Love and Other Unknown Variables (25 page)

6.8

T
here’s nothing special about Charlotte’s dad. He’s a drunk. He wept from the moment she stepped into the dim, dingy house she used to call home. Like the old church, I can see it was once warm and inviting, but now it’s full of shadows, and it smells like old cheese. Charlotte says her dad started drinking after her mom died. She says he’s like Juliet without the balls to use the knife. He’s slowly poisoning himself instead.

“Baby,” he moans into her shoulder as he’s hugging her good-bye. “Please, please do the trial. Please.” He breaks off sobbing. This is the fifth time in forty-five minutes he’s begged.

Charlotte’s already explained (four times) why the trial isn’t the miracle he’s looking for. It’s like he’s deliberately trying not to hear her so he can keep up his melodrama. It makes me wonder, if she were doing the trial, would he be begging her not to take such a big risk with her life?

Charlotte pulls away from Mr. Finch. He drops his head into his hands and continues to wail. “Let’s talk about something else, okay? You’re coming to visit for my spring break, right? There’s an art show at school I’m entering a few pieces in.”

“About that,” he says with a sniffle. He stares at a point over her shoulder. “I think I’m going to be too busy here to get away.”

Charlotte’s face falls, and I wonder why she cares. Why she still tries. “Oh, okay,” she murmurs. Clearing her throat, she stands up straighter. “Well, then I’ll see you this summer.”

Mr. Finch’s eyes get full again and he grabs Charlotte up in his arms once more.

“Dad, can’t we just say good-bye without the tears? Can’t you just give me a big hug and say ‘love ya, Charley’ and give me a smile?”

It’s like she’s talking to a toddler. Mr. Finch snuffs out his big tears with the heels of his hands. His bleary eyes lock on mine. “What are you looking at?”

I step back from his anger. “Nothing, sir.”

“Think you’re better than me? You’re nothing. You’re just the son of a bitch nothing that’s going to let her die.” I’m sure he’d come after me if he could stand up straight.

“I’m not going to let her die.” I wanted it to come out all macho and loud and shit, but my voice has shrunk. Being around him scares me because I can’t hate him like I know I should. Part of me would love to join him, wailing on Charlotte’s other shoulder, begging her to stay with me a little longer.

“Don’t lie. You’re all in this together. You all want me to be miserable.”

Charlotte crosses her arms over her chest. “Now you listen to me.” Her body trembles as she waits for him to look at her. “You leave him out of this. And Jo, too. This is my choice. This is my life.”

He understands. For a picosecond, I saw the understanding wash over him, but Mr. Finch pushes it away, reaching for his glass. He takes a big swig, standing there in a Leaning Tower of Pisa sort of way, and says, “Well don’t let me get in the way.” He stumbles off with his glass in tow. “Love ya, Charley,” I hear him mumble as he rounds the dark corner.

Charlotte makes it to the car before everything falls apart. This horrible scream tears itself from her lungs, startling the birds around the house so they explode from the trees like machine-gun fire. She beats her purse on top of the car until the strap breaks and then she just uses her fists. Afraid she’ll hurt herself, I jump between her and her car, absorbing her fury as best I can, wishing I could draw the pain, like snake venom, from her body.

Eventually, she stops beating on my chest, and I scoop her up in my arms, holding her together as best I can, while sobs rack her body. I press my lips to her forehead, her cheeks, her neck, her hair, her eyelids—infusing her body with as much love as I’ve got to give. And then a little more.

It takes me 22.41 minutes to pick up all the pieces of Charlotte and patch her back together.

6.9

T
here comes a point when crying doesn’t make you feel better anymore—but never underestimate the power of the donut. There’s no Krispy Kreme in this little town, but Charlotte has assured me the ones at Miss Rose’s bakery are better.

“That’s blasphemy, you know.”

Charlotte doesn’t argue, but arches a brow at me in a
we’ll see
sort of way.

I smile when we reach the bakery. The door is not any old pink—it’s flamingo-ass pink.

As soon as we step inside, a large woman wearing a tiny pink apron descends on Charlotte like the Joker in baking gear. She’s got flour in her black hair and a big white smile framed by bright pink lips. My instinct is to grab Charlotte and run, but one of the woman’s meaty arms reaches out traps me in her crazy bear hug, too.

“Charlotte! Oh, my sweet girl.” The woman pulls back, keeping one hand on my shoulder and the other on Charlotte’s. “And you’ve brought me your beau.”

She drops Charlotte and takes me in both of her paws to examine me. “He’s tall.” She turns me this way and that. “And clean.”

Charlotte stands next to the woman, admiring me. “He’s smart, too, Miss Rose.”

“Of course he’s smart. He’s with you, isn’t he?”

“Yes. Yes, he is.”

Miss Rose pulls us in for another smothering hug before breaking away and dusting off her hands. “So, what can I get you?” She steps behind her counter, her cheeks flushed.

“As if you have to ask?”

Miss Rose smiles and busies herself putting together a pink cardboard box. “Charlotte, be a dear and get me some fresh cream from the back for your coffee.”

Miss Rose watches her go. “Jo tells me things,” she says, taking the box to the case and beginning to fill it with donuts.

“Oh, well.” My ears are on red alert.

“I’m glad Charlotte has you.” She shrugs a shoulder to wipe her cheek. “It’s not often we find people that can see through our shortcomings.”

“Cancer isn’t a shortcoming.”

Miss Rose’s hand falters and a glazed donut falls to the floor. Her brow wrinkles as she studies it where it has landed. “No, you’re right. It’s a damn curse,” she says, looking up at me. “But maybe I wasn’t talking about Charlotte.” Her pink lips curl into a wry smile. “As far as I know, Charlotte doesn’t have any flaws. Now you, on the other hand…”

A sharp laugh escapes me. “You
have
been talking with Ms. Finch.”

Charlotte comes out from the back with a jug of cream and a fresh pastry she snagged. “Talking to Jo about what?”

Miss Rose and I share a look. She smiles at me before pulling Charlotte into another big hug. “How much I’ve missed you, child,” she whispers into Charlotte’s hair.

Miss Rose joins us around a small bistro table half her size. She tells me stories about the Finch girls, until Charlotte and I are crying with laughter.

“She was so stubborn,” Miss Rose says. “Jo was learning to ride a two-wheeled bike, and Marcus—that’s Charley’s daddy—said she wasn’t big enough. Well, Charley wasn’t having any of it.”

Charlotte’s face takes on a determined light as she remembers. “I didn’t want to get left behind.”

“That’s right,” says Miss Rose. “Charley followed Jo around everywhere. So there’s Marcus running alongside Jo, encouraging her as she wobbled along, and the next thing we know little Charley comes zooming by on her bike, blood running down her legs and arms like she’d just gotten into a scrabble with a bobcat.”

“I stole Daddy’s tools and took off my training wheels.”

“And taught yourself to ride?”

“It wasn’t hard. I only fell twice.” Charlotte pulls up her sleeve to show me a scar on her elbow. “It healed up nice.”

“How old were you?”

Charley looks to Miss Rose for confirmation. “About four? Not too little at all. Daddy was just overprotective. Guess that’s where Jo gets it from.”

Miss Rose nods. “After that, we’d see the Finch girls riding all over town together. Inseparable.”

Charlotte’s eyes get glassy. “I just didn’t want to get left behind,” she says again, more to herself than to us. She looks up at Miss Rose. “Guess I don’t have to worry about that anymore.”

“No, child, I guess you won’t.”

Charlotte gives me a shaky smile, and I pull her chair closer to mine. Miss Rose excuses herself, saying, “We need another round of donuts.”

Charlotte and I sit in the bakery window with the afternoon sun glancing off her black curls, my hand touching the small of her back, and the sound of her breathing soft in my ear. I kiss her neck and whisper, “You aren’t leaving us behind—not really.”

She pulls my face to hers, kissing me fiercely, like if we never come up for air, never move from this moment in space and time, then cancer and the past won’t matter because this is all there will ever be from here until forever.

Or from here until Miss Rose comes back with fresh donuts, which she does. She drops the tray on the table with a clang. We pull apart, my ears aflame, Charlotte’s cheeks flamingo-ass pink, and try to compose ourselves, but Miss Rose laughs, a loud booming laugh like a church bell. “Oh, excuse me. Did I interrupt something?”

Charlotte growls and throws a donut at Miss Rose, who chuckles and walks to the counter. “Let me get y’all a box so you can be going.”

---

O
n our way out of town, Charlotte points out the landmarks of her childhood—the playground where she broke her arm, the brightly painted cottage where she took her first art lesson, the junior high basketball court where her friends would meet late at night to play truth or dare.

“What kinds of dares?”

“The usual.”

“For the sake of argument, let’s say, someone isn’t familiar with ‘the usual.’ Examples?”

Charlotte arches a brow. “Stupid stuff like daring each other to jump off bleachers, sit in the Dumpster for two minutes, or kiss someone everyone knows you have a crush on.” She rests her head back, appraising me. “You never played?”

“No one ever asked me to.”

“Truth or dare?”

My fingers tingle. I’m not sure I want to play this game. “Uh…truth?”

“When did you first know you wanted to ask me out?”

“The moment you didn’t punch me for touching your tattoo at the Krispy Kreme.”

She laughs. “For real?”

I nod.

“Do me.”

“Excuse me?”

Charlotte rolls her eyes. “Say, ‘truth or dare,’ Charlie.”

“Oh.” I grin. “Truth or dare.”

“Dare.”

Crap. Now what? I drum my fingers on the steering wheel, considering. “Are there limits?”

A smile slithers across Charlotte’s face. “What do I have to lose?”

My stomach clenches and I crack my window open to let in a cool breeze. Fast food joints and gas stations begin to dot the landscape as we near another small town. “I think you’re feeling hungry, Charlotte,” I say, my dare taking shape in my mind.

I slow and pull into the drive-through at a Burger King. Charlotte’s wicked smile spreads in anticipation.

“When they ask for your order, you’re going to tell them your name and that I’m the best boyfriend in the world.”

“That’s my dare?” Charlotte leans over me to get closer to the order board. “Rookie,” she whispers in my ear.

“Welcome to Burger King. May I take your order, please?”

“Yes, please. My name is Charlotte Elizabeth Finch and my boyfriend Charles Mortimer Hanson has the prettiest penis in all the land.”

“Charlotte!”

She dissolves in puddle of laughter.

“Uh…w-well, yes…congratulations, but…would you like fries with that?”

“N-n-no thanks,” I splutter before Charlotte’s contagious laughter infects me. I peel out of there like a madman, my window still open, and the cool air whipping Charlotte’s curls into my face. My body is humming. I’ve never felt so alive.

Charlotte grazes my jaw with a kiss. “I kind of cheated,” she says, peppering my neck with kisses. I’m finding it hard to stay in my lane. “Now I owe you a truth.”

It’s my turn to arch a brow at her.

“If I thought there was a chance it’d save me, I’d do that trial just to have more time with you.” She kisses my neck once more before sitting back in her seat and turning up the radio to sing along. Her voice fills the car and rises through the open window. I imagine it reaching all the way to the great infinite those poets write about.

7.0

L
ately I get texts from Charlotte in the middle of the night.

Can’t sleep.

The part of me that knows insomnia is a symptom brought on by her growing tumors has a tiny anxiety attack. The rest of me is thankful for the extra time those long nights give us.

On the sleepless nights, we meet on the greenway halfway between our homes and walk for hours, her thumb tracing circles on the back of my hand and making me have to stop every so often and wrap her in my arms. She looks up at me with those eyes of hers, and it takes all my strength to keep standing under their weight. When we kiss, I feel like gravity releases me.

But tonight is different. Tonight is special. Tonight Charlotte is sleeping over. It’s the first time in two months. It’s the first time since the seizure.

Technically, Charlotte’s spending the night with Becca.

I’ve been in my room for eons, waiting for Charlotte. Mom and Dad went to bed hours ago. And the girls turned off the music 17.54 minutes ago. I slip into bed and pull my pillow over my head to drown out the silence. Maybe I misinterpreted. Maybe this is just another sleepover night, like all the others. Becca and Charlotte holed up together—me alone.

“Charlie, you awake?” Charlotte whispers into the darkness.

I don’t see how I’ll ever sleep again now that I’ll forever hold the memory of Charlotte leaning into my bedroom with my name on her lips, wearing short shorts, and an MIT T-shirt I’d given Becca for Christmas this year.

I can hear her footsteps padding across the carpet. I sit up and make room for her on the bed. She weighs so little the bed barely moves under her as she tucks her body beside mine.

Her fingers drum a rhythm on my chest as she hums a familiar tune. Eventually her fingers slow and the tune drifts away. I bury my face in her curls and listen to her steady breathing, feeling the pulse in her carotid artery as it thrums against my shoulder. It feels strong.

I whisper into her hair, “You asleep?”

Her pulse flies. “Difficult to sleep with something so
stiff
in bed with you,” she says.

I can feel my ears flame up.

She giggles. “I didn’t realize my being here would make it so
hard
for you to relax.”

“You’re an idiot,” I say, but I’m laughing now, too.

“True, but at least I don’t need to
bone up
on my bedroom etiquette like someone else I know.” She points toward me and dissolves into laughter. Listening to her laugh is like hearing my favorite song playing on the radio as I drive home on Friday afternoon with the windows open. Down-in-your-soul goodness.

Maybe it’s because she’s getting too loud or I’m loopy from the sleep deprivation of late or maybe it’s the song of her laughter in my head, but I let the words fall from my mouth. “I love you.”

She tips her face to mine and I kiss her. Not one of those long, deep, end-of-the-movie type kisses. Just long enough to know I like doing it, and deep enough to know she does, too. So, pretty much, the perfect kiss. When I pull away, I have a goofy just-been-kissed grin on my face, which makes Charlotte start laughing all over. So, I kiss her again. And again.

I get the feeling Charlotte wants to do
more
—that feeling being her hand working its way into my boxers. The thrill of it makes me do this gasp-groan thing in a not-very-sexy kind of way. Charlotte snickers. I kiss her neck to shut her up, working my way to the top of her collarbone just below the neck her T-shirt. As much as I love seeing her in MIT colors, as soon as she lifts her arms above her head, I lose no time dragging the hem of the shirt up along her stomach, exposing her chest, and finally tossing the shirt off to the side.

This is the first set of breasts I’ve seen in real life. The best part is that they’re Charlotte’s. My breath catches in my stomach. They are beautiful.

A patch of tight, angry, pink skin just under her right collarbone distracts me. My finger caresses the scar. Charlotte’s smile tightens. “What’s this?”

“It’s from my port.” I must look confused because she continues. “Where the chemo drugs go? Or, where they went anyway.”

The scar is all I can see. Everything else becomes a blur. Cancer. It is inside of her, eating her, killing her even as her fingers are brushing against my groin. A better man could ignore the panic and give Charlotte what she wants. All I can think is she can’t be my first while I’m her last.

“We have to slow down,” I say and move away from her enticing fingers. Hands down, hardest thing ever (har har, Charlotte). She looks bewildered. “I mean, Becca is right down the hall. And my parents.”

“Right. Of course.” Charlotte’s whole body has gone rigid.

I try to laugh, but it sounds wrong. “I don’t know if I can be quiet.” Which seems kinder than saying,
I can’t have sex with you because you’ll soon be a corpse, which depresses me to the point of flaccidity.

Charlotte doesn’t let me pull too far from her grip. “Charlie, look at me,” she says, catching my face in her hands. “It’s okay. I love you. It’s okay.”

My eyes feel heavy with tears and I don’t want to cry now. Charlotte’s breasts are right there in front of me, and I’m going to have a sobfest? I take a few deep breaths, Charlotte breathing along with me, her hands still holding my face.

“We don’t have to do anything you don’t want—”

I groan. “I want, Charlotte.” Her thumb traces my bottom lip. “I want all of you, but I feel like we’re sprinting through this relationship, racing the clock, and no matter how fast we go, there will never be enough time.”

I pull her close, our skin melding together, and goddamn it feels so good, but it also hurts so much to know it won’t stay like this. I can’t make any of it stay.

“What if I’d like to marry you someday? We’ll never get that chance.”

“Marry me?”

“I know. It’s crazy. This is Charles Mortimer Hanson talking crazy here.”

“Charlie most couples in high school don’t actually get married.”

“Are you trying to be logical with me right now? Did you want to talk statistics?” My voice is verging on cracking as it jumps in octaves.

“No,” Charlotte says, she brushes my hair from my forehead with her fingertips. Holding her this way, lying on our sides with our chests breathing in and out together, her lips are very close to mine. She brushes a kiss over my lips and whispers, “I’d probably marry you, if given the choice.”

I swallow. She’s just said what I was thinking. I don’t know if I’d want to marry her in a few years, but I do know that this stupid, fucking disease is taking that choice away from me. Away from us. And there are so many other choices being stolen. The choice to move in together. The choice to have children together. Big choices, but little ones, too. Like what color should we paint our bedroom? And do we get a dog or a cat?

Charlotte’s face is so…despondent, sorrowful, forlorn…all those words the poets in Ms. Finch’s books like to use. They all mean the same damn thing.

Sad.

I sigh and burrow my face in the crook of her neck. Her fingers trail along my shoulder blades.

Damn it. I want
happy
. I choose happy.

“There are so many things we’re never going to get to do with each other,” I say and kiss the spot I love behind her ear.

Her breath catches. She slides her hands down my spine.

“We get now,” I murmur in her ear. She shivers beside me. “We get
this
.” I lift my head and kiss her tattoo. “I like this.”

I drown myself in the endless sweetness of her mouth.