"Actually, I have no idea what I'm doing when I'm acting, I just read the words off the page," Penny confessed to me, as we were sitting in the Pirate Palace, where her best friend, Sophie, was a hostess. She was nursing a vanilla milkshake, and I had a full meal of a cheeseburger and a side of fries in front of me that I hadn't even touched yet, because I was so engrossed in the conversation.

"That's my girl," I told her admiringly.

"It's so cute whenever you say that," she giggled. "Actually, one time I was talking, and I realized in the middle that I was just talking to hear myself speak. Like, I love the sound of my own speaking voice. And I thought to myself, 'oh no, this is not good.'"

"Oh, I did that today! And thank you."

"You really like the sound of your own voice? Because that's such a cliche, but it's true for me."

"I love the sound of my own voice. But I heard I sound aggravating. And I called you my girl in my head sometimes, but it won't come out."

"Some guy at Starbucks told me that my voice gave him a headache, and I told him, 'you and me both, kid.'"

"I like your voice! If I didn't I'd tell you to shut up in drama and chem."

"I wish Mrs. Kipling felt the same way."

"I thought she was going to fight you in class today. She's going to shush you before you go to sleep and you're going to think it's a shadow in the corner of your room, but nope, it's Mrs. Kipling." She laughed so hard she almost choked on her drink, and she had to collect herself before she responded.

"This is turning into the plot of a great horror movie."

"We could make it together. If we were together, which, from past news, I don't know if we ever will be."

"Stop being melodramatic, Cal! I told you that was okay."

"After a day. And I'm sorry, but I can't stop. That's my main characteristic."

"Yeah, it took me a day to realize I was being stupid about it."

"Okay," I said, and laughed, even though it wasn't funny, because I still felt bad. I had called up Jose, after our argument last night, freaking out. "I fucked it up," I told him. "I fucked everything up so bad, and now I can't fix it." I think Jose had talked to Penny for me, though, because her entire demeanor had changed. She never acted like she liked me so much. I decided not to question it, though. Instead, I would just appreciate it, since I didn't know when her feelings about me were going to change. "Do you ever pay attention in chem? Because sometimes you look so zoned out everytime, and you make a face that's hilarious. Like, a never-ending stare."

"That must be my paying attention face, because I do pay attention. What does it look liek?"

"Next time I'll take a picture and show you."

"Shut up! Stop pointing out all of my flaws. Maybe you should pay attention to Mrs. Kipling instead of me."

"I'm sorry, you're cuter and better than her."

"Well apparently I'm not, because apparently I make dumb faces when I'm trying to get an education."

"They're cute. I laugh because it's cute," I assured her.

"Whenever I'm making those face, is that when you say, 'that's my girl', to yourself in your head?"

"No, I think, 'does she know I can see her ridiculous faces?' Or, 'wow, does she know what's going on?' But I did think that two times today."

"Now you have to tell me the two times!"

"The first was when you told Charlotte you didn't care, when she got mad at us for talking in rehearsal, and you were sassy after. the other time was when you got the answer wrong."

"No, those are terrible times to think that! And I ruined what I said to Charlotte by passionately adding 'geezum' at the end."

"No, beautiful, it was perfect."

"I could deliver the Gettysburg Address or the I Have a Dream speech or something, and ruin it by passionately adding geezum at the end. And, that's my new favorite thing, next to that's my girl."

"What? Beautiful?"

"Yes!"

"The beautiful thing was random for me."

"I guess you just couldn't help yourself?"

"Nope!"

"I tend to have that effect on people."

"Geezum, beautiful, why do you have to have that effect?" Then she kicked me playfully under the table, and we laughed hard enough to ellicit glares from an older couple in the booth across from us.

"Did you ever do the sub work?"

"Sub work?"

"You know, for drama class. The class that we had a sub in?"

"Oh, where we had to write a monologue? Yeah, I did that."

"Frick, I am so screwed."

"I'll do it for you, if you want."

"I'm not going to make you do that."

"Just freaking send me a picture of it later and I'll do it, that's what a guy should do for his girl." I always watched my language in front of Penny, because even though I usually swore with my friends, I didn't want to swear in front of her.

"Yeah, but a girl shouldn't make her guy do that so I'm not going to. But thanks for the offer!"

"But here's the thing.... you're not making me do it. I'm offering to do it because I like you."

"Fine, well then, I'm not going to let you do it."

"Okay, good, then send me a picture of it."

"No, for real, I don't want to take advantage of your kindness. So I will get it done on my own, don't worry about it."

"Ugh, fine."

"Sorry, I know you were just dying to do it."

"I was. I want to help you. Hey, do you want to play 20 questions to get to know each other? I promise nothing will happen that was like last time."

"Okay, sure! And I told you, I don't care! But whatever."

"I know, but it was kind of quick to know that about me."

"I won't argue with that."

"Okay, so who's going to go first?"

"You can! I hate thinking of questions."

"Umm," I thought about it for a moment, trying to keep it as non sexual as possible, so she would form a different opinion of me. "What's your favorite color?" That seemed safe.

"I don't really have one. If I had to choose, I'd choose blue. And I see you're bad at questions too, so this will be okay. When's your birthday?"

"June 17th."

"Oh, you're younger than me. That's embarrassing."

"When's your birthday?"

"December 25th."

"You're kidding!"

"Nope."

"That's awesome."

"Not really. I used to love it when I was a little kid, but it kind of sucks now. I never get to spend my birthday with my friends. What's your next question?"

"Um, okay, let me think. What's your favorite genre of movies?"

"I like girly movies. Or comedies."

"Like chick flicks?"

"Yes, exactly. I admit that I have terrible taste in movies, though."

"Is it weird that I love chick-flicks?"

"Yes. Just kidding, they're great, so I can see why you would. You can hold a conversation with Sophie about Vampire Diaries, though, so I'm not surprised."

"Is that a challenge for some people?"

"It's just that she always tries to talk to me about it and I tell her I have no idea what she's saying but she still insists on talking about it for two hours."

"It's a great show. I'll make you watch it."

"Okay, I'm looking forward to it!"

"I like your friends. So I may hang out by you guys instead of Ricky and all them, if that's okay with you."

"No, my friends are the worst. They're loud and horrible and they would probably tell you bad things about me."

"They are very loud and horrible, but I love it."

"I love how you're so willing to ditch your friends right now."

"Well, the only one I actually like is Ricky, but sometimes I get these urges to hit Dylan and Griffin in the face."

"Ricky seems like a funny person! Who's your favorite and least favorite one of my friends?"

"My favorite is Garrett, he's actually one of my favorite people at the Academy. And my least favorite is Jose, no offense to him." She laughed and said,

"You're right, he's lame. And he's your favorite besides me, right?"

"Yes, that's why I said one of my favorite people."

"Okay," she said, "so I thought of a compliment for you earlier. Do you want to hear it?"

"Yes, of course. Flatter me!"

"Whenever you talk about something that you think is funny or that you're excited about, your eyes light up so much, and it's really cute."

"You've succeeded in flattering me. I appreciate that. Did I compliment your laugh and facial expressions and actions when you laugh?"

"No, you didn't, but all I do when I laugh is bark and rock back and forth."

"It's a lot more expressive than that, so I guess you don't notice what you do."

"I have no clue."

"Would you like for me to inform you, then?"

"Please do!"

"Okay, so you have two different laughs, at least that I've noticed. 1 laugh style your eyes will light up and you won't blink at all, and you literally have the cutest smile, and it's like a big smile. And then the 2nd laugh style, you will make sporadic movements. It's precious to see you laugh not because I'm making fun of you, but because it's so cute to watch. So yeah, there's my compliment of the day."

"We should make this a daily thing, because you're an expert at it!"

"It's fine with me, because I find something new everyday."

"Oh my gosh," she said, and then just smiled at me for a long moment. "Tell me something that happened when you were nine."

"What?" Penny was always surprising me, but that statement took me aback in a very particular way, considering Tucker had died when I was nine years old.

"I don't know. I just like that question. I think whatever memory a person comes up with, that happened when they were nine says a lot. Nine is a very telling year."

"Nothing that interesting happened to me when I was nine." I wasn't avoiding the subject; I wanted to tell her about Tucker sometime, but not in that moment, not in the diner, when we were having a nice time that I wasn't prepared to ruin. "When I was twelve, I made an anti-bucket list," I divulged, providing her with enough interesting backstory to distract from the original question.

"An anti bucket list? Like, the opposite of a bucket list, I'm assuming?"

"Yeah, that's exactly what it was. It was a list of things I never wanted to do."

"What was on it?"

"The first thing was skydiving. I'm afraid of heights. I wouldn't jump out of a plane, not even if it was the only way to save my life, much less for fun."

"I couldn't agree more. People who want to go skydiving scare me. I went parasailing once, on my birthday, in the Bahamas."

"You mean, on Chirstmas day?"

"Yeah, it was my favorite birthday because we weren't in the states, and I didn't have cell phone service. I didn't have to worry about who was or who wasn't telling me happy birthday all day. That alone would've been relaxing enough, but I was also parasailing, and I was also in the Bahamas, so it was absolutely perfect." Heather used to say she wanted to go skydiving. It was one of the many differences between us. Her aunt had agreed to take her, when she was old enough. You had to be either eighteen or twenty-one, I had forgotten, but she talked about it all the time. "What else was on it?"

"A bunch of stuff I've already done."

"Like what?" I tried to something that was safe, that would perpetuate the upbeat nature of the conversation.

"Go to Cleveland."

"Cleveland does seem pretty miserable," she agreed. "When did you go?"

"For my dad's cousin's funeral last year. I didn't even know he lived there, or that he existed, until he died. But Jacob and I took a week off of school to go. I begged to stay with Rowan, but my dad made me. I don't even remember that much about the trip. I think I tried to block it out. There were a lot of factories, though. And a lot of smoke. And garbage. And a lot of homeless people."

"That doesn't even sound like Cleveland," she said, and then laughed. "That sounds like Detroit. Or how someone who's never been to Cleveland before would imagine it."

"I swear, it's even worse than they say it is." She ripped a pile of napkins out of the dispenser, and then began separating them individually. "What are you doing?"

"I want to make an anti-bucket list. It sounds like fun."

"Don't do it," I warned her. "It'll jinx you."

"That's ridiculous, Cal. And melodramatic," but her eyes were sparkling, like she was about to burst out laughing.

"I thought of another compliment. Whenever you're messing with me, your eyes light up. And it makes me not care so much that you're messing me."

"Thank you, I appreciate that," she said, because that was the phrase we always used to accept each other's compliments. It was very cordial, but seemed appropriate for our relationship. "You know what? I never want to go to Cleveland, either. I think that's going to be the first thing on the list."

"You'll have been there by this time next year," I guaranteed her. "You'll probably be living there. Some disaster will strike and Cleveland will be the only inhabitable place left on earth."

"This sounds like the plot of another horror movie, Cal. You're just coming up with these left and right."

"No, it's the same horror movie. You're living in Cleveland, sharing a room with Mrs. Kipling, who whispers the elements on the periodic table to you in the middle of the night." She shuddered, and said,

"Please stop. I'm going to have nightmares." I saw her write the number two on the napkin, and then she scribbled something in a messy cursive-print hybrid. I noticed that when writing the letter "S", she drew it from the bottom to the top, which was unusual.

"What did you just write?"

"Make one of Cal's movie ideas become a reality. Now come on, you think of something. It can be our bucket list. I mean, anti bucket list. How about we agree to never break each others' hearts then?"

"Maybe you should just agree to never break my heart. We both know that's more likely."

"That's not true."

"Yes, it is. I'm never letting you go, Penny. Not unless you want to go, that is."

"Melodramatic, melodramatic, melodramatic," but she was writing, and when she was finished, I turned the napkin in my direction. At the top it said, "Cal & Penny's Anti Bucket List," and number three was, "Cal & Penny will never break each others' hearts."

"You jinxed it. Now you're going to break my heart, if you weren't going to already."

"Okay, David Calvin, you've kept me out long enough. It's 6, and I have a history test to study for tomorrow." She was in AP history, since history was her favorite subject.

"I'm sorry! Well, don't let me keep you. You go. I'll take care of the check. Happy studying, Penny... what's your middle name?"

"Avigail."

"Abigail?"

"No, Avigail. It's a Jewish thing. Don't worry about it."

"Okay, then, happy studying, Penny Avigail. I'll see you tomorrow."

The End