Oliver/Penny/Percy
Penny, you've always been a girl whether 'playing at it' or not. I'm sure you will look lovely and breathtaking in whatever you choose to wear, and any man or woman with eyes would see you for the woman you are.
Perhaps that is because at times it seems like fewer people read than when we were younger. But I agree completely about the companionable silence, particularly when it is punctuated by being amused by a particular passage and looking up to the other person, only to find that they are looking back, and even though both are reading something completely different, it doesn't matter because at that moment, it's all part of the very same experience.