Which was a real possibility, given my earlier reaction.
“I—”
“Ada, tell me,” he encouraged, apparently sensing I was going to brush off his question. “Are you okay?”
I decided to believe him. My dad and our complicated past wasn’t a secret. I just felt more than a little raw, which made it hard to be vulnerable to anyone. Let alone Charlie English.
“I saw my dad today. We met for coffee.”
He stilled, his eyes turning into lasers as he moved his gaze over my face and body, absorbing my words and emotions and who knew what else. “Fuck, Ada, that’s a big day.”
My chin wobbled, but I held my emotions in check. “Adleigh was there too, so it wasn’t like... just us. But yeah, we met for coffee. It was weird. And awkward. And... apparently, he has a son in Oklahoma who’s going to be a senior in high school.”
Charlie’s frown was its own world of emotions. “Really? A half brother? Did you know anything about him before today?”
I shook my head. “Nope.”
He put his glass down and stepped over to me, pulling me into a tight hug. I let it happen, unable to resist the warmth and comfort of his arms around me. My brain struggled to make sense of the sheer force of nature that was Charlie’s empathy. It filled up the room and pushed at the seams of everything I knew about the universe and life and people. It swallowed me whole.
It wasn’t just a cursory compassion. It was his heart opening up and absorbing all my feelings and hurt and heartbreak. He didn’t just relate to me, he got down into the dirt and muck of my pain and felt it with me.
It was too much. Too intense. Too consuming.
I wanted to push him away and kick him out of my apartment, out of my life. Maybe out of this city. Because he didn’t give it away in half measures. He poured it out in a way that cracked my brain as it struggled to process and catch up.
But at the same time, it was a healing balm that soothed and whispered restoration over my old scars and still-broken pieces. It was life in all the places that seemed dead and barren in my heart. It was hope when I could only feel despair. It was something I couldn’t name because it was only just blooming, only growing tiny baby roots that were still fragile and young.
“Are you excited about a brother? Neutral? Mad?” he asked in a gentle voice.
“I don’t think I know how to feel yet,” I told him honestly. “All of those things maybe? He seems to have an actual relationship with Briggs—that’s his name. My, uh, brother’s name. So maybe we could also add jealous? And a fresh wave of heartache I didn’t know to expect.”
Charlie laughed at my sarcastic tone. “Do you ever wonder why things are so hard for you when everyone else seems to have a perfectly normal existence?”
I pulled back a little, surprised at his question. “All the fucking time.”
His smile was small and careful but still sincere. “That’s a lie, Ada. Nobody has a normal experience. Everyone is carrying hurt and hardships. We just don’t get to see it because most people don’t like to advertise the things that wound them the most.”
My heart twinged with a sharp pain, but it was hard to say where it was coming from. “So you’re saying to get over my dad?”
He shook his head. “No, I’m saying the jealousy is unfounded. Your brother might have gotten the dad you didn’t, but he isn’t without his own baggage. And your dad might have grown up at a later point in his life and been able to have a good relationship with his son, but he still has plenty of regrets. So many, I bet it’s hard to look at himself in the mirror.”
I collapsed back into the hug, practically melting into him. “How do you know?”
“Because he left you, Ada. And speaking from experience, that’s about the stupidest fucking thing anyone could ever do.”
The hug suddenly felt like we’d crossed an invisible boundary I’d forgotten was off-limits. We’d been talking about my dad, but now that he’d shoved our relationship into the light, I wasn’t sure what to do or say or where to put my hands.
I’d promised myself a long time ago that I wouldn’t broach this subject with Charlie. It was sometime after he’d brought some date into the bar when he knew I was on shift and before I’d fully decided he was a piece of worthless man trash I refused to waste tears on. But now it was here, out in the open, and I was too emotionally exhausted to put up much of a fight.
Plus, he’d brought me chips and salsa and told me it was okay to be emotional.
“Why did things end with us, Charlie? I mean, I get that we weren’t dating. But you know, I’m a smart girl. You could have told me you weren’t interested.”
He flinched, apparently as surprised by my honesty as I was. I pulled away before he could and started pulling out tacos to see what he’d picked out.
I’d gotten three bites into a carne asada and cotija one before he said, “I was a fucking idiot back then, Ada. Honestly, I did you a favor.”
I snorted around the taco. “Oh, I see. This is one of those ‘it’s not me, it’s you’ conversations? Honestly, Charlie, give me a little more credit than that.”
