Penelope in Retrograde

by Brooke Abrams

To my parents, I’m basically a human version of an air plant. I’m alive and thriving, but they don’t really understand the science behind it.

Running is the sort of thing I don’t enjoy, for two reasons. One, it’s running, and two, it’s not walking.

Smith slides into the captain’s seat next to me and carefully pulls Harriet out of her carrier. Her little butt starts to wiggle a hundred miles an hour as he places her in my lap. “Careful. She pees when she’s happy,” Smith warns me. “So do I.”