The Last Time I Saw Her

by Alexandra Harrington

  “Why are you here?” Sean.

  “I just came to see Charlie. I’m leaving,” Max said.

  Silence. Charlotte imagined them just staring at each other uncomfortably.

  “I hear her, at night,” Sean said, “the nightmares. You stay over because of that, don’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  More silence.

  “I don’t want her to need you,” Sean said. “Don’t let her.”

  “It isn’t like that,” Max answered.

  Exactly, she told herself. It was never anything.

  “It’s not,” Max continued, “it’s the other way around.”

  Charlotte sucked in a breath and rolled back over, facing the wall she knew Max and Sean were on the other side of.

  When she woke up some time later, she told herself she wasn’t remembering right, that she’d been dreaming.

  • • •

  “You,” Max said dramatically, “are going to ruin my laptop.”

  Leo rolled his eyes. “Would you relax? I download from this site, like, every day. Your MacBook Pro Grand Supreme 2000 is gonna be fine.”

  Max slouched back into his seat, looking exasperated. “I saved all year for that laptop.”

  Charlotte sat between them in Max’s living room. “By ‘save’ you mean you didn’t spend your allowance until you had enough?” she said, arching an eyebrow.

  Leo chuckled into the keyboard.

  Max looked at her across Leo’s shoulders. “That’s what saved means. And I don’t remember inviting you here.”

  “I invited her,” Leo said, adding a few zeroes and other odds and ends to his search for a download of the latest episode of some HBO show. “She’s only just returned to us, we must keep her entertained so she doesn’t run off again.”

  Max laughed. “I see her enough,” he said quietly.

  Charlotte bit back a smile. She wondered if Leo knew just how much time they spent together. Probably. Leo knew everything. And to be fair, most of the time she spent with Max they were both unconscious. Didn’t exactly count as hanging out.

  “Does this usually take this long?” Max asked Leo.

  “Your computer sucks,” Leo said. “Too much junk on it. What are you hoarding on here? All your prom photos?”

  “You know I would never delete those.”

  “Well, your date was exceptionally good-looking,” Leo returned.

  “Wait, Sophie?” Charlotte asked. “No. Who did you guys go with?”

  “Max went to prom with the second best-looking person at school, next to Sophie,” Leo said. “And I went with my second choice.”

  Charlotte frowned and Max shot Leo a look.

  “We went together,” Max explained.

  Charlotte looked back and forth between them. “No one tells me anything! Am I third-wheeling right now?”

  “It’s a long story,” Leo said, still talking to the laptop. “A statement. An uprising. A rage against the machine kinda thing. Anyone who didn’t go to North Colchester had to be signed in and okayed by the school. They wouldn’t let me sign Ben in because they said nineteen was too old.”

  “Which we know is bullshit because Delilah got her twenty-one-year-old hipster brewery boyfriend from Tatamagouche in,” Max added.

  “So, the next day at lunch Max told everyone in the cafeteria that I was the love of his life, yadda-yadda, asked me to be his prom date, I fake-cried a bit for the sake of theatrics, said yes, and obviously the school couldn’t do anything.”

  Charlotte tilted her head and closed her eyes, trying to envision the scene in her head. “Why did I miss this?”

  “Did you have prom at boarding school?” Leo asked.

  “Yeah. I didn’t go.” Prom was something she and Sophie had talked about for years. She was either doing prom with Sophie or not at all.

  “You didn’t miss anything,” Max said.

  Leo threw himself back into the sofa cushions with a sigh. “There, it’s done. Now we just need an HDMI cord so we can plug this into the TV.”

  “Shit. Hm.” Max stood up. “I think there’s one…somewhere.”

  Charlotte joined him as they poked around the living room, looking in baskets of other cords that weren’t the right one, under the sofa, and in cabinets. She was digging through a trunk near the end of the room to no avail.

  She poked her head into a smaller room off the living room, where Max had disappeared. “Any luck?”

  It was Simon’s office. Max was lifting and re-stacking huge towers of papers and files. He shook his head. “I thought there was one in here. Wait. What’s that noise?”

  She paused to listen. It was a distant, low buzz. Charlotte shifted a pile of papers on the top of the desk at her hip.

  “Here,” she said. “It’s his phone.” She held it up for him to see. Small, nondescript, old. Charlotte wasn’t even sure it was one that could access the internet.

  Max looked puzzled. “That isn’t his phone.”

  “Oh.” Charlotte looked back down at it as it began ringing again in her hand. The caller-ID just said “unknown.”

  “They’ve called five times.”

  Max squinted at the tiny screen.

  “It’s probably his work phone,” she said.

  “Maybe he’s having an affair.” Max smirked.

  The phone quieted, but restarted immediately. Same number.

  “Here,” Max sighed, taking it from her. He pressed the green button with his thumb and held it to his ear. “Simon,” he said, in a fake voice deeper than his own.

  “Right,” Max said after a few seconds, “and…so, what will?”

  He pulled the phone back from his ear like he was offended. “They hung up.”

  “Who was it?” Charlotte asked.

  Max shrugged. “No idea. Some guy.”

  “What did they say?”

  “‘It’ll be next week.’ Or something like that. Something about next week.”

  “Oh. Huh.”

  “It’s probably just his work phone,” Max agreed.

  “I like your Simon voice. I didn’t realize he was Batman.”

  Max dug through a couple drawers. “I wonder who my new mom is gonna be.”

  Charlotte rolled her eyes and joined him on the other side of the desk. “I don’t think the cord is in here.”

  “What are you doing in my office?”

  Charlotte’s head snapped up. Simon stood in the doorway, his hand still on the knob.

  “Hey, Dad,” Max said without looking up. “Just doing some research for the exposé Charlotte is writing on our family. It’s gonna be good. You ever see Blackfish?”

  Charlotte held Simon’s gaze as his eyes fell on her, almost looking like he thought his son was serious.

  “Max,” she said slowly, “we’re just looking for that cord, right?”

  Max finally looked up and glanced between them. “Um, yeah…you know you’re not actually writing an exposé, right?”

  “Get out of my office,” Simon barked. “And stay out.”

  She felt Max’s hand at her waist as he shuffled her out of the office. She didn’t know why she felt so uncomfortable. They hadn’t been doing anything. She didn’t like the way Simon had looked at her. She could feel Simon’s eyes raking over her like she was a bug. But like she was a whole infestation that would cause trouble down the line, and had to be eradicated.

  The door shut behind them.

  “He’s just still mad about the chocolate fountain thing,” Max explained. “We didn’t get the deposit back.”

  “Yo, Hardy Boys,” Leo called from the couch. “It’s a good thing you’re cute. But the cord is plugged in already. It’s hanging off the back of the TV.”

  While the boys were engrossed in the show (there was a lot of nudity), C
harlotte found herself watching the door to Simon’s office. He left once, but returned, leaving the door just barely open. She thought maybe he wanted to be able to see them.

  Jesus. Pull it together. Charlotte pulled her attention to the TV and tried to follow along for a few minutes. She was losing it. Maybe Simon was just a cranky weirdo who really was upset about the chocolate fountain’s demise.

  The show ended and Max and Leo took a few minutes to debate the significance of something the dragon girl said and what it meant for the overall plot. Leo suggested it meant she was going to die, which made Max very upset and start looking off sadly into the distance.

  “Anyway,” Leo said finally, “wanna go get Chinese?”

  Max agreed and Charlotte thought her bout of paranoia might have just been brought on by her hunger. And maybe she needed to drink more water.

  “Bye, Dad!” Max called in the direction of the office. “We’re leaving, forever! I love you! Give my regards to your mistress!”

  No answer.

  “Where’s Deirdre?” Leo asked.

  “I think getting groceries,” Max said. “But not sure. She doesn’t cook. Last we talked she’d decided she wanted to be a sommelier. I think she cleared out the NSLC in town, for educational purposes.”

  “God, I love her,” Leo said.

  “Hey,” Max said to Charlotte when they stood up, his hand catching her elbow. “You good?”

  “Yeah.” She nodded as they headed for the door. “I’m fine. Oh. Wait, I’m gonna use the washroom.”

  Leo was already on the deck and Max was stepping through the door, positioning an unlit cigarette between his teeth. “We’ll wait in the car.”

  After she was done, she stood outside the bathroom door, kitty-corner to Simon’s office. The door was still open a tiny bit. Charlotte could hear Simon talking. He must be back on the phone. She waved off everything she’d ever learned from Nancy Drew books and crept closer, his voice swirling into focus.

  “It’ll have to be sooner,” Simon was saying.

  And then as if he knew she was listening, the call ended, or at least she assumed it had. No more talking. Okay. She’d learned enough from Nancy to know better than to wait around for Simon to discover her. She left the house, sliding the door shut behind her.

  twenty-one

  Charlotte didn’t feel like eating, making some excuse about not feeling well once they got to the restaurant. She knew by Max’s expression that he saw right through her, but he didn’t press it. She worked tonight so she’d be back at May’s later, anyway. Laurie had been so good to her. She was getting four shifts a week and could pick up more from the other girls if she wanted to. It felt good to finally be putting money away somewhere. It wasn’t much, but it could be a foundation for more.

  Charlotte left Max and Leo to their egg rolls and headed in town, toward the library. She didn’t know what she wanted to do there; maybe it was the air conditioning and the Wi-Fi. (The River John library was the only place in town with free internet. It was on the town sign.)

  The place was cool and quiet. She didn’t think there was anyone else inside. Charlotte busied herself with a shelf that announced the new arrivals (which included Twilight, 2005). She picked a few up anyway, for nostalgia’s sake.

  “Charlotte?”

  She turned around. At the table in the corner of the room behind her, Sophie was almost completely shrouded from view by the bookshelves.

  “Ah, h-hi,” Charlotte stammered, looking away quickly. She placed her books on the table and waited a few seconds. Her brain had been so wired the last few weeks toward convincing Sophie to forgive her that she had temporarily forgotten Sophie’s reaction to her at Max’s party. Taking a deep breath, she turned around again.

  “What’s up?” Sophie asked.

  “Um, nothing, really.” Charlotte practically tiptoed into the room toward her. Bookshelves lined the walls and stood back to back in the centre of the room, creating a few cubbies with tables. “How are you?”

  “Oh, you know me.” Sophie had a newspaper crossword before her. She could usually polish them off in less than twenty minutes. Sophie was smart—way smarter than Charlotte and probably Max, and way smarter than she ever let anyone give her credit for. “Same old, same old.” Sophie was also really good at talking to you like you’d managed to annoy her, no matter what you said.

  “Right.” Charlotte nodded. “You come here a lot?”

  “Yes. You’d be surprised how few people from school show up here.”

  “Not that surprised.”

  Sophie flipped her pencil around, erasing a few squares. “Listen. I’m sorry about what happened at the party. With Amy and Emma.”

  Charlotte slid into the seat across from her and rested her elbows on the table. “Don’t worry about it.”

  “I was just…angry, because Emma kept going on about how she was sure you were trying to get with Max and I…I dunno, I was in a bad mood, I guess.”

  If she didn’t know better, she’d swear she saw Sophie’s lips curling at the corners as she doodled a flower in the margins. “I told Emma to piss off,” Sophie continued. “That you would never do something like that to me. Even though Max was telling people at Delilah’s last night that he was on his way to your place. But I know there’s nothing going on with you two.” She looked at Charlotte, a challenge in her eyes.

  Charlotte felt like she was going to be sick. Max was such an idiot.

  Sophie raised an eyebrow and looked at her out of the corner of her eye. “Right?”

  Charlotte had known Sophie for ten years. And if there was one thing Charlotte Romer knew about Sophie Thompson, it was that Sophie rarely asked questions she didn’t already know the answer to.

  Charlotte twisted her hands in her lap. “There’s nothing—”

  “I knew it,” she said, shaking her head and pursing her lips at her paper. “Amy owes me a quart. Considering you’re grovelling at my feet every time I see you, you’re not doing a very good job of winning me back.”

  “We’re just friends,” Charlotte insisted. And they were, really. They hadn’t done anything wrong.

  “Well, then, I wish you’d gotten something out of it. You should have slept with him while you had the chance.” Sophie tossed her hair back behind her shoulders. “I don’t really want you spending time with him.”

  Charlotte scrunched up her face. “All right, Mom.”

  Sophie frowned at the crossword. “Not that you’d know, though, right?”

  Ow. Charlotte stood up. “God, Sophie. Go to hell.”

  “Okay, here it is.” Sophie rubbed at the side of her face like she was tired. “You’re not going to see Max, all right?”

  “Why?”

  “Because I don’t want you to have anyone,” Sophie said, suddenly much angrier than Charlotte had originally thought. “Not my ex-boyfriend. Not my ex-friends. I want you to know how it felt. You can’t just come back here and work your way back in. You left River John and you don’t get to come back.”

  Charlotte paused, and the realization clicked into place. Ten years hung in the balance. “You’re never going to forgive me, are you?”

  Sophie folded the newspaper in half. Charlotte could see that the crossword was complete. “No,” Sophie said.

  “When did you decide that?”

  Charlotte could hear Sophie breathing.

  “The day Sean told me you were gone,” Sophie said blankly.

  So, that was it. Charlotte knew defeat when she saw it. For a second she wondered why she’d even come back at all.

  “Bye, Sophie,” she said, turning to leave.

  “And Charlie,” Sophie sang after her, her anger once again shrouded by her usual gleeful malice. “I meant what I said. I don’t want you hanging out with Max. I’m just saying…everyone was drinking so much the night of t
he car rally. Me, Delilah, Max.”

  Charlotte whipped back to look at her, nearly dropping her books. “Max wasn’t drinking. He was driving. Everyone who was there…would know that.”

  Sophie tilted her head. “I’m pretty sure everyone there was pretty focused on themselves. And you weren’t there, were you, Charlie?”

  “He wasn’t,” was all Charlotte could think to say.

  “Well.” Sophie shrugged again and pushed back from the table. “If you’re so sure then you have nothing to worry about.”

  Charlotte couldn’t describe what she felt. The walk home from the library felt a lot longer than it should have. She was angry. As she stomped down the road toward her driveway, she hated Sophie. But she was sad. Sad that Sophie would ever even suggest doing something like this—to Max and to her. Sad that this was what they were now. And she was scared, because she either had to say goodbye to Max or he could end up…she didn’t want to think about it. An optimistic part of her was trying to convince her that Sophie was bluffing, trying to scare her. That she wouldn’t do anything. But Charlotte didn’t trust optimism.

  The driveway was empty when she got there; Sean wasn’t home. She glanced toward the workshop and for a few seconds let herself miss her Dad. Most of the time she tried to ignore it, because it was too hard and it didn’t do any good. Her eyes focused on the heavy door, and she noticed something new—something different than the last time she’d tried to go inside.

  There was a shiny new padlock across the door. Charlotte pulled on it, confused. Locked. It must have been Sean, she guessed, to keep the animals out. Or her.

  As Charlotte turned back to the house, her phone buzzed in her pocket. It was a text from Max: I wanted to say I’m sorry about last night. I shouldn’t have slept in your bed without asking you. Do you still want me to come over tonight?

  Charlotte stared down at the screen. She thought of Sophie.

  Charlotte swiped her thumb on the screen and deleted the conversation.

  twenty-two

  There was a knock on her bedroom door a few days later. Charlotte peeled her eyes away from her laptop, where she was streaming a shitty pirated version of Gone Girl. Sophie’s favourite book/movie.