17. Charlotte In the Moment
Charlotte In the Moment
My stomach was in knots, but I was trying not to let Iris know. Seeing Bill still stuck in jail, realizing that I was totally powerless to change it, had undone me. My mind was reeling, my heart pounding, my brain in a vise grip. I closed my eyes and did what Grace had suggested: I thought of Bill, with Iris, dancing in the kitchen. I couldn’t help but smile. It didn’t fix things, but I thought my heart might have slowed a little. Progress.
We pulled into Alice’s driveway and Iris slammed the car door as she got out, stunning me out of my thoughts. Oliver adjusted himself in the seat next to me. “She’ll be okay,” he said. “I can imagine that seeing your dad in there would take a toll.”
“I’ll say. Maybe I did the wrong thing. Maybe I shouldn’t have taken her.” I looked at Oliver. “Was I prioritizing Bill’s needs over Iris’s?” It hit me then how deeply involved in our lives Oliver had become. He was a friend. And he knew the little unit of the three of us better than almost anyone. As I studied his face, I had a terrifying thought: Maybe Oliver was the one who set Bill up.
“Iris needed to see her father’s face and hear his voice when he said he was innocent. That was important. You did the right thing.”
Maybe it was that smooth British accent that did it for me, but suddenly I felt guilty for having even considered Oliver. He was on our team. He always had been.
“What do I do, Oliver? How can I help?”
“Look, Charlotte, the reality is that there’s not much you can do. The other reality is that the SEC starts these investigations ages before we even know about them, so I don’t have any idea what they have. Once the prosecution provides me with their discovery, I’ll be able to put the missing pieces together, solve this. I know I will.”
I sighed. I certainly hoped he was right. “I want to play offense , Oliver.”
He nodded. “Me too. But, unfortunately, that’s not the game we’re in right now.”
I let that sink in. He was right, of course. I felt like I was playing defense in every single area of my life. “Let me know if you think of anything ,” I said.
“Will do.” He paused. “I’ll grab you tomorrow to get your car.”
Small mercies.
Grace, Alice, and Julie were waiting for me when I walked in the back door. Silently, Grace grabbed a bottle of wine and four glasses, and we all followed her out the door, down the steps, and onto the beach.
A gentle breeze was blowing, and something about the way the birds were chirping back and forth made me feel like they understood what was going on in my life. But if they didn’t, the three women around me certainly did. I had, suddenly and fiercely, lost my footing in the world, just like they had.
“Well, welcome to the lost ladies club,” Julie said, putting her arm around me as we walked out to the shoreline.
I couldn’t help but laugh. “And what a prestigious club it is.”
“Waiting list a mile long,” Grace said in a wistful tone totally opposite from what it should have been.
I nodded as Grace handed us each a glass and Julie poured.
We sat down on the sand, which was cool and a little damp. It was soothing to feel a part of this beach.
“So, how did it go?” Grace asked.
I shook my head. “I just feel so powerless. And now I’m questioning whether I should have taken Iris to see him.”
“Of course you should have,” Julie said. “He’s her father. She needs to see him.” She put her arm around me. She was so sweet in her private life, which was such a contrast from her work persona that sometimes I had to remember she was the same person. “I know this is hard, but we’re here to help you.” I sighed, knowing now was the right moment.
“I know that, and you’ve all been so great. But I have to be honest about something.”
All eyes were on me.
“Iris and I can technically go back to our house.” I grimaced. “But Bill is worried about our safety. He doesn’t really want us to be alone there. But it’s also not fair for us to stay here when we don’t really need to be here.”
Alice laughed. “Charlotte, sweetheart. The mommune isn’t about what we need . We could all move on. We’re strong, capable women. But being together makes us stronger. We want you and Iris to stay here as long as you want.”
I put my hand to my heart. “You are amazing. You all are. Thank you so much.” I paused. “And, um, I haven’t exactly broken the news to Iris that we could go home. I would never ask you to lie for me, but if you could perhaps not mention it.”
“Of course we won’t!” Grace agreed. “We don’t want y’all to go anywhere. It’s so much more fun when we’re all here together, not on our own.”
“And we have Alice to take care of us!” Julie said.
Alice smiled, and I raised my glass. “To Alice!” I said.
“Hear! Hear!” Grace said.
“I don’t know where Iris and I would be if it weren’t for you.”
“If it weren’t for you ,” Alice said. “Thank goodness you had that total breakdown in the bank. Otherwise, we wouldn’t all be here together now.”
We all laughed.
Alice reached over me and took Julie’s hand. “You saved me.” She looked at Grace and me too. “All of you. You have given me purpose. You have given me a family when I thought even the fantasy of that was over for me.”
My stomach hurt just thinking about what she had been through. “What happened?” I asked. As soon as I said it out loud, I realized I hadn’t meant to. I’d only wanted to think it.
Alice shook her head. “Jeremy died in an avalanche while we were on a ski trip, Glen had a car accident, Walter fell off a ladder while cleaning the gutters.”
I shuddered, thinking of the gutters on this house, three stories tall including the garage underneath, and the concrete below. How did Alice stay here?
I looped my arm through hers and sipped my wine. Alice was a chatty, vivacious woman when she chose to be. Her brief answers with no embellishment were all I needed to understand that she wasn’t interested in discussing this further. And that was okay. I understood why she wouldn’t want to dwell on the past.
Grace cleared her throat and raised her glass. “To second chances,” she said.
“Or fourth, as it were,” Alice said, laughing lightly.
“To never giving up,” I said. That included all of us, didn’t it?
“Yes,” Julie said. “That. To never giving up.” We all clinked glasses. Julie cleared her throat and called, “You can come down now!”
I looked up and could make out two figures on the steps. Merit and Iris.
“Drink up,” she said to me. Then to them as they approached, “Kids, sit down. We’re having a family meeting.”
“Uh-oh,” Grace said. “I don’t like the sound of this.”
“Um, why aren’t the other kids at the family meeting?” Merit asked.
“Yeah,” Iris said. “Forced family fun usually pertains to them too.”
“Not this time,” Alice said.
“Oh, um,” Merit stuttered. “Well, if I could just explain—”
Julie cut him off, and Grace and I shared a look. She’d just broken Mom Rule Number One: never silence a kid who is about to confess to a crime.
“I want to talk to all of you about Bill and, in a larger sense, our reputation as a house.”
My face felt hot. “Julie! You can’t just—”
She put her hand up. “No, Charlotte. You and Iris are two of us now, and it is our responsibility to take care of each other. We might not be able to change what happens in court, but we can shape what happens in the court of public opinion, and I think we all know that, in a town this small, it’s usually the same thing.”
“That’s the truest thing I’ve ever heard,” Alice said. She looked at me pointedly. “She’s right, Charlotte. They’ll get jurors who aren’t close to the case and all that, but, come on. Is that true? How do we know that some of those jurors aren’t lying? Aren’t planted? We have to change people’s minds about Bill.”
“Well, great,” I said sarcastically. “Fan-freaking-tastic. Let me just hop right out and do that.”
Grace said, “Julie, apologies, but what does this have to do with the kids?”
“If all of you would let me finish, I would tell you.”
Alice made a motion like she was zipping her lips.
“First, I need to write an article in the paper about Bill’s innocence. I want to interview him—and, Charlotte, I know I promised, but I hope you too—and his lawyer and his staff and everyone who can sing from the rafters that he is good and honest and has been framed.”
“I don’t know, Julie…” I said.
She charged ahead: “Then, Alice, we’ll need you to write an anonymous letter to the editor about some tip or lead or something that hopefully will be real, but even if it isn’t, it will get published because it will sell papers, and it’s a letter to the editor so it’s opinion.”
“Sure,” Alice said. “Whatever you need.”
“Grace, I know this isn’t really your speed, but we’ve got to come up with some way to work Bill’s innocence into your massive online following. Maybe you do a special segment with Charlotte and Iris, and it somehow comes up or something.”
Grace nodded. “Anything to help.”
“I still don’t see how this affects us,” Merit said.
Julie smiled. “Ah, well, that’s where you’re wrong, because I’ve dissected Juniper Shores Socialite’s content thus far, and the six of us around this circle are her prime fodder. So at first, I thought maybe we should conduct an investigation, find out who she is—”
“Ohhhh!” Iris said. “We should do that!”
“Too slow,” Julie said. “Instead, we’re going to make sure that everything we do, everywhere we go, we are preaching the gospel of an innocent Bill. She’s everywhere we are, watching our every move. That can’t help but make it onto her page.”
Honestly, I was impressed. So, no, this wasn’t going to get Bill out of jail or prove his innocence, but it was something . Julie was right that the court of public opinion could affect Bill’s future enormously.
I nodded and said, “Kids, you just live your lives and—”
“Kids,” Julie interrupted, “you are fourteen and sixteen, and thus old enough to help. If Charlotte is too proud to accept that, fine. But I’m here to tell you that this is important, and your voices matter.”
With that, Julie stood up. “I’m off to start my article. Charlotte, I promised you I wouldn’t make you talk. And I won’t. But you have the chance to help right this very personal wrong. If I were you, I wouldn’t squander that opportunity.”
Julie was already marching up the beach. The General had issued the battle plan. “Wow. She is good ,” I said. Finally, someone who would help me play some offense.
“Too bad Julie isn’t our attorney,” Iris said. “Dad would at least be on house arrest.”
“Do you think she’s feeling so feisty and sure of herself because she’s back with her ex?” Merit asked casually.
“Houston?!” Grace and Alice yelped at the same time.
“She is not back with him,” Alice said.
“That’s not what Juniper Shores Socialite says,” Iris chimed in. “And I’m sorry, but facts are facts…”
We all laughed, but Julie and Iris had both touched on something here. Whether it was true or not, one anonymous Instagram account was shaping the reality of our entire town. We could use it for good, or we could use it for evil. Julie’s plan was the perfect kind: a little bit of both.