Chapter 2
Charlie
“Have you seen my top? The purple one that makes my boobs pop ?”
Amy darts in and out of view, lifting throw pillows and seat cushions to find her favorite shirt. Midterms cover our thrifted rug on the living room floor, and she bends down to check beneath the papers.
“Hanging above the washer.”
Amy and I live in a perfect, harmonious ecosystem; she misplaces something, and I tell her where she left it. She zips back and forth between the living room and the full-length mirror in my bedroom.
“Whatcha doin’, Ames?” I ask, tossing another paper into the completed pile and treating myself with a piece of chocolate.
Complete a midterm. Eat chocolate.
It’s how I keep my brain from rotting.
“It’s trivia night at Bongos.” She peeks around the corner. “You’re going to come, right? ”
The to-do list I wrote after Cheryl’s email sits by my laptop, none of the items crossed off. Rather, I continue to add tasks in fear they will be the topic of her cryptic meeting.
There’s no space in my schedule to pencil in “annihilating middle-aged men in trivia.” My silence is answer enough, and Amy flops onto the floor and steals my grading pen—the perfect shade of blue—and taps it against my forehead.
“We’ve talked about this,” she begins, winding up to start the same lecture she gives me every time I decline an invite. “There’s a life waiting for you outside of the lab.”
She sighs deeply like she always does when we have this uncomfortable chat; the one where she tells me my achievements do not define my worth and I ignore how her words strike a chord.
It’s easy to get lost in my work. There’s almost a rush of oxytocin when I achieve something great. It’s the one aspect of my life I’m proud of.
I scramble for a rebuttal, but Amy has heard every excuse under the sun and has every counter argument locked and loaded, so instead, she shoves a piece of chocolate into my mouth.
“Wait here. I bought you something to wear.” She pops up from the floor and sprints into her bedroom, while I chew the treat I was force-fed. Amy returns with a small bag.
“I don’t want to go.”
“No, you don’t want to be seen.”
Fuck, I hate how her words peel back every hardened layer I’ve created to protect myself.
When I first left the hospital, I hid away.
Didn’t leave my house until I moved from Philadelphia to Rhode Island for graduate school.
In lectures, I would sit at the back of the class and avoid conversation.
My groceries were ordered online and left outside my door.
Every invitation to birthday parties or game nights was met with excuses and refusals. I was a hermit .
The only event I mustered up the courage to attend was the new student mixer, and I went partially to assuage my parents’ concern. It’s where I met Amy.
She found me in the bathroom, tears streaking my cheeks and wine covering my dress. One look at my mess and she leaped to action, dabbing away the wine with her stain stick and chatting away about the horrible date she had left.
She appeared when, more than anything else, I needed a friend.
Three weeks later, she moved into my two-bedroom apartment and brought life and love into the space when it was barren and cold.
It has gotten easier to exist in the public eye, but I’m not choosing to do so voluntarily.
Amy sees all, including the way my lip curls into a snarl at her statement. But she ignores my disdain and pulls a white linen long-sleeved top from the bag.
“It covers most of your scars, but it’s thin enough that you won’t get hot,” she explains as she offers the shirt. The fabric is soft beneath my fingertips, and emotion clogs my throat. “Go put it on.”
I’m halfway to my room when Amy adds, “And those cute jeans that make your butt look good!”
I change into the outfit she demanded, and for the first time in ages, I can hear it: the small, nearly silent voice in my mind saying I’m pretty.
It’s been ages since I heard her voice. The thought alone is enough for tears to form, but I sniff them away and smooth the wrinkles from the fabric.
I spin left, then right, examining the outfit in the mirror.
It’s fragile, but the foreign excitement of going out takes root. I’m running my fingers over the sleeves for the third time when Amy appears in my doorway and wolf whistles .
“Hottie on aisle four,” she yells, before launching to wrap her arms around me in an odd hug. Once again, I’m left without words, unable to express my thoughts.
I’ve never been great at sharing how I feel or unpacking my emotions. With Amy, I don’t need words. She understands everything I’m unable to say.
Her head falls onto my shoulder.
“Do you want to talk about it?” she whispers.
“Maybe tomorrow.”
It’s the same response I offer every time she asks. I don’t want to burden her with my thoughts. She’ll take on my emotions, try to carry my baggage, and she doesn’t deserve the weight on her shoulders.
I don’t miss the disappointment that flickers in her eyes.
Maybe one day I’ll work up the courage to tell her what rattles in my mind, but today is not that day.
Tugging on a loose strand of my hair, she allows the moment to fizzle away.
“How about I help you grade a few papers before we destroy people in trivia?”
It would save me loads of time, but something stops me from accepting her help. Maybe it’s the excited gleam in her eye or my sliver of self-confidence in this outfit, but I slide my to-do list into the cavern of my mind.
It can give me debilitating anxiety tomorrow.
“Why don’t we go now and get a good table?”
Her brows rise in shock. “I know you’re stressed. We don’t have to go early.”
“I want to spend time with my best friend.”
A coral blush spreads across her cheeks, but she sprints to put on her shoes and grab her purse. She corrals me out the door like a border collie, afraid I might change my mind, but for the first time in forever, I want to go out.
“Charles, you’re staring.”
“I’m trying to melt him with my laser eyes,” I amend, swirling my tongue through the air to find my straw. If my focus falters, the lasers won’t disintegrate him.
Amy and I are hidden by dim lighting, perched at a high-top table in the back of Bongos, a local college bar.
Cheap tropical decor and signed dollar bills plaster the walls, and too-loud Jimmy Buffett filtering from old speakers drowns out the sound of chatter and shouted drink orders.
Several groups settle in for trivia night and half-off drinks, but I cannot waste away in Margaritaville while my enemy encroaches on my territory.
Amy follows my line of sight until she’s also watching Mateo from across the bar, laughing with his friend. “I’ll never understand why you don’t like him. He’s kind and his accent is sexy.”
It is not sexy. It makes my skin tingle—not in a seductive way, but rather like there are a million tiny venomous spiders roaming along my skin, poised to attack.
His accent aside, Bongos is my bar. This is my kingdom, where I rule over all my other plebeians and show them who the queen of trivia is: Charlotte Louise Bowen.
“Do I need to pull out my list?”
“Have you added any new insane reasons?”
I shake my head. It’s still the same.
Ruined my dress with red wine and ran away rather than apologize.
Has more publications than me.
Mocks my hobbies.
Rules over hell.
Has annoyingly perfect hair .
“That’s what I thought. Maybe you see what you want to instead of what you’re meant to,” Amy says, fiddling with her flamingo earring. I pause my laser attack to school my best friend on why Mateo is, for a lack of better words, the most exacerbating human ever.
“We’ve been over this, Ames. The accent is to distract you from his true occupation as overlord of the underworld.”
His coffee-hued hair, just long enough to run your fingers through, and deep emerald eyes, bright like a rainforest, are a mask. Behind it is a teasing, cocky know-it-all who finds joy in one-upping me at every turn.
Mateo may have been appealing once, long, long ago, but that was before two years of sharing an office space, teasing comments, and his total annihilation of my favorite sundress.
A ruckus at the front of the room drags my attention away from reciting my list.
“We have an incredible turnout tonight,” the announcer booms into the microphone, “but not enough tables, so if you’re at a table with empty seats, please raise your hand.”
Amy waves hers high in the air like she’s on a deserted island and spotted a plane. It’s all I can do to stay in my chair while I yank her arm back to earth.
“Put your hand down,” I hiss. I don’t want to share a table with random people who might steal our answers. While I’m proud I left the apartment, and there have been zero crippling thoughts since we arrived, I am still here to win.
“Too late,” Amy sings, waving at whoever she summoned. My heart skips as Mateo and his friend walk toward our table.
“What have you done?”
“We know them. It’s better than strangers.”
That’s not true, not in the slightest.
I cling to the black tourmaline crystal hanging on my neck. Protect me, I plead to the stone, guard me against Mateo and his charming smile.
“Tired of staring from across the bar?” Mateo’s raspy voice travels along my spine, and the blood drains from my face. I flounder for a response, which is exactly what he wants if the tilt of his lips is any indication. “I’ve told you before, bruja, you can stare all you want.”
In a moment of sheer insanity, I take him up on his offer, drinking him in.
Keep your enemies close, right?