golden | peter parker

twenty nine

Penny had ditched gym and walked home, granted it was the last period, but she couldn't be around Peter anymore. Michelle had tried to leave with her, but Penny refused. She wanted to be alone.

As she took the eight flights of stairs up to her apartment, she pulled out her phone checking her social media. Someone had took a video of her yelling at Peter and it was spreading like wildfire. As she scrolled through Instagram, the video appeared in her feed four times in a row before she got to something different.

Penny was annoyed and turned her phone off, not needing the extra stress. She got to her door and opened it, taking William and Sara by surprise.

"Penny? What are you doing home so early?" Her father asked, standing up from where he was sitting on the couch.

"Something happened, and I ditched. I'd rather not talk about it right now, and I ask that you please respect that. You can ground me if you want but trust me when I tell you, it's a good thing that I left," Penny explained, dropping her bag to the ground.

Sara and William exchanged nervous glances, this was very uncharacteristic of her. But they let her be as she went to the kitchen, to stress eat probably.

Sara nudged her fiance and motioned with her head that he should go talk to her. He nodded and hesitantly followed his daughter.

"So, how was your day? Besides the ditching, of course?" William asked, trying to strike up casual conversation.

"It was fine," Penny replied monotonously. She was not in the mood to talk about her feelings, or talk about what a mess her life was at the moment.

"That's... good. Well, in any case, I'm glad you're home early. We have guests coming over for dinner, and we'll need your help cooking," William said, patting her on the back. Penny nodded her head and grabbed a water bottle.

After taking a sip she asked, "What are we making? I'm thinking Italian."

William nodded his head, scratching his chin, "Yeah, we could do that. How does a spicy chicken pasta with roasted potatoes and seasoned vegetables sound?"

Both Sara and Penny nodded their heads, already excited for dinner to be ready. William was an amazing chef, and it was rare that he was home early enough to cook for his family.

The three of them began the preparation for the meal at 2:36, laughing and joking around the entire time. At one point William had picked up a spare chunk of potato and flung it at Sara, hitting her in the cheek. Penny burst out laughing as Sara stood there in shock, holding the chunk in her hand, contemplating her next words carefully.

"William, I love you when I tell you this, but you're a pain in my ass," Sara huffed out, tossing the potato back at him. He only stuck his tongue out, as it thumped his chest.

"There's plenty more where that comes from when we get married in 11 days," William teased.

"Speaking of, I can't believe you guys managed to plan a wedding in seven months. Like that's actually insane. And you guys aren't even stressing about it! Like, you're just going with the flow, that's so crazy," Penny said while chopping up some chicken.

"Well, we didn't want it to be over the top. And we called in favors from our friends to do the photography, and being the DJ, and using the hall of your father's law firm where they host their company parties; it was all relatively stress free because we could depend on these people to deliver," Sara replied, taking William's hand in her own, leaning against his body.

Penny gazed at them wistfully, they were so in love. After her mother died, William was a wreck. He didn't know how to cope without her. Then one night about a year later, Sara stumbled into his life by way of her needing directions. Penny had originally found it cliche, but soon grew to love it.