to Penny from that deleted post she’d seen when she first signed up. She’d returned several times to that thread, though nothing had ever changed since.

  Rogue2017: User123456 is in the house!

  User123456: Yes I am! Hello, losers.

  Rogue2017: User191001…you still here?

  User123456: Yes, sorry there, gatecrashed the convo. Carry on.

  User191001: I’m still here.

  Rogue2017: Great. I’m glad.

  Penny’s fingers hovered above the keyboard, wondering whether she should announce her presence also. How many others were doing what she was doing? Did the website know or report who was watching? She couldn’t see anything. Nothing was obvious. The conversation moved on a little, edging away from what had been said and Penny raised her hands away from the computer. Three minutes later, the discussion honed back in on the issue on the mind of the user she had been watching call himself a freak.

  User191001: I’m worried what my parents will think. What my brother will think. If my classmates ever found out the truth, I would be an outcast. I’m in an all-girls school.

  So she was female, apparently, and of school age. Penny couldn’t help but assume from the comments made by the other two active
users that they were both males, and probably older. She had nothing else to go on, but it was a hunch, an assumption.

  Rogue2017: That sucks, I get it. The power of this forum is you get to share what you’ve never shared before. There is enormous release in voicing something you’ve never dared to share, even if its just onto the Internet.

  User123456: You might also want to hold back from telling folks around here you’re a school girl, User191001. Many’ll try to take advantage.

  Rogue2017: ^^ what he said. ^^

  User191001: Sorry.

  User123456: No need to apologise, we are just looking out for you. So, are you going to say what’s on your mind?

  There was a full two-minute pause, Penny waiting for the response, though no one was typing. She could only imagine the internal struggle going on inside this girl, wherever she was. It only then occurred to Penny that these people could be anywhere in the world. She didn’t know why she assumed it was just a UK based forum.

  User191001: They already think I’m a freak.

  Rogue2017: You can tell us.

  User191001: I have no friends as it is. The truth will only label me even more.

  Penny knew exactly how that felt. Her fingers were just millimetres above the laptop now, her mind already thinking through a reply. She was typing before she knew what she was doing.

  WAI2001: I hear you! Been there, done that, User191001. It really doesn’t matter what others think.

  Rogue2017: Welcome to the party, WAI2001. You new here?

  WAI2001: Yes, first post. Couldn’t help but reply to the thread. User191001, I know your dilemma.

  Penny didn’t know why she was typing as she was, saying what she had just said, but she didn’t want to be the silent part in this three-way conversation taking place in front of her––albeit on the laptop over the Internet.

  User123456: Welcome to the madhouse, virgin!

  WAI2001: What?

  Rogue2017: Virgin is just the term for a first-time poster. He meant nothing inappropriate.

  User123456: ^^ yes, what he said. ^^ Sorry if you thought I meant something else. Though if that were the case, I’ve got a few groups I could recommend. Lol.

  It seemed to Penny at that moment that she found chancers wherever she went.

  WAI2001: I’m quite okay. Thanks, but no thanks. And we are stealing from User191001 and what’s on her mind.

  Rogue2017: Quite right! Terrible behaviour User123456.

  User123456: Feeling thoroughly put in my place. Sob.

  WAI2001 and Rogue2017 almost simultaneously: Good!!

  Rogue2017: ROFL!!!

  User191001: I have a voice in my head telling me to do bad things to people.

  Penny nearly choked on her coffee as she had just taken a sip when that last comment came in. If the Internet could be silent, Penny experienced a frozen, still second in time as the sentence sank in, the conversation seemingly momentarily paused.

  User123456: To harm people?

  User191001: Yes.

  User123456: To kill people?

  User191001: Yes.

  Rogue2017: User191001, I’ve sent you a direct message!

  User123456: Anyone in specific, User191001?

  User191001: Maybe. A family member, yes.

  Rogue2017: Is it your mother, User191001?

  User123456: Check your inbox, User191001, for Rogue2017’s msg.

  There was no response for a moment. Penny’s heart had been thumping. Penny had not only had a similar thought but had turned it into action with her mother. This situation was apparently different, but it just reminded Penny of her guilt. She needed air. Standing up, she placed the laptop back on the coffee table and opened the front door. The sun was bright, the contrast initially a little too much. The milk had arrived at some point during the morning, and Penny bent down and picked up both bottles. She then closed the door and went to put the milk in the fridge. She switched on the kettle.

  In the lounge, the kettle starting to come to the boil, Penny opened the curtains. Light flooded the room. She couldn’t face getting dressed just yet, so returned to the kitchen to make herself a drink. Before long, however, the laptop was drawing her back to the conversation. Each footstep across the room she was playing through each of her sins in her mind, yet the nearer Penny got to the computer the more she knew she needed to see what had happened.

  Sitting back down on the sofa, Penny was alarmed to see that despite there being multiple new entries––including one from a new contributor with the ominous username of DemonHunter36––all were now showing as deleted, the last one now showing being Rogue2017’s ROFL!! entry. Everything since––multiple messages fired back and forth barely seconds apart––was now not showing.

  WAI2001: What happened?

  Penny wrote, not knowing if there was going to be anyone left around, though soon saw that the latest user was typing a response. Penny held her breath.

  DemonHunter36: They ran away as they always do. You read what they wrote here, did you, WAI2001?

  WAI2001: No, I went to the kitchen to make a drink and came back to nothing.

  DemonHunter36: Likely story. So which one are you? The idiot, the lost soul, the desperate soul or the working one?

  Penny had no idea about what the user was talking.

  WAI2001: What?!

  DemonHunter36: You must be new to this. WAI…its hardly original. I’m guessing you picked your birth year, young one, as last time I checked there weren’t so many soul searchers on here as two thousand.

  WAI2001: It’s the year I retired.

  Penny didn’t know why she felt like lying, but she didn’t trust this confrontational user.

  DemonHunter36: As if. That would make you about 82, and most folks I know that age aren’t asking questions like Who Am I?, Where Am I? Neither would they use what an idiot or works as intended.

  WAI2001: I don’t follow.

  DemonHunter36: WAI. There is one of four things it means. Those ain't no initials now.

  Penny read that last sentence with an American accent. So the user was a Yank. Before she could think about a response––she was at a loss as to what to say––there was a notification that a direct message had just arrived. It was from Rogue2017. Don’t talk with DemonHunter36; he's nothing but a troublemaker. Sorry that we had to leave. Here’s a link to another thread we are on. Maybe see you there? There was a link attached, though Penny didn’t know whether to click on it yet or not. She exited the thread, anyhow, taking the advice of Rogue2017, seemingly siding with him over the outspoken stranger.

  She closed down the laptop altogether, finishing her tea as she contemplated going upstairs and getting showered. She was thoroughly bewildered about all that had just happened, but knew already she needed to know more. There had to be some places on the forum where conversations were flowing. She determined to come back again soon.

  4

  As winter approached that year, I had one eye on Christmas. It was far from an expensive time of the year for me compared with most––I had no known family to speak of––but still I knew I didn’t have enough. Heating was costing more, plus the rates for running the home, which was far more extensive than I needed, of course, and if I’d thought it all through maybe, I should have done something about that long ago. There were empty rooms––I could have rented them out, or sold the house completely––but I like my space, I loved living alone, and I wasn’t ready to let go of the place just yet.

  None of those sentiments helped me to buy the shopping, however, nor update my wardrobe or put fuel in my car. That required money, and with my working life already balanced around the fact I was earning as much as I could from the hours available at the pub, something would have to give. I would either have to radically change my hours, which would affect my college studies, spend less, or earn some more money. My education had to stay, and by that point, I was living on minimal expenses already. There wasn’t much more I could go without, and with winter approa
ching, if anything, I knew bills would rise.

  So, I had to earn more money.

  At the pub, I had already moved from the kitchens––where I sometimes waited tables as well––to working behind the bar, having turned eighteen the other week. I didn’t let on to anyone, besides my boss, that I was now an adult. Working behind the bar had enabled me to earn a little more, though it was still not enough.

  I was still pondering what options I had before me when something presented itself. In the bright light of day, I would have run a mile right away, especially given the man I knew him to be. But this wasn’t the bright light of day. I was in darkness, it was winter, and I didn’t think I had any viable options in front of me that would work around my current life. Clive Banks was to show me I did, at least, have one opportunity.

  Millie had not come over to the pub as regularly as she had in the past, and not since they both started at college. Penny still had to work and needed the income, so she had no choice, but seeing as Millie was with her friend during the day now, she didn’t see the need to spend the weekends hanging around a crowd of people which had already affected her significantly.

  Clive was in the corner, though must have come to the bar at least a half-dozen times as Penny served drinks. Most times he was buying them for his friends, the circle a huddle she knew well, though there were always people of whom she wasn't acquainted with joining him, mostly men. Clive was a man with connections everywhere, it seemed. He certainly had a reputation.

  “You alright?” he asked Penny, taking a little longer this time getting out his wallet. They’d not been speaking as much as they used to. Millie had not been in for months.

  “Yes, I’m fine. A little tired, that’s all.”

  “I’ve probably got something that’ll help you there.” She was sure he did. Drugs and Clive Banks seemed to be synonymous with one another. Thankfully the landlord had overheard the end of the conversation and, coming out from behind the bar so that he was next to Clive, could be heard speaking firmly into the younger man's ear.