My favorite voice in the world. My favorite person in the world.
I rub my eyes to keep the tears back, to keep all the fine in place, and then, just like I knew she would be, Charlie’s right there.
My back is to her, but she taps my elbow.
“Hey,” she says softly. “What’s wrong?”
Because there is no hiding with her. There never really has been. It’s only because she met me after Mr. Knoll that she never knew I was keeping something from her. But now that something doesn’t want to stay hidden. It’s tired of the dark. I fed it a bit of light last night with Hannah and it’s hungry, this something. It’s ravenous. Distracting it with guitar lessons and dinner with Alex isn’t enough. Those things are a penlight when it wants the sun. It needs light and air and maybe, maybe, maybe if I tell Charlie, my person, it’ll be satisfied. Maybe then it can finally lie down and sleep.
“Hey,” Charlie says again. My shoulders are shaking. My hands. My legs. My heart. My lungs.
I turn and settle on a stool, my breathing so loud and deep that I’m dizzy.
Charlie sits next to me. “Mara, you’re scaring me.”
She sounds totally freaked out, so I grab her hand. Breathe. Breathe.
“Whatever this is, let me help,” she says. She leans closer to me, her cheek on my shoulder. It’s so natural. So safe. So right. So us.
I rest my head on hers and look out at the festival winding down. Little girls with sticky cotton-candy fingers. Tween girls with freshly glossed lips, casting shy glances at the high school boys. Girls my own age in jeans, in skirts, in running shorts, in flannel, long hair and short hair and dyed hair, walking through the grass, searching, hunting, needing connection and belief and validation and something.
Something to feel worthy. To feel like ourselves.
“Mara,” Charlie says. She lifts her head and wipes the tears off my face with her thumbs. “Is it Owen?”
I think about this, because everything has felt like Owen lately. But then I realize this isn’t. This isn’t Owen at all. This is me. This is mine.
And then I open my mouth and give myself a little more light.
Chapter Twenty-Three
CHARLIE’S FINGERS TIGHTEN AROUND MINE, her eyes dark with worry. But she doesn’t say a word. She just waits, stays close while I tell her everything.
It has nothing to do with bravery or strength. It has to do with nothing left to lose. No matter how much I’ve tried to make it all work, I don’t have Charlie. I don’t have my brother. I don’t even have myself anymore. Now that day with Mr. Knoll tumbles out of me in a messy rush, tears and snot, trembling and embarrassment and shame. It explodes into the light, carnivorous and determined, and I let it have its way.
“Oh my god, Mara,” Charlie breathes out when I’m finished.
“That’s why I could never . . . when we were together, why I didn’t let you . . . didn’t touch you . . .” A sob gets stuck in my throat and all I can do is wave my hand between the two of us, hoping she gets what I’m saying.
“No, no, no,” she says. “Shhh, don’t even think about that. It’s okay. You know that was always okay with me.”
“I wanted to,” I say, my voice broken wide open, light spilling into all of the cracks. “I really did want to.”
Then I’m in her arms and she’s holding me so close that I can feel her heart beating an erratic rhythm, feel her softly shaking, register the hot splash of tears that aren’t mine against my cheek. I cling to her, feeling hollowed-out and full all at once, hunger replaced with nourishment.
“That’s why you seemed so sad when I first met you,” she says.
“I did?” I ask.
She pulls back so she can see me and nods. “I wanted to make you smile so damn bad.”
“You did make me smile. Every day.”
Tears race down her cheeks, matching mine, and she swipes them away. “God, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” she says.
I don’t know what to say to that. Don’t know what to say to anything. I just want to stay here, where Charlie knows my secret and I don’t have to think about anything other than the spicy scent of the boy deodorant she uses and the press of her fingertips on my back.
We stay like that for a while, close breaths and light caresses. I feel that hungry something retreat and I sigh in relief. I feel it start to lie down. I feel it getting drowsy, satiated by my confession.
