The sun was setting when he drove her home. She thought about what it would be like to keep driving. They could drive until they were a long way Philadelphia, a long way from fourteen and seventeen, a long way from their families, a long way from home.
“I don’t want it to be over,” she whispered as they neared her house. “When will I see you again?”
“I have to go away for a while.”
“What does that mean?”
He didn’t want to look at her so he stared out the windshield. His car idled beside the curb two houses down from hers. She didn’t know if she was supposed to get out here but she wouldn’t, not until he told her to get out. She didn’t care if it made her look stupid. She didn’t know when she would see him again. He wouldn’t be back to school in September. He was going away for a while. She knew stepping out of his car now would entail stepping out of his life, maybe forever.
He took a deep breath and put his foot to the gas.
She was afraid as his tires smoked over the pavement in front of her house. She swallowed nervously and wondered if he was mad, if she should have got out when she could have. They left her house behind and rocketed down the door at breakneck speed, right through a set of red lights.
“What are you doing?” she yelled clutching her skirt in her wiry fists. “Tommy! Slow down!”
He did, but only because he had reached the destination he set out to find.
Tommy stopped in the parking lot of the park where they had come that first day, his fifteenth birthday.
He looked at her now, acknowledging how she had changed. She wasn’t a child anymore but she still had so much innocence. She looked scared. He almost wished he hadn’t driven so recklessly. Yet he liked this glimpse of fear. It made him feel like he could protect her even if just from himself. Rick’s girlfriend wouldn’t be afraid; she was too brazen to fear anything. Penny wasn’t like her; Penny wasn’t like anyone he knew. He didn’t want anyone he knew to even meet her, corrupt her, scare her away. He wanted to keep his family and Penny separate lives. Though he had never met his mother he felt in his heart that she would love Penny.
Tommy noticed Penny’s pale white hands still clutching her skirt. Her nervous smile was endearing and though she was taller now and grown into her features a little more, she still had the face of a child. Her soft hair was curled in perfect ringlets tied in a neat ponytail. Her face glowed. She was an angel. A moment ago he didn’t want to look at her, now he didn’t want to look away.
He could feel the weight of his stare weighing on her. He asked if she wanted to go for a walk. The sun set and they ate ice cream and they walked. They didn’t hold hands, they just walked. When they reached the end of the park they turned and walked back – it was ending, their time was fading fast.
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