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The heavy of the bathhouse creaked open, instantly letting out a puff of humid air that cut through the biting chill of the spring night.
Ari stepped into the lobby while Sam walked in right behind her, shaking out his blonde hair. He was carrying a sports bag over his shoulder, his cheeks a little flush from the walk up from the town.
"Man, it is freezing out there tonight," Sam laughed, dropping his bag onto a floor for a second to stretch his arms. "Alex better be ready to actually work out and not just stare at his own reflection in the mirrors for two hours."
Ari smiled, turning to face him. "You know he’s going to do both sunny, it’s part of his routine."
She looked toward the door leading to the pool area, feeling the inviting warmth radiating from the tiles. "Are you sure you don't want to skip the weights and just join me in the pool? It looks so empty tonight."
Sam grinned, that familiar playful glint appearing in his eyes. He stepped a little closer, lowering his voice just in case anyone else was wandering around the locker rooms. Since it was Ari's first year in the valley, they were still keeping their relationship entirely under wraps, a secret rhythm they only shared when the town wasn't looking.
"I don't know angel," he murmured, his voice a low teasing rumble. "Maybe if I can get rid of Alex early. If he takes a twenty minute break to talk about gridball stats, I might just slip away and find you."
Ari let out a soft laugh, the sound echoing quietly in the high ceilinged lobby. She leaned in, catching him by surprise and pressed a quick lingering kiss to his lips, sweet and hidden in the shadows of the entryway.
"You better," she whispered, stepping back with a smirk.
Sam blinked, a soft flush creeping up his neck, his grin widening. "Yeah… okay, now I’m definitely cutting the workout short. See you when we're done, alright?"
"Don't keep me waiting too long," Ari smiled, giving him a little wave as she turned toward the door marked with the pink sign.
"Never," Sam promised, grabbing his bag and heading off toward the gym lockers with a pep in his step.
Ari shook her head fondly and pushed open the door to the girls' changing area. The locker room was quiet, lit by a soft warm glow. She quickly changed into her swimwear, the ambient heat of the bathhouse already making her feel a little drowsy after a long day of tilling the soil and watering the crops on the farm.
Leaving her boots and clothes in a locker, she walked past the tiled showers and followed the short echoing hallway that led straight into the main pool area.
The heat hit her like a physical wall, billows of dense white steam rolled off the surface of the glowing blue water, rising toward the high shadowed ceiling. The atmosphere was heavy, quiet and deeply vulnerable.
Then, she saw her.
Sitting on the tiled ledge at the far edge of the pool, her legs dangling into the water, was Penny.
She was entirely still, staring blankly into the shifting mist, her hair -usually pinned up in those neat perfect buns- was loose, damp strands clinging to her neck and cheeks. Even from across the cavernous room, Ari could hear the shuddering fragile sound of her breathing.
Penny was crying, quiet ragged gasps that she tried to swallow, her shoulders trembling violently under her simple clothes.
Ari hesitated, her footsteps slowing on the wet tiles.
They were never close, Penny was the quiet polite tutor who kept to herself, and Ari was still the relatively new city girl turned farmer, but Ari knew about Penny's situation.
Sam had told her about the volatile atmosphere in the trailer, about Pam’s drinking, the shouting and the heavy unfair burden Penny carried every single day.
Seeing her like this -completely stripped of her usual composed exterior- made Ari's heart ache.
Taking a slow quiet breath, Ari walked forward, the wet tiles warm beneath her bare feet until she reached the edge. She didn't say anything at first, she just quietly sat down on the warm ledge, letting her feet sink into the heated water a few inches away from Penny.
Penny didn't look up immediately, she wiped her eyes hurriedly with the back of her hand, her voice cracking as she tried to force her usual polite demeanor.
"O-Oh... hello! Good evening. I... I didn't expect anyone else to be here tonight…"
"I needed a place to relax," Ari said softly, looking out at the ripples their feet made in the water. "The spring chill was getting to me. Are… are you okay Penny?"
A bitter uncharacteristic laugh escaped Penny’s lips, muffled by a sob. She pulled her knees up to her chest, wrapping her arms tightly around them, trying to shrink herself into nothingness.
"I'm fine, I just... I needed some air, though it's not very easy to breathe in here is it? The steam... it feels so heavy."
"It does," Ari agreed, turning her head to look at her. "But sometimes a heavy room matches what’s inside your head. You don't have to pretend around me Penny, I know how hard things have been lately."
Penny stiffened, a flash of humiliation crossing her face before it melted back into pure raw exhaustion. She buried her face in her knees, her voice coming out small and muffled.
"It’s embarrassing… it’s my life, it’s my mother, and I... I should be able to handle it. I’m the adult… I’m the teacher… I’m supposed to be patient and good."
"You're allowed to be tired," Ari said, her voice dropping to a whisper. "You're allowed to hate it."
Penny lifted her head, her green eyes wide bloodshot and swimming with fresh tears. The steam coated her skin in a layer of condensation, making the tears blend into the moisture on her face.
"I do," Penny whispered, the confession sounding like a sin. "I hate it so much sometimes. Tonight... she was so angry. I tried to clean, I tried to make dinner, but it’s never enough… nothing I do fixes it… she just drinks and yells, and the trailer... it feels like a cage, a tiny metal cage that’s roasting in the sun and I’m trapped inside it."
She clutched at her own arms, her breaths coming faster and panicking.
"I look at Jas and Vincent and I tell them about the big wide world in their books... I teach them about geography, about oceans and deserts and cities, and then I realize... I’ve never seen any of it, I’m twenty four years old and I have never left Pelican Town. I’m terrified Ari… I am so terrified that I am going to die in that trailer, taking care of a woman who doesn't even see me."
Ari felt a sharp familiar ache pierce her own chest. She reached out, her hand hesitant in the humid air before gently placing it on Penny’s trembling shoulder.
Penny didn't pull away, she leaned into the touch, starved for comfort.
"I feel so selfish," Penny sobbed, covering her face with her hands. "She’s my mother, she’s lonely and she’s hurting, and I feel like a monster for wanting to pack a bag and just... run away. I want to have a life, I want a real house with a garden and books and peace… is that horrible of me? To want to leave her behind?"
"No," Ari said firmly, squeezing her shoulder. "It’s not horrible, it’s human. You’ve given up so much of your own life to keep her afloat but you can't set yourself on fire just to keep someone else warm. It doesn't make you a monster to want to breathe."
Penny let out a shaky breath, slowly lowering her hands from her face. She looked at Ari, her eyes wide and glistening with tears in the heavy steam. For a long moment, she just listened to the quiet lapping of the water against the tiles, letting Ari's words sink in.
"I just... I look at you sometimes," Penny whispered, her voice laced with a quiet envy that quickly melted into curiosity. "And I wonder why anyone would ever choose to come here. You came from Zuzu City right? It just seems like... there would be so much freedom there, so many opportunities to build whatever life you wanted so why did you leave it behind? Didn't you want that?"
Ari looked away, staring into the thick white mist rising from the center of the pool. The warmth of the water felt suffocating now, mirroring the memories rising in her own throat.
"I didn't leave the city because of a dream Penny," Ari confessed, a bitter faint smile touching her lips. "I left because I was dying there."
Penny blinked, her brow furrowing in confusion. "What do you mean? Your grandfather left you the land, we all thought..."
"We all love a good story," Ari murmured, looking down at her own reflection distorted by the ripples. "But the truth is... my parents were perfect, they were the kind of couples people write poetry about... madly, deeply, obsessively in love with each other."
Penny’s expression softened, still a bit puzzled. "That sounds... wonderful though, to grow up around that much love."
"It sounds like a fairy tale, but it was a nightmare to live in," Ari whispered, a tear finally escaping her eye, cutting a clean path through the condensation on her cheek. "They were so wrapped up in each other that they completely forgot I existed. I was a ghost in my own house, I would sit at the dinner table and they would talk over me, past me, through me as if I was just a piece of furniture. They didn't do it maliciously either, they just... didn't have room in their hearts for anyone else... not even their own daughter."
Penny’s breath hitched, her heart aching as she stared at the girl everyone in town thought was so fiercely independent. "Ari... I had no idea, to be right there and feel completely unseen... that sounds so lonely."
"It was," Ari continued, her hands gripping the edge of the tile tightly. "I spent my whole childhood trying to be perfect, trying to get them to look at me, to notice me, but I was invisible. The only ones who ever truly saw me, who made me feel like I mattered were my best friends. They were my entire world, they kept me grounded when I felt like I was floating away.”
Ari paused, her throat tightening so hard it hurt to breathe. The steam around them felt heavy, like the weight of the grief she had tried so hard to bury in the soil of her farm.
"A month before I came here, they died," Ari’s voice broke, a ragged sob tearing from her chest as she stared blankly into the steam. "A sudden accident, just... gone, both of them, in an instant. My entire support system, the only people who actually looked at me… vanished, and do you know what my parents did? When I was losing myself, when I couldn't get out of bed, when I was completely shattered by the loss?"
Penny’s hand shot out, wrapping around Ari’s wrist, her grip was tight, desperate and fiercely warm, sensing the raw pain rolling off her. "What did they do?"
"Nothing," Ari whispered bitterly, a fresh tear tracking through the condensation on her skin. "They patted my head, told me I’d get over it and started packing their bags for a vacation they’d been planning. They didn't know how to handle my grief because it interrupted their perfect, two person world. They literally wanted to leave me alone in an empty house to mourn by myself so they could go enjoy their trip."
Penny’s breath caught in her throat, her fingers tightening around Ari’s wrist in sheer disbelief. "They wanted to leave you behind? After you lost your best friends? Ari that’s... that’s horrific."
"That’s when I decided to leave," Ari said, looking at Penny, their eyes locked in a shared painful understanding. "I realized that if I stayed there, I would disappear completely. I came to the valley to survive but even now... I carry that trauma. Every time someone is nice to me, every time someone looks at me, a part of me is waiting for them to forget I’m there. I’m terrified of being invisible again.”
Penny let out a shaky breath, tears spilling over her cheeks anew, but this time she reached out and pulled Ari into a tight fierce embrace.
The two girls clung to each other on the edge of the steaming pool, surrounded by the heavy humid silence of the bathhouse. It was an embrace born of shared isolation, one trapped by the crushing weight of a mother’s dependency, the other haunted by the ghost of a parents’ neglect.
Penny buried her face in Ari’s shoulder, her voice muffled but clear. "I’m so sorry Ari… I’m so sorry they did that to you, you aren't invisible, not here, not to... to anyone, and definitely not to me."
"And you aren't trapped forever Penny," Ari murmured, wrapping her arms tightly around Penny’s back, feeling the sharp lines of her shoulder blades. "You want a house with a garden? You want a life? You are going to get it, you are the strongest person in this town do you hear me? You carry a whole household and a whole classroom on your back and you’re still so kind. You deserve the world."
They held onto each other for a long time, letting the heat of the spa thaw the icy frozen corners of their chests. The steam rolled over them, no longer feeling like a suffocating cage, but like a protective blanket keeping the rest of Pelican Town away, just for a little while.
Slowly, Penny pulled back, wiping her face, a soft genuine smile -one that didn't look forced or polite, but tired and relieved- touched her lips.
"Thank you Ari," Penny whispered, her voice steadying. "I... I don't think I’ve ever told anyone all of that, I always thought people would judge me."
"Never," Ari said, offering a weak but warm smile back, wiping a stray tear from her own cheek. "We’re allowed to have messed up families Penny, it’s what we do with the life we build for ourselves that matters."
Penny looked down at their feet, still submerged in the glowing warm water. "I suppose... I suppose I don't have to figure it all out tonight, but just knowing that someone else understands... it makes the air feel a bit lighter."
"Anytime you need to breathe Penny," Ari said, leaning her shoulder against Penny's, their shared warmth a solid grounded reality against the shifting mist. "I'll be right here.”