Chapter 12 Charlie
“Get in the car.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
“Charlie, get in the fucking car.” Andrew walks around to his side, opening the door before all but shoving Charlie in.
He allows it, but only because he’s not in the mood to call a ride.
Andrew is here, and the least he can do after throwing Charlie under the bus at a family dinner is drive him home where he can wallow in peace.
“You know you’re acting like a toddler.”
“Me,” Charlie balks, buckling his seatbelt. “You’re the one who threw a piece of bread at me at dinner.”
“That’s because you wouldn’t stop rubbing two forks together to make that metal on metal scraping sound you know I hate. It made me wanna rip my skin off.”
Purposely making a noise he knows deregulates Andrew was probably juvenile and a dick move, but Charlie had been pissed off after being thrown under the bus the second he walked through the door for a family dinner.
A dinner to which Jason had brought Emerson as his boyfriend.
Charlie wasn’t so put out about the second part.
Emerson is kind of disgustingly perfect for Jason, and he’s happy for them both, but the timing means he lost the bet that he, Andrew, and Alec have had going for years.
Charlie was so sure that Jason wouldn’t have his bi-awakening until he hit thirty-five.
Fucking Andrew pegged it down to the year and month with a frankly terrifying clarity.
“Just because you didn’t like that sound didn’t mean we needed projectile carbohydrates. You almost hit Emerson. That poor boy looked shell-shocked all dinner.”
“He did look kind of like a deer in headlights,” Andrew agrees, starting the engine. “To be fair, dinner at the King house would be a lot for anyone, autistic or not.”
“I still can’t believe Jason brought a boyfriend home,” Charlie sighs, slumping back into the seat. “With no warning. How did none of us know?”
“Theo knew.”
“I can’t believe Theo knew and didn’t tell Alec. How long do you think Alec is gonna give him shit about that for?”
“A long time,” Andrew laughs.
“I’m still pissed off at you,” Charlie says, needing to remind him.
“Be honest,” Andrew prompts, slowly backing away from the curb. “Are you more pissed off about what I said or about losing the bet?”
“Both, obviously,” Charlie grumbles, crossing his arms. “I can’t believe you told everyone I was dating someone. What the fuck? I’m not dating anyone. I’m perfectly happy being a single slut.”
“Should I put that on your next cake? ‘Happy Birthday to the Single Slut of Santa Leon.’”
“Joke’s on you, we always share a cake. That makes you fifty percent slut.”
“Maybe this year I’ll do something different.”
“The day you do something different, I’ll eat my hat.”
“You don’t wear a hat.”
“Not the point, Andrew.”
“I hate it when you call me Andrew,” he frowns.
“That’s literally your name,” Charlie points out.
“I know that, but you don’t use it. I feel like I’m in trouble when you do that.” Andrew’s face falls, and Charlie feels a little bit guilty. He was maybe, possibly, really mean to Andrew all night because of what he said.
“Who the fuck were you texting all evening anyway?” Charlie asks, finding it easier to focus on his curiosity than his guilt, or his inability to stop thinking about Eden.
After the boundaries they established, Charlie never should’ve pushed for more but he did, and then Eden fled.
Even then, Charlie couldn’t stop himself from trying to seek him out at his job—maybe not the best idea since he’d hidden from him there too.
At this point, it’s clear Eden wants nothing to do with him, so Andrew’s jokes about Charlie seeing someone possibly struck a nerve.
“My therapist. I asked if she had an emergency appointment for you.”
“Oh fuck you very much. Seriously, who was it?”
“Someone.”
“Someone who,” Charlie demands, jabbing his fingers at Andrew’s dash to change the music. Without rising to the bait, Andrew changes it back. “Every single person you text was in that house. Mom, Dad, Alec and Theo, Jason and his new boyfriend, and me. You don’t text anyone else.”
“I have other friends,” Andrew grumbles.
“I didn’t say you don’t have other friends, I said you don’t text anyone.
Denise hates phones as much as I do, and we all know that since she moved in with Amanda, you two have gotten chummy.
I know you guys have monthly wine and whine dates.
So my comment stands. Anyone you text was at Mom and Dad’s tonight. Who was it?”
“You’ll find out soon enough,” Andrew hedges, being oddly elusive.
“Annie, tell me.”
“Now it’s Annie because you want something,” he says with an exasperated shake of his head.
Charlie grins, leaning closer. “Yes, Annie, my most favorite brother.”
“Didn’t you once tell Alec that I couldn’t be your favorite brother because I hogged the womb?”
“You don’t need to remember every single fucking thing someone says to you, you know.”
“Trust me, it’s not on purpose. I wish I didn’t.”
“What does that mean?” Charlie frowns, not liking the morose tone of Andrew’s voice.
“Nothing,” Andrew says, plastering on a smile. “Anyway, we’re almost to your house, so just know that whatever happens I love you.”
“You didn’t hire me a stripper, did you? I’m shocked, Annie.”
Andrew snorts. “No, I did not hire you a stripper.”
“Is it paint?”
“I love that your two thoughts for a surprise are just a stripper or paint.”
“There are few things in this world better than the human body and a way to immortalize it.”
“You’ve done enough immortalizing of this one already.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Charlie asks, turning his eyes on his own tree-lined street. “What the hell is at my house?”
“Something you’re going to like. I think.”
“You think.” Charlie pokes him in the side. “Details, now.”
“You can wait one minute.”
“I absolutely the fuck cannot,” Charlie protests, turning to stare out the front window watching as his little bungalow comes into view at the end of the street. “I don’t see any—oh.”
Charlie’s heart leaps into his throat.
He’s just as beautiful as Charlie remembers, his blonde hair blowing in the wind and his arms wrapped around his middle as he sits on Charlie’s front porch.
“You...he…how.”
“The how doesn’t matter,” Andrew shrugs. “He’s here, for now. Just…be patient with him?”
“How do you know Eden? Have you two been texting? Are you two friends?” Charlie gapes.
“Don’t worry, he doesn’t like me like that.”
“I wasn’t worried,” Charlie scoffs, unsure how to explain to Andrew how happy it makes him to imagine that his favorite person in the world might like Eden, too. “He’s kind of great, right?”
“He’s a fucking handful that’s for sure, but…yeah, he’s great.”
“He’s twenty, Annie.”
“Yes, he is.”
“I’m too old for him.”
“You’re the one always telling me that age is just a number.”
“He ran away,” Charlie sighs. “Do you know why?”
“You should ask him that.”
“What if he doesn’t want to tell me?”
“He’s here, Charlie. That should tell you everything you need to know. The other stuff, well—you might have to be patient.”
“Fuck, I’m not patient.”
“You’ll have to be, with him, if you think it’s worth it—if you think a chance with him is worth it.”
Charlie swallows around a rush of emotions.
How the fuck would he know? He’s never seriously dated anyone.
Even the significant others he brought home in college only lasted a few weeks.
The only reason his family thought they were serious was because he brought them home.
He’d only done it because both times they had no family to visit, and Charlie hated the idea of someone being lonely.
Charlie never bothered to correct them. He and Andrew knew the truth, and he didn’t much care what anyone else thought.
In all the years since he came out as queer and started sleeping around, he’s never wanted to date anyone. Until now.
“I don’t know what I’m doing. I don’t date, Annie.”
“Neither does he.”
“What the fuck are we doing?”
“How the hell should I know? I’m not part of whatever the hell you two have going on. I just got him here.”
Charlie groans, unsure how the first person he might maybe want to date is the one person who doesn’t want to.
“Get out of the fucking car, Charlie. He’s going to think you don’t want to see him.”
“I do,” Charlie half-whines, “but I don’t know what to say.”
“That’s a first for you. Should I write it down in my calendar—Charlie King lost for words.”
“Oh, fuck off.”
“Gladly, if you’ll get your ass out of my car so I can go home.”
“Yes, sir,” Charlie intones, flinging his car door open. He has one foot out the door before he flings himself across the center console, wrapping Andrew in a hug. “I love you, Annie.”
“I love you too, now go,” Andrew whispers, kissing the side of his head before ruffling his hair. “Oh, and Charlie?”
“Yeah?”
“I sent him all your naked baby photos.”
“Fuck off,” Charlie grumbles, slamming the door harder than necessary and ignoring Andrew’s echoing laughter as he departs.
When he turns around, it’s to find Eden watching him with cautious eyes.
He rises from the front steps, tugging on his skirt that hits him a few inches above the knee.
It’s black again, with ruffles, and his band t-shirt is so oversized, his upper body is barely visible except for where the hem of it is tucked into the waistband of his skirt.
Both his arms are lined in friendship bracelets, his colorful array of tattoos peeking out between the beads and continuing up his elbows to beneath his shirt.
It occurs to Charlie that he never got to see Eden without a shirt, and has no idea just how many tattoos he has or even where they all are.