Chapter Seventeen

Friday, December 3rd

“Carson, what are you doing here?” I look up from my notebook and see Charlotte, for once without Josh Brown attached like a golden barnacle to her side. Here is the first home game of the Fenton Lady Tigers with their star player, The Great Gabby. I’m here as a reporter. Sure I am.

Charlotte’s with a few friends. She motions for them to keep moving and she sits next to me. I imagined her many times this close, but not this clothed. She wears a big blue hoodie to cover her tiny frame. She’s got Josh’s class ring on her left thumb. “I’m covering girls’ sports.”

She doesn’t say a word, just nods, smiles. A sly smile. I don’t like it.

“Sure, Carson, that’s why you’re here.” The smile turns to a smirk. My face turns red.

“What?” I look down at my deliberately mismatched Chucks.

“It’s okay, nobody else knows,” Charlotte whispers.

How long will I play this stupid card wearing my worst poker face? “Know what?”

Charlotte leans closer, her hand almost on my leg and her mouth near my ear. “You and her.” She points toward the court, where Gabby shoots three pointers during warm-ups. I take Charlotte’s hand and put it back by her side. Weeks ago that skin touch would have thrilled me for days.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” My eyes no doubt dart back and forth.

“She told me, Carson,” Charlotte whispers. I’m angry at Gabby for all of one second, since I told Tim. “And it is so obvious, if you know it, but I think your secret is safe with me.”

“When did she tell you?”

Charlotte starts to answer, but then we notice the game is about to start. We stand for the anthem. Candy Tanner, the hammer to my writing club nail, stands in front of the microphone. Everybody’s all hand on heart, but if I did that, people would see it bouncing off my chest like Gabby dribbling the ball. I’m not angry that Charlotte knows, but oddly excited. Like it’s some sort of vindication after having struck out with Charlotte for years, then having been ejected from the game by Thien, that I’m not a love life loser. I mean, I’d had other make-out partners before, dating back to ninth grade, but they’d all ended too soon. It had been practice for the real thing, except I’d never gotten to the shirts and skins levels or even close. Maybe there’s room for only so much sex, and since porn takes up so much of it, the universe takes it from someplace else, which would be the females of Fenton, except Gabby. Gabby slows down my game, but at least I’m on the court. I feel guilty thinking about sex during the national anthem, but I notice Candy sings a second verse. How many are there? The answer appears to be three. Wait, four.

“So, Charlotte, how long have you known?” I say when we sit. Gabby’s ready to jump.

“Last year,” she says in a pseudo whisper. “After you wrote that story about her, she asked if I knew you. Tennis players gossip like you wouldn’t believe.” I imagine Gabby in a tight white bright Serena-style outfit and a wide smile on her face as she smashes the ball across the net.

“Then why did she wait until this year?” I so don’t understand girls’ minds, although thanks to Gabby I am learning some of the finer points of the female anatomy.

“First off, you went to prom with Thien.”

Gabby grabs a rebound and starts the fast break up court. “Like that lasted.” Charlotte’s silent like she’s expecting me to say more, and I’m hoping that she doesn’t know anything. I can’t imagine she does because I don’t think she’d want to be sitting this close to me.

“Then after that… Well, you had that other girl.” I shrug at the odd expression.

The pass comes back to Gabby, who hits a three off the backboard. The clang matches the sound in my head from Charlotte’s puzzling words. “Who do you mean…that other girl?”

Charlotte stares down at the wood bleacher. “Me, Carson. Gabby knew you liked me.”

My face blushes brighter red than the Beecher High jerseys. “If only that was mutual.”

“I’d heard some things about you.” She doesn’t end the sentence with ‘from Thien’.

“I have quite the reputation as a ladies’ man.” I laugh. She doesn’t make a sound. Now she’s like mute Thien and whoever these girls are that Charlotte says talk trash about me.

“Do you want to know the truth?”

Gabby steals a pass and starts for the basket.

“No,” I answer, but I know headstrong Charlotte, who stubbornly resisted my every feeble flirtation, clumsy pass or outright straight-ahead requests to go out, is going to tell me.

She moves closer. I wonder where Josh is. He’s probably spinning a seamless sonnet. “Girls are just different than guys about…you know. You wanted too much too soon, I heard.”

Beecher inbounds the ball and moves up-court. Two quick passes and a shot goes up, except Gabby times her leap perfectly and rejects. The home crowd cheers, except the girls who are here, who I guess want to boo me. Don’t blame me, I think, blame Homemade Hos. The producers who send more email than Nigerian oil barons, but no info on Caitlin aka Callie. Not that it matters anymore since I know where and when to find her, just not how I’ll get there.

“Well, I didn’t scare Gabby away,” I say in the pouty tone of a five year old.

“That’s because, I think, she loves you.” Charlotte whispers the big three words. On the court, Gabby hits a three pointer. The crowd cheers. I take in the applause as my own.

My shocked hands drop my pen and notebook. “She said that?”

“Like I said, Carson, girls and guys are different. I can tell from how she talked about you,” Charlotte says. “It’s like when I talk about Josh.”

I pick up the pen and notebook, but say nothing about the bard boy wonder. “Carson, we’ve known each other a long time, right? Since seventh grade, right?” I nod yes to all of this.

“Well, I’ve known Josh for way longer,” she says. “Our parents are in the same country club. They’re friends, so…” The only club Dad belongs to is AA.

“How long have the two of you…?” I don’t know what phrase to use—been together, hooked up or crushed my dreams. Maybe all of the above. I use her words. “You know.”

“This summer, finally,” Charlotte stammers, which is odd for such a confident person as she always appears to be. “That’s the other reason, Carson, me and you. I wanted Josh only.”

I try to pay attention to the game, but the back and forth action makes me dizzy as Charlotte lays down a full court truth press that I didn’t ask for and certainly don’t need.

“So, look. He and I got together, and now you and Gabby. So, the universe worked it out.”

If the universe worked, I think, I wouldn’t be developing some elaborate story to tell my parents so I can lie my way to California to rescue my stripper turned minor porn actress sister, or maybe the other way around. I’m unfamiliar with the sex industry career ladder.

“One last thing, Carson.” Charlotte’s small hand goes hard on my shoulder. She grips it like she does a racket or Josh’s hand. “Do not mess this up. I care about you and Gabby. Whatever got screwed up with Thien, learn from your mistakes. Gabby deserves it.”

“It?” I ask Charlotte, but my eyes focus on Gabby running with grace down the court. Charlotte lets go of my shoulder, but I gaze upon Gabby’s shoulders. I imagine them sweaty.

Charlotte stands and says, “A happy ending.”

One last blush, since that’s taken on a whole new meaning in Gabby’s hands. Hands that just shot the ball through the hoop. Love turns life turns into nothing but net.