Chapter 16
TEXT MESSAGE FROM JIO VARGAS TO CHARLOTTE THORNE, 9:41 AM:OH MY GOD CHARLOTTE WHAT ON EARTH!!!! QUEEEN!!! BITCH!!!! WHAT!!!!
(Message not delivered.)
The quad burst with color. Maybe it was the adrenaline surging through her body. Maybe she could fully experience her surroundings without worrying about Roger. Charlotte didn’t care why the world had dialed up its saturation. She soaked up every detail.
Warm copper brick paths. Grass so green it belonged in a crayon box. The occasional flash of a blue-and-silver Hein tank top.
Charlotte could stand there for hours and count every hue. She wanted to grab a sketch pad and capture it on paper. It didn’t matter that the picnic was organized exactly as it had been last time. Nothing was the same. She didn’t feel abandoned or embarrassed. She felt no urge to hide. She felt…
excited scared nervous speechless satisfied irritated relieved
Honestly, she felt a little high.
She needed to find her friends.
A familiar bark pulled her from her thoughts. Little paws battered her calves. Charlotte leaned down to greet her loyal new friend. “Hey, Misty. How’s my favorite girl?”
Misty panted up at her, tongue waggling from her mouth. She perched her tiny feet on Charlotte’s thigh.
Charlotte scooped Misty up and held her like a hairy baby. “Where’s your uncle?” she asked. “I have some groveling to do.”
Misty didn’t answer, but Charlotte already knew where to find Reece. RC staff and class officers stood behind a long table beneath an old beech tree, roasting hot dogs and serving platters of scrambled eggs and bacon. She’d bet anything that Reece was exactly where he was supposed to be, serving tongs in hand.
“CHARLOTTE!”
She whirled around. Jio waved at her frantically from a blanket not far from the path. Matt lay stretched out on his back, his head pillowed in Jio’s lap. She’d been so lost in her thoughts that she walked right past them.
“Charlotte, get OVER HERE!” Jio hissed, cell phone clutched tightly in their hand.
“What’s wrong?” She crossed the grass and sank to her knees beside them. Misty wiggled out of her grasp and sniffed at Matt’s hand. He ruffled her fur, unperturbed by his fiancé’s panic.
“Girl, what did you do?” Jio barked a startled laugh at her, so she knew no one had died, at least.
“What are you talking about?”
Matt threw her a lifeline as he scratched under Misty’s chin. “You’re trending.”
Charlotte’s hand went immediately to her phone in her pocket, still as the dead—or the powered down. “Huh.”
“ChompNews already wrote a story!” Jio shoved their iPhone at her. She made out the headline roger ludermore’s commencement address was so f*cked up that his assistant quit on twitter!
They’d found a photo of her, an ancient selfie from her Instagram. She could imagine the comments: supportive jokes from the take this job and shove it crowd, vicious attacks from the pay your dues boomers.
She pushed the phone away. “You know what? I don’t even want to know.”
Jio grinned and turned the screen back in their direction. They kept scrolling. “I’m so proud of you. My viral star. I’ll keep an eye on the conversation for you, don’t worry about it. Put it out of your head.”
There were perks to having friends who worked in digital communications. “Thank you. I appreciate it. Let me know if anyone doxes me.”
At long last Matt took off his sunglasses and revealed fond, bloodshot eyes. “Well done, Charlotte.”
For some reason this praise from the most reserved member of the 3Ds got through to her. She let seafoam green pride fill her chest, determined to take the compliment.
“Thank you,” she said.
Matt nodded once. Then he put his sunglasses back on.
She reached for Misty, needing the dog’s reassuring weight on her lap. Misty licked her chin and resettled in her lap.
Jio typed furiously on their phone. “What’s your Venmo?”
Charlotte frowned. “Why?”
“No reason.” They gave her an innocent look, full eyelashes batting sincerely.
She sighed and decided to just trust her friend. “It’s the same as my Twitter handle.”
“Great, thank you.” More furious typing. Then Jio made a satisfied noise and dropped their phone on the blanket. They smiled at her again, joy almost disguising the circles under their eyes. And the leftover glitter stuck to their cheekbones.
“You look wiped,” Charlotte said before she could stop herself. “Did you sleep?”
“Garrett and I watched Say Yes to the Dress until six a.m.,” Jio chirped. “He’s coming to the wedding.”
Oh goodness. The Vargas-Larsen wedding was turning into the Hein social event of the season. Garrett better acquire some sequined accessories, pronto.
She scanned the crowd for a familiar brown topknot. No dice. “Have you seen Jackie?”
Matt teased his fingers through Misty’s furry tail. “Not yet.”
“Hmm.” Charlotte nodded. “If you do, tell her I’m looking for her.”
SLACK MESSAGE FROM AUbrEY PAGE TO CHARLOTTE THORNE, 9:53 AM:r u really quitting?? R u crazy??
(Message unread.)
Just as she’d expected, Reece stood behind the catering table under the beech tree. Charlotte watched from a distance as he served hot dogs. He smiled at each person, trading small talk and asking questions. When an elderly alumna couldn’t hear him over the table, he leaned forward to speak directly in her ear. The lady patted him on the shoulder before moving on to a platter of breakfast sandwiches.
Charlotte felt pink. Eager to be next to him, nervous about what she had to say.
Reece loved her. He’d all but told her in the parking lot. There are so many people who love you, Charlie. We would do anything for you.
Even if he only meant it as a friend, she could work with that. It would be an honor to be Reece’s friend. She would show up for him every goddamn day if that was what it took to convince him to let her be more than that.
She would never walk out on him again.
You just have to ask us.
Charlotte wove through the picnic and circled the banquet table. She picked up a spare set of tongs and eased into the spot next to Reece. “Hi there,” she said.
Reece placed a hot dog on a plate outstretched in front of him. The alum who held it, midthirties if she had to guess, nodded in thanks and carried on.
“Hello,” Reece said to her, sotto voce. He glanced at her, but his face gave nothing away.
A little girl, someone’s daughter, stepped up next. “Can I have one?” she asked Charlotte, peering at the platter of breakfast sandwiches.
“Of course!” Charlotte exclaimed with as much fanfare as she could. She placed the sandwich onto the child’s plate, brandishing her tongs like a wizard.
“Thank you.” The little girl grinned and darted away.
Reece threw her a curious look. “You joining the alumni relations committee?”
“Exploring a career in catering,” she explained. At his raised eyebrow, she added, “I quit my job.”
That got his attention. He gawked at her, dropping the tongs on the hot dog platter. “Are you serious? Just now?”
Charlotte nodded. She didn’t want to get into it, the commencement address and the tweet and the internet salivating over the spectacle of it all. Besides, Reece understood the deeper consequences beneath all of that. The freedom and financial precariousness it brought back into her life. What exactly she was escaping.
“It’s a long story,” she said.
For a moment Reece just looked at her. Her exhausted, fragile heart rose to her throat as she waited for him to say something. She didn’t need him to be proud of her—her own pride was enough—but she wanted him to know that she had heard him. That she just needed to be ready to see it for herself, and to do something about it.
Then she saw it: not a smile, not a tear, but a single nod that said he got it. Before she could say anything else, he wrapped his arm around her shoulders and pulled her against this chest.
“Good for you,” he murmured. She felt him press a firm kiss to her hair, and she melted.
“What are you going to do now?” he asked when he finally let her go.
She hadn’t thought about it yet; there wasn’t time. The future stretched out ahead of her in a delicious blank expanse. It didn’t scare her because Reece was right: She didn’t need to face this chapter of her life with a plan. She could nanny again, or freelance, and ask Terry for her old job back if other opportunities didn’t arise. She wouldn’t mind moving back here for a while and tending bar.
She would have time to draw. Anything she wanted—not cartoons, but maybe abstract shapes. Flowers. Mossy eyes and honey lips.
She hadn’t asked herself what she wanted from her life for years. The prospect was strangely thrilling. She could run a marathon. She could learn how to do stick-and-poke tattoos. She could get super into Dungeons Dragons.
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “But that’s okay.”
Reece nodded. “You have time to figure it out.”
Charlotte watched him serve another hot dog to a thirty-something alum. “Can I ask you for another favor?”
“Does this one involve a billionaire?” He clacked his tongs together menacingly.
She laughed. “No, definitely not.” Her thumb wanted to work its way to her mouth. Instead, she used her tongs to rearrange the breakfast sandwiches in neat lines. “On your way back to St. Louis…Could you drop me off in Brooklyn?”
Reece blinked. “I thought you were taking the train.”
She looked around them, wary of the alumni milling about the table and her own dishevelment. This was hardly a romantic moment to tell him how she felt. But Reece deserved to hear it. She needed to be honest with him. He’d been waiting five years to have this conversation.
Charlotte put the tongs down and nodded toward the tree behind them. Without needing clarification, Reece pulled the apron up over his head and handed it to an RC kid. Then he followed her to the other side of the tree and into the shade.
Shoot, she didn’t know how to do this. She didn’t know the words.
But she had to try.
“I don’t want to leave here without you,” she admitted. “I don’t know what comes after this. I don’t know what I want my life to be. Some days I’m not even sure who I am. But I know that you are a good person—the best person, really—and I want to start there.”
She couldn’t tell if that was enough or too much, and in the end it didn’t matter because it erupted out of her anyway. She couldn’t stop talking now that she’d started, even as the words stumbled across each other.
“This weekend, I have felt so many emotions—so much more than I have felt in years, and I— The best feelings were with you. About you. I care about you, and I know I could care so much more if we…I could fall in love with you so easily that I might have already done it.” She groaned and hid her face in her hands. “God, I’m so bad at this, I don’t know how to say it.”
Reece took her gently by the wrists and guided her hands away from her eyes. Thank goodness, he was smiling at her. He gave her the classic, just-for-Charlie megawatt special.
No, this was a limited edition.
“You’re saying it just fine.”
“Okay,” she breathed.
His thumb found the center of her palm and rubbed in a comforting circle. Charlotte couldn’t look away from his eyes, warm and green and full of emotions to match her own. They proved what she already knew: She wasn’t alone in this.
“Charlie.” She blinked up at him, powerless to do anything else. His hold on her hand tightened just so as he wet his lips. “I have loved you for years. I don’t plan on stopping.” He lifted her hand and pressed a gentle kiss to her knuckles. An altogether different smile teased her as he added, “Even if you’re unemployed.”
She swatted him in the side, and he laughed, pulling her closer for a lingering kiss. Then he murmured, “I think the Jeep has room for one more.”
TEXT MESSAGE FROM JIO VARGAS TO CHARLOTTE THORNE, 1:15 PM:hey viral queen, you should check your venmo balance
(Message not delivered.)
TEXT MESSAGE FROM JIO VARGAS TO CHARLOTTE THORNE, 1:16 PM:idk how much money people have sent you but my tweet linking to it has over 8k likes sooooooo it might be a lot
(Message not delivered.)
TEXT MESSAGE FROM JIO VARGAS TO CHARLOTTE THORNE, 1:16 PM:you’re welcome!!!!!!!
(Message not delivered.)
When Charlotte got back to the dorm, the door to her room was cracked open. Thank goodness, because she still didn’t have her keys. She had a feeling they were in Jackie’s pocket, just waiting for her to ask for them.
Charlotte eased the door open. Her best friend kneeled on the floor beside her open suitcase, rolling her socks into neat balls. The package of Oreos sat beside her, almost empty.
“Hey, stranger,” Charlotte said. “I brought breakfast.”
Jackie startled. Her face was guarded when she looked up from her task, but it softened as she took in the plate of breakfast sandwiches. “Bless you, you asshole.”
Charlotte sat down on the cold linoleum next to her, crossing her legs as she handed over the plate. She picked up a pair of jeans, unworn by the looks of their neat creases, and folded them. “I looked for you at the picnic.”
Jackie swallowed a piece of bacon and then cleared her throat. Her lips pinched with uncharacteristic embarrassment. “Nina just left.”
Charlotte didn’t bother to fight a smile. “Good for you, lady killer.”
“I would never kill a lady,” Jackie trilled in a bastardized English accent. She thrust her chin in the air and pressed the back of her hand to her forehead with a flourish. “How dare you accuse me of such a crime!”
Charlotte laughed, but her smile faded as silence fell on the mountain of clothes in front of them. She reached for a sweatshirt and held it in her lap. She’d been thinking about this all morning but, once again, she still didn’t have the right words.
Then again, an apology always started with the same two.
Jackie beat her to the punch. “What happened?”
She blinked. “Hmm?”
Her best friend gave her a sideways look. “You have a weird look on your face.”
Charlotte picked up the hoodie and tucked the sleeves into the center. “Jio can send you a Vox explainer.”
“What?”
She shook her head and put the hoodie in the suitcase. “Sorry, bad joke.” Charlotte took a deep breath and held it. Then she turned to meet Jackie’s eyes. “I quit my job.”
Jackie’s surprise bloomed like a rose, her lips parting in a delicate gasp. “You…you did?”
Charlotte nodded. Then, a little proud herself, she added, “On Twitter. During Roger’s speech.”
“What?”Jackie dropped her plate, the breakfast sandwich flopping open on the floor. “Char, you did what?”
“It doesn’t matter.” Charlotte took her friend’s hand and closed it between both of her own. “You were right, Jackie. I’m sorry. I’ve been so self-absorbed.”
Jackie goggled at her. “Yeah. You’ve been a shithead.” But her face brightened, and her dazed smile melted the worry from Charlotte’s heart. “But it’s okay. I mean, I didn’t know what was going on. I just wanted to help, but—”
“About that.” Charlotte sat up on her heels for a moment to pull a folded page of cream construction paper out of the back pocket of her overalls. Then she turned over Jackie’s hand, palm up, and placed it in her grasp. “I made this last night at Acronym.”
Jackie gave her a curious look. She unfolded the page, smoothing out the creases, and turned it over. Charlotte watched as confusion and then understanding spread across Jackie’s face, her jaw going slack as she took it in.
It was a color wheel. Not very colorful, though. Charlotte had ground the gray pencil to a nub, filling most of the pie slices with darker and lighter patches of ashy blank nothing—the void of her life, thick with insecurity and loneliness and shame. But lines of color as thin as embroidery thread wove through the expanse of gray: violet, tangerine, sepia, electric blue.
Gold for Nina. Metallic silver for Jio. Jade green for Reece. Burgundy red for Jackie.
Hope and affection and ambition and desire and anticipation all straining to break through, radiating from the corner of herself she kept protected. She wanted all those colors back.
“This is how I felt last night,” Charlotte said. “When I stormed out, I mean. I guess it’s how I’ve felt for a while.” Jackie looked up from the sketch, her eyes wide but focused on her words. Charlotte licked her dry lips, her hand fisting where it rested on her thigh. “But I think that’s starting to change now. I hope.”
For once Jackie didn’t say anything. She looked back at the page, at the expansive gray mess and the streaks of emotion fighting for space. Then she pulled Charlotte into a tight hug, her fingers clenching the back of her shirt.
Charlotte pressed her face against Jackie’s shoulder, relief and security overwhelming her alongside a violent pang of love and gratitude. Warm burgundy red again, all Jackie Slaughter.
They sat like that for a very long time. Then they resumed packing.
“So, Baroness Slaughter,” Charlotte spouted in her best attempt at the queen’s English. “Pray tell, did you engage in scandalous conduct with Lady Dorantes?”
“How perfectly impertinent for you to inquire, Duchess Thorne!”
@HeinUniversity, 1:57 PM:The #HeinRandC2018 committee would like to apologize for our selection of Roger Ludermore as this year’s commencement speaker. His remarks do not reflect the values of the Hein community. We hope the Class of 2018 will forgive us for this error in judgment.
TEXT MESSAGE FROM NINA DORANTES TO CHARLOTTE THORNE, 2:01 PM:I’m heading out for my flight, please forgive me for not saying good-bye. It sounds like you’ve had a wild twenty-four hours! Can we FaceTime this week so you can tell me all about it? If you need some cash this summer, I’d love to commission a Charlotte Thorne illustration of an orchid for my next tattoo…
(Message not delivered.)
TEXT MESSAGE FROM REECE KRUEGER TO CHARLOTTE THORNE, 2:15 PM:ready to hit the road?
(Message not delivered.)
Empty cups went in a shopping bag, dirty clothes into suitcases. Jackie stuffed the leftover snacks in a tote bag for Charlotte to take with her on the road. The ritual helped distract from their impending good-bye. Unlike almost every other time they’d packed up a dorm room together, they weren’t guaranteed to see each other again at the end of the summer.
“I’ll call you when I get off work tomorrow,” Jackie promised. She shoved the empty Oreos package into the trash bag.
“You don’t have to do that,” Charlotte said. She collected their used towels and put them in a neat pile on top of her dresser. “Plus I want to be the one to call you.”
Her fingers drifted automatically to her phone in her back pocket. She reminded herself again that it was off. It would probably take weeks for her to get used to living outside the radius of Roger’s whims. Without his fragile ego at the forefront of her mind, she might even be able to understand her emotions.
Good timing too. The events of this weekend would take ages to process.
“I’m holding you to that,” Jackie said. “We’ll nail down those dates for you to come hang out in L.A. I’m buying roller skates.”
Charlotte laughed at the idea of Jackie gliding down the Santa Monica boardwalk, her French braids peeking out from under a helmet. “Hard yes to L.A., soft maybe to skates.”
“Maybe you can come when Nina visits too! That’ll be a fun new dynamic.” Jackie winked. “And next week you are…?”
Charlotte repeated her marching orders. “Texting Amy about getting brunch, and calling your dad for help breaking my lease.”
“Very good. The time has come for you to couch surf. We can all rotate hosting you, I’ll put together a calendar.” Charlotte’s unease must have shown on her face because Jackie gave her a firm poke in the nose. “Do not give me that look! Let us love you! You can stay with me as long as you want, and I’m sure Reece will say the same.”
It would take practice for Charlotte to be comfortable accepting help, but she had to start somewhere. “Yes, ma’am,” she said. She didn’t even tack on a self-deprecating joke.
“I wish I could put you in my suitcase and take you with me.” Jackie held the bag open and offered it to her. “Do you think you could fit in here?”
“I’d have to become a lot more flexible very quickly,” Charlotte drawled. “I wish we had more nachos.”
“Go see Terry again before you hit the road.” Jackie zipped the suitcase and toed on her sneakers. “Maybe he can hire you to fix his awful merch.”
The room looked stark without their personal effects scattered across every flat surface. Charlotte folded up their used bedding and rolled down the blackout curtain. Once again it was just another anonymous dorm room with standard-issue furniture. The ceiling bulb wheezed overhead, casting a yellowish glow over the empty walls.
Over the decades, millions of adventures had unfolded here. Hundreds of occupants and thousands of nights. Parties and study groups and hookups and homesick phone calls and discoveries and mistakes.
Charlotte leaned against the door, her arms crossed over her chest. “Do you think it’ll be like this at our ten-year?”
She expected a dark joke in response. Instead, Jackie tilted her head to the side in thought. “Yes and no. This place will be the same. Who knows who we’ll be?”
The question could have been ominous, but Jackie smiled at her, and Charlotte smiled back. She knew what she meant. They were still at the beginning.
Jackie stood up and patted her pockets. “I should head out.”
“Wallet, phone, charger, car keys,” Charlotte chanted.
“Got it, got it, got it somewhere, got ’em.”
“Did you remember your sunglasses?”
Jackie took her cheap shades out of her jacket pocket and popped them on like a headband. “Of course.”
Charlotte leaned against her bare bed and wove together her emotional Kevlar. She hated good-byes. Good-byes called for something meaningful to say, some profound unburdening of the soul. What Jackie meant to her went beyond platitudes about platonic love.
There was so much she wanted to tell her, so many things she wanted to thank her for. Not just for this weekend. For nearly eight years of friendship. For kicking her ass and forcing her to stand up straight. Jackie was her hero, and the annoying big sister Charlotte never asked for. She was family.
They stood opposite each other for a quiet moment, Jackie with her suitcase and Charlotte by the bed. She studied Charlotte’s face, the worry lines and the uncomfortable tightness at her mouth. “You’re going to be okay, Char,” her best friend promised. “You did good this weekend.”
Charlotte snorted. “I puked on the President’s Lawn.”
Jackie wheeled her suitcase to the door. “Well, he deserves it for choosing such a shitty commencement speaker.” She swung it open and stepped out into the hallway, the wheels quietly whisking from the linoleum onto the carpet.
Charlotte hovered in the doorway, biting her lip. “Thank you for everything.”
They hugged. Charlotte rubbed her sleeve across her face when Jackie finally let go. “Come to L.A.,” Jackie commanded. She tapped Charlotte’s nose. “You hear me?”
“Yes, boss.”
Jackie poked her in the nose again before she turned and started toward the lobby. “You coming?” she called back to her.
“I think I’m going to hang out here for a bit,” Charlotte said. “Breathe in the nostalgia some more.”
Jackie shook her head. “You’re a freak.” She put on her sunglasses even though the hallway boasted no natural sunlight. “Byeee!”
Charlotte watched her wheel down the corridor. They waved to each other one last time before Jackie turned the corner and left her alone.
Charlotte leaned against the closed door and sighed. Her shoulders sagged with relief. She was overdue for an introvert recharge, her brain waterlogged. This was the first time she’d been alone for hours and she appreciated the moment while it lasted.
Even now with Jackie gone, she wasn’t truly alone at Hein. Music leaked under the door of the room across the hall. A crowd of people chatted in low voices the next hallway over, just around the curve in the corridor. She could hear footsteps overhead as people packed, doors swinging open and banging shut. The campus perpetually hummed with company, no matter the time or the day.
Tomorrow it would fall silent for the summer when the grads packed up and moved out, and its halls would lie dormant until students returned at the end of August. But during the school year, you were never truly alone if you didn’t want to be.
College life played out in constant overlaps and gentle collisions. Her years at Hein were full of connections. Some were mundane, like listening to Phish with Terry during weekday lunch shifts. Some were complex and ugly, like her relationship with Ben. And others were the steady heartbeat of her life, vital and sustaining and rare. Jackie, Nina, Jio.
She closed her eyes and tried to separate the sounds. It calmed her to sort the footsteps above from the laughter echoing down the concrete walls. Car horns squawked in the distance as parents navigated the parking lot. Someone thundered down the stairwell to her left, their sneakers pounding on the rubber-topped steps.
Maybe she could stay like this for a few hours. Just rest her head against the door and soak up the daily soundtrack of the university before returning to Brooklyn’s impersonal roar.
Charlotte didn’t want to go back to college. She really didn’t. She didn’t want to sleep on narrow mattresses or wake up at noon or drink away her trauma. What she missed about life at Hein wasn’t the parties or the gossip or even the challenging, cozy classes. She missed this. She missed a dorm full of people who said hello to each other while brushing their teeth at three a.m. side by side. She missed being part of a community.
She didn’t want to be alone anymore, bubble-wrapped by isolation so that no one could hurt her or let her down. She wanted to look at life with the same optimism she had at age eighteen, already scarred by her family’s rejection but still venturing forth to find people who understood her. She missed knowing others and being known.
She didn’t want to go back in time. She couldn’t go back, she couldn’t even start over. She could only go forward.
“Charlie?”
Reece emerged from the stairwell, a backpack slung over his shoulder. He’d showered and changed into clean clothes, his damp hair shining under the fluorescent lights. That stupid single curl licked at his forehead, begging to be coaxed back into place with her fingers.
He really was so handsome, the rough cut of his jaw balanced out by his smile. She wondered again how she’d not seen his perfect imperfection before. Now there would never be a day when the sight of him walking toward her didn’t send her heart racing.
Charlotte leaned against the door, her hand curled around the handle. She pressed her other hand palm-flat against its wood surface.
Reece stopped in front of her. The humor evaporated from his face as he devoured her inviting posture. They were exactly where they were on Friday night, give or take a few yards of carpet.
“Hi,” she said. It was a pleasure to flirt with him like this, to tease and watch as heat flared in his green eyes. He was an open book to her now, willingly so. She understood the courage it required for him to love her so transparently. She would never take it for granted again.
“Hi,” he repeated, a playful bend to the word in his mouth. He dropped his backpack on the carpet and crowded her against the door. Charlotte squirmed up to reach his mouth and he smiled, just beyond her reach. “We gotta get on the road, Charlie.”
“Not fair,” she whined, narrowing her eyes.
His laugh was rough and husky. Reece caught her jaw in his hand and tilted her face up to examine her. She shivered as he cataloged the purple bags under her eyes and the creases running across her forehead. One of his fingers traced her hairline, detecting the silver strands among the blond.
“You are so beautiful,” he breathed, his voice thick with disbelief.
Finally he kissed her. She melted against him as his index finger traced below her chin and down her neck. She adored him. The emotion almost hurt, the force of it in her chest.
Their lips parted. He leaned his forehead against hers, eyes falling closed as he breathed unevenly. “We have to go if we want to avoid traffic,” he said, his voice racked with regret.
She placed a kiss on his lips, chaste and sweet. “Reece…”
He opened his eyes. She nearly tumbled into them, green as sea glass. “What?”
“I meant what I said. I want to be with you. I love you.”
She wished she could elaborate. She wished she could make him endless promises and keep every single one. She wished she could list the reasons why he broke through her walls and cemented himself into her foundation. His kindness, his self-awareness, his character, his plush mouth that said so many unadorned, incredible things. But her throat was thick with tears, and she wasn’t as good at this as he was, goddamn it.
Instead, she kissed him again, pouring the intensity of how much she felt for him into every touch and tease of her lips against his. She gasped as he pressed her to the door. Charlotte wound her arms around his neck and reveled in his solid strength, in how much he smelled like home.
She loved him. It broke her open and gave her the strength to start over, to change and try and grow. She loved him and it scared and delighted her in equal measure.
Their lips parted. He leaned his forehead against hers, his eyes falling closed as he breathed unevenly.
“We’re really doing this,” he whispered against her lips, his fingers delving into her lion’s mane. “I trust us to figure it out. I love you too much not to, Charlie.”
They stayed like that for a long minute, his nose butting against hers, her arms circling his waist. Charlotte pressed her palm to the small of his back, just over the notches of his spine.
She deserved this kind of love. They both did.
TEXT MESSAGE FROM JACKIE SLAUGHTER TO REECE KRUEGER, 4:37 PM:hi loser, charlotte’s phone is still off so I’m texting you. I think I left an earring on the bookshelf, any chance she grabbed it on her way out??
TEXT MESSAGE FROM REECE KRUEGER TO JACKIE SLAUGHTER, 4:39 PM:hi jackie! charlie’s driving! she says she has it and she’ll mail it to you when she finds time to go to the post office what with her very busy unemployment
TEXT MESSAGE FROM JACKIE SLAUGHTER TO REECE KRUEGER, 4:40 PM:tell her that I will mail her glitter again if I don’t see that earring by the end of June. also tell her I LOVE YOU I AM SO PROUD OF YOU #GROWTH
TEXT MESSAGE FROM REECE KRUEGER TO JACKIE SLAUGHTER, 4:40 PM:she says you’re an asshole and that glitter ruined kit’s carpet
TEXT MESSAGE FROM JACKIE SLAUGHTER TO REECE KRUEGER, 4:41 PM:good, kit sucks.
TEXT MESSAGE FROM REECE KRUEGER TO JACKIE SLAUGHTER, 4:41 PM:lol I can’t wait to meet her, I’m gonna crash at Charlie’s tonight to break up the drive back to STL
TEXT MESSAGE FROM JACKIE SLAUGHTER TO REECE KRUEGER, 4:41 PM: oh I’m SURE it’s JUST to take a break from driving. okay have fun being disgusting together byeeee!!!
TEXT MESSAGE FROM JACKIE SLAUGHTER TO REECE KRUEGER, 4:41 PM:don’t let her get a dog!!!
TEXT MESSAGE FROM REECE KRUEGER TO JACKIE SLAUGHTER, 4:42 PM:charlie says, and I’m quoting directly here, “bitch I do what I want”