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Page 25 of The Chemistry Test

Penny

The university bubble people talk about is so real. I’ve been messaging Mum and Delilah a bit since I got here, but nowhere near as much as I expected. And I really want to change that.

I feel like I’ve been sucked into a whole new world and there aren’t enough hours in a day for me to live in this one and my old one too.

I’m either in classes, doing something with Amy and Ro, or resting.

And it’s not just me who’s feeling it, either.

Even without the aggressive rest, Amy feels the same way.

So, from now on, we’re going to try calling home at a set time each week to keep the FOMO to a minimum – if that’s even possible here.

That way, literally everyone wins. Even Ro, who’s not big on phone calls, can join the Fashion Society he’s not-so-secretly been itching to join since day one, while we’re calling home.

Tonight though, I’m finally biting the bullet and going home, even though it’s not our designated day. And while I will be missing out on whatever the dynamic duo get up to without me, I woke up with such a deep longing to go home that I don’t think I mind.

So, home it is. All it took was a phone call, and now Mum’s taking me and Delilah to Nan’s for a hug and a takeaway. No notice needed, just like old times. As in – just like five weeks ago.

Before I came here, Lilah and I visited her at least twice a week, and have done for basically our whole lives, since our grandad passed away the year we were born. And even though I can’t go twice a week anymore, I’m sure I can go, or even call, more often than I have been.

I find the photo of the three of us wearing Mexican hats at Chiquitos back in July last summer and set it as my home screen on my phone.

Cam’s messages are getting to me more than I thought they would, although I don’t think it’s necessarily a bad thing.

I’ll never regret making time for Nan, and I’m glad he’s made me realise that now, rather than later down the line.

But my heart still aches for him every time I think about how different our situations are – with my own nan ready and waiting just a ten-minute drive away. Always. While his gran is ... not.

I brush my hands over my arms to make the shivery feeling go away and turn on my fairy lights, ready to reply to him.

There’s enough people now that I can group them into themes, so I usually put him in the depression set, and I also usually leave him until last because, despite the nature of his messages, he’s the one that typically leaves me feeling the best afterwards.

I don’t know if it’s the little sign-offs he does, or how blatantly appreciative he is, but something about his messages, especially compared to some of the others, makes me feel good.

I get to work at whizzing through them once again.

It’s the last thing I have to do before my mum picks me up at six, and even though the sun is only just beginning to fade, I have a feeling it’ll be mostly dark by the time I’m done.

Now, finally at the last one, I clear the textbooks off my nightstand to make room for my hot chocolate, and begin to type.

Hi C(l)am,

That’s one shell of a story (Sorry, couldn’t help myself.) Honestly, though, I love that so much. I googled the shells and can confirm that they do indeed look like beds for fairies. I’ll never look at them the same way again.

Regarding not wanting to do things because you can’t tell your gran about them, I completely get it. And I’d like to tell you a little story of my own.

I started writing a book a few years ago and my friend said she couldn’t wait to read it.

What I didn’t know then was that was our last year together before we lost her unexpectedly.

I hadn’t made any progress on writing that book, and I felt like I’d let her down because I hadn’t finished it in time.

But deep down, I know it’s not really too late, because as long as I speak from my heart instead of my mouth, I have faith that she can hear me.

And so, part of me thinks she’ll hear my story another way. Maybe even straight from my mind as I’m writing it – that’s an absurd thought, isn’t it? But what’s even more absurd is that I really believe that.

And I feel the same way about your gran.

Her ears may not be able to listen anymore, but if you speak from your heart, she won’t need ears to hear you.

So, keep telling her about all the things she’d love to hear and bring her along for the ride, whenever you want to You can stop if it doesn’t feel right, but it might be worth a shot. Let me know what you think.

Yours cordially,

Someone Who Believes In You x

Mum opens the porch door without a key and as she steps inside, I catch a glimpse of the front door hanging wide open too – as if the house itself wants you to come in.

We take our shoes off on the grey padded bench by the stairs and I breathe in the lightly scented air – apple, cinnamon and something warm I can’t quite put my finger on.

It wouldn’t be Nan’s house without a candle burning somewhere.

In the kitchen, Lilah belts out a powerful rendition of ‘Halo’, dipping in and out of tune as she pleases. She’s sitting on the countertop that Nan stopped telling her to get down from long ago, and she squeals when she sees me.

‘Penny!’ She hops down immediately, squeezing me way too tight. ‘I’m so glad you’re back, we’ve all missed you so much,’ she says, walking me into the living room, where Nan is sitting with her latest knitting project on her lap.

She beams up at me when she sees me and takes my hand as I sit down next to her on the sofa.

‘We can’t let it go this long again, Penelope,’ she says, holding on to me as if I’ve been gone for years.

I look over at Mum as if to say, Can you believe this?

but even she looks a bit glassy-eyed. Honestly, from the way everyone’s acting you’d never know I’ve only been gone for a month.

And as I start recounting the last few weeks, the three of them practically glow.

‘I always knew you’d get there,’ Nan says, nudging me with a proud grin, and I know she means it. As rough as the last few years were, she never let me lose hope that things would improve one day. And now they finally have.

They all listen eagerly as I tell them about Amy, Ro and our Friday night adventures (tactfully leaving out the bit about Amy throwing up in the back of a taxi ... right into the sparkly clutch bag I borrowed from Delilah), but when I casually mention CJ, Lilah stops me.

‘Whoa, whoa, whoa, Penny! You can’t just casually drop that in,’ she says, when I recount the night of the wheelchair wheelies.

At the time, I figured they didn’t need to know about Café-gate or that monstrosity of a first meeting at the doctors’, so it’s the first they’re hearing about him.

‘I told you you’ve still got it.’ She winks, nudging my arm. ‘What does he look like? Is he hot?’

‘Lilah! It’s not like that!’

She tips her head back, laughing. ‘That’s a no then,’ she says. ‘But that’s okay still, looks aren’t important anyway.’

‘He is, actually,’ I say defensively, getting out my phone to find a photo I took of him and the kittens. I meant to delete it after I sent it to him, but it’s such a cute photo, I couldn’t bring myself to do it.

‘Oh, look at those precious little angels with him,’ Nan says, picking up her reading glasses, but before she can get a proper look, Delilah gasps.

‘No way ,’ she says, snatching the phone off me. And for a second, I feel oddly proud that she approves of the company I’ve been keeping. He is pretty hot.

But then she says, ‘That’s the boy from that HBO show in America!’

And the world falls away from underneath me. ‘It’s not, is it?’ I plead, my heart dropping. I don’t know his name, but I know who she’s talking about. He went to the other grammar school in our city, but everyone has heard of him.

‘Did you seriously not know?’ She turns to my mum. ‘How could she not know?’

‘You can’t know every celebrity, darling.’

Celebrity. Heck, even the word is making me nauseous right now. Mum continues, unaware of everything going through my mind.

‘Nan and I have heard of him too, but we don’t know what he looks like either, do we, Nanny?’

She shakes her head, and I can physically see the neurons in Delilah’s brain fighting the urge to say , Yeah, but that’s because you two are old.

Mum raises her eyebrows at her, smirking, daring her to say it.

‘And it’s not because we’re old,’ Nan tuts, finally catching on.

Mum takes the phone from Delilah and pushes her glasses on to her hair to get a better look at him.

She shrugs. ‘This is his debut show, so if you’ve not seen the show, you probably wouldn’t know who he was.

Even if you’ve heard of a show, you wouldn’t necessarily know if you saw someone from it.

’ She taps the screen to keep it awake, before passing it to Nan, who tries to zoom in on CJ but accidentally gets stuck on the kittens.

I lean over to help, but she taps my hand away, zooming in even further when she realises what’s going on with Callie. ‘That’s a story for another time,’ I murmur to her as Mum carries on, unaware.

‘Anyway, what’s that show I watched with Dad ...’ She clicks her fingers as it comes to her. ‘You’ve both heard of The Sopranos , haven’t you?’

Delilah nods, I’m too busy mentally spiralling to respond.

‘But you still wouldn’t recognise any debut actors or actresses from it if they walked past you in the street, because you haven’t seen them before. It’s just like that, Lilah.’

It makes sense. Too much sense. And this makes the whole thing with CJ so much worse. I can’t like someone like that. Not when my own life is so ... messy. I need her to be mistaken. He can’t be him.

‘Okay, fine,’ Delilah says, turning to me. ‘I thought you would’ve at least googled him at some point though. The rest of us did, back when we were in year eleven or something. When we first found out about it.’

In fairness to her, I kept meaning to google him back then too, I just never got around to it. But in fairness to myself, I didn’t get around to much that year with my health (or lack of) just starting to ramp up.

I wrack my brains, trying to think of all the conversations I heard about the show back then, right when the news first started to spread.

I know it’s a sci-fi sort of thing, but I can’t even remember the name of it.

My thoughts tumble out of my mouth before I’ve had a chance to process them. ‘What’s the show called?’

I need all the information. And I need it now.

‘I’m trying to picture the poster for it,’ Delilah says, gazing blindly at the candle on the coffee table. My eyes settle on the label ( cloves , that’s the scent I couldn’t pinpoint earlier) and we all wait for it to come to her. She’s the only one of us who would know something like this.

‘Oh! That’s it!’ she says suddenly, snapping back to life. ‘The Age of Artemisia.’

My phone is out and ready, so I search for it online the second it leaves her lips.

And sure enough, his face comes up as we scroll through the cast. It’s a photo from two years ago at a Comic Con panel, but it’s definitely him.

She follows the photo to the Wikipedia page for CJ Taylor and I draw my eyes away. This can’t be happening.

Mum catches my eye. ‘Penelope, he’s still just a person. And from the sounds of it, he already likes you,’ she says. ‘This doesn’t change anything.’

My mind flashes back to when I first got sick.

I told all my friends they didn’t have to be friends with me anymore as I didn’t feel like I could keep up with them.

They were meant to be going to concerts and festivals and I didn’t want me and my medical crap to hold them back.

So, I sat them down in a café and told them to just go and live their lives without me – at least until I had found my place in the world again.

My friends didn’t listen of course and continued to see me after school every day anyway, but I know it still broke Mum’s heart that I said that. Or more importantly, that I believed that.

Nan looks at her now, confused.

‘The boy is on a TV show in America, so Penny thinks she’s not exciting enough for him.

’ She shakes her head at me. ‘But she is so wrong,’ she says fiercely, her eyes boring into mine.

‘Your life may not be movie premieres and red carpets, Penelope, but spotlights aren’t the only way to shine. Don’t forget that.’