Nathan<\/em><\/p>\n The metal of Charlotte’s bed rattles as she is wheeled out of her room toward the operating theater. Her blue eyes look afraid, like the time she was eight and Nick and I were trying to get her to jump off the diving board into the pool. I finally walked out onto the board with her, held her hand and we jumped off the side together. No amount of hand holding is going to take that fear from her or from any of us.<\/p>\n For a moment after Charlotte is taken away, the room is silent. No soft words exchanged between mom and Aunt AM. No gruff low tones from Uncle Bo or dad.\u00a0 No sounds from Nick’s Gameboy. It is eerie. Then Aunt AM begins sobbing and her cries are so awful that I have to leave the room. Then I have to leave the hallway but I can\u2019t escape the sounds. They are embedded in my brain.\u00a0 I sink down into a chair in the waiting room on the trauma floor and clutch my head in my hands. If I could rewind time, I think I\u2019d never get up this morning.<\/p>\n I hear my Dad and then Bo enter the waiting room.<\/p>\n \u201cThe surgery may take a couple of hours, it may take longer. Why don\u2019t you take Grace and the boys home and get some rest. We’ll call you as soon as she’s out.” Uncle Bo says.<\/p>\n Dad looks at Uncle Bo and then grabs him. The two stand there clutching each other and that\u2019s all it takes for Nick to break.\u00a0 Dad reaches out and the three of them huddle together. The only one I hear is Nick but Uncle Bo\u2019s shoulders are heaving.<\/p>\n I walk in the opposite direction toward the windows. The air conditioning is leaving condensation on the window and the glass feels both cold and wet against my forehead. Outside the city is running like nothing out of the ordinary was happening, like two families aren’t breaking down inside this hospital. Like our whole future isn’t dependent on Charlotte making it out of surgery.<\/p>\n I\u2019m not sure how long I stand there but I feel dazed when Dad places his hand on my shoulder.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re going to go home for a bit.\u201d Dad says, drawing me away from the window.<\/p>\n \u201cDon\u2019t want to,\u201d I reply. I want to be here when Charlotte wakes up. She might need me.<\/p>\n \u201cWe need to take care of your mom.\u201d Dad squeezes my shoulder.\u00a0 I nodded because Dad isn’t asking. His tone is mild but when it came to taking care of mom, he wasn’t ever moved.<\/p>\n Home isn’t much better. The other side of the penthouse floor was silent and dark.\u00a0 Mom starts crying in the car and hasn’t stopped. Dad carries her into the elevator and then down into their bedroom. Nick trails behind.<\/p>\n I stand in the entryway, unsure of what I should do.<\/p>\n Five minutes later, Dad came out looking like he\u2019d aged about ten years in this one day. He dragged a hand through his hair. \u201cWhy don\u2019t you go work out some of that energy,\u201d he suggested.<\/p>\n That seemed like as good of an idea as any.\u00a0 After changing into a pair of gym shorts and a sleeveless t shirt, I walked down the stairs into the private work out facility but stopped short when I saw the long padded mat that Charlotte used to practice her gymnastic moves.<\/p>\n Not gonna happen.<\/p>\n Working out in common gym.\u00a0<\/em>I texted my dad.<\/p>\n OK.<\/em><\/p>\n As I was boarding the elevator, the phone pinged again.\u00a0Love you son.<\/em><\/p>\n x2<\/em>\u00a0I responded.<\/p>\n The elevator stopped on the eleventh floor and Madeline Short got on. Madeline is a freshman at one of the city colleges. I don\u2019t know her well but she was definitely in my mental spank bank. She\u2019s got a tight body and tends to flirt with me just so she can make me blush or something. Like I\u2019ve never had a girl before.<\/p>\n Madeline stands so close to me you\u2019d think that there were dozens of others in the elevator car instead of just the two of us but I don\u2019t move away because her body is warm and for the first time in hours, I feel like I\u2019m thawing out. And when her arm brushes mine, I start getting hot.\u00a0 The look in her eyes is an obvious invitation so when the elevator stops at the sixth floor, I don\u2019t get off. And I don\u2019t protest when she presses the close door button and I don\u2019t say anything when she presses the button for her floor.<\/p>\n I follow her silently into her family apartment that is clearly empty.\u00a0 She leads us confidently down the hall toward a bedroom. I don\u2019t say anything when she pulls down my gym shorts or pushes the t shirt off my head. I\u2019m afraid if I do talk the sounds of Aunt AM\u2019s cries or my mother\u2019s sobs will come back and I don\u2019t want that. I don\u2019t want to think at all.<\/p>\n When Madeline leads me to her bed, when she takes off her clothes, when we lie down together I shut down my brain and just concentrate on the physical feeling of release.<\/p>\n A chime from my phone wakes me out of a dose. I jerk upright and grab my phone.<\/p>\n She made it. She\u2019s asking for you.<\/em><\/p>\n I can\u2019t get dressed fast enough.\u00a0 My motions must have awakened Madeline or maybe she was awake all along. I don\u2019t really care.\u00a0 I\u2019ve got to get to the hospital.<\/p>\n \u201cHey, where are you going? I told you my parents are gone.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cGotta run.\u201d My mouth feels dry and my throat is sore like all the tears I\u2019ve suppressed were like shards of glass that scraped my insides raw as they traveled from my eye sockets into my stomach.<\/p>\n Madeline leans toward\u00a0 me and hooks a finger through the waistband of my shorts. \u201cWhat\u2019s your rush? I\u2019m ready for round three if you are.\u201d<\/p>\n I can\u2019t even stand to have her touch my clothes but my dad would kill me if he knew I was rude to a woman, particularly one I\u2019d just been intimate with.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m sorry,\u201d I give her a tight smile, \u201cfamily thing.\u201d<\/p>\n She shrugs and ten minutes ago, the lift of her naked breast would\u2019ve gotten me hard and I\u2019d have fallen on her. Now I\u2019ve only got Charlotte on my mind and the two of them together in my head is making me sick.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ll call,\u201d I say and then pulled on my t shirt and grab up my socks and shoes. I don\u2019t look back even when she calls my name out in a bewildered fashion.\u00a0 I can\u2019t tell her Charlotte\u2019s situation. It\u2019s a family thing.<\/p>\n By the time I get to the hospital, my clothes are back together and I\u2019m winded.\u00a0 I run to the door and dad is standing there looking grim.\u00a0 I falter. \u201cDid she,\u201d I\u2019m afraid to finish the sentence.<\/p>\n \u201cShe\u2019s fine. A fighter.\u201d Dad says with approval. I move toward the entrance and he stops me. I hear him inhale and then he pushes me back. I strain against him but my seventeen year old body isn\u2019t strong enough to overtake him. Dad was a professional fighter back in the day and he\u2019s still as strong as hell now.\u00a0 I\u2019m proud to be his son but right now I\u2019m confused as to why he\u2019s keeping me from Charlotte.<\/p>\n \u201cSorry, hoss, I can\u2019t let you go in there stinking like sex and perfume. You\u2019d embarrass your mother, piss off your Uncle Bo and break Charlotte\u2019s heart. AnnMarie\u2019ll have your nuts on a platter.\u201d<\/p>\n I flush and turn away, embarrassed of my behavior. Dad grabs my head and brings me close to him.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is going to be a tough. Loving people is hard.\u201d He looks hard at me. \u201cAre you strong enough to see it through?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI am.\u201d I say and straighten. \u201cSorry, Dad. Won\u2019t happen again.\u201d And it won\u2019t. I\u2019d apologize to Madeline at my first opportunity but Charlotte was meant to be mine.\u00a0 I knew it when she was born. Nick was her brother but I was her protector. I\u2019d let her down this time, but never again.<\/p>\n Want more Charlotte? Sign up for the newsletter and you’ll get the Charlotte Chronicles delivered to your inbox a week early!<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Charlotte Chronicles II Nathan The metal of Charlotte’s bed rattles as she is wheeled out of her room toward the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2475,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,4],"tags":[30],"class_list":["post-432","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-charlotte-chronicles","category-general","tag-charlotte-chronicles","charlotte-chronicles","general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jenfrederick.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/432","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jenfrederick.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jenfrederick.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jenfrederick.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jenfrederick.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=432"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jenfrederick.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/432\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jenfrederick.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2475"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jenfrederick.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=432"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jenfrederick.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=432"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jenfrederick.com\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=432"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}