“Well, your chariot awaits,” Josh says as he pats the roof of the car. “Not quite a limousine, but it’ll get us where we need to go.”
Charlie takes a moment to examine the car. The slate-gray Pontiac Grand Am—to her eye, at least—looks far from junky. Exterior freshly washed. No obvious scratches or dents. Definitely no tinted windows. Charlie can see right into the front seat, which is blessedly empty. It’s the kind of car her father might drive, if he was still around. Sensible. Hopefully dependable. A car built to blend in with the crowd.
Josh eyes the box and suitcases at her feet. “I didn’t think you’d be bringing that much. You plan on being gone awhile?”
“Hopefully not too long,” Charlie says, not meaning it but also wondering if she secretly does. And why shouldn’t she want that? Doesn’t she owe it to Robbie to at least try to come back for the spring semester? Doesn’t she owe it to herself?
Even though Maddy’s the reason she’s doing all this, Charlie knows she’d disapprove.
You’re being an idiot, darling. That’s what Maddy would have said about her plan to leave campus.
“Is there enough room for it all?” Charlie says.
“Plenty,” Josh says as he quickly moves to the back of the car and unlocks the trunk.
Charlie grabs the cardboard box and starts to carry it toward the open trunk. Josh swoops in before she can get near it, taking the box from her arms and leaving Charlie only with her backpack.
“Let me get that for you,” he says.
Her arms suddenly unburdened, Charlie spends the next few seconds watching Josh load her things into the trunk. In that short span of time, she notices something strange about the way he’s standing. Rather than pack everything from directly behind the car, Josh remains at an angle, his broad back blocking whatever view Charlie might get of the open trunk. Almost as if there’s something else inside. Something he doesn’t want her to see.
Charlie suspects it’s nothing.
She knows it’s nothing.
People sometimes do weird things. She’s the girl who sees movies in her mind, and Josh is the guy who fills his trunk in a weird way. End of story.
But then Josh turns around after slamming the trunk shut and she notices something else about him. Something that, to her mind, is stranger than how he loaded the trunk.
Josh is dressed the same as he was at the ride board.
Exactly the same.
Same jeans. Same sweatshirt. Same nice hair. Yes, they’re at a college and everyone dresses like this; it’s the unofficial uniform of Olyphant. But Josh wears it uncomfortably, almost like these are not his normal clothes. There is, Charlie realizes, a bit of Central Casting to his look, as if he’s been hired as an extra. Generic College Hunk #2.
Josh smiles again, and Charlie notices that it’s absolutely perfect. The smile of a matinee idol, intimidating in its full glory. It might be sexy. It might be sinister. Charlie can’t decide which.
“We’re all set,” he says. “Ready to ditch this pop stand?”
Charlie doesn’t immediately answer. She’s distracted by the idea that these all could be warning signs. The trunk. The clothes. They’re exactly the kinds of things she’d sworn would make her turn around and go straight back to her dorm.
It’s not too late for that. She could easily inform Josh she’s changed her mind and that he should just take her things out of the trunk. Instead, she tells herself to stop being so suspicious. This isn’t about Josh. Or what he’s wearing. Or how he loads the trunk. It’s about her and the fact that, now that she’s on the cusp of leaving, she’s suddenly seeking out reasons to stay.
And there are reasons. She should get an education. She loves her major. Then there’s the simple fact that it would make Robbie happy.
But would she be happy?
Charlie doesn’t think so.
She could pretend to be, for Robbie’s sake. She could go through the motions, just like she’s been doing since September. And maybe—just maybe—the storm cloud she’s been living under would eventually lift and she could go back to being a normal college student. Well, semi-normal. Charlie has enough self-awareness to know she’ll never be exactly like everyone else. There always has been and always will be an aura of eccentricity about her. And that’s okay.
What’s not okay, at least to Charlie, is remaining in a place where she’s miserable. Where she’s reminded daily of a deep, painful loss. Where memories sting and guilt lingers and not a week, day, hour goes by in which she doesn’t think, I shouldn’t have left her. I should have stopped him. I should have saved her.
She looks at Josh, still patiently waiting for an answer.
“As ready as I’ll ever be,” she says.
INT. GRAND AM—NIGHT
Charlie learned to drive in the car her parents would later die in.
It was her father who taught her, his patience thinning with each lurching spin around the high school parking lot. He insisted Charlie learn how to drive stick because, in his words, “Then you’ll be able to drive anything.”
But the manual transmission baffled her. Three pedals instead of two, like in her mother’s car, and all those steps she had to follow. A dance she didn’t know and thought she’d never, ever master.
Left foot clutch.
Right foot brake.
Neutral. Ignition. Accelerate.
It took an entire afternoon of practice before Charlie could drive a single lap around the lot without stalling or grinding the gears in a way that made her father break out in a cold sweat. It took two more weeks before she truly felt comfortable behind the wheel of that maroon Chevy Citation. But once that happened, the rest came quickly to her. The three-point turns and parallel parking and slaloms through traffic cones her father had borrowed from a buddy who worked construction.
She aced her license exam on the first try, unlike her best friend, Jamie, who needed three attempts before she passed. Afterward, Charlie and her father went out for celebratory ice cream, her behind the wheel and him continuing his lessons with advice offered from the passenger seat.
“Never drive more than five miles over the speed limit,” he told her. “Cops won’t bother you. Not for that.”
“And over five?” Charlie asked, taunting him with the idea that she intended to be a speed demon.
Her father gave her one of those Excuse me? looks that had become common during her teenage years. “Do you want to use that brand-new license of yours?”
“Yes.”
“Then stick to the speed limit.”