Chapter 42
42
Saturday, August 16
16 Days Left at the Lake
“Are you sure I shouldn’t come tonight?” Heather asks.
I’m in a bed in the Barry’s Bay hospital emergency room with a splitting headache and three fresh stitches above my right eyebrow.
“I don’t want you driving in the dark,” I tell her. “And Bennett and Nan are fine.” Shaken, but unharmed.
The fox is okay, too. Charlie swerved to miss it, then swerved again to move out of the way of an oncoming car. He slammed on the brakes just as we were about to hit the ditch. All in all, it was an impressive feat of emergency driving, but I bashed my head on the door frame in the process, blacked out briefly, and woke up to Charlie frantically calling my name and pressing his balled-up T-shirt to my brow.
“I know they’re all right,” Heather snaps. “Bennett called me right away. I’m worried about you .”
“They don’t think it’s a concussion,” I tell her. “The doctor and nurses have checked me out. You’ll be here tomorrow, anyway.”
I glance up and find Charlie lingering at the edge of the curtain around my bed. I insisted he take Nan and Bennett home to the cottage. I didn’t want them waiting around the hospital. Charlie stares at my stitches, deep grooves between his brows. He must have made a pit stop at his house—he’s wearing a T-shirt that’s not covered in my blood.
“I gotta go,” I tell Heather. “Please don’t tell Mom and Dad. I’m fine. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
She sighs. “I love you, Turtle.”
“I love you, too.”
A nurse slides past Charlie, telling him to take a seat.
I avoid looking at him as she asks me a series of questions.
Am I dizzy? No.
How is my headache? Bad.
Am I nauseated? No.
Any ringing in my ears? No.
She examines my eyes again, and then excuses herself to go talk to the doctor on call.
“Alice?” Charlie’s voice sounds like a metal scrape.
I fiddle with the ID band on my wrist. “Nan and Bennett are okay?”
“They’re worried about you, but yeah. I put a frozen pizza in the oven and poured your grandmother a scotch. They’ll be waiting for you.”
I nod.
“Alice?”
Reluctantly, I lift my eyes to Charlie’s. He’s pale. Anxiety radiates from him in waves. We stare at each other, but then the nurse pops back in and announces that I’m okay to go home. She says to continue monitoring for signs of a concussion and then lists symptoms that would require me to call an ambulance.
“You look out for her, Charlie,” she says, giving him a pat on the shoulder. They’re about the same age.
“I will. Thanks, Meredith.”
Neither Charlie nor I speak as we walk across the parking lot, my arm looped through his to keep steady.
“I’m so sorry,” he says once we’re in the car. “I can’t believe I hurt you.” He’s staring out at the farm on the other side of the road, and the lake beyond.
“It wasn’t your fault.”
His eyes swing to mine, full of disbelief. “I wasn’t paying attention. And now look at you.” He lifts his fingers toward my temple, and I flinch. He drops his arm. “I could have lost you.”
I steel myself against how wrecked he sounds, reminding myself of what he said in the car.
We wouldn’t be good together, would we, Alice?
“It’s just a few stitches. It’s nothing.”
“You’ll have a scar.”
I shrug. “A tiny one.” The doctor said it should fade to almost nothing.
He runs his hands over his face. When he looks back to me, I can tell he wants to talk more, but I hold up my hands. Whatever he wants to say can be saved for later—my brain feels like mashed bananas.
“Can you take me back to the cottage?” I ask. “I just want to put on some clean clothes and see Nan and Bennett.”
Charlie nods and starts the engine.
“I’m spending the night with you,” he says a few minutes later as we pull into the driveway.
“That’s not necessary.”
“It’s not optional, either. I said I’d look out for you.”
He shuts off the car and faces me.
“I don’t want you to stay,” I say.
Charlie blinks, and I know I’ve insulted him. It’s not intentional—but I need space to untangle my feelings.
Just when I think he’s going to relent, he straightens his spine. “Too bad.”
I let Nan and Bennett fuss over me and fix a cup of chamomile tea while Charlie sits in the corner, watching us in uncharacteristic terse silence. By ten, I’m exhausted and announce that I need to go to bed. When I’m done brushing my teeth, I find Charlie in my bedroom, his jeans exchanged for pajama bottoms.
“What’s this?” I point at the wooden rocking chair he’s moved into the corner.
“That’s where I’m spending the night.”
I look at the size of the chair and the size of Charlie. The two are incompatible. “I don’t need you to watch over me.”
“Please just let me do this,” he says. “I promised Heather.”
“You spoke to my sister?”
“I wanted to apologize for putting you all at risk.”
I’m too tired to argue, so I pull back the sheets, flick off the bedside lamp, and lie down. It’s not the most comfortable mattress, but right now it feels like heaven. I hear the creak of the rocker as Charlie sits.
“I can’t sleep with you staring at me like that,” I say after a few minutes. He’s lit by the moon, hands between his knees, wide awake. “Just go home, Charlie.”
“Not happening.”
“Fine. Then get in bed. It’ll be less creepy than you sitting there.”
“I’m afraid I’ll fall asleep if I lie down.”
“You should fall asleep,” I tell him. “I won’t tell Heather you slacked on the job.”
The mattress dips with his weight. I’m several degrees warmer with Charlie lying there, face tilted to me. I stare at the ceiling, hands behind my head, wishing I could pretend that he’s not here, that what he said in the car didn’t hurt.
It’s so much darker here than in the city, but Charlie’s presence cuts through the black. It’s awkward, him and me, lying together in my bed.
“I reek, don’t I?” I didn’t have the energy to shower, and Charlie smells so good.
“You’re fine.”
I make a dubious noise, and Charlie leans over, giving my armpit a good sniff. “Better than fine.”
I push him away. “Gross.”
He turns to me, resting his chin on his hand and trailing a finger over the inside of my upper arm. “Nothing about you is gross.”
I shiver, and despite the headache, despite good sense, my body sparks to life.
Charlie’s finger drags back and forth across the sensitive skin, down toward my armpit and back up to my elbow. His mouth follows a minute later, leaving kisses behind. While his lips caress my arm, then my ear, his fingers journey south, along my side, over my stomach, slipping beneath the waistband of my pajama shorts.
“I don’t think we should do that,” I say.
His fingers still. “I want to make you feel good. After today, I owe you that at the very least.”
I shake my head. “It’s too dangerous. Nan, Bennett…” But it’s also me. I need to make sure I’ve got any squishy feelings in check.
Charlie pulls his hand away. “I don’t have anything else to give you, any other way to say I’m sorry.”
I frown. “Sex isn’t the only thing you have to offer.”
He turns back to face the ceiling. “I know a lot of women who would disagree with you.”
I don’t have patience tonight. “That’s because you purposely seek out partners you know won’t ask anything more of you.”
“What do you really think, Alice?” His tone is light, but I feel him looking at me intently.
“I think that one day, when I don’t feel like my head is being crushed under a giant’s foot, we’re going to have a real conversation about your relationship baggage.”
He knows mine. I’ve told him about Oz and Trevor, and the boyfriends in between. I shared my theory that lifelong love is mostly a scam. He didn’t agree.
Charlie doesn’t speak for a long moment. “One day,” he says eventually. “But not right now.”
He extends an arm around my shoulders, giving me a nudge. I relent, settling my head on his chest, and he rubs his hand over my back.
“Alice, I don’t know what I would have done if you’d been badly hurt…or worse.”
I shush him. “Don’t think like that.”
“I feel better now that I can touch you,” he says. “I think it helps get the message to my brain that you’re okay.”
“I am okay,” I whisper, shutting my eyes. My body is leaden. “But let’s rest now.”
I fall asleep to the beat of Charlie’s heart and even breaths. A lullaby that’s specific to him, to this night.