Chapter Text
Penelope Featherington had long ago learned how to make herself small.
Not in the literal sense—she grew up wearing bold colors after all thanks to her mother and made pointed observations when she felt brave enough—but in the ways that mattered. She learned to bite her tongue instead of speaking her heart. She smiled when it hurt. She stayed silent when the world, and especially Colin Bridgerton, demanded her silence in subtle, unspoken ways.
They had been best friends for years. Since childhood since they lived across from each other. Colin was her favorite person in the world. And also the person who hurt her the most—though he never meant to.
That was the tragedy of it.
He never meant to hurt her. Which meant he never even realized he was doing it.
She saw it first in little things. The texts that slowed when he was dating someone. The way his voice softened when he talked about a new girl. How he lit up like a bonfire when he was falling. Penelope was always there to listen. To laugh in the right places. To say “I’m happy for you” and mean it in the smallest, most fractured way.
He brought them to their usual coffee shop sometimes—without warning her first. Penelope always stayed. Sat across the table like a polite ghost, stirring her coffee while someone else touched his arm and called him “Col.”
And the girls—they were always lovely. Interesting. Fashionable. One was a painter. A model. An influencer. One liked hiking and dragged him up mountains, and he came back with sunburn and windblown hair, giddy with joy.
And Penelope—Penelope stayed the same. Waiting in the wings, clapping silently while someone else took center stage in his life.
The worst part was that he loved her. He did. Just not the way she wanted.
He told her things no one else knew. He shared his doubts, his dreams, his fears of never finding his purpose. She held those secrets like fragile glass in her hands, careful not to let them slip or shatter. He relied on her. Trusted her.
But never chose her.
Not really.
She remembered one night, during his last breakup—the one with the model he met at an event. He’d shown up at her flat at midnight, soaking wet from the rain. No umbrella, of course. Just him and that damn smile, rueful and tired.
“I didn’t know where else to go,” he’d said, and she let him in, heart pounding like it always did when he looked at her like she was safe.
They stayed up until 3 a.m. He fell asleep on her sofa, and Penelope sat beside him, barely breathing, watching the rise and fall of his chest. Wondering if that moment was the closest she would ever get to having him.
When he woke up, he thanked her, hugged her, and said he didn’t know what he’d do without her.
And she smiled. Of course she did.
Because what else was there to do?
Sometimes she wondered if she should just tell him. Just say the words: “I’m in love with you, and I have been for years.” Let the silence settle after. Let him flinch. Or pity her. Or worse, apologize.
She imagined the conversation a hundred different ways, and in every one of them, she walked away with her heart in pieces.
So she stayed quiet. Because silence didn’t humiliate you. It just broke you slowly.
Then one day, it happened.
He posted a photo.
Her name was Marina. A bookstore owner who had a shop in Notting Hill. Beautiful in a serious, elegant way. The caption read: “Some people just sneak up on you.”
Penelope stared at the screen for a long time. Long enough that the image blurred. Her coffee went cold.
She had always imagined this day. The day he fell in love—with someone who wasn’t her. But she hadn’t expected it to feel like this. Like she was standing outside in the cold while someone closed a door she hadn’t even realized she’d been holding open.
That night, he called.
She let it go to voicemail.
He texted:
“You okay? You’ve gone quiet on me.”
She stared at the blinking cursor for ages. Typed:
“Yeah. Just busy. Congrats on Marina. She seems lovely.”
And hit send before she could change her mind.
He replied with a heart emoji.
She turned her phone over and let the silence wrap around her like a second skin.
Penelope went to bed that night with tears on her pillow—not sobbing, not loud, just quiet, steady grief. The kind that sits in your chest for years and finally asks to be felt.
She knew what she had to do. She had to stop hoping. Stop waiting.
But loving someone like Colin wasn’t something she could just turn off. It had never been a switch. It was a slow-burning candle, melted into everything she was. She could snuff it out, eventually. But not tonight.
Tonight, she just needed to mourn.
Not him.
Herself.
The version of her that believed, deep down, that one day he might look at her and finally see her.