Page 10 of Out of Focus

“Go over there and ask Chuck that. I don’t have a problem with her.” Elaina narrows her eyes and frowns at me, but it’s quickly replaced with a smile as Adam, her fiancé, comes to stand next to her.

“Raffy. Be serious. What’s the deal with you and Charlie? We’ve been watching you practically at each other’s throats since you met, and it’s only gotten worse this past year.” She and Adam casually shift around so he’s sitting on the chair, and she’s on his lap. My best friend doesn’t even look at me. He knows Charlie is a sore subject.

“Baby girl, I promise I have nothing against her. I just like riling her up.” Elaina looks thoughtful while Adam mutters something under his breath that I can’t quite make out. “What was that, my very loyal and non-judgmental best friend?”

“I just said maybe you like it a little too much. You’re not like this with anyone else. It’s always her.” Leave it to my best friend to call me out. He’s right, of course, but I don’t need to admit that right now. It’s always her. He’s also the only person who knows about what happened between me and Charlie last year. But he doesn’t know everything she said. No one does. “Have you ever tried to talk about it? When one of you isn’t blackout drunk?” He also knows the answer to that.

“Nah. It’s more fun to watch her face get as red as her hair every time I hit her with a nickname she hates.” Adam and Elaina shake their heads at me, and when I see Elaina scooting a little closer to him, I decide it’s my cue to leave. I scan the party for someone else to talk to. I’ve got to get away from these lovebirds. Maybe focus on who I’m leaving this party with tonight.

I look around for a woman I can flirt with. Maybe my midnight kiss, maybe more. It never takes much work. I see a blonde looking my way, and when our eyes meet, she licks her lips in a way so suggestive it would make a porn star blush. She’s objectively hot, but my dick doesn’t seem to care, so I quickly look away toward the bar, and my gaze lands on a pair of wide blue eyes that surprise me. Charlie’s. Being the glutton for punishment that I am, I walk over to her.

“Not going for a repeat performance of last year, are you, Chuck?” I take her in as she rolls her eyes at me. She’s wearing a very short black skirt and a loose white top tucked into the front of it. She has flat shoes on, because she never wears heels. Her hair is that same bright orange-red, but it’s straight tonight. She almost doesn’t look like herself without the wild waves and curls.

“Not that it’s any of your business, but no. I don’t plan on getting so drunk I forget nearly everything.” She looks past me as if she’s looking for someone. “What about you? I don’t see a scantily-clad woman hanging off your giant body tonight. Are you all right?”

Fuck, she really thinks so little of me.

My brain chooses to focus on the fact that she just said she doesn’t remember a lot of last New Year’s Eve. We hardly ever talk, so this isn’t something that would have come up in conversation.

“What exactly do you remember from last year, pumpkin?” I can’t help my curiosity.

She takes a sip of her water and scrunches up her face. “Talking to a Thor look-alike. You taking me away from him.” She shoots me a death stare, but it never reaches my eyes. “Me waking up with a massive headache. Thank goodness Maeve took pity on me and left me with Gatorade and aspirin. It was a rough New Year’s Day.”

“Hmm. Is that all you remember?” I narrow my eyes at her, trying to see if she’s just omitting our entire conversation, but she just shrugs, nodding at me. If there’s one thing Charlie isn’t, it’s a liar. “What about that bush over there you got real up-close and personal with?”

She looks over to where I just pointed with my thumb, and her look of confusion is quickly replaced with shock. Her eyes go wide and when she looks up at me, her cheeks are flushed, and she nearly spits her water out.

“Oh no. I spilled my guts all over those bushes, didn’t I?” I feel my lips jerk up into a smile at the look of horror on her face. She really doesn’t remember.

“Uh-huh.” I laugh, and I love how her eyes shut as she takes a deep breath, like she’s trying to calm herself down. Charlie wears all her emotions on the surface, though she tries her damndest to hide them as well as her sister does. They’re always right there, though. In her eyes, her body language, the deepening blush of her skin. I’ve watched them all play out for over two years now, even if most of the time, the feelings are annoyance, anger, and frustration; all pointed directly and exclusively at me.

I heard her laugh once. I couldn’t see her face, but I remember the sound vividly. It plays like a radio commercial jingle in my head, on a loop, over and over and over. I rub my forehead to wipe away the memory and an annoying headache as Charlie opens her eyes.

“Well, I’m sure you took great pleasure seeing me in such a compromising and humiliating situation. I’m surprised you haven’t brought it up sooner or used it to embarrass me in front of our friends.” Her lips are set in a straight line. She is waiting for me to make fun of her, but I won’t.

I haven’t.

I wouldn’t.

“It gave me no pleasure to see you hurting and not feeling well. So, I don’t need to bring it up or embarrass you. No one knows.” Her eyes grow even wider at my statement, then immediately narrow again, which tells me she doesn’t believe me. “All right, so Maeve knows because she’s Maeve.” I didn’t even tell Adam that she was sick in the bushes, just that she drank too much. And I refuse to tell Charlie that it wasn’t Maeve who got her to bed and set her up with electrolytes and aspirin.

She swallows and looks back up at me. “Thank you,” she whispers.

“Wow, that was hard for you, huh, carrot cake?” I chuckle to lighten the mood and she goes back to slightly narrowed eyes, shaking her head at me. Back to the Charlie I know. I’m opening my mouth to say something, anything that isn’t an insult or a stupid nickname, when the goddamn walking mannequin from last year comes to stand next to us.

“Well, what are the chances I’d see you again, beautiful?” He smiles widely, a Cheshire-cat smile if I’ve ever seen one, and his unnaturally white teeth are bright enough to light up the entire yard. I look at Charlie, but she doesn’t have an ounce of recognition in her eyes.

“Hello. I’m sorry, have we met?” She looks at me for less than a second and goes back to the severely tanned man who smells like the body spray aisle at the drugstore. I like that she doesn’t bother smiling at him. Charlie doesn’t do pleasantries, especially not with people she doesn’t know.

Dude scoffs but keeps smiling. “Yeah, babe. In this very spot last year, don’t you remember? We were having a pleasant chat until your friend here took you away, and then, I couldn’t find you for the rest of the night.”

Charlie seems to put it together, and when she looks my way again, her expression is horrified. I can almost hear her pleading with me not to leave her with this douche. I love watching her squirm, so I clap him on the shoulder and smile brightly. “Well, I’ll leave you two to finish what you started. Have fun!” I have no intention of taking my eyes off this asshole, but Chuck doesn’t know that. I wink at Charlie and walk past her; then I feel the warmth of her slender fingers wrap around my forearm. She has never intentionally touched me before.

“Oh, honey, you’re hilarious!” She looks up at me, and there’s almost a smile on her face. “Always full of jokes, this one.” She grips my arm tighter. “I’m sorry, but my boyfriend and I were actually just leaving.” I nearly choke on air when she says boyfriend. She smacks me on the back harder than necessary, and I smile through my coughing fit. Well, this is fun.

She practically drags me by the arm, and the mannequin man is left at the bar looking thoroughly confused. She stops in front of a tree, and I can’t believe the overwhelming sense of déjà vu I’m feeling. It’s the same spot as last year.

Charlie rolls her head back to the tree, and the feeling gets stronger. “That was the guy I nearly went home with last year?” I raise my eyebrows in confirmation. “Do you think anyone has told him his leather pants, fake tan, and startlingly white teeth make him look like several inferior versions of Ross Geller all rolled into one?” I laugh at her Friends reference and how accurate it is. Charlie is funny.

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