"Jose told me that your mom yelled at you, whenever you got home last night. He said he was scared to leave you alone," Penny told me, after play rehearsal on a Saturday. We were the only two upperclassmen in the cast who didn't drive, so we were sitting out front on the benches, waiting for our rides. We both told our parents that rehearsal ended an hour and a half later than it really did, giving ourselves more time to talk. We hardly had any time during play practice. Mrs. Tsegaye had me running lines with Charlotte, who played the mom in the show. I spent more time with Charlotte during those three weeks then I ever cared to for the rest of my life, but I appreciated the advice she gave me advice on Penny.

"I'm afraid I'm going to do something stupid and she's going to stop liking me," I confessed.

"Then don't do anything stupid." She may've been insufferable, but she gave excellent advice.

"Yes, that's true, she even slapped me," I said to Penny, answering her earlier question.

"No, why?"

"Because I kept her waiting for me. There's so much you don't know about me, it's crazy. But I don't mind telling you if you want to know, because you know I'm so interesting."

"Yeah, sure, go ahead and tell me your life story."

"Are you serious? You really want to know?"

"Yes I am serious! Why would I not want to hear interesting things?"

"Hey, if I tell you things about myself, will I find out things about you?"

"I mean, you can, but I'm not that interesting. I'm pretty much an open book."

"I'm interested in you because I like you!" I insisted. "I'm not that interesting."

"If it's about you then I'm interested."

"Then you're interested in a boring person."

"Well, sorry, you're just going to have to deal with it!"

"Okay, I will."

"Good. So you're really not going to tell me anything else about yourself?"

"You really want to know, don't you?

"Well, I said you didn't have to tell me, and you don't, but now you have me curious."

"Tell me what you want me to know, and I'll be honest and say the answer."

"Well I don't know what kind of questions to ask!"

"I don't know know how to start or what to start with."

"Just start from the beginning!" She told me. "Has anyone ever told you you're a very melodramatic person?"

"Are you calling me emotional and dramatic?"

"Not emotional, just dramatic. It's not a bad thing, it's just a fact," she said, and then she laughed.

"My brother calls me that all the time and acts like it's bad so I can only assume it's bad."

"No, take it as a compliment. It can be my compliment of the night." She was referencing our tradition of complimenting each other, every night before we went to bed. It started off as an accident. I always had something to tell her that I loved about her, something that I hadn't told her yet.

"Okay, well thank you. I don't know what mine will be. What have I complimented so far?"

"Oh, it's okay you don't actually have to do one right now I was just kidding."

"No, I'll compliment you whenever I think of something I love about you."

"I don't think there's anything left, honestly. You went through it all. But stop trying to change the subject. You didn't start telling me about yourself!"

"Darn it," I said, and laughed.

"Yeah, you won't get out that easily."

"Ugh, fine. I'll start it with I'm adopted. That's pretty much the first thing I tell everyone about myself."

"I know, Cal," she laughed. "I already knew that. You talk about it all the time. But see! That's interesting."

"I was adopted because my dad ran out on my mom, and my mom was a drug user. My dad was abusive, before he left. To me and to her. There was a long court process to get my out of her custody, but I was adopted when I was two, so I don't remember anything." Her entire demeanor changed when I told her that bit of information; her eyes, which had been lit up with excitement, were fading along with the rest of her face.

"Wow, Cal, I don't even know what to say, except I'm sorry you had to go through that." I shrugged, like I didn't care, even though it was one of the most significant parts of my life. Penny couldn't understand something like family issues, not when her home life was so perfect. Well, perfect was a strong word, for anybody, but hers was fairly close. I doubted their problems extended far beyond where to go on the family vacation. She was a middle class, private school, Jewish girl, through and through.

"Like I said, I don't remember anything about it. I wonder a lot about my biological parents, though. Not my dad so much. I don't think I would ever want to meet a man who abused his wife. Not that I want to meet my mom, either, I just wonder what her deal is. I wonder what about me is like her, and what about me is like him. Like, where do I get my music from? Where did I get my blue eyes from?"

"You don't want to meet them, though?"

"My dad didn't want to meet me. My mom was crazy. So no, I don't want to meet either of them. Jacob can't believe it. He already booked a flight to Africa for his eighteenth birthday. That's when his adoption records stop being sealed. Mine aren't. I could find them anytime. But his parents gave him up because they already had seven children, and they wanted to give him a better life. His parents were so incredibly selfless. He has all these siblings he wants to meet. Real siblings. My parents had to give me up, or at least my mom did, because they were the opposite. They were so selfish, and they only thought about themselves. You know why the court case took so long? Because my mom didn't want to give me up. She knew she couldn't raise me, she knew I would have a better life somewhere else, and she was trying to stand in the way of that."

"You're a real sibling, Cal. I don't know Jacob as well as you do, obviously, but I can tell he's never thought of you as anything less than his brother. And he grew up with you. Nothing's ever going to change that."

"I'm sorry, this isn't even the important part." I looked up and smiled at her, trying to bring the conversation back to its lighthearted roots. She didn't smile back. I could tell that she was still absorbing everything I had just told her. That's why it was easier, with Meredith. Meredith wasn't surprised by anything. She had done and seen it all. I wondered how she moved on from one relationship to the next, and it never phased her, but then she told me her mom died, on Christmas day, when she was twelve years old. Then, I understood, because Jacob was right about one thing: circumstances change a person. "Do you want to know more?"

"Heck yeah I do," she grinned. "Bring it on."

"Well, I'm very bad, or at least I used to be."

"What does that even mean?" She laughed.

"Garrett would know exactly what I mean."

"I'm not Garrett, so I guess you're going to have to explain it to me."

"Okay, well, let's just say that because of some things I've done in the past, I'm not something anymore." She didn't respond for a moment, and then just said,

"Oh."

"Is that a problem?"

"No, I mean- I don't know. I'm just a little disappointed, I guess. I probably shouldn't be. It's just that, you always talk about your old girlfriends, and you've obviously done a lot of stuff with them, and I have, like, negative 2 experience. It's intimidating."

"You make me sound like a tool, but truthfully I care more than that. I like you because you're very gorgeous, and extremely cute with like, what you do and how you act. You're very funny, and hearing what you have to say just makes me smile. And I don't know, I love a lot about you. Plus experience has nothing to do with anything. It's not like I look for that. And I love the fact that you said 'negative 2 experience.'" She didn't make eye contact with me while I was talking, or when she answered,

"Okay. So, keep going."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes. If there's more, keep going. Do you expect me to have sex with you?"

"Sex isn't really something I ever asked for. It just kind of happened. Like yeah, I've sex before, and it's always been apart of my relationships, but I wouldn't care if I had to wait eight months just to kiss you, because I really like you." And at time, I swear, I meant it. She seemed to like my answer. "And yeah, there is more. I mean, are you sure you want to hear it, though?"

"Yes, Cal, I want to know everything about you. The good and the bad."

"Well, like I said, I used to be a bad kid, and I used to hang around people who influenced me to do bad things. And so I've been arrested before, for drugs, for stealing, and for vandalism. I got a probation officer in eighth grade. So that's my life, and that's the world I live in. And I don't want to anymore, because you're better than them. I mean, the people who got me into that kind of stuff. At first I didn't want to have things change, but now I want to change because I want you."

"You have to want to change for yourself," she said.

"That's not what I mean- I mean, I do want to change. But you inspired me to change, and now I realize that's really what I want. So does that make things different? Because I don't want to ruin anything, especially not with you."

"I mean, you can't do anything about it now."

"I could build a time machine and slap my past self, then run away so I don't ruin my future self."

"That could work."

"Yeah, totally."

"Except not."

"Yeah, I know, unfortunately. I don't want to ruin anything if I haven't already. I'm not still like that, I promise."

"It's fine. Can we actually just not talk about it anymore?" She was visibly getting upset, but since it was because of me, I didn't know what to say to make it better.

"Yes, of course. I'm sorry."

"Okay, thanks."

"No problem. So how was Sophie's party?"

"It was fun. It was kind of awkward, though, because it was like a bunch of people from different friend groups at school. It was like everyone sent a representative."

"Seems reasonable," I said, and then a black honda pulled up in the carpool line.

"I have to go," she said. I started to stand up, but she started walking away before I could do anything.

"Goodbye," I said. "Should I call you later?"

"Um, probably not," she told me. "I just need a little while."

"It's fine."

"I hope so, because I can't go back and change it." Then she smiled, and said, "Wow, just kidding. Too soon?"

"No, it's okay, that was a good one. I'll see you later. Bye, Penny."

"Bye, Cal." All I could think about was the things I hadn't told her, and the things I couldn't tell her, if I wanted the relationship to work.