Penny hastily pulled on a pair of skinny jeans and jammed her feet into her green high-top Converse sneakers. She'd only meant to nap for half an hour before her evening shift, but she'd overslept. Now, she had less than twenty minutes to make the subway ride from the apartment in Manhattan's West Village to the bar where she'd been working as a cocktail waitress for the past two weeks - a stone's throw from the Smith Street subway stop in Brooklyn.

Life's A Beach, the place was called. It looked like just another nondescript bar from the outside, but the owner had covered the expansive back garden with 5,000 pounds of imported white sand and furnished it with plastic beach furniture and inflatable palm trees. "Shirts and shoes optional," said the neon sign in the front window. The all-female staff set the tone by waiting tables in jeans with tropical-print bikini tops.

These days, the bar was quickly becoming so popular that the Brooklyn hipster clientele lined up down the block for admittance. But it had only just opened for business, the night when Penny first ended up there for a drink.

"Hey!" a familiar voice had called out from behind her that night. "Hey! Penny! Wait up!"

She'd been close to tears at the time, stumbling blindly down the sidewalk toward the Smith Street subway entrance. Not that she knew which train she would take when she got there. She had no idea where to go or what to do once Lauren and Kristen had turned her away.

So she'd felt nothing but pure relief when she'd heard that familiar voice behind her and turned around to see his hulking form, lumbering down the block in her direction.

"Penny!" He'd been a little out of breath, and he'd put his hands on his hips to recover himself as they faced each other on the sidewalk. "Hey! I-I've been meaning to call you."

"Greg?"

In other circumstances, she might have given him a harder time. He'd been meaning to call her? Maybe he should have thought of that before he cheated on her and kicked her out of the apartment where they were supposed to be living together two summers ago. But it had all felt like water under the bridge that night. He had seemed genuinely happy to see her, and she'd desperately needed to see a friendly face.

"Where are you headed?" he'd asked.

"Nowhere." She'd been carrying the box that David left at her old apartment, and she set it down on the sidewalk at her feet with a thud to relieve the ache in her arms.

"That looks heavy." He'd stooped to pick it up. "Here, let me help you. Maybe we should grab a drink or something."

"Yeah, um. No thanks."

"Come on, Pen. I mean it. I feel really bad about- well, you know."

"Right. So how's your girlfriend doing?" Penny had said by way of reply.

He looked down uncomfortably, his eyes fixed on the contents of the box. "That didn't really go so well.... " He let his voice trail off at the end of the sentence. "Look, Penny. I'm sorry. Really sorry. I acted like a total ass, and that's the not the way I want you to think of me."

"It's not," she'd said. "I don't." The fact was, she barely even thought of him at all. The memory of their four-year-long relationship had been all but washed away, blotted out by other memories - memories of someone else completely. But she didn't bother to tell him that. "Don't worry about it." She'd forced a smile and reached out to take her box back, but he held onto it a moment longer. He'd pointed his head in the direction of a bar just down the block:

"Come on. Come have a beer with me."

She followed the direction of his gaze and read the sign aloud. "Life's A Beach. Shirts and shoes are optional. Sounds classy?"

"They're going for kitsch, I think. It's very Brooklyn."

"Right," she sighed. "Brooklyn." What had just made her say that? She sounded just like... "I'm just a little short on cash at the moment," she quickly added.

"I'm buying," he'd replied. And that was all it took. Somehow, she'd been swept up in the current, and now here she was, in the last place she had ever expected to find herself: back in the apartment she'd first shared with him when she moved to the city two years ago, crashing on Greg's couch.

It felt good to be back here. Surprisingly good. Restful, somehow. Like she'd been sailing merrily along through life and suddenly gotten swept up in some freak, fast-moving squall. Found herself washed out to the open seas, knocked hopelessly off-course, and spent the past two years paddling furiously against the current just to stay afloat. And now, somehow, by some miracle, she'd woken up one morning, and here she was - washed up on a sandy shore with the sun beating down on her face. Safe, on solid ground again.

Not that she planned on hanging around here for long.

She just needed a place to stay for a few weeks while she got her feet back underneath her. She'd told him the whole story that evening over drinks.

"Seriously, Greg. Why did you want to come here?" she'd asked when they went inside the bar and snagged a pair of plasticky white lounge chairs in the back corner.

"One of my friends just started working here." He'd waved across the bar to one of the bikini-clad waitresses. "That's Marin," he explained. "She's in my study group."

"That girl's a med student?"

"Sure," he'd shrugged. "Whatever pays the bills, right? She says the tips are great."

"She's pretty," Penny had replied, careful to keep her voice neutral.

Greg nodded. "I mean, not that she and I are- she's just a friend."

"None of my business, Greg."

"There's not exactly a lot of spare time for fraternizing, if you know what I mean."

"The workload's pretty intense?"

"Brutal. And we used to think pre-med was bad.... But you know what it's like. Yale must be the same, right?"

Penny had been on her second beer by then, and the whole story had come pouring out of her.

"Shit, Pen! So you never even started?"

"Nope. Never quite got there."

"It's been two years!"

"I know. My MCAT scores expired." She'd actually found herself laughing with him about it.

"That sucks. Do you remember how much we studied for that?"

That much, at least, she remembered. She'd found herself remembering quite a lot of things as they'd lingered there, playing with the sand and sipping bottles of Corona.

"You were the best study buddy," she found herself reminiscing. They'd taken all their pre-med classes together. Shared notes. Crammed for exams. Did silly impressions of their professors to relieve the stress, among other things they did to relieve the stress... But the point was, they'd been friends. Good friends. Probably the best friend she'd had, those four long years of college. And that particular night in Brooklyn, a good friend was what she needed most.

"Penny, it wasn't because of.... Did you get off track because of me? Because of what I did?"

"No!" she'd protested. "Of course not. It just got really complicated-"

"Is there anything I can do? There's got to be some way I can help."

She'd put her hand over his on the tabletop for just a moment. "It wasn't because of you, Greg. You don't owe me anything. Really."

"But as a friend?"

She'd looked at his face, hesitating. Did he really mean it? Or was he just trying to assuage a guilty conscience?

Not that she was really in any position to quibble. "Well, there is one thing...."

"Name it."

"Your friend, Marin. She said the tips were good here?"

"Yeah. You want me to-"

"I'm just a little low on cash right now," she'd hastily explained. "I just need something short-term."

"Totally! Of course! I'll ask her to put in a good word for you." His eyes had wandered briefly from her eyes down to her chest. "I'm sure you're fully qualified."

Penny had crossed her arms in front of herself, and he'd looked up at her and grinned. "Anything else?"

She'd tried to maintain her frosty look, but she must have been on her third or fourth Corona by then. The alcohol must have gotten the better of her. "Well, there is one other thing...."

Now here she was, two weeks later, couch surfing in his living room. "Just for a little while," she'd insisted when she'd first brought it up that night. "Just until I can make enough cash to get my credit card reinstated."

She'd been making good progress on that front, too, but she couldn't afford to lose this job. She'd already been given a warning about the chronic lateness. Her shift manager seemed to find that little foible of hers a lot less endearing than her previous boss had.

Penny stuffed her Metrocard in her front pocket, trying to think if she needed anything else. Too much trouble to carry a purse at work. She wouldn't need her keys - Greg would be home studying by the time she finished her shift.

Penny was just about to dash out the door when she looked down and realized she didn't have anything on over the bikini top.

"Shit shit shit," she chanted out loud, as she skimmed her eyes over the living room couch, strewn with empty food packages and study books. Her eyes lit on a swatch of dark red fabric, and she grabbed it as she ran out the door. She didn't even register what it was until she was halfway down the stairs. Too late to go back and swap it for something else, even though she knew she must look ridiculous. It was far too big for her - an old college sweatshirt, men's size X-large.

It would have to do for the night.

The kangaroo pocket flapped awkwardly against her knees as she pulled the zipper closed and dashed down the street toward the subway.