Chapter 7 Erasing You
Erasing You
Keaton | The Past
Even though every part of me ached to rush back to our apartment, I forced myself to honor her final request as she left the pool house. After everything, it was the smallest act of decency I could offer.
Granite Bay University's campus sprawls so wide that a walk from David's house to the far edge and back should give her the time she needs.
Tears sting my eyes all over again as I picture what she must be doing right now.
This wasn’t supposed to be how things ended. We were supposed to finish college, start our careers, and have the wedding she’d dreamed of since childhood. After that, a home of our own, then kids.
We dreamed big, convinced our future couldn't be broken. Charlie and our mothers insisted we were meant to be. I believed it. Until Rianna showed up and everything changed.
So how did it all unravel? How did I end up limping through a silent campus, bloodied and alone, while the girl I love packs her life away from me?
If I’d seen this ending back when I met Rianna that last semester of junior year, would I have just kept walking instead of letting her into my life?
Sixteen years of memories crash over me, so fierce I collapse to my knees right in the middle of the campus courtyard.
"I'm Charlie. Who are you?"
My nose crinkles up. "That's a boy's name."
Charlie's eyes get really big and shiny, and her lips shake. "That's mean."
I don't like it when she cries. It makes my tummy upset and my heart feel funny. "I'm sorry. Please don't cry. I-I-I promise not to hurt you ever again."
Her lips still shake, but she sniffles and wipes her face on her shoulder. "You better not, or I won't be your friend anymore."
I kept that promise, right up until Rianna entered the picture.
The memories keep battering my heart, ripping away pieces with every blow.
The day a drunk driver crashed in their yard where Charlie's five-year-old little sister, Joely, was playing and killed her, my butterfly begged me to tell her it wasn't real. I promised her I'd never lie to her.
The day she told me she loved me in a boyfriend kind of way, when we were thirteen, and I told her I loved her too. I promised her I always would.
The day we lost our virginity to each other at sixteen, she asked me if we'd always be each other's one and only. I promised her we would be.
The day we talked about our dreams and our future, and she made me promise we'd always be together. I gave her that promise.
Now, all my promises to her feel cruel, reminders of how completely I failed her.
Except one.
It's a promise I'll be able to keep until I leave this world.
If I’d known this was my fate, I would have just given Rianna a polite smile and pointed her toward someone else for directions.
I wipe my eyes and force myself upright, every movement aching. A gentle breeze stirs the air, carrying that suffocatingly sweet, flowery scent from my shirt. The nausea hits so hard I double over, retching until my throat burns raw.
Ripping the shirt off, I fling it aside, then break into a run. But no matter how fast I go, I can’t escape my fuck up. The scent clings to me, a permanent brand of my betrayal.
Why did I do it?
Why is that answer so impossible to find? I should know why I tossed a grenade into my own relationship, obliterating the future I desperately wanted.
Charlie.
Her broken eyes are forever etched into my heart.
Here I am, running from everything, when I should be with her. If only she’d let me explain, let me beg for forgiveness.
Call her. I can call her, and when she answers, I can beg her to stay long enough for me to get there.
I dig into my pockets for my phone, but they're empty.
Shit. I have to find it. Every photo of Charlie is on that phone. They’re all I have left of her now.
A long, low sigh blows past my lips as I rub at my eyes, slowing to a walk.
I can’t just storm back. Charlie asked for one thing. Time to gather her things. No matter how much I ache to see her, my wants stopped mattering the moment I betrayed her.
My thoughts are the only company I have on my walk back to the apartment.
When I first saw Rianna, lost in the hallway, I simply meant to be helpful.
Charlie’s kindness often influenced me, so I helped a new girl find her way before lunch.
Still, I noticed how striking Rianna was.
Her blonde hair, her brown eyes, and the way her lips pouted.
She wasn't like Charlie, who always stood out, but she had a pull of her own.
Finding Rianna attractive shouldn’t have mattered. But since I was in a relationship with Charlie, that guilt gnawed at me. I’d never really noticed other women before, not like this. Maybe that’s why the guilt hit so hard.
After I helped her find her way, I ran late to meet Charlie.
Looking back, maybe that was the first red flag.
In sixteen years, I’d only ever been late to meet Charlie three times, always with a good reason.
This time, I was late just because I lost track of time talking to Rianna.
Charlie didn’t mind—she was even glad I’d helped—but that only made me feel worse.
When Rianna came looking for me a few days later, for some reason I can’t even recall, that guilt should have made me walk away.
So why didn’t I? What made me keep reaching for her friendship?
The glow of the apartment complex parking lot lights leads me home. As I drag myself up the steps, the sharp scent of burnt cotton hits my nose. At the walkway’s end, an orange glow flickers, drawing me closer.
I should have paid attention to the warning signs Charlie always mentioned. The prickling dread crawling over my skin, the pressure squeezing my chest until my head spun, the shaky breaths as I rounded the corner and saw the sprawling backyard.
My eyelids flicker as I struggle to process the scene. A metallic tang floods my mouth as I stumble down the back stairs toward the two women by the firepit, surrounded by boxes and shattered picture frames.
Charlie’s stuffed Gremlin catches my eye, and when she hurls it into the flames, a jagged pain rips through my chest.
I got that for her after she made me watch both movies with her for the first time when we were thirteen. It took my mom and me forever to find one, but I was so damn excited when they delivered it a few days before her fourteenth birthday.
As the toy ignites, I must make a noise, because both Charlie and Amelia whip their heads toward me. Amelia’s glare is pure hatred, but it’s nothing compared to the emptiness in Charlie’s eyes. The light she once carried is gone, and I’m the reason why.
You took a fundamental part of who she was and crushed it in your fucking hand.
As I stare into her eyes, David's words haunt me.
"What the fuck are you doing here? She asked you to give her time to get her things, and you couldn't even do that? Was cheating on her not enough? Huh? Did you not find your satisfaction in destroying her, so you had to come and do more damage? Which one is it, Keaton?"
Amelia’s fury in every word slams into me, leaving me hollow.
Shit. I didn’t just destroy things with Charlie, I wrecked my friendship with Amelia, too. The fallout from my betrayal is suffocating, and I can’t believe I never saw it coming.
That’s the real problem. I never thought. Not about myself, not about Charlie, not even about Amelia. Hell, I barely even thought about Rianna.
What the fuck is wrong with me?
Through blurry eyes, I witness Charlie putting her hand on Amelia's shoulder.
"That's enough, Mel. Why don't you go inside and carry those other boxes to your car?"
Amelia turns to her. "What? No. I'll stay right here with you. Once you finish, we'll get the boxes together and get the hell out of here."
"Mel. Look at me. Really look. I'm okay. Nothing he does now can ever hurt me the way he's already done."
Her voice is as empty as I feel inside—drained of anything resembling life.
"If you need me, just yell."
Charlie nods, and Amelia strides past me, her eyes cutting right through me. Her shoulder slams into mine, nearly knocking me off balance.
Charlie snatches a photo from its frame, rips it out, and flings it into the fire. In sixteen years, I’ve never seen her eyes look at me with such raw disgust and hatred.
"All of that," she says, waving her hand in the air to trace my body. "It'll never measure up to the amount of pain I felt when you fucked that bitch." A shudder rolls over her, and with a glare, she spits at my feet. "I hope it hurts, though."
I nod, swallowing hard, lost in the venom of her words.
My body goes rigid as she tears the candid prom photo from its frame.
It’s my favorite. Anyone could see how much we loved each other in that shot.
We sat tucked in a shadowy corner, Charlie straddling my thighs in her shimmering black dress, gazing at me like I was her whole world.
My hands cradled her face, our foreheads pressed together, lips almost touching.
Amelia caught it from the side, every emotion laid bare for the camera.
It's also the only copy we have that I know of.
"Don't," I plead, moving closer.
Charlie stares down at it intensely as tears run unchecked down her cheeks, but then looks over at me when I come to a stop beside her.
"Why shouldn't I? All of this was nothing but a lie.
The boy who's in this picture with me would never do what you did.
This boy would rather have hurt himself than ever think of causing me pain.
This boy...this boy loved me. But considering that you are this boy, this," she lifts the picture for me to see, "is nothing more than a well-crafted fabrication of a fairytale that I was stupid enough to believe. "
She hurls it into the fire without a flicker of regret, and that hurts more than anything. Like someone is hacking my heart out with a pickaxe.
“Why are you doing this?” I whisper, watching another memory vanish into the flames.
"Because I want to erase you from my life, Carr. I don't want any memory of you to remain. All they'll do is remind me of how I naively gave my heart to the one person in this world I'd never thought would crumble it to dust."
She grabs the last box and, instead of discarding the items one by one, dumps the entire box in it.
The last box—final proof we ever shared a life—goes up in smoke.
Sixteen years as friends, eight as a couple, and all that’s left is a camera roll on a phone I’ve managed to lose. No one to blame but me.
Charlie turns to leave, but I reach out, fingers brushing her arm. She whirls around, yanking free, and slams her palms into my chest, shoving me with everything she has left.
"Don't touch me! Don't put your filthy fucking hands on me," she screams.
The only small mercy tonight is that it’s party night at David’s, so the apartment complex is nearly empty.
"You make me sick, Keaton. So sick that I want to go inside and stand under a shower so hot it boils my skin.
You fucked her without a condom." She shoves me again.
"You gave her something that was only supposed to be mine.
You. You were only supposed to be mine, just like I was only supposed to ever be yours.
" This time, her fists hit me. "You promised me.
" A sob rips from her chest. "You promised, and you lied. "
When she shoves me back, I stare at my feet, certain my heart must have fallen there because I can’t feel it beating anymore.
"I'm going to the clinic tomorrow to get tested, and I swear to fucking god, Keaton, if you gave me anything..." she says, stopping in the middle of her sentence and dashing her tears away with harsh strokes.
I jam my hands into my pockets to stop myself from reaching for her. “You don’t have to. You didn’t catch anything.”
Her caustic laugh soars through the night. "Like I'd ever believe a word out of your filthy, lying mouth."
"This was the first and only time I ever fucked up, Char. God, butterfly. I promise."
"Your promises mean shit to me anymore, and never call me that again. I'm not your butterfly. I never will be again."
“Charlie, please, just listen. It never happened before tonight, and I wish it never had at all. I fucked up, Char. Really fucked up, and I’m so sorry. Hurting you was the last thing I ever wanted.”
"But you did. You hurt—no, that's too tame a word.
You completely massacred me, Keaton. You turned me into a walking corpse whose only purpose is to live again.
That way, I can do it without you. Regardless of what you say, I'm getting tested, anyway.
I won't take that chance. You know...I think I almost hate you more for not using a condom.
I really do hope you get gonorrhea and your dick falls off.
That would be divine retribution for what you did to me.
" She pulls her phone from her pocket and holds it out to me.
"Here. I already pulled their number up. You just have to hit the call button."
My brows lower as I slowly reach out to take it into my hand. When I glance down, my parents' number is there.
I peer back up at her in confusion, and she bares her teeth at me in a hateful smile. She reaches over to press the call button and sticks it on speaker.
My pulse races as cold fingers wrap around my throat while I wait for my father to answer the phone.
"My Charlie girl! Is everything okay? You don't normally call me and Norma this late."
The happiness in his voice has my stomach rolling with nausea again.
"No, Mr. Carr. Everything isn't okay. I'll let your son tell you all about it, though. Don't worry. I'll be right here to correct any part he tries to fib about."
"Keaton?" my dad calls sharply.
I close my eyes as I prepare to destroy one more relationship in my life.