10. Charlie
Charlie hunched over his phone at Frank’s Diner counter, thumbs moving across the screen.
The document had grown to twelve pages over the past month.
A story about a boy who learned to disappear in plain sight.
A boy who smiled for cameras and swallowed everything real until it poisoned him from the inside.
Fiction. Except for the parts that weren’t.
“Are you writing?”
Charlie’s thumb hit the lock button. The screen went dark. He turned to find Skylar standing at his shoulder, close enough that he caught the faint scent of her shampoo beneath the diner’s grease and coffee.
His pulse kicked up. He ignored it. “This week’s playbook.”
“That didn’t look like football strategy.” She moved behind the counter, tying her apron with quick, efficient movements. “That looked like a story.”
He’d forgotten how observant she was. Must be a photographer’s eye thing.
“Just a project I work on sometimes.” He pocketed the phone. “What are you doing here? I thought your shift started at four.”
“It’s four-fifteen.”
Charlie glanced at the clock above the register. She was right. He’d been writing for over an hour without realizing.
“Time flies,” he said.
“When you’re writing a secret novel, apparently.” She grabbed a coffee pot and refilled the cups of two elderly men at the far end of the counter. Charlie tracked her movement without meaning to. The way her ponytail swung against her neck and the efficiency of her hands.
She returned to his end of the counter and set down the pot. “Why are you here? Slumming it with the common folk?”
“I live around the corner, and the food is good here.” He scratched his cheek. “Plus, I need my critique partner to finish this week’s assignment.”
“Right. Five hundred words about a moment of change.” She gestured to her uniform. “In case you haven’t noticed, I’m working.”
“I noticed.” He swept his gaze across the nearly empty diner. The two older men and a woman with glasses reading a paperback in the corner booth. “Looks like you’ll have some downtime.”
“I can’t just sit and chat with customers.”
“I’m not asking you to chat. I’m asking you to help me.” He picked up a menu. “I’m also hungry. Win-win.”
She stared at him. He held her gaze, watching the calculation behind her eyes, then the reluctant acceptance when her shoulders dropped.
She pulled out her order pad. “What do you want?”
“Double bacon burger. Extra pickles. Cheese fries.” He paused. “And whatever you’re having.”
“I’m not having anything.”
His chest tightened at her immediate denial. When had she last eaten a real meal? “It’s my treat.”
“That’s not—”
“Skylar.” He set down the menu. “It’s just a burger.”
Her jaw flexed and he was sure she’d argue. Instead, she turned and pushed through the swinging door into the kitchen.
Charlie let out a slow breath. He’d tried to stay away, to wait until the breakout session tomorrow. It had only been two days since Poppy had ended things, sitting on her couch with tears in her eyes, telling him they both deserved better.
The grief should have settled in by now.
Instead, his shoulders had dropped an inch and his lungs opened wider than they had in weeks.
Then the guilt crept in, souring the relief.
Underneath lived a current of anticipation that had pulled him toward this diner, toward the woman currently arguing in the kitchen.
A burly man emerged through the swinging door. Frank. Charlie recognized him from the few times he’d picked up food here—bearded, forearms like tree trunks, wearing an expression that suggested he’d seen everything and found none of it impressive.
Frank set a plate in front of Charlie. The burger was massive, the fries golden and glistening.
“You’re the quarterback.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Saw the game Saturday. Good arm.” Frank planted his palms on the counter and leaned forward, studying Charlie with open curiosity, so different from the calculating assessment Charlie dealt with from men in suits. “You’re too skinny to lead us to a championship.”
A laugh escaped before Charlie could stop it. “I’m trying to stay agile.”
“Agile.” Frank snorted. “Eat the burger.”
Charlie picked up the burger and took a bite. Flavor exploded across his tongue. Perfectly seasoned beef, crispy bacon, tangy pickle cutting through the richness. He involuntarily made an embarrassing sound.
“Good?” Frank’s weathered face cracked into a warm grin.
The expression hit Charlie in the center of his chest. His father never looked at him like that.
Brennan’s approval came with conditions and the unspoken reminder that good wasn’t good enough.
But Frank just stood there, arms crossed, watching Charlie enjoy his food.
As if Charlie being fed and satisfied was the whole point.
Charlie swallowed past the sudden thickness in his throat. “Incredible.”
Skylar emerged from the kitchen with a smaller woman in tow. She had silver hair and wore a flour-dusted apron.
“Rosa.” Frank jerked his chin toward Charlie. “Tell the quarterback he needs to eat more if he’s going to win us a championship.”
“A growing boy needs more than one plate.” Rosa crossed to Charlie and patted his arm. The touch was casual, maternal, nothing like the calculated shoulder-squeezes his father deployed for cameras. “He needs a grilled cheese and a salad.”
“And pie,” Frank added. He turned back toward the kitchen.
“They’re good people.” Charlie wiped his fingers with his napkin.
“The best.” Skylar refilled his water glass, not meeting his eyes. “They didn’t have to give me this job. My availability was terrible. But Rosa took one look at me and said I reminded her of her daughter.”
“They care about you.”
“They do.” She touched her collarbone. “More than most people understand.”
The bell over the door chimed. A group of students tumbled in, loud and laughing. Skylar shifted into work mode, guiding them to a booth, handing out menus.
His gaze followed her through the diner. The confidence in her step. The way she joked with the customers, drew smiles from strangers, made the whole room feel warmer just by being in it
He envied that. The ability to just exist without performing. At one point she pulled out her phone and angled it toward the kitchen window, stealing a frame from between orders.
He pulled out his phone. Unlocked it and stared at the document.
A Moment of Change.
He had too many to choose from. The football injury at eight, when he’d learned that love came with conditions.
His mother leaving at fourteen, when he’d learned he had to be stronger to protect those he loved.
The first time he understood what his father really was, sitting at the top of the stairs listening to words that cut like glass.
The day he’d driven to New Haven and tasted freedom.
None of which he could put on paper and hand to a professor.
“Still working on the secret novel?” Skylar slid onto the stool beside him. The counter shrank and her knee brushed his beneath the laminate edge. Heat shot up his thigh.
She didn’t move away.
Neither did he.
She rested her elbow on the counter, angling her body toward him. The movement pressed her knee more firmly against his. “Are you going to tell me what it’s about?”
Charlie’s fingers tightened around his phone. He’d didn’t talk about his writing to anyone except Sam, and even then only in vague terms. The one thing his father couldn’t criticize, couldn’t monetize, couldn’t turn into content for three million Instagram followers.
But Skylar’s hazel eyes watched him, gold flecks catching the fluorescent light, and the honesty in her gaze made him want to offer a truth in return.
“I write.” He licked his lips, mouth suddenly dry. “Stories, mostly. Sometimes just scenes or dialogue.” He lifted his phone. “This is where I put the stuff I can’t say out loud.”
Her eyebrows rose. “You write.”
“Don’t look so surprised.”
“A jock who writes” She tilted her head, dark hair falling across her shoulder. “That’s not exactly the expected narrative.”
He twisted on the stool to face her fully. His knee slid along hers, denim against denim. The contact sent sparks up his spine. “A jock isn’t allowed to have a brain?”
Color rose in her cheeks. “I didn’t mean—”
“I know.” He turned his water glass in circles on the counter. “Everyone assumes they know who I am.” He met her eyes and held them. “There’s a version of truth in all of it. I do have a rich dad. I do drive a ridiculous car. But there’s other stuff. Stuff the public doesn’t get to know.”
“Like the writing.”
He nodded. The admission hung between them, fragile and new.
Skylar shifted on her stool. “It’s not exactly a sin. Why hide it?”
Charlie’s jaw tightened. The familiar bitterness rose in his throat.
“My father. He thinks creative writing is a waste of time. A crutch people use when they don’t have real skills.
” The words curdled on his tongue. “The class this semester? He tried to get me out of it. Called the Dean personally.”
“But you’re still there.”
“Only because it’s a requirement. Even the Carnell name can’t override that.” He forced his shoulders to release the tension coiling there. “It’s the one silver lining of mandatory distribution courses. Three months of doing something I actually care about, and he can’t stop me.”
She studied him. The crease between her brows eased, and her chin tilted a fraction to the left.
“You’re not what I expected.”
His ribs pressed inward. “Is that good or bad?”
“I haven’t decided yet.”
The corner of her mouth curved. Not quite a smile, but close. Charlie found himself leaning toward her, drawn by a pull he couldn’t name. Her breath hitched, barely audible, and for one suspended moment—
“Frank says you’re sharing.”
They jerked apart. Rosa stood at the counter, plates balanced on her arms, a glint in her eye. She set down the grilled cheese, the salad, and a generous slice of apple pie with two forks. “Skylar needs to eat something besides coffee.”
“I’m not hungry.” Skylar’s fingers pressed flat against the counter, steadying herself.
“Eat.” Rosa pushed the pie between them. “Both of you.”
Charlie picked up a fork, grateful for the cool metal against his fingers, to do anything besides dwell on the heat still radiating from where their knees touched. “You heard the woman.”
They ate in silence, Charlie found himself hyperaware of every small movement she made.
The way she avoided the cherry tomatoes in the salad, nudging them into a small pile.
The way she held her fork, fingers curved around the handle.
The way she kept her knee pressed against his like she’d forgotten it was there. Or like she hadn’t.
He plucked a cherry tomato from her plate and popped it in his mouth. She glanced at him, eyebrows raised.
“You weren’t eating them,” he said.
“I don’t like them.”
On the counter, her phone buzzed. The screen lit up with a photo of a dark-haired man and the name Jake.
Skylar’s expression shuttered. She grabbed the phone and shoved it in her apron pocket, the movement sharp, almost violent.
“Everything okay?” Charlie asked.
“Fine.” The word came out like a door slamming.
That word again. Heat flared beneath his sternum, sharp and unfamiliar. His jaw tightened over a reaction he had no right to. A name on a screen, and his whole body had responded like a threat.
They were critique partners and reluctant PR props and maybe, tentatively, two people learning to tell each other the truth.
But his insides didn’t care about logic.
“We should talk about Saturday,” Skylar said, clearly changing the subject. Her knee pulled away from his, leaving a cold absence. “The donor reception.”
Charlie swallowed his questions about Jake. “Right. It’s at Alumni House. We sit for dinner at eight, but there will be a cocktail hour beforehand. That’s where we’ll do most of our shmoozing.” He stabbed at a cucumber. “At least we’ll get a free meal.”
She didn’t joke back, her fingers twisting in her apron.
“What’s wrong?”
Her shoulders lifted, then fell. When she spoke, the words were so low he almost missed them. “I don’t have anything to wear.”
Charlie set down his fork. “What do you mean?”
“I mean I don’t own anything formal.” She stared at the counter, refusing to meet his eyes. “The nicest thing I have is my graduation dress, and it’s . . .” She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter. I’ll figure something out.”
The vulnerability hit him like a fist to the chest. This woman who worked multiple jobs and refused every offer of help, admitting she didn’t have a dress.
He wanted to fix it. Wanted to hand her a credit card and tell her to buy whatever she needed. But he knew her well enough now to understand that would backfire spectacularly.
He picked up his phone. “Let’s text Poppy. Maybe she has a dress you can borrow.”
Skylar’s head came up. “Should you be texting your ex?”
“When Poppy broke it off she wanted to stay friends.” He found her number and typed a quick request.
Silence stretched between them. When he glanced up, Skylar studied him with an expression he couldn’t read. “Do you stay friends with all your ex-girlfriends?”
“Actually, this is something new. Poppy’s special.”
“I agree.”
Both their phones pinged with a message from Poppy.
Warmth spread in his chest. “She’s in.”
Three more dings and a string of photos filled his phone. He skimmed the options. “The red one is…” he lost his train of though, imagining Skylar wrapped in the silky material. Ignoring the shake in his hands, he swiped to the next photo. “This black one is perfect.”
Skylar nodded. “I can make that work.”
“Great. That’s settled. I’ll pick you up at six-thirty.”
“I can get there myself.”
“It’s across campus. Let me drive you.” He offered her his best smile. “Consider transportation part of the arrangement.”
The gold bled from her eyes. “Right. Sure.”
The woman with the paperback cleared her throat and Skylar popped off her stool.
Before she returned, the dinner rush arrived and wave after wave of hungry students filled the booths and lined the counter. Charlie stayed on his stool, nursing coffee, working on his phone, keeping one eye on Skylar.
At ten, the crowd thinned. At ten-thirty, Frank flipped the sign to closed. At eleven, Skylar emerged from the back in her regular clothes, jeans and a worn green sweater, bag slung over her shoulder, exhaustion carved into every line of her face.
Charlie stood. “Let me drive you home.”
“I can take the bus.”
“It’s dark and cold and I’m headed in that direction anyway.” He pulled on his jacket.
Her eyes narrowed like she wanted to argue, but fatigue seemed to win. “Fine.”
This time he didn’t mind the word.