Her Father's Voice From Beyond The Grave

"You're taking it easy, aren't you? You better not be working from home," Iris said sternly.

Penelope frowned. Was she that much of a workaholic in this world? She did love the field of graphic design but the only reason she worked as hard as she did right now was because there was a crushing mountain of debt to pay.

If she had a proper career, her free time would be filled with trying new hobbies she never got the chance to before. She was always down to try something new at least once.

"I'm not. I'm taking it nice and easy," she lied.

She hadn't been taking it easy yesterday when she overdid it with the journals. That was a mistake she wouldn't be repeating. She did not want to be carried to bed again.

"Good," her mother said before speaking in a muffled voice to someone else. "What? No, Trev, I'm talking to Penny…uh huh, she's fine. Do you want to talk to her?"

Iris put the phone back to her ear and said, "Your father wants to talk to you. Take care, baby. I love you!"

"I love you too," Penelope said softly, unprepared for the sound of her father's voice from beyond the grave.

"Penny!" Trevor greeted cheerfully. "How's my girl? I had my appendix taken out when I was about your age too. Not the most fun. I hope you found something interesting to do while you're laid up."

Though tears filled her eyes, she refused to let them fall. This was a happy moment. She couldn't ruin it by crying. She had never thought she would be able to hear him talk to her again. Rewatching old home videos wasn't the same.

"I guess I'm feeling a little nostalgic. I've been rereading old journals of mine from when I was a kid," Penelope said in a slightly choked up voice.

"Oh, that's always fun! I haven't looked through my old memorabilia in years. I wasn't much of a journal keeper but my mom was a big proponent of scrapbooking so there are tons of albums of me and your uncles."

She already knew that. Her grandma had showed a few to her once when she was about ten. It had been weird seeing her dad so much younger.

He looked a lot like Percy if you ignored the fact that his hair was light brown. Iris had passed her redheaded genes onto her children but their hazel eyes were unmistakably from the Logan side of the family. Grandma Logan had the same strangely yellow hue.

"I know. Grandma showed me once," Penelope reminded him.

"Ah, right. She loved showing off things like that," Trevor said fondly. His mother had passed away about eight years earlier at age eighty-five.

"Speaking of families…when are you and Roman going to give us a grandchild? You've been married for almost four years now."

Penelope froze. That was absolutely none of her business. She couldn't get their hopes up randomly. Whatever the other Penelope's and Roman's reasons were, they had to be important.

"Uh…" she stalled, completely at a loss.

"I'm just giving you a hard time! Relax. I know you're focusing on your career right now. Don't wait around forever though, okay? I want the chance to really know my grandkids before I join my parents in the great beyond," Trevor said cheerfully.

Her father had always been flippant about death. He used to make light of his terminal cancer diagnosis too.

"Don't talk like that," Penelope said sharply. She didn't want him joking about such a thing when she had already lost him once.

"…sorry. You know your old man has a strange sense of humor."

"Yeah. It's probably where I get mine."

Trevor laughed. "You have an excellent point! Goodness knows where your brother gets his from…I don't think he actually has one. Or if he does, it's so deeply covered in sarcasm that no one can tell if he's being serious or not."

That was fairly likely. Percy had always been a bit out of touch with other people. That was what tended to happen when you were smarter than everyone else your age.

The smell of smoke filled Penelope's nostrils and she looked at the pancake she had completely forgotten about in a panic.

"Sorry, Dad, I have to go! My pancake's burning!"

He cracked up even harder. "Only you, Penny! Feel better now. We love you!"

"Love you too," she called back before hanging up and frantically scraping the burnt pancake into the sink's garbage disposal.

Penelope sighed. A perfectly round pancake ruined. Now the pan had burnt grossness stuck to it too. She had to scrape all of that off before trying again. Her stomach growled. This was what she got for being distracted.

She couldn't regret picking up the phone though. Hearing her dad talk to her had been wonderfully bittersweet.

Ten minutes later, Penelope sat down at the overly nice dining room table—yes, they did have a dining room in this house—and happily ate her pancake stack drizzled with maple syrup. She was about halfway through it when her phone dinged.

Roman had texted her. 'Hey beautiful, what are you up to? Feeling any better?'

She turned red at being called beautiful. Even if it wasn't meant for her, the two Penelopes did have the same face and body shape.

'Yeah, now that I've eaten and taken my pain meds. I made pancakes but burnt one because my parents called and I lost track of time talking to them' she replied.

His answer came in immediately. 'Of course you did. Always so distractible. Did they say how their research was going?'

'No, they wanted to check in on me and didn't mention that'

They had also wanted to know about grandchildren but there was no way Penelope would tell him that. She was suddenly grateful to be recovering from surgery so Roman wouldn't be expecting anything that normally happened between husband and wife anytime soon.

'Yeah, they're pretty distractible too. Must be where you get it from' He tacked on a laughing emoji at the end of the message.

She rolled her eyes. Roman really did know her parents well. It would be hard not to after growing up next to them and eventually becoming their son-in-law.