Chapter 5 #2
“Real hair. It was before she got sick,” I answer softly.
Mom hated wigs. They were itchy and heavy, but she wore them after chemo took her hair, mostly for me, I think.
So I wasn’t so obviously reminded every time I looked at her that our days together were numbered.
“She didn’t know it yet, but she was pregnant with you in this one. ”
Charlie screws up her face. “How can you be pregnant and not know it? Don’t you feel the baby moving in your stomach?”
There will come a day I’ll have to explain the nitty-gritty of sperm, eggs, and implantation to Charlie. That day sure as hell is not today.
“She hadn’t taken a test yet. You only know for sure when you take a test.”
“Can I ask you a question? But don’t be mad.” Her cautious tone already warns me I’m not going to like this question one bit.
“Sure, but tread carefully. We just made up.”
She folds her hands in her blanket-covered lap and taps the tips of her thumbs together. “Have you taken a test?”
I let out a tortured growl. Again with this? “Charlotte Riley, I swear?—”
“You just said you don’t know for sure unless you take a test.”
My eyes fall shut and I pinch the bridge of my nose, breathing through my exasperation.
If she were any other woman, I’d be tempted to smack her, but because she’s my little sister, I have to spell this out clearly.
“Do you understand this hurts my feelings? You don’t ask a woman if she’s pregnant unless you see the baby popping out.
Even then, feigning a little surprise that she was growing a person is polite. It’s girl code one oh one.”
She squints one eye. “What’s feigning mean?”
Did she even hear my point? I take a steadying breath, schooling my irritation.
“It means faking. So yes, I’m gaining weight because I’m not taking my…
vitamins anymore, and it’s very hard for me.
So you should feign support by not calling me fat, or bringing any attention to my body in front of our friends. ”
The color drains from her face as her eyes widen and her lips fall apart. “Is that why you got mad and left me at the club?”
“I didn’t leave you.”
She cuts me a look that says what she’s not allowed to say out loud— Bullshit.
“Okay, fine. I didn’t leave you for long,” I add.
“You were gone ages,” she snivels. “What were you doing?”
“Scoot.” I gingerly close the scrapbook and set it aside on the floor. Pulling back the comforter, I wiggle in so close to my sister, I’m practically sitting on top of her. After covering us both back up, I nudge her knee with mine under the blanket. “I met a guy.”
Charlie grows quiet for a moment as she stares straight ahead. “Was he cute?”
“ So cute .” Because she’s way too young for me to say “rideable.”
“Was he nice?”
I nod. “And polite, and considerate. Kind of funny, too.”
She scowls at me. “Is he in your bedroom?”
“ What ? Of course not. I left him when I heard you singing. Speaking of which, do you realize how dangerous that was? How did you even give Lennox and Dex the slip and get on stage?” I thought I made my position quite clear when I snatched that signup form out of her hands.
“I didn’t escape them. I told them you texted me and said it was okay.”
“And they believed you?”
“I guess.” She shrugs without an ounce of remorse on her face.
Rookie mistake. Always verify the text. Eleven is one of the worst ages for this nonsense. They are young enough they’re still believably innocent, but smart enough to be very skilled at the art of lying.
Looking around the bedroom, it dawns on me how out of place Charlie looks in here.
My new company owns this complex and offered us a furnished apartment at half the cost of normal rent.
Of course I jumped. I wasn’t sure how to split furniture with Jesse, so I left it all behind.
This unit is decent. The shower is free of mold and mildew.
There are no questionable stains on the carpet.
All the blinds are intact and functional.
But it feels like a businessperson’s home away from home. Not a little girl’s room.
“We should decorate,” I announce. “What do you think? We can’t paint, but how about a new bedspread and matching curtains? We could also get a cute nightstand and dresser.”
There’s a little twinkle in her bright blue eyes. “But you said we can’t spend money anymore. We’re poor.”
“We’re being frugal and trying to save money, but we’re okay.
We can afford some new furniture. Nothing too crazy.
IKEA stuff. Let’s at least add some color to this room.
” It’s a partial lie. We really can’t responsibly afford new stuff, but for this, I’ll max out my credit card. Charlie deserves a room she loves.
She nods, her smile widening as she takes in a panoramic view of her space. I’m sure endless ideas are running through her mind. I hope she understands I draw the line at One Direction wallpaper. Not happening .
“Is this a good time for me to bargain?”
Charlie’s question takes me by surprise. “Bargain? What do you mean?”
“If I tell you a secret and I promise not to lie ever again, could I get something I really want in return?”
My stomach drops as my heart starts to race. This can’t be good. “What secret?”
She seals her lips shut and shakes her head.
“Fine,” I grumble. “What exactly do you want?”
“A pet. A small one.”
“What kind of pet?” Dear Lord, please do not let my little sister be in a reptile phase.
I shudder thinking about Jesse’s bearded dragon, Smaug, I had to tolerate for the two years we lived together.
Smaug had eyes like the Mona Lisa ; he was stone-still, but no matter where I was in the living room, his gaze was always on me .
Charlie holds her shoulders like she’s bracing for impact. That’s how bad she wants this. “So, I sort of made a friend at school yesterday. Claire.”
I pat her knee excitedly. “On your first day? That’s great. I told you you’d make friends quickly.”
“Claire’s in seventh grade. She’s popular too, so she didn’t have to sit by me at lunch but she did anyway so I wasn’t alone.”
“Aw, that’s nice.”
“Well, she has these guinea pigs, and her grandma says one has to go because they keep humping.”
“They keep what ?” Oh. This conversation just took a turn. Damn.
“Humping,” Charlie says, again nonchalantly. “I don’t know, that’s what animals do to make babies. Right? Or is it just guinea pigs?”
Oh no. Oh, no, no. Immediate conversation dodge. “So you want one of her guinea pigs?”
Charlie presses her hands together as if she’s praying. “The guinea pigs love each other but Claire’s grandma says they have to split up. But if I keep one and Claire keeps one, then when we hang out, the guinea pigs can still play sometimes. That way they don’t have to break up for real.”
“And then Claire will want to hang out with you so her little pigs can see each other?”
Charlie shrugs. “That too.”
I could lie and tell Charlie that our apartment doesn’t allow pets. But haven’t I put her through enough? “I’ll need to talk to Claire’s grandma, but I think we can make that work.”
She gasps, then tents her hands over mouth and nose. I give her dramatic reaction a moment to simmer. “Seriously?” she finally asks.
“Seriously. But I want to know the secret now.”
She hangs her head. “You know how you said I’m not allowed to be on TikTok or Instagram?”
My eyes narrow. “Yes.”
“ I’m not ,” she says quickly. “But I make singing videos and send them to Jesse. He made an account and one of the videos went viral. He texted me this morning.”
A wave of fury takes me out of my body. My mind blanks as my limbs go numb momentarily.
By the time I unball my fists, there are deep indents in my palm from where my nails nearly broke the skin.
“Don’t do that anymore, okay? I want you to stop texting Jesse or I’ll take your phone away.
Do you understand?” I try to keep my tone neutral, but I’m breathing fire and screaming atrocities on the inside.
“Yes.”
“But thank you for telling me, Charlie.”
“Can I still have the guinea pig?”
My eyelid starts to twitch. No matter how much I blink, I can’t calm the little nerve down. “Fine. Now, eat your breakfast. I even got boysenberry syrup for you.” Pulling off the covers, I swing my legs over the side of the bed. “I’m going to clean up the kitchen.”
“One more thing,” Charlie says as I near the door. She has no idea I’m in arm’s reach of an aneurysm.
“Yes?”
“I don’t think you’re fat. I think you’re the prettiest woman in the whole world. I just thought that if you were pregnant, it means you and Jesse would get back together. We could go home and be a real family.”
I keep my gaze fixed on her sad eyes. I wonder if this is how Mom felt at times after my dad left.
Did she feel the pressure to make us whole ?
I wish I could ask her what she’d do when her heart ached like this.
Because no matter how much I sacrifice, and how quickly I force myself to grow up to be more of a mom than a sister, it’s not enough.
There’s a hole in my little sister’s heart that she’s trying to fill with a greedy, materialistic snake.
“Charlie, we are a real family. Small, but real. We don’t need a man and a baby to complete us.”
She ducks her head. “Okay,” she murmurs. I’m sure my words are in one ear, out the other. I close the door behind me and hurry to my phone in my bedroom.
With inhuman speed, I unblock Jesse. I consider a text message, but it’s not enough. Not even a slew of profanity in bold, capital letters can convey my anger.
He answers on the first ring. “Spencer?”
The background noise is near deafening. “Where are you?”
“Courthouse,” he says. “One of my firm’s divorce cases escalated to trial. We’re dealing with a mess?—”
“I don’t care,” I interject, cutting him off before he can continue rambling about work. “I’ll make this quick. Stop contacting Charlie. End of story.”
“What? I?—”
“You put her on the internet, you psychopath! Have you lost your fucking mind?”
“Spence, calm down. I didn’t put her face online. Just her voice.”
“ I don’t care ! I can’t believe you’re still doing this. She is not your get-rich-quick plan, you selfish asshole.”
“Selfish? Spence, you’ve got this all wrong.” The background noise quiets after a door slams. Jesse’s voice is now echoing. “Everything I’ve done has been for us. I’m trying to take care of us.”
I scoff so hard my throat scratches. “Bullshit. Bull-fucking-shit. You’re filling her head with these asinine dreams of being the next Taylor Swift while you slowly drain every penny her dad left her.
That’s all she has, Jesse. No dad, no mom, nothing except a little money to help get through college and to adulthood. ”
“She has us.”
“Wrong. She has me. ” Which isn’t saying much because I’m the idiot who let Jesse trick me.
“You lied to me. You manipulated me into signing everything over to you. And you know the worst part? I don’t know who I hate more.
You, for taking everything from us, or me, for being foolish enough to trust you. ”
“You’re just too young and naive to understand. I have a plan. I’ll get the money back, easily. This is insanity. You packed up your shit and just disappeared in the middle of the night with Charlie? You’re so immature.”
This has been the entire narrative of our relationship.
Jesse calls me a child, and I shrivel because I’m scared he’s right.
I was always enamored that Jesse was older and smarter.
He’s a lawyer, for God’s sake. I thought I found a good one.
I didn’t realize he spent four years at law school learning how to be even more conniving than he already was.
“You still there?” he asks after neither of us says anything for a solid minute.
“No,” I answer. It kills me that he chuckles. I wasn’t trying to be funny, but like it or not, sarcasm tends to be my primary communication style.
“I’m sorry. How do I fix this, baby? Come home and I’ll do anything. You can’t support Charlie and yourself on your own. You need me.”
He almost had me. In a brief moment of vulnerability, I just wanted him to pull a hero move and make it right.
But when Jesse says he doesn’t believe I can do this by myself, he means it.
The ledger against him is too long now. He treats me like a child.
He doesn’t include me in decisions big or small, like where we’re going to live, or what we’re having for dinner.
The man proposed without a ring, twisting the story as if he couldn’t afford the ring I deserved.
I would’ve proudly worn a Ring Pop if it came from his heart.
If Mom were here today, she’d tell me to trust my intuition and to never ever let a man, or anyone for that matter, tell me what I’m capable of.
“Jesse, you can fix this by leaving my sister alone. The next time you contact her, I’ll file a restraining order. Clear?”
I hang up before he can say another word.
He thinks I can’t do this on my own?
Watch me.