The Vanishing Pennies

Elodie:

Chicago is clear as a bell. The river is doing its coin trick, and the bridges wink like old vaudeville. Thomas opens Car B with a flourish, and the taped star on our window holds its crease like a superstition that learned to sit.

We detour to the kiosk for coffee because ritual likes to be seen. He's already there, with his thermos and sketchbook. His hair lost one curl to steam and pretends not to miss it.

"Morning."

"Morning." My tote taps my hip—key charm on red ribbon, polite heartbeat.

He orders plain coffee, no sugar. I'm indecisive. The cashier names a number, and he does something new: he counts change into her hand like a tiny story—quarter, dime, nickel, two pennies—exact, no leftovers, no tray.

"Playing it precisely?" I ask, amused.

"Saving the good luck for later," he says, mouth crooked. "If the pennies vanish from the dish, I want it to be on purpose."

He slides two fingers over the battered leave-a-penny/take-a-penny tray, like he's smoothing a cowlick on the day. Then he adds a single bright copper—face up—and writes later on the napkin with his bad penmanship, circles the word, and tucks the napkin in my bag like a dare.

Naya appears behind us, her case and bravery in hand. "Morning economy?" she asks.

"Exact change," he tells her. "For days you plan to keep."

She lifts her bow like a salute and plays two upward notes that belong to everyone now. We board the train with our cups and the red-penciled oath sitting where the star lives: No half-truths about feelings. The little red underline we hung days ago trembles with the car.

We take our seats, and he tears a thin strip and arches it between our knees. Paper bridge, liturgy.

"Small futures?" I ask.

"Returned a library book on time," he says, glancing at his watch with that quick, private habit he hates, and then tucks it away. "Labeled the mail slots on our floor so couriers can stop auditioning. And I put my found pennies in a jar I named 'Later.' Not for spending. For...when we need a lucky weight."

"Dangerous," I say, warmed. "I wrote Monica at the museum—muffin deliveries to school tours continue. The sabotage is ongoing. And I moved Sketch #47 so it can spy on more sky. Zofia said the plant looks less tidy in the soul; I accepted the blessing in its native gruff."

He smiles—careful, then true. "Good."

We work. I parent a chapter that's been dodging sincerity and force it to hold still. He draws the kiosk tray, two pennies missing, one bright copper left like a promise. In the corner, he writes: later.

Harrow glides by. He doesn't move. My ribs unhook.

At Marigold, his watch flickers again. He reads it, swallows something, and folds the motion into a grin. "Client run," he says. "I have to hop."

"Feeling?" I remind him.

He breathes out. "I want to stay. Fact: I can't." A beat. "Feeling: I'll be sore about it all morning."

"Held," I say. "Go. I'll bully commas in your honor."

He stands with the car's choreography, steadies my stack with two fingers—ritual, vow. His sleeve brushes my wrist like a secular amen. He leans close enough to warm my cheekbone without writing a scandal. "Later," he says softly, and the word feels heavier than two pennies.

"Later," I echo, and he's gone, and I'm fine, and then I'm less fine than I want to be.

Thomas rolls by with his punch, clocks the empty diagonal seat, and lowers his voice like a chorus that knows when to hum. "Announcements," he says mildly. "Exact change is in effect. Related: missing is permitted; lament is allowed."

"I'm fine," I say, too quickly for anyone who knows mornings.

He taps the taped star. "Car B recognizes grief in the key of minor. It pairs well with pastry."

The aunties pretend not to listen by arguing about yarn weights. Naya plays something small and brave and climbs a scale like a staircase that forgives your knees. And I reread the same paragraph twice, retaining only the punctuation.

That night, the penny from the kiosk tray appears in my coat pocket, where no one could have tucked it in earlier but me. I put it on the counter next to my key charm and red thread, and labeled the spot with a sticky: Later. I don't move it. Superstition is a language; I'm learning it like a second.

***

He misses the next morning.

My body does an immediate, humiliating inventory: sleeves not present, grin not performing, thermos with two dents unaccounted for. The diagonal seat sits like a witness.

Thomas stamps my pass and doesn't make a show. "Client run?" he asks, neutral as a park bench.

"Probably." My mouth tries to pretend I'm not searching the car, but my eyes file an appeal and win.

The aunties annex a bench and guard a paper bag with state-level secrecy. Naya perches on her case and plucks a phrase that sounds like 'hold /let'. I take our window anyway and tuck the paper bridge into the rubber seam myself. It holds, though it shakes as if privately insulted by absence.

My phone buzzes at Harrow.

Sketchbook: Report: client run ate the entire morning. Fact. Feeling: I hate missing the chapel. Training continues. Later?
Me: Fact: you missed the star. Feeling: I'm annoyed at the air for not being you. Later.

Thomas appears with something approximating a pastry and not enough solemnity. "If anyone asks," he says, dropping a cinnamon knot into my palm, "this is pastoral care."

"Filed," I tell him, voice aiming for light.

He taps the star, then the paper bridge I set alone. "Infrastructure remains," he says. "We learned that already."

On my lunch break, I write a note to my author: Let absence be a scene. Make the room feel the shape of who isn't in it without punishing anyone. Then show the small economies that keep the day upright. I don't attach anything. She'll understand the shadows.

I go home and find myself counting stupid things: stairs to my walk-up, holes in the colander, the heart-shaped leaves on the pothos, which has produced another. I label it stay because I'm an adult with a label maker and a crush.

***

He misses the next morning, too.

The car knows before I admit it. The diagonal seat holds its phantom. The taped star learns to keep its own halo.

Thomas stamps my pass with priestly mercy. "Double client," he says, just enough question left at the end to be kind.

"Apparently." There's an edge under my tongue I don't like. Missing is allowed; suspicion is a bad hobby. I push my red pencil into doing its job.

Naya glances toward the door every time it opens—a habit learned from adults; I feel correctly chastened. The aunties knit justice. The seat-hog lawyer attempts to colonize an armrest and is quietly stabbed with a sharp jab of hospitality.

Harrow passes. I hate how much my body waits.

My phone buzzes.

Sketchbook: Fact: Client run #2. Feeling: this part...hurts. I'm saving pennies. Later, later, later.

Me: Fact: Two mornings is statistically rude. Feeling: I miss you in a dumb, inconvenient way. Later.

He sends a photo: the Later jar on his kitchen counter. Two pennies, one dime, a paper bridge folded and tucked as a label. My heart does a small, disobedient thing.

I put my own penny on the sill below the taped star and wrote, 'For later' on a sticky note. Thomas sees, nods once like a man who has presided over stranger altars.

Work is a fight. Every line wants to dress up as competence; my job is to take its makeup off. Stop pretending the interior is a hallway, I write to my author. Put a chair in it. Sit.

I step off at my stop, already missing the stairs I've walked six thousand times. I buy stamps I don't need. Zofia sells me one tulip with a sigh that translates to, 'Fine, you're sentimental.' I put the tulip in the chipped juice glass where Sketch #47 can see it, and the plant can judge me.

The key on the red ribbon taps my tote when I set it down—yes, yes, yes, a tiny greedy bell.

At 9:18 p.m., my phone lights up.

Sketchbook: Report: Day ended. Feeling: I hate this much absence. Fact: I'll make the morning if the world cooperates.

Me: Feeling: I want to see you. Fact: the parish has sugar and opinions.

Sketchbook: Saving luck. Later.

Me: Later.

I put his napkin—later—under the whale magnet with Someday, Almost, Again, Ten, the yes. The wall is starting to look like a conspiracy I'm willing to join.

***

Third morning. I'm braced and also foolish.

He's there.

He's early, even. He looks thinner by an idea, or I'm inventing thinness because fear is rude. The grin starts carefully, then remembers how to live. He clocks my face, the taped star, the penny on the sill below it, and the tiny second cup waiting—the spare lid he always pours into for me.

"Later," he says, by way of both hello and apology. "I brought change."

He opens his palm. Pennies. Dimes. A quarter. He counts exact change for two coffees into the cashier's hand and adds a penny to the tray. Doesn't take one. "Saving the good luck for later," he repeats, softer, like the sentence has work to do.

We take our seats; the bridge goes up; the car exhales.

"Feeling," he says, first, honoring the oath. "I missed you, and it made the morning stupid."

"Feeling," I answer, because we made a church out of this. "I wanted to be mad at you for leaving and couldn't make it stick."

"Fact," he adds quietly. "Clients. Two in a row. Training that's not interesting on paper. I'm—" He stops himself.

"Feelings only," I remind us.

He nods, grateful for his own rule.

Thomas drifts by, senses the returned oxygen, and hums an announcement to the star. "Parish notes: late arrivals may be met with public relief. Exact change economy continues. If you love a person, steady their pages."

He laughs into his wrist and lays two fingers on my stack exactly where he always does.

We work. He sketches the tray again, but this time he adds my penny on the sill under the star. In the corner: shared later. He flips it, writes Stet in tiny print like he's learned how to invoke my magic.

"Small futures audit?" I ask.

"Bought a dollar's worth of luck," he says, smiling. "Returned a lost glove to a bench like a ceremony. Labeled my tea tins Mercy and Nerve again to remind my morning how to behave."

"I told my author to let absence stand without dressing it as punishment," I say. "And I wrote 'later' on a napkin and didn't ask it to act like 'now' until it was ready."

"Look at us," he says. "Fluent."

Harrow passes; he doesn't move. My spine, traitorous and loyal, unhooks.

At Marigold, he checks the watch, then puts his hand over it, as an adult would close a book. He stays a stop longer without saying anything about it. When he does stand, he steadies my pages with two fingers; his sleeve kisses the inside of my wrist, and the key on my tote taps once like agreement.

"Later," he says again, but this time it's a date, not a dodge.

"Later," I answer, and mean I'm saving the luck he left in my pocket; I'm hoarding it for a room made of glass; I'm not going anywhere.

He goes, and the penny on the sill catches light and pretends to be a planet.

At my desk, I send my author a note: Let your lovers build a jar called Later and fill it with small proofs. Two mornings of absence can be a chapter. The reunion can be exact change. I add, Title holds. After the Door Opens. I add, Stet.

That night, I tip my own Later dish into a jar: three pennies, one dime, a paper bridge, a torn corner that says 'yes', and a square of red thread I couldn't throw away. I label the jar with a star sticky note: Lantern fund (luck, not money). I laugh at myself and mean every word.

When I turn off the kitchen light, Sketch #47 catches the last of it and holds. The room insists on it. I let it. And in the dark I count something gentle—not time, not distance—just a small inventory of lucky weights, set aside for when "later" finally knocks.

I hope you enjoyed the chapter!! 🤞🤞