Bitingly cold beer in hand and the comfort of a plush pillow under my coffee table-elevated feet, I scrolled through the channels until I came to the one that would feature me.
Tonight, I’d be making a splash into reality television, and I doubted I’d ever be dry again. I dreaded the forthcoming recognition and the prying questions into my personal business.
I feared the mockery they’d make of my carefully crafted career.
And I dreaded the moment Charlotte walked onto the screen at the same time I longed for it.
It’d been too long since I’d seen her—too long since I’d smelled the lavender in her perfume and too long since I’d tasted wine on her tipsy, trivia-night lips.
With her on my mind and her absence leaning on the bruises on my heart, I made a decision.
Brave or stupid, the result was undisclosed, but my phone felt weighty in my hand as I moved to my contacts to dial the number and put it to my ear.
The sound felt painful, like each bell was a toll toward the end of my existence as I knew it, but luckily, she didn’t make me wait too long.
“Hello?” she answered on the second ring.
“Hey, Winnie. You got a sec?”
I heard her moving around a room, and then the sound of a creaking door pulling closed behind her. All the background noise dulled completely, and a new level of nerves descended thanks to the eerie silence.
“Yeah, of course. You sound really serious.”
I sighed and rubbed at my phoneless temple. “I just need to talk to you about something.”
“You do know your show’s about to start, don’t you? Georgia and Cassie came over for a viewing. They’re obsessed.”
“Oh, I know it’s about to come on,” I confirmed. “That’s actually what I wanted to talk to you about.”
Her voice was soft, maybe a little scared, as she questioned, “Yeah?”
I took two sharp breaths and then dove right in. There was literally no time left to handle this on my own, and if I didn’t come clean now, the show would do it for me. Some inkling told me this was the better way. “I know you’ve been imagining what light the show would paint me in, but I think you should worry about something else.”
“What?”
I rubbed painfully at the surface of my forehead with the tips of my fingers. “It’s Charlotte.”
“Charlotte? What are you talking about?”
“My ex-girlfriend, the one who, in the interest of full disclosure, I probably won’t ever be over, is Charlotte Hollis.”
“Charlotte Hollis,” she whispered.
I closed my eyes and let my head fall back on the couch with a thud. I had a feeling I probably wouldn’t be able to hold it up myself after she got done with me. “Yep.”
I wasn’t ready, though, for the power of her reaction—and the sound of her tears.
“Oh Jesus. Are you crying?” I pounded my fist against my forehead. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know who she was. I never would have started something with her if I’d known the history between her and Remy. I found out early on about the wedding, or the non-wedding, I guess, but I didn’t know who the groom was until the weekend she was supposed to meet Lexi. I—”
“Nick,” she called, interrupting me.
“Yeah?”
“Shut up.”
“Win, I’m sorry.”
“I said, shut up!” she snapped.
My eyebrows were drawn, but I did as I was told and shut my mouth.
“I get it now…why you’ve been so upset. Charlotte is… Charlotte was…she was my sister. I loved her, and I miss her every day. She cut all contact with me after what happened with Remy, and I never blamed her, but I…I missed her. I still do. So, I get it. I get why you can’t get over her, and more than that, I don’t think you should.”
“Win…”
“It happened twelve years ago, Nick. We were all kids. Hell, what happened between us went on for seven years, and three with you like you are now, and I’ve forgiven you. I think I can handle you and Charlotte together after twelve. Unless you fucked it up for some other reason.”
“No,” I laughed. “The family relation is about the only reason.”
“I had a feeling. You’re not all that bad when you’re not knocking people up.”
Ouch. Still, I deserved it. So I ignored it.
“What about Remy?”
She sighed. “Remy needs to face that demon head on. He’s never been truthful with himself about how much of that was his fault or how Charlotte didn’t have to be his only. That she wasn’t his only.”
“Yeah, but I’m not sure I want to be a part of him learning that lesson. He hates me enough.”
“Too bad. And shame on you for not telling me earlier! I could have saved us all the three months of you doing your best impression of Hobo Joe.”
“I don’t know if it’s that simple. Char…she’s texted me a few times…and I didn’t answer her with anything worthwhile…or sometimes at all. It was just too hard.”
“She’ll get over it if you’re honest with her. She might knee you in the nuts, but I’m not entirely opposed to that.”
“Great,” I commented. “Does that come before or after the black eye from Remy?”
“Well, I’d say before. He can’t get mad until he actually sees you together, and to see you together, you have to win her back. Duh.”
I winced. “Yeah, about that. I’m pretty sure it’s going to come out whether we’re back together or not.”
“How?”
“The show. I really wasn’t mindful of the cameras when it came to my interactions with Charlotte,” I admitted. “I didn’t really know I had a reason to be at the time.”
“Hmm,” she murmured. “Okay, so you get the black eye first. That might actually go a long way in your fight to win Charlotte back.”
“To remind her of all the conflict and strife she’s involved in? I think not.”
“Chicks dig scars, Dr. Raines. Chicks dig scars.”
I heard nothing more but a sniffle or two before the line went dead. I supposed Winnie had said all she’d needed to say on the matter, and that was that.
My heart raced as I tried to organize the completely unexpected outcome of that conversation in my head. I felt wild and wondrous, and like maybe there was a chance I could have everything I wanted. Before I lost the nerve, I opened my text messages to find Charlotte.
I had so much to say and no easy way to do it.
So there was only one option—to bite the bullet.
Me: Can we talk?