Lenny Penny

This story is by Jewel Eliese and was part of our 2025 Fall Writing Contest. You can find all the writing contest stories here.

Everyone always said Grandma was a serial killer.

 

So naturally, I’m standing at her door with the rain stabbing me in the back like tiny knives. The brandy from the reception burns through my blood, keeping me warm in this raging storm. I take out the key to my late Grandma Lettie’s house and stumble in.

 

Smells assault me. Not the fresh-baked cookie scent of old-lady houses—but of Pine-Sol, bleach, and something new yet familiar. Acrid. Metallic. 

 

Maybe it’s blood, I think, but push the thought aside. Besides the smell, nothing else has changed since I was here as a little girl. It’s too sterile. Too clean.

 

She was never a nice Grandma like Nan from Peter Pan. When we came to visit as kids, Grandma Lettie would give my sister and me a soapy rag and tell us to scrub her white walls. For fun, to replace cartoons. Cruel. I used to wish the rag were a brush and the walls a canvas. 

 

The only thing fun about it was trying to get inside the mystery room upstairs. We never did find out what was in there. Today, however, that will change. Today, I will solve that mystery at long last. 

 

Like always, the house is too hot. I take off my black jacket and hang it on the hook, making myself at home.

 

Everywhere I look, I see my reflection cast in polished silver decor. Bland and colorless except for the blue of my eyes staring back at me. The lack of creativity mirroring Grandma Lettie’s personality. 

 

“Lenny, don’t be such a copper penny in a world of silver coins,” she’d say whenever I showed her my new painting from art class.

 

I gasp as there is a sudden blinding light and boom that makes my ears ring. Everything goes black but with just enough light to make things visible—like textured shadows.

 

“Damn it,” I say to no one.

 

I hate when the power goes out. I am not afraid of the dark, per se, but I miss the color and life that come with light. 

 

My heart races. 

 

Okay, maybe I am a little afraid. But I won’t let it stop me. I am determined to finally see what the mystery room holds. 

 

Bodies, Lenny Penny, my mind taunts. Goosebumps tickle my flesh. I hate that nickname. Makes me feel like my worth is near nothing. 

 

I carefully walk past the couch, running my fingers upon its soft leather to help guide me through the dark. I cover my nose in an attempt to keep out the acrid smell, but it doesn’t help. It’s pungent and getting worse. 

 

I find the creaky wooden steps—but then I stop dead.

 

There, on the railing, is a smudge that I can just make out due to the incessant lightning coming through the curtains. I find myself reaching out to touch the stain. My fingers come back with flaky crimson. Dried blood.

 

The room sways, and the barely visible arabesque walls meld together with my fear and the brandy, mixing to create an emotional cocktail.

 

Suddenly, I realize what the smell is. Death. And it grows stronger as I make my way up the stairs. More intense toward the locked door. To the mystery room. 

 

My mind races, imagination swirling with images of rotting remains and gore waiting for me. 

 

Maybe we were right as kids. 

Maybe this wasn’t gossip or childish teasing. 

Maybe she really was a serial killer. 

Maybe I am about to find her final victim.

 

Suddenly, I am sure of it.

 

My breath comes out in shallow bursts. I reach for my phone, but remember it is in my coat pocket. Downstairs. Which would have had a flashlight, too. Smart, Lenny. 

 

The rain pelts harder on the windows. It’s pitter-pattering upon the roof, not like Santa’s reindeer, but more like Halloween goblins—or the ghosts of Grandma’s victims coming back to haunt her. 

 

The stairs creak and groan as I take one step and another, making my skin turn to ice. I shiver and tremble, but finally make my way up.

 

And there it is—the mystery room. Plain with a golden handle. Below the door is another red streak as if something was dragged into this room. Something heavy.

 

Like a body.

 

Oh, God. This is dumb. I shouldn’t be here.

 

But the brandy makes me bold.

 

Almost by instinct, I bring out the brass key that came with her will—vintage, with decorative roses on the handle—and glide it into the lock. It fits. Thunder booms and lights up the hallway as if to show me the way. Or to warn me. I take a calming breath and gag on the chemical tang of death.

 

But I don’t stop.

 

I turn the key.

 

And open the door.

 

Strings hang from the ceiling like shadowy vines. But I don’t see a body. Not yet. 

 

I flinch in surprise as the power comes back on just in time for the lights to expose Grandma’s secrets. I reach to the right, feeling for a switch, and flip it on, praying it will work.

 

Slowly, a bundle of lights flicker to life. Dim. One by one, used and old, but fighting to let their brilliance shine. White bulbs like Christmas lights hang from the ceiling in rows. 

 

A lamp in the corner glows orange, revealing a room awash in amber and rust and gold. No silver in sight.

 

It’s cluttered and yet cozy—exactly what I imagined a grandmother’s room should look like. Even the rain seems comforting now, as though I could curl up with a paintbrush and a blank canvas creating landscapes until the sun sets.

 

And the most surprising part is there are paintings everywhere: stacked together by the wall on the left, gathered near the window on the right. I look closer to see the signature. My heart stutters. These are Grandma Lettie’s paintings. All of these are hers. 

 

She even painted the walls—as if she couldn’t contain herself, as if the art had burst straight from her soul. Colors don’t hide here, they scream.

 

And there, on the right, sits a can of turpentine—its lid open, the liquid molding over time, intensifying the smell. Realization hits. The smell I thought was death is turpentine. That’s why it was familiar. 

 

Then my eyes land on a bow.

 

There, in front of a cluster of beautiful paintings, rests an empty canvas, with a pink ribbon atop it and an envelope with my name written in scrawling letters. 

 

Hands trembling, I open it and read:

 

 

Lenny Penny,

 

I was wrong. Don’t be a silver coin. Stand out and shine bright like a copper penny. Don’t ever stop. Don’t ever hide like I did. The world needs more copper pennies like you. 

 

Love, Grandma Lettie.

 

 

Tears drip down my face.

 

I pick up a painting at random and realize it’s of me as a child, cleaning Grandma’s house with that wet rag. But instead of making the wall clean, art is smeared behind it. My art. Paintings I had shown her as a child that I thought she’d ignored.

 

She saw me.

 

She understood me.

 

The nickname no longer makes me feel cheap, but worthy. Like who I am matters.

 

Grandma loved me just like Nan from Peter Pan, but now I am grown. And she is gone. I sob, but my heart glows amber—not with brandy, but with love.

 

My mystery is solved. Grandma was not a serial killer, but just a woman who was too shy to share her talent with others. Who buried her dreams.

 

I wipe my tears.

 

I guess you never know what lies behind a locked door—or behind the locked heart of someone you thought you knew. And maybe, just maybe, the brightest truths are waiting in the shadows, like copper pennies among silver coins.

 

I set the painting down and see a red thumbprint on its corner.

 

Was that blood?

 

It’s paint. Definitely paint. Grandma’s final touch.

 

Right?