Chimera Fields you're just a line in a song.

Penn felt his frustration rising, but he tempered it with a deep breath. He wanted to respond and tell her he followed every single time. Maybe it took him a while, but eventually, he found his way back. Just like she apparently did. For whatever reason, their worlds were always colliding, regardless of what stupid thing took them away from each other. They always ended up back here. Yelling at each other. Neither seeming to be able to understand the other. And yet, they clearly just kept on trying. Neither of them seemed to be able to stop trying to get the other to understand.

It was actually rather toxic. But Penn went with it.

"Fine," Penn breathed, clearly exasperated, "I left last time to go looking for my kids." He didn't really want to revisit the place he'd been in back then, and for a moment, he'd thought he might be able to tell this without going back there. But obviously, that wasn't the case. It was still hard. It still sucked, but he did his best to tell it matter-of-factly, like it didn't suck. He wasn't seeking her pity, or even her forgiveness. She had wanted answers. Well, this was it.

"I've never met them," Penn explained, "Most of them, anyway. I think the popular terminology for what I am is a 'deadbeat dad'--I ran out of them when I found out their mother was pregnant. At least, on the one litter. The other one, I was told flat out by the mom that I would never be part of their lives. But in any event, I was a coward, and a piece of shit, and I decided they'd be better off without me. So, I bailed."

"I don't know that I've ever felt worse about myself in my life. I spent a long time trying to run from it, mostly by making some really bad errors in judgement. But, as luck would have it, one of my kids actually happened to find me while I was recovering from the worst of those bad mistakes," he continued, his thoughts drifting to his daughter and their brief conversation on the beach, "She didn't know who I was. But I knew who she was. And after she left, I got it into my head that I was going to right all of my wrongs. I was going to go find them. Redeem myself. Be a good dad."

"That's when I ran into you," Penn looked at her then, for the first time since he'd started, "And once again, I was a coward. I didn't want to drag you into my shit, but mostly, I didn't want you to know what an awful, good for nothing loser I'd become, though I suspect you've actually always known that. I was in a really bad place, and I had to go and deal with it. So yeah, I left again."

"I never found them, but I did figure out that it actually is best for them that I didn't," Penn said, his gaze drifting out across the field, "They're grown. They have lives. They don't need me interrupting that just so I can try to feel better about myself. My terrible decisions are mine to live with. All of them. That and all the shame and guilt that goes with it. That's all mine too."

Penn glanced back at her again, taking a deep breath as he looked at her, "As for how I felt when I left--it sucked. It felt terrible, just like every time it happens. You don't realize this because you're blind and all, but I sit there and I watch you go every single time, and it tears me apart. Every time." Penn paused for one last second, one last moment of peaceful cowardice before he ripped the band-aide off.

"I have been in love with you since we were kids. And I am perfectly well aware of the fact that I have fucked it up over and over again and I have given you no reason whatsoever to believe me, but if you want the truth that damn badly, there it is. I have never forgotten. I have never moved on. I have made up a lot, and I mean a lot of excuses for why I should never, ever admit it to you. But you're right, I shouldn't decide for you whether or not you ought to know. So now you do."

Penn steeled himself for what came next. He assumed violence. Probably more shouting. Insults. Maybe all three.

Or worse.

She'd just leave.