Chapter 58
Chapter Fifty-Eight
CHARLIE
“Charlie and I are in love.”
I’m sitting in the back seat of Tyler’s car with Lydia and Cookie. We’ve barely reached town limits, but that woman is trying to get us both killed. Right after she says that, Tyler nearly jumps the curb.
“ What ?”
I aim a frantic look at his sister. I thought we had an understanding, a mutual agreement about being just friends. And I thought she knew I liked Alice—isn’t that why she hunted me down with her brother?
Before I can hyperventilate or jump out of a moving vehicle, she gives me a reassuring glance. A trust me glance.
It doesn’t help.
I wish I had my phone, so she could text me her plan. Mostly, though, I wish we could call the bus station and tell them not to let Alice leave. But Lydia has called five times already, and it never goes through. We can’t even reach my brother on his cell—we can’t reach anyone.
Tyler stares at me in the rearview mirror. I’m pretty sure he’s plotting my demise. But his sister stays calm, her voice sincere.
“We should’ve told you sooner, but we didn’t know how. We never wanted to hurt you.”
“We had a rule. One rule. Sisters are off-limits. We?—”
“You had a rule,” she says gently. “And we never planned to go against that. We started out as friends with the best intentions, but then…we fell in love.”
Lydia is selling this so hard, I’m almost buying it myself. When did Tyler’s sister turn into such an actress? I still have no idea what she’s getting at, why we’re torturing her brother when we’re supposed to be driving to the bus station. But I guess we can do both.
Until he pulls over.
Lydia says the magic words, “I think he might be the one,” and her brother plays bumper cars with the curb. We come to a dead stop by the courthouse, and Tyler turns off his car. Dottie’s favorite town slogan sign is outside, the one about Ponderosa Falls being a great place to fall in love, and the irony is top-notch.
Tyler rests his forehead on the steering wheel and tries to breathe. As he fends off high blood pressure and rage, Lydia keeps going.
“Here’s the thing—nobody has ever treated me better than Charlie. He’s your best friend for a reason, and he’s a good guy. But I think that old off-limits joke has really gotten to him.”
“It wasn’t a joke.”
His sister sighs. “I’m serious, Ty. Charlie thinks he’s not good enough for me—that you’d never trust him to take care of me—but I know that’s not true.”
She’s a mind reader.
It’s as if Lydia has pulled those words out of my head. I’ve never told her any of that, but it’s exactly how I’ve been feeling. If Tyler doesn’t think I’m good enough for a great girl, how will I ever convince anyone else?
“I want this to work,” she says sincerely. “Today—everything on the horizon—I need this to work. But Charlie needs your blessing first. He can’t do this if he doesn’t know you believe in him. Your blessing means everything.”
She’s right.
Maybe it’s dumb, needing his approval, but he’s my closest friend on earth. If he thinks I’m good enough for his sister, maybe Alice will think I’m good enough too. Maybe she’ll actually take a chance on me.
I hold my breath. This conversation shouldn’t even be happening—how has Tyler not noticed I’m such a goner for Alice? But it is happening, and I really need it to go my way.
Tyler sighs, but when he glances at me, he doesn’t look angry anymore. He looks full of remorse. “Of course, I trust you. You’re a great guy—the best guy. This wasn’t what I had planned, but I’m happy for you. For both of you.”
The honest emotion in his voice knocks the wind out of me, how much he believes in me. Lydia lets me enjoy it for five whole seconds before she gives her brother a look.
“Great—our love is fake, but thank you for finally giving that poor man your blessing. He’s been in love with Alice for days . Way to crush his spirit and make him doubt himself, though. Some friend you turned out to be.”
Tyler gasps, betrayed, but mostly, he’s trying not to laugh. While also trying not to kill his sister.
“I hate you both.” He glances at me in the rearview while he keeps fighting that smile. “But you can still have my blessing—for Alice, not my sister. You’re way too good for Lydia.”
Now it’s his sister’s turn to gasp, and the Sharp twins are in their element. They’re going after each other the way only siblings can, and everything is right in the world again.
Except when the car won’t start.
I’m jogging down Pearl Street alone. Alice’s bus leaves in ten minutes, but I’m still eighteen blocks away when a car pulls over: Mrs. Nelson and her corgi.
When I was a wayward teen, I dug up all her rose bushes the day after she planted them. She’s hated me ever since, and the sight of her Buick idling beside me is far from comforting. I wait for her to throw something or run me over. She rolls her window down instead.
“Where are you going, Charles?” she asks.
“Bus station.”
“Is this about the girl?” When I nod, she unlocks her passenger door. “Get in.”
She tells me she’s late for Chester’s vet appointment, but she takes me as far as she can, six whole blocks. Three more people do the same after she drops me off. Each Pondie drives me as far as their daily errands will allow, and I’m pretty sure I have the Victorian to thank for this. I guess a little gossip can be a good thing after all.
I sprint the last two blocks, but the Number 5 shuttle bus from Denver pulls out before I reach the station. I catch up at the stoplight on the corner, panting as I knock on the bus door.
It doesn’t open.
Mrs. Wexler is driving the Number 5 bus this morning, and it’s a cruel twist of fate. I stole that woman’s newspaper for seven straight months when I was fourteen—because I was an idiot who’d been dared to toss it on her roof—and she has never forgotten my treachery. No gossip column on earth could sway a heart that cold, a soul so deprived of its daily newspaper.
Forgiveness is always a nice surprise, but sometimes, you have to reap what you sow. That door is never going to open, and we both know it.
I scan the long row of tinted windows, but I can’t figure out where Alice is inside. All the people-shadows look the same. But I’m running out of time before the light turns green. So I guess any window will do.
Backing up, I glance at the shuttle bus, and it’s go time. I’m not sure what to say, but that’s never stopped me before.
“You can’t leave.”
That’s the only way to begin, the most important part. No matter what happens next, Alice can’t leave. I’ll miss her too much.
“I think I’m in love with you. We barely know each other, but you make every single thing better. It’s barely been a week, but I don’t know how I’m going to live without you.”
Nothing happens inside. There’s no movement in the shuttle bus, no signs of life. I hesitate, and my voice catches.
“Listen, I know I’m not good enough for you, not really. You could do so much better than a screwup like me. But if you stayed, Alice, if you took a chance on me—one chance—I promise you won’t regret it. I’ll make it feel like the right choice every single day.”
That’s all I can manage before time runs out. The stoplight turns green, and nothing else matters.
Mrs. Wexler starts to pull away, stone-faced. Before she can make it two inches, the bus erupts with screams and shouts. Cries of stop and no and don’t you dare . Two voices shout loudest of all, and they travel toward the front of the vehicle like they’re running for the door.
The bus screeches to a halt. Once the door opens, it isn’t Alice who was making all that noise. It’s her sisters. Both of them are out of breath from yelling at Mrs. Wexler, and Emma holds up her phone like she’s been filming the whole thing.
Meanwhile, Nicki wipes tears from her eyes before smiling down at me. When she speaks, yelling over the rumble of car horns and traffic, she says the only words I want to hear. And they’re music to my ears.
“ She’s at your house .”