Page 115 of The Charlie Method

“Dude. Same.”

And I know we’re both thinking about Charlie now. How good she tasted. How warm and soft she felt in my arms. My dick swells, pressing against my zipper.

“Have you spoken to her?” I ask.

His expression clouds over. “No. You?”

“Nothing since I saw her at Malone’s.”

AKA the night she made me feel like absolute dirt for makingherfeel like dirt.

My hard-on deflates at the memory.

That ravaged, mortified look in her big brown eyes.

She has nothing to be ashamed of. But I get it. There’s a life script. There are rules. There are things you do and things you don’t do. People like Will and Charlotte freak out when they go off script. It took Larsen a long time to be able to accept that sometimes it’s okay to ad-lib. Charlie’s not there yet. Our girl’s not ready to improvise. She might never be.

“You have her number, right?”

“Yes.” He gives me a warning look. “But I’m not abusing the privilege. I promised her I’d only use it for class.”

“I know. I just… Fuck, man. What she said at Malone’s that night—I can’t get it out of my head. I want to send her a message telling her she’s got nothing to be ashamed of. She can ignore it if she wants, but…one message, Larsen. Please?”

Will falls silent. Several seconds tick by, until finally I see his finger swiping at his phone.

A moment later, Charlotte’s contact info appears on my screen.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

CHARLOTTE

Inside and out

MY BROTHER’S NAME ISHARRISONLEESTEVENS.

He’s four years older than me. He’s a freelance web designer from Nevada. He arrived in Massachusetts a month ago but hadn’t worked up the courage to approach me until last night.

This is all the information we were able to exchange outside Malone’s. All I was capable of digesting because I had to leave early the next morning and the shock of seeing him had fried my brain.

Now I’m home, surrounded by my family, and there’s nothing more I can do about it until I’m back at school. He asked for a proper meetup, and I agreed. We exchanged numbers, and that’s how we left it.

I want to tell my family, but I’m worried about their reactions. I don’t want to ruin the holiday. We love Thanksgiving, maybe even more than Christmas. Mom goes all out with the decorating. Our front porch is practically drowning in pumpkins. We have a handmade gourd-shaped wreath on the door. Centerpieces full of acorns and—for some reason—antlers, even though we’re not a hunting family and never have been.

My brother’s wife’s family usually joins us, but they’re in Aruba this year, so that leaves just the five of us along with Uncle Erik and his two kids. Ava has a new boyfriend in New York who couldn’t attend, and I’m a bit disappointed about that. When she told me his name is Ash, I had to laugh, because of course it is. They’re both three-letter A names. Ash and Ava—sounds so perfect together. Everyone in this family is perfect.

So rather than invite an emotional and angst-ridden conversation by confessing about Harrison, I don my perfect face and go help Mom prepare the pie. We just stuffed ourselves full of turkey, and now everyone is in the family room ready to play games over dessert. We don’t watch football. We’re not that family. We’re a trivia crew.

“Are you okay, sweetheart?” Mom asks, watching me stand on my tiptoes to open the top cupboard.

“I’m great.” I pull out the ceramic serving plate she asked for.

“Are you sure? You seem distracted today.”

I turn to face her, holding out the plate. “Just stressed out, I guess. Midterms were rough, so now I’m worried about finals.”

“I’m sure you killed those midterms, Char.”

“I know, but…the grad school programs I’m applying for are so competitive. I just don’t want my GPA to drop…”

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