Chapter 2 - Weekend Era
Penelope didn’t plan on seeing Jack that Saturday.
She was already cranky about losing the parking battle to the stroller industrial complex, and the day had started with a text from her mom that just said:
“Do you remember that girl from swim team who broke her arm? The one you liked. She’s engaged now. To a lesbian!”
Which somehow felt equal parts supportive and threatening.
She was halfway through navigating the fluorescent labyrinth of the HomeGoods store–where time stops and every aisle smells faintly like genteel poverty–when she turned a corner and stopped in front of a full-wall crime scene.
Aggressively inspirational wall art. Faux plants. A throw pillow that said GATHER in a font she personally considered a hate crime. A sign that read, “LIVE LAUGH LOVE (IN THIS KITCHEN)” like a warning label.
“Absolutely not,” she muttered.
She pulled out her phone, snapped a photo, and sent it to Jack with no context.
[Penelope]
📸
Please send help I am trapped in House of Beige and Regret
He replied almost immediately.
[Jack]
Oh my god
Is that the downtown HomeGoods?
She frowned at the sign near the ceiling.
[Penelope]
Yeah
Why
[Jack]
Because I am ALSO currently in House of Beige and Regret
Different aisle
Same emotional state
She blinked, then huffed a laugh right there in front of the cursed typography.
[Penelope]
You’re kidding
[Jack]
Sadly no
I’m here for a housewarming gift and I almost bought a multipack of fall propaganda.
This is a cry for help
She looked down at the two bath mats in her cart–beige, joyless, compromising her soul.
[Penelope]
Okay so we’re both being held hostage by bad choices
Where are you
[Jack]
Near the candles
Smells like “Autumn Orchard Feelings” and bankruptcy
Come shame my decisions
She stared at the screen for a second longer than made sense, then shoved her phone back in her pocket and pushed her cart toward the next aisle.
[Penelope]
Fine
But if I catch you near anything that says “Farmhouse” I reserve the right to publicly shame you
[Jack]
Honestly if you didn’t I’d be disappointed
They met in the candle aisle.
He rolled up in a henley like he hadn’t just disrupted her weekend equilibrium, and immediately looked skeptical at the options in her cart.
“You’re telling me you’re voluntarily spending a Saturday choosing between these two shades of tan?” he asked.
“They’re mushroom and sand, thank you.”
He made a face. “I take it back. The patriarchy was right to keep women out of interior design.”
She smacked his arm with the bath mat. He didn’t even flinch.
They wandered the store for longer than either of them would have admitted to.
Penelope kept pointing out ridiculous oversized art pieces and asking if she should redo her entire apartment in “grumpy flamingos” or “abstract sadness.”
Jack was more decisive than she expected--about textures, not colors. He cared about how things felt, not how they looked. She filed that away.
At one point they took a wrong turn and somehow ended up back in the candle aisle.
Jack looked up at the wall of jars and serif fonts. “We’re trapped.”
“HomeGoods is a circle,” Penelope said. “Like Dante.”
Jack nodded gravely. “And this is the ninth ring. It smells like cinnamon and poor decisions.”
“I want to meet the candle naming department.” She said, “I have questions.”
Jack glanced at a label “Cozy Cabin Retreat. That’s just code for wood and debt.”
“Cashmere Woods,” Penelope deadpanned. “What does that even mean. That’s just two rich words in a trench coat.”
Jack drifted alongside her, close enough that their paths lined up. While he was still talking–like it didn’t even register as a decision–his fingers hooked the side rail of her cart and held on.
“Sweater Weather. Congrats, it smells like an itchy neck.”
Penelope felt the faint change immediately–the cart’s momentum taking him with it, rolling him steady down the aisle like it was the most normal thing in the world. Not pulling, not yanking. Just letting it do what it was already doing. Letting her do what she was already doing.
Penelope’s brain did a tiny, stupid static-pop.
She pretended not to notice. Of course she did. She kept talking, because if she stopped talking she might start thinking about the way his hand looked there–easy, controlled–how close his shoulder was to her arm, how their speed matched without effort.
“Okay,” she said, like her brain wasn’t quietly lighting up. “If I made a candle it would be called…Passive Aggressive Text From Your Mother.”
Jack snorted. “Top notes of lavender guilt. Base notes of ‘Are you sure you’re eating enough?’”
“Nailed it.”
He scanned the shelves, still casually attached to the cart. “Mine would be ‘Conference Room B, 4:57 p.m.’ Smells like cold coffee and regret.”
Penelope laughed, pushing them forward. They moved in sync–her pushing, him coasting beside her–like a casual little formation.
“Or,” she added, “Seasonal Depression (Limited Edition).”
Jack nodded. “Apples and influencers.”
“So what are you actually here for?” she asked, as if nothing had happened, as if her body hadn’t quietly gone, oh.
He glanced at her, fingers still on the cart. “Housewarming gift. My brother just bought a condo and I panicked and ended up in the seasonal aisle. I almost bought him a twelve-pack of decorative pumpkins.”
She winced. “Yeah, no. You did need supervision.”
He lifted his brows. “See? This is why I keep you.”
“Don’t say that like I’m your service animal,” she said, steering them around a display of distressed wooden signs.
I would never,” he said. “You’re more like… a deranged crisis manager who yells.
Eventually they landed in front of a pillow wall that looked like a soft, expensive Tetris game.
He leaned back slightly, his wheels squeaking on the floor. “Okay. What’s the winner for ‘guy in his thirties who is trying but also clearly unsupervised most of the time’?”
She ran her fingers over a velvet one in a deep green. “This. Bold. Elegant. Slightly smug.”
“So… me in pillow form?”
She snorted. “You wish.”
But she handed it to him anyway, gently setting it across his lap. His hands stilled for a beat as he looked down at it.
“Why do I feel like I just got sorted into a Hogwarts house?” he said.
“Because you did. Congratulations, you’re in House Competent Adult.”
He grimaced. “Can I transfer?”
“No returns. Store policy.”
They grabbed a toaster that burned Bob Ross’s face into bread for Jack’s brother--“starter adulthood,” she called it--and headed for checkout.
On the way, Jack fell back into place beside her again, and this time his hand found the cart rail faster–like it was just the obvious thing to do.
Penelope kept her eyes forward and absolutely did not look down at it.
As they stood in line, he glanced sideways at her, the corner of his mouth tugging up.
“You ever notice how this… kind of became a thing?”
She looked at him. “What did?”
“This.” He gestured vaguely between them, then to the cart. “Us. Hanging out on purpose. On days off. In the Church of Discount Homewares.”
She stared at him like he’d said something obscene. “On purpose is a strong accusation.”
He smiled. “Mm.”
“I thought I was being summoned,” she corrected, pushing the cart a little harder like it could save her. “Like a demon. With candles.”
He smirked. “Don’t worry. I still have the receipts.”
“For what, exactly?”
“For your crimes against bath mats. Mushroom and sand?”
“They’re neutrals,” she said. “I’m building a calm foundation.”
“Your foundation is boring and I’m staging an intervention.”
They ended up in the parking lot, lingering by her car like neither of them was actually in a rush to go live the rest of their lives.
She leaned on the passenger door, sunglasses pushed up in her hair, watching him adjust the green pillow on his lap.
“You know,” she said, “for someone who claims to hate errands, you’re surprisingly good at them.”
He glanced over, hands pausing on his wheels. “Yeah, well. It turns out they’re less terrible if you outsource all decision-making to a chaos goblin.”
She tilted her head. “Is that my official title now?”
“I’ll get it printed on a mug,” he said. “Very tasteful. Mushroom and sand.”
She laughed. “You’re never letting that go, are you?”
He grinned. “Absolutely not.”
He said it lightly, but it landed with that same tiny, traitorous warmth in her chest she’d been pretending not to notice.
“Careful,” she said. “If you keep asking me to rescue you from decorative pumpkins, people are going to think we’re friends or something.”
He met her eyes. “Penelope, people already think that.”
She opened her mouth, then closed it again, because… fair.
“Tragic,” she said finally. “Guess you’re stuck with me.”
“Could be worse,” Jack said. “You did save me from ‘Live Laugh Love.’”
She pointed at him. “I will be accepting gratitude in the form of tacos.”
“Obviously,” he said. “Text me when you’re free next week and I’ll schedule an Official Business-Only Taco Meeting.”
She rolled her eyes, but she was smiling as she backed away toward the driver’s side.
“Fine,” she said. “But just so we’re clear--if you show up to tacos with a farmhouse sign, I’m blocking your number.”
He laughed, backing his chair toward his car.
“Fair,” he called. “If I bring a quote sign to a taco meeting, block me. I’ve lost the plot.”
She laughed, heart doing something it had absolutely not been invited to do.
Not love. Not yet.
But something lighter and sneakier than that. The kind of thing that shows up on a random Saturday in the candle aisle and refuses to leave.
The kind of thing nobody plans for–and then plans around, without realizing.
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