11. Charly #2
I smile through all of it. I laugh at the right moments. I work the room, because the best revenge is looking alive when everyone expected you to disappear.
Clarence stays close. Not hovering, not possessive, just there. A hand on my back when I need steadying. A dry comment when I need to laugh. He reads the room better than I expected, knows when to jump in and when to let me handle it myself.
It’s nice. Having one person in my corner who actually wants to be there.
“You’re surprisingly good at this whole thing,” I tell him during a brief lull, leaning into his side.
“At what exactly?”
“Being supportive. Being present without being overbearing. You’re not trying to fix anything or fight anyone or give me unsolicited advice. You’re just here, and it’s actually really helpful.”
“Is that a compliment? Because it sounds like one and I want to make sure I’m reading this correctly.” He raises an eyebrow over the rim of his glass.
“Don’t let it go to your head. Your ego is healthy enough already.”
“Too late. It’s already there. I’m going to be insufferable about this for at least a week.” He grins down at me, pleased with himself.
I’m smiling at him, genuinely smiling, when the air changes.
Adam walks in.
He’s got Rebecca on his arm, and even from across the room I can see how much has changed since the wedding. She’s showing now, unmistakably pregnant, one hand resting on her belly. Her face is thinner. Her smile is the kind you put on when you’re trying to convince yourself you’re fine.
She left him at the altar. But she went back to him.
I found out two weeks after the wedding. Clarence told me, careful about it. She went back. They got married at the courthouse. Quietly. No guests. No fanfare. No sister standing beside her pretending to be happy.
I didn’t break. I just felt tired.
“We can leave right now if you want,” Clarence says quietly, his hand finding my lower back. “No one would blame you. We can walk out and get those tacos I mentioned.”
“I’m not running from them. Not anymore. I’m done running.” I keep my eyes on Adam and don’t move an inch.
“Charly, you don’t have to prove anything to anyone here.”
“This isn’t about proving anything. This is about refusing to let them take one more thing from me. They already took enough.”
Adam’s eyes find me across the room. His face shifts when he sees Clarence beside me, his hand on my back. Possessive. Angry. Absolutely not his right to feel either of those.
He says a word to Rebecca. She nods, her face carefully blank, and he starts walking toward us.
“Here we go,” I murmur, setting my champagne down on a passing tray. “Brace yourself for whatever this is about to be.”
“I’m right here. I’m not going anywhere.” He shifts a half step closer.
“I know you are. That’s the only reason I’m not heading for the exit.”
Adam reaches us with a smile that doesn’t touch his eyes. He looks good, because he always looks good, because men like him spend their whole lives perfecting the outside while the inside rots.
“Charly. What a surprise to see you here tonight. I didn’t think you’d show.”
“Why wouldn’t I show? Clarence’s foundation is one of the sponsors. I’m here to support him.” I keep my chin level.
“How convenient. Playing the supportive friend.”
“I didn’t think you’d want to show your face after everything that happened. Most people would be embarrassed.”
“After everything you did, you mean? I’m not the one who should be embarrassed, Adam. I’m not the one who cheats on everyone.”
His smile tightens. “I see you’ve moved on quickly. That was fast, even for a woman trying to make a point.”
“Clarence is my friend. Not that my relationships are any of your business anymore.” I fold my arms.
“Is that what we’re calling it?” His eyes move to Clarence, cold and dismissive. “My brother. Picking up my scraps. Some things never change.”
“You need to watch how you’re talking right now.” Clarence’s voice goes low in a way I’ve never heard before.
“Or what exactly? You’ll tell Mom the way you did when we were kids? Run and hide the way you always do when things get difficult?”
“Adam. That’s enough.” I step forward, putting myself between them, a hand flat on each of their chests. “Did you actually want anything, or did you just come over here to make yourself feel better about your own choices?”
“I wanted to talk to you, Charly. Just you and me.”
“We’re talking right now. This is a conversation.”
“I meant alone. Somewhere private where we can actually have a real discussion.”
“That’s absolutely not happening. Whatever you have to say, you can say it here.”
“Charly, please.” His voice softens. Changes. Becomes the voice he used to use late at night when he wanted a favor, all warmth and vulnerability and practiced sincerity. “Just give me five minutes. That’s all I’m asking. Five minutes to talk.”
I should say no. Every rational part of my brain is screaming at me to say no.
But I want to hear what he has to say. I want to know what possible excuse he could offer, what pathetic justification, what spin he’d try to put on three years of lies.
“Two minutes. Right here where we’re standing. Clarence stays exactly where he is.” I plant my feet.
“This is private, Charly. It’s between us.”
“Nothing between us is private anymore. You made sure of that when you announced your affair at our wedding in front of everyone we knew. You lost the right to private conversations.”
Pain crosses his eyes. Or a very convincing imitation of it.
“Fine. If that’s what it takes.” He exhales like I’m the one being unreasonable.
Clarence shifts beside me, tense, ready. I touch his arm lightly. I’ve got this.
Adam takes a breath. Puts on his most concerned face, the one that fooled me for three years.
“You need to stop this, Charly. Whatever you think you’re doing with my brother, it needs to stop.”
“You’re joking.” I almost laugh in his face.
“I’m serious. Clarence isn’t what you think he is. He’s using you to get at me. He’s always been this way. Every single thing I’ve ever had, he’s tried to get close to it. You’re just the newest way for him to prove a point.”
“That’s really the move you’re going with right now? Your wife took off her ring in front of a whole church, went back to you anyway, and you came out here to warn me about your brother?”
“Because somebody should. You think he cares about you?” Adam’s voice goes hard and ugly. “He doesn’t. He cares about beating me. That’s all he’s ever cared about. He sees what’s mine and he can’t leave it alone.”
“Nothing about me was ever yours.”
“Ask him about Elena.” He says it fast, saving the best for last. “Ask him what happened when I brought her home junior year. Ask him why she stopped coming around.”
Clarence’s whole body changes. I catch it beside me before I see it, this sudden stillness that’s nothing at all related to his usual quiet.
“Stop talking.” His voice comes out low and flat and I’ve never heard it sound that way.
“Why? She deserves to know what kind of man she’s trusting.” Adam turns back to me. “He spent months getting close to her. Convinced her I was the wrong brother. And then when he’d gotten what he wanted...”
“I said stop.” Clarence takes a single step forward.
Two words, and Adam actually shuts up. Not because he wants to. Because Clarence’s face just told him what happens if he doesn’t, and for once in his life Adam believed it.
The quiet lasts about three seconds. Then Adam resets, softer now, the concerned version, because he’s got twenty faces and he’ll cycle through all of them until one works.
“I know I hurt you, Charly. I know I don’t deserve anything from you. But I can’t watch you walk into the same mistake with him. He doesn’t want you. He wants to win. That’s all it’s ever been.”
“And what do you want? Because you’re standing here with your whole life on fire behind you, trying to convince me your brother is the problem. What’s the plan here, Adam?”
“I want you to be careful. That’s all.” He spreads his hands like he’s the reasonable one.
“The way I should’ve been careful with you?”
He flinches. Good.
“Here’s what I know, Adam. I know you cheated on me with my twin sister.
I know you took my money. I know you stood up in front of everyone I love and humiliated me.
And now that I’ve got somebody who treats me with basic decency, you can’t stand it, so you’re out here trying to wreck that too.
” I don’t raise my voice. I don’t need to.
“Whatever Clarence is, whatever happened with Elena, he’s shown me more honesty in the last six weeks than you did in three years.
So take your concern and go find Rebecca.
You two deserve each other. We’re done.”
“You’ll regret this. When he shows you who he really is...”
“Goodbye, Adam.” I turn my shoulder to him, done.
He stands there another second, looking for a crack. He doesn’t find one.
He walks away.
I wait until he’s far enough that he can’t hear me, and then I turn to Clarence.
“Who’s Elena?”
He closes his eyes. Takes a breath.
“It wasn’t what he said it was.”
“Then tell me what it was.” I keep my voice soft so it doesn’t sound like Adam’s interrogation.
“Can we not do this here?” He opens his eyes, and there’s a thing in them I haven’t seen before. Not anger. Not guilt. Older than both of those, and he’s been carrying it a long time. “Please. Not here.”
I want to push, because I’m so done with men who answer hard questions with later. But this isn’t Adam stalling. This is Clarence asking me for a thing he’s never asked me for.
“Okay. Not here.” I let my hand find his sleeve for half a second, then drop it.
We don’t talk in the car. He drives with both hands on the wheel and his jaw set, and I sit with my clutch in my lap and watch the city go dark and bright and dark again through the window.
The quiet isn’t comfortable this time. It’s got weight.
It’s sitting between us on the center console waiting to be picked up.
He pulls into the driveway and kills the engine and neither of us moves.