Perks of Being Penelope

Chapter Three: We Catch A Fish And A Charlie

Emmett

I squint my eyes at the beam of sunlight suddenly shining down on my eyes. I shut my eyes close again, my hand resting against on my face.

"So you've awaken." I hear a familiar voice call. I open my eyes to see nothing but sunlight once again. I try to look forward and there she was, Penelope.

There were tiny hints of dark circles around her eyes, but her eyes were still as sparkly as before. The sunlight shines through her dark hair, making it turn golden brown.

"Yeah, good morning to you too." I let out a small croak.

"Good afternoon, actually," Penelope corrected, "Looks like your friends here aren't going to get up 'till evening."

I looked beside me to find and Callum curled up against the thin layer of snow. I nodded my head, and tightened my lips to a thin straight line.

"You looked like you've stayed up all night," I point out as Penelope focuses her brown eyes at me.

"I couldn't sleep," she bit her lip.

"Why?" I asked idiotically.

"Because I went wandering around."

I wiggled my ears to make sure I was hearing the correct words. "Wandering..?" I trailed off.

"Off." She finished my sentence.

I was such in shock I could hardly even take my eyes away from hers.

"What?" She finally asked, eating her left over Cheetos.

"Penelope, this is not the place to go wandering around in!" I finally choked out.

"Why not? It's fun. I even found a friend!" Penelope said. I rolled my eyes at her.

"Yeah, a porcupine." I mumbled.

"Actually, it's a human."

"Human?"

"Yes." Penelope nodded her head while stuffing more Cheetos down her mouth.

"Anyways," I say trying to change the subject because my little friend here- er, ex-friend- is crazy. I wondered if she had a mild concussion when she fell, but not those kind of concussion. The ones where they go crazy? That's what I'm talking about.

"I decided to-"

Beautiful.

She was beautiful.

I look at a girl who comes in with sticks in her perfect hands. She has pretty hazel eyes with curly long blonde hair. If there was a way to describe, she would definitely be perfection.

"I've got some sticks.." She says in her innocent voice, and I could feel myself climbing an invisible ladder to cloud 9.

"See, Emmett? This is who I was talking about," Penelope says, "My friend."

I finally land my eyes on Penelope's. Her eyes show anger but her mouth doesn't say anything.

"Hey," Her friend smiles at me so sweetly, I almost faint. Her smile was crooked, but amazingly crooked.

"Hi." I manage to croak as I wave idiotically.

"Your friends over here seem a little passed out." She says as she sets herself in the cold ground. I don't realize until now, but my bottom was soar of coldness.

"They had a lot to drink last night." I manage a smile.

"I'm Charles, but I go by Charlie." She says. I can feel my eyebrows knitting together. My whole life I thought Charles, or Charlie, was a boy name. That's when I realized how dumb I was. Finally, Penelope was right about at least something.

"Charlie," Penelope notices my weird expression, "let's try to build a fire."

I finally come back to life. "What are you guys gonna cook.. grill.. anything?" I say, confusing myself.

Penelope digs in her bag pack that of course I rescued out of the cabin, and digs for something I can't make out.

Penelope pulls out a fish- a fish? And no, this wasn't a regular fish you would find in a lake, this was a fish that was ten times more bigger.

"Where on earth did you get a fish?" I gasp of amazement.

"I found a small lake somewhere where I caught a fish-" Penelope pauses then looks at Charlie. Then she points to the fish. "I found a friend too." She says, referring to the fish. Charlie playfully hits Penelope on the head, rolling her hazel eyes. I let out a small sarcastic laugh.

"When are we going to go home?" Penelope finally says, as she rubs two sticks together to make a fire.

Then it hit me. We didn't have a ride, we didn't have anything at all. We were kids simply in the middle of a forest.

"Wait," I stop, "Where'd you find Charlie?"

Penelope still rubs her stick together back and forth. "Long story short," she pauses, "Charlie was lost."

"Charlie was.. lost?" I whisper not believing what I was hearing.

"How'd you find yourself in this forest?" I ask Charlie.

"I was in the same camp as you guys." She says, then blushes, her cheeks flooding with pink, "and after the.. incident.. I kind of followed you guys here."

She continues. "I couldn't help but follow in awe when you were holding Penelope in your arms when she got un-conscious and brought her all the way over here!" Penelope says sweetly.

I take a peek at Penelope who's looking at the ground, her cheeks flushed with red.

"I kind of helped." I hear a voice. I look beside me to find Callum awake.

"Kind of." I mimic.

There was a long silence before Charlie took the fish out of the fire with a metal tong she pulled from her backpack.

"Fish for breakfast," I mumble to myself, "just the perfect thing I want, you know?" I ask them sarcastically while taking a piece of fish.

"I'm a vegetarian." Jackson mumbles as he tries sitting up.

Just the perfect thing we want.