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“Why did you do it?” I ask, unable to keep silent any longer.
“Why did I do what?” she asks, her voice tired and weak.
“Why did you fuck Izzy over like that? She’s your twin sister.”
When she doesn’t speak, I turn and look at her, unsure of what I’ll find. But instead of anger at my question, she looks broken. Her mouth is downturned, her chin is dipped almost to her chest, and her fingers are agitatedly picking at her perfectly manicured nails in her lap.
“I asked you a question, Princess.”
“Why do you keep calling me Princess? I have a name.” From the sound of her voice, it’s clear she’s trying to sound like she normally does: snooty and unimpressed, but her tone has no intensity, and instead she sounds like she’s fighting back tears.
“I know what your name is, Penelope,” I scoff lightly. “But that’s what you are, isn’t it, a spoiled little princess? I think the nickname suits you better.”
“You’re a dick,” she hisses, but again, there’s no power in her voice, and instead of saying anything else, she quietly turns her head and stares out of the window.
“You didn’t answer my question.”
Her sigh is shaky and resigned. “It doesn’t matter why I did it, I know what you all think of me, and you’re right, I’m a monster.”
“Just be honest,” I snap.
“Fine,” she hisses. “When it all started, I didn’t know I was doing anything wrong. I was fourteen and terrified of screwing up and losing my family billions of dollars. Izabella offered to help me, and I needed her. By the time I realized that what we were doing wasn’t normal and that we weren’t being fair to her, I was too far into the lie to turn back. Every time I’d question things, my parents would assure me it was all okay. They told me that letting Izabella help was the right thing to do, that we all had our roles to play and that that was hers. I’d like to say that I had no idea how bad things had gotten, but if I’m honest, I just didn’t want to see how messed up things were until the day they attacked her.”
Her voice cracks, and I turn and glance at her, shocked to see her hurriedly wiping a tear from her cheek. Until this exact moment, I hadn’t believed she was capable of feeling bad. When Izzy dragged her out of that party weeks ago, drunk off her ass, I thought everything she’d done since then had just been to save her own skin, but maybe there’s more to it than just that.
“So, everything you’ve done in the last few weeks, everything you’ve done to try and break the will, it’s all been for her?”
I feel the weight of her gaze on me, and I risk another glance away from the road. Her eyes are glassy, and her lips are trembling as she forces them into a shaky smile. “I’d make myself sound better if I said yes, wouldn’t I?” she asks.
“Not if it’s a lie,” I say simply.
Inhaling slowly, she quietly scoffs. “Part of it is because of what they did to her, but mostly it’s to save myself,” she admits quietly, and that honesty, even though it’s ugly, impresses me.
“It’s okay to look after yourself, to be selfish,” I find myself saying, even though I don’t necessarily think it’s true, at least not all the time.
“Maybe, for some people, but when selfish is your one and only defining characteristic, I’m not sure it’s so acceptable,” she says, laughing self-deprecatingly.
“Is that how you see yourself?” I ask, genuinely interested to hear her answer and wondering if she sees herself the way we see her.
“Selfish, stupid, vain, and weak-minded,” she says soberly.
“I don’t think you’re stupid.”
“So just selfish, vain, and weak-minded then.” She grins, wiping away more tears that she thinks I don’t see.
“I think we all have the capacity to be all of those things, it’s our choices that define us. Maybe what you’re doing for your sister now is your chance to be different. Izzy thinks you can be. She believes that you’re as much a victim in all of this as she is?—”
“She’s wrong,” Penelope says, cutting me off. “I’m not innocent, and I’m not a victim. I might not have understood what I was doing in the beginning, but in the last couple of years, I was fully complicit. I’m not some manipulated puppet, I’m exactly the monster you all know I am.”
Neither of us speaks again as we travel the few miles from the hotel to the mall. “Let’s find you something to wear that isn’t quite so…conspicuous,” I say, killing the engine and opening my car door.
When I round the car to the passenger side, I find Penelope sitting primly in the front seat, her hands clasped together in her lap, clearly waiting for her door to be opened for her. My lips twitch into a broad smile, and I shake my head as I consider once again the vast differences between her and her sister. If this was Izzy in the car right now, she’d have opened the door, even if I’d planned to be a gentleman and do it for her, because that’s just the type of girl she is. Maybe because Izzy has been so sheltered from real life for the last few years, she’s forgotten that she’s actually an indulged rich girl, but clearly Penelope hasn’t. She’s every inch the socialite, and I can’t help but want to play with her a little.
Instead of reaching out and opening the door, I cross my arms across my chest and wait. After a minute or so, she looks out the window and spots me standing there. When it becomes obvious that I’m not planning to open her door for her, she looks down at the handle like she’s never seen one before in her life and finally opens it herself.
“I wondered how long it would take you,” I say with a sarcastic smirk.
“You could have just opened it for me,” she snaps peevishly, all traces of the vulnerable girl from a few minutes ago gone.
