The Charlotte Chronicles

by Jen Frederick

  Earlier today I’d been in Charlotte’s kitchen, ostensibly because we were out of milk or at least that’s what I told Donna, the Randolphs’ housekeeper. She rolled her eyes, handed me a carton and kicked me out. I stuffed some putty into the lock when she wasn’t looking, and sure enough the door opens soundlessly, lock unengaged. Score.

  There is a little light over the stove, but I’ve been in Charlotte’s home enough to walk through it blindfolded. Silently moving over the marble tile and then on down the hall to the bedrooms, the darkness hides the figure leaning against the wall right past the entrance of the living room.

  “You got a death wish, boy?” rumbles Uncle Bo’s voice. My heart stutters and then I trip on the smooth surface, nearly falling on my face. A hand passes over my mouth, and I’m jerked upright. Blood pounding in my ears, I look up into the shadowed face of Charlotte’s dad. He looks like he can see every dirty thought I’ve had about his fifteen-year-old daughter. Almost sixteen though, well, in May and that’s only like five months away. As the silence lengthens between us, I remind myself that Uncle Bo loves me. I’m like his firstborn son, really.

  “Hey, Uncle Bo,” I mumble into his hand.

  His hand drops from my face to my shoulder, and he turns so that we are looking straight at each other. I’m close in height but not as bulked out. I wonder briefly whether I could take him and that must show on my face because he busts out a huge grin. “No, you can’t take me, son.”

  “In a couple of years,” I say only half in jest, still wondering if my nuts are in danger of being chopped off because there’s really only one reason I could be standing in this hallway.

  Whatever Bo is thinking, he doesn’t let on. Instead his hands fall away, and he turns on his heel and walks toward his own bedroom. Over his shoulder he says, “She needs her sleep.”

  I’m momentarily paralyzed. I think he’s given me permission to enter Charlotte’s bedroom, but it could also be a trap. The darkness at the end of the hall swallows him up, and I quickly dart into Charlotte’s room before Bo can come back.

  Charlotte isn’t asleep. She’s lying on top of her covers listening to something, no doubt a female artist. Charlotte says she doesn’t like to hear male voices, or maybe she just doesn’t like what men sing about. Who knows. I’ve never given it much thought. The lamp on her nightstand is the only illumination in the room.

  She doesn’t even move when I come in, although the carpet pile is so thick in here that an elephant could walk in and the sound would be swallowed up. Puzzled I sit on the side of the bed and pull down her headphones. Does she have so many midnight visitors that my appearance here is just normal?

  “Nick texted me.” She holds up her phone, and I see a huge number of texts between the two. My mouth falls open as I take in the sheer volume of exchanges. They must text each other like every day, several times a day. A kernel of something dark unfurls inside of me, and I don’t like it. There’s always been a closeness between Nick and Charlotte, but it’s just a friendship. That’s what I’ve always believed. “And I told Daddy so he wouldn’t shoot you when you tripped the alarm.”

  “You have interior alarms?”

  She looks at me like I’m stupid, and I guess I am. “Yes, don’t you?”

  “No, I don’t think so.” At least, I didn’t up until this moment. Nick and I will have to do some snooping. “I think your dad did threaten me out there in the hall, but I’m not sure what the consequences will be.”

  “Oh, it’ll be castration,” she says impishly like it’s no big deal, but I think my nuts are shrinking just at the thought. “That’s his go-to threat.” She moves over on the bed to make room for me. I stretch out beside her, still a little tense, but then I tell myself her dad is three doors down and I’d be able to be on my feet and in the armchair before he even twists her doorknob.

  “Real comforting, Charlotte.” I suppress the urge to cup myself protectively.

  She smirks, but the expression fades away quickly at my next question.

  “Why are you really leaving? There’s no way there is better medical care somewhere else in the world than you can get here. Is it because we hid you were sick? We won’t do that anymore.”

  We both look at the other side of the bed, where an IV stand sits like a creepy skeleton. Charlotte has had to have one bag of IV nutrition a day since Halloween. It’s nearing Christmas, and she looks a lot healthier now. The bones in her wrists and shoulders don’t look as sharp, and her cheeks are fuller. She can stand to gain another twenty pounds, but I keep that to myself. The last time I mentioned that she should eat more, she threw her sandwich at me and didn’t talk to me for the rest of the day. But I bet she texted Nick, I think sourly.

  “I just. . .” She pauses and then squints at the ceiling as if she can read her thoughts up there. “It’s not just the hiding thing because that was my fault not yours. It’s everything. I’m so behind in all my classes, and everyone looks at me like I’m about to keel over. Where I’m going, you know, everyone there is kind of in the same boat I’m in.”

  “We can take care of you better than anyone,” I tell her. She glances at me and smiles, and it’s the smile that she gets when she’s about to do something that she knows no one is going to like. I saw that smile when she agreed to play Never Have I Ever at the Carson’s pool party last summer, right after she’d turned fifteen. We’d had a big fight after that. She kept telling me that I couldn’t treat her like a child forever and that every other girl played a round. Every other girl wasn’t Charlotte though. I didn’t care what everyone else did. I only cared what Charlotte did, but she didn’t see it that way. She just thought I was being Nate, the no fun police when it came to her.

  “You know, before I was sick you were pretty mean to me all the time.”

  “Was not.” I was never mean to her. Watching out for her, yes. Mean, no.

  “You were. You’re always criticizing what I’m wearing or that I’m hanging out with the wrong people who—” she points a finger into my chest, “—are the same people you hang out with.”

  I grab her finger so the pointy nail doesn’t dig any farther into my chest wall, and then I cover her hand with mine so her palm is flat against my pecs. “I’m just watching out for you.”

  She comes closer until her head is resting on my biceps, and then her hand curls underneath my arm. “Nate.” My name is like a soft sigh escaping, and it sounds like nothing I’ve ever heard from her before. It’s almost like a caress, a whisper of longing underneath a note of tenderness. My hand grips hers tighter, and I roll so I can face her, my palm still clasping hers over my heart.

  “If I’ve ever made you feel bad, I’m sorry,” I tell her. There are a few strands of hair that are falling across her forehead, so I move them for her, tucking them behind her ear. Her eyes flutter shut, and this time I see contentment. She ducks her head, and I run my fingers through her hair, rubbing her scalp. Her new hair is slightly wavy, honey gold, and soft. The moan that she releases is so sexy that it goes from my fingers straight to my dick.

  Do I tell her that the only times I’ve ever seemed angry were when I was scared or jealous and sometimes both? That she grew from kid to someone who made my pants too tight with just a smile in what seemed like overnight; and that if she was affecting me this way, she had to be affecting every male around her in that fashion, except for Nick who apparently still sees her as Charlotte, his five-year-old playmate?

  “No, I know it’s because you care.” Her hand slips out from under mine and creeps up to my shoulder. My hand stills and merely cups the back of her head. She begins a small exploration, feeling my clavicle and then down over the ridges of my biceps and back up again. Goosebumps freckle my skin at her touch, and I wonder if she knows what effect she has on me. Nah, because if she did, she wouldn’t be lying here so angelic next to me.

  Or maybe she would. Maybe all those times she was challenging me to do something.

  “I do care,” I say, pu
lling her head closer to mine. “Did you know I was the first one outside of your family to hold you? Nick was still a baby, so Mom was holding him, and Dad was getting cigars out for everyone. Your mom had the nurse place you in my lap.”

  “How do you remember these things? You were like two.”

  “I just do.” I shrug and the motion makes her hand fall away. It slips under my arm and then finds its way to my chest. I wonder if she can feel the thunderous beat of my heart. I don’t think she’s ever touched me this much, this closely, with this kind of attention. My loose sweatpants are suddenly too confining as every part of me strains toward her feather-light caresses.

  “I can’t remember anything.”

  The back of her head has a surgical scar, and under her skin lies a shunt, a tube that drains out any excess fluid. Charlotte thinks her head is too big in the back, but it feels okay to me. I’m surprised she is allowing me to touch her there, but I don’t question it nor do I fiddle with her scar, knowing that if I pay too much attention to what she thinks are flaws our little moment will be over.

  “I remember when you turned two. You got cupcakes instead of a birthday cake and none of us could eat until you’d take a bite, but you were confused by the paper around the cupcake. Nick got impatient and stuck his fingers in your frosting and made you cry.”

  “I don’t remember that either.”

  “I do,” I say curtly. I remember all of it. I clench her hand tighter to me as a flood of images march in front of my eyes. Charlotte at five, running from the clown that had been hired, straight into my arms. Me at nine, holding her hand when we were at the Navy Pier riding a carousel. Her at twelve dancing in her room to a Taylor Swift song pretending her hairbrush was a microphone, singing that she was Juliet and I was Romeo. I sat through the whole horrible thing. She is not a good singer. Me at seventeen watching her lift a swimsuit coverup over her head and realizing she turned from child into a smoking hot girl. So yeah, I remember everything. She’s mine. I was born for you and you were born for me. “Don’t go. Stay here with us.” I say us because it’s safer.

  “I’m going because it’s better for all of us,” she responds and then tugs on my shoulder until our faces are so close together I can count the individual lashes that veil her eyes. “But, Nate, before I go, I want—” she stops and then ducks her head into my chest. I feel her say something against my shirt, but I can’t make it out.

  “Want what?”

  “Iwantyoutokissme.”

  10

  Charlotte

  My request for a kiss doesn’t result in Nate rolling me over and pinning me down on the bed. Oh no, he jumps off the mattress like I’ve stuck a burning iron into his side. His athletic instincts kick in, and he’s halfway across the room before another breath is taken by either of us.

  “What the fuck?” he almost yells at me and then, tossing a worried glance toward the door as if my dad will bust through any minute, he lowers his voice and repeats the question sans profanity. “What did you just ask me?”

  Scowling, I answer, “I asked for you to kiss me, not kill me.”

  He places one hand on his hip and another he scrubs through his hair, looking exasperated, but his irritation is nothing compared to my mounting annoyance. My earlier shyness is chased away by my frustration. This is classic Jackson brother behavior. Because I’m a girl, I can’t possibly want the same things that they do.

  “Charlotte, I—” he begins, but I cut him off. I don’t even want to hear what he has to say. I roll over on my side so I’m not facing him.

  “Forget it. I’m not going to beg you.” I would if I thought it would do any good. It’s just . . . since I’ve been sick Nate’s been different to me. He’s been nicer, and he’s held me closer. His behavior is not so brotherly. I catch him looking at me with a gleam in his eye, and it makes me feel warm all over. At this moment, though, he’s looking everywhere but me and so I turn away.

  I feel his body depress the side of the bed, and he rolls me toward him.

  “What’s this all about?”

  “Nothing, just go away.” I keep my eyes covered so he can’t see my hurt at his instant rejection. He didn’t even have to think twice about it. He can kiss—and more—any number of girls at school or other schools or, heck, even a couple of girls who live in our building, but the idea of kissing me results in curse words and discomfort.

  “I’m not going away,” he insists. His palm is on my shoulder, and I feel electrified just from that small touch. I wonder what it would feel like if he touched me other places.

  “All that talk about me being important to you seems like just that—talk,” I mumble, still refusing to look at him. He pulls on my wrist that is covering my eyes, but I resist. It would be easy for him to overpower me, but instead he just lets go . . . and even that makes me sad.

  “It’s not just talk, but you’re fifteen, and I think we should wait.”

  “I’ll be sixteen in five months, and it’s not like you weren’t kissing girls when you were fifteen.”

  “You stay here, and we’ll kiss when you’re ready.”

  My heart sings at the words “we’ll kiss.” He wasn’t rejecting me! I drop my arm and sit up abruptly. Nate reaches out to steady me, and we are only inches apart. If I leaned forward I could kiss him. Instead I say slowly and clearly, “I’m ready now.”

  “You’re not.”

  “How do you know? You were like twelve the first time you kissed Molly Masterson at her birthday party. And you had sex when you were fourteen with Olivia Petrzelka in her parents’ rec room.”

  He gapes at me. “Goddamn Nick. I’m going to beat him until he can’t remember his own name let alone anything about me.”

  “Nick? If you want to shut down the gossip pipeline, you better start picking better partners.”

  Nate does a double take. “Are you saying that it’s the girls?” He draws out the word girls in shocked disbelief.

  “What do you think we’re talking about?” I drop to the bed and stretch out like a starfish. “I’m going to kiss someone someday. Do you want that first kiss to be yours?”

  He glares at me and presses his lips together, but behind his glower I can see something else, something that maybe if I was more experienced I could identify. I just know it’s there, and it’s something other than anger.

  I stretch farther, making tiny linen angels in my bedsheets. Nate’s attention is diverted, and at first I think he’s staring at my chest, where my IV port is but then I realize his gaze is lower, much lower. A devilish impulse comes over me, and I drag one foot up my leg, around my slender calf, up to my thigh and then allow my knees to fall apart. Despite my illness, I am still limber from years of gymnastics training. As I watch beneath my eyelashes, Nate does not look away. He’s riveted, and my gaze falls down his body past his chest and down to his sweatpants that hide absolutely nothing.

  I’ve seen erections before, on the Internet, but I couldn’t decide whether I thought that penises were disgusting or attractive. I prefer looking at the naked chest, the abs on a male model, or even his back. Somehow I know that Nate’s erection would be different, amazing. Girls in the locker room talk about blow jobs and oral, but I haven’t done any of that. I pretend like I know what they are talking about, but the closest I’ve ever come to anything remotely sexual is a few Tumblr gifs. No one is willing to brave the Jackson brothers to get to me, and I haven’t been too interested in breaching the line either.

  Saliva pools in my mouth as I think about taking Nate inside me, and I wonder what it would feel like if he touched me between my legs. As quickly as the wanton spirit had spread over me, it leaves, and I lock my legs together, rolling to the side, embarrassed at my thoughts.

  Nate groans, my motions awakening him from his trance. He turns to face the wall, and presses his forehead against a palm. Shame sets in, and I’m sorry for what I’m doing to him, what I’m doing to myself.

  “I’m going to Switzerland. I’m
leaving after the first of the year and I just don’t want my first kiss to be with someone other than you.” I bite my lip and then touch him tentatively on his back and wait for his response. I’d like him to be my first everything, but he’s skittish and I don’t want to scare him off. His hard on, though, must mean something.

  When my palm hits Nate’s back, his muscles bunch tightly under his T-shirt—as if he is anticipating a blow. Remorseful, I lean into him, resting my cheek in the middle of his spine, and slip my arms around his waist. I’m not sure why I’m pushing him tonight. I think it’s because I’m scared of what is going to happen to us when I go away, but my claim on him has never been one of girlfriend/boyfriend. We’re family and no matter what he gives to the other girls in his life, I’ll always mean something to him. I should be satisfied with that.

  I should be, but I’m not.

  “I’m sorry,” I whisper against the worn cotton. I rub my face tenderly against his back as if I am his old dog Hobo, seeking forgiveness from my owner.

  I feel him exhale, and then he grabs each of my hands in his to pull me tighter. We sit like that for some time, his head bowed and mine nestled in the curve of his back.

  “You’re going no matter what, right?” he finally says.

  “Yes.”

  I’m not able to explain to Nate why I feel compelled to go and how I really believe that this is the right thing for all of us, but especially me. I’ll never get better here because it will be too easy to rely on Nate and Nick to do things for me. Nick will cover for me in classes, and Nate will glare all my detractors away, and I’ll be smothered in sympathy and pity. It would be easy to stay and that tells me more than anything I should go.