Welcome to Corbet's Inlet, North Carolina, where the teenagers act like adults and the adults act like teenagers. It's Griffin Connolly's favorite place in the world. And while she may not be good at making decisions when it comes to her own life, s...
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Griffin tried to keep her expression neutral, but her eyebrows still jumped up in the middle.
"OK..." she said, and the only thing she could think to say next was, "Are you worried you won't get along?"
"We aren't getting along now," Charlie said.
"That's kinda normal sometimes, though. Right? When you're that close with someone?" she said lamely.
She wanted to think she could give better insight if she had more context on what was going on between Charlie and Evan. It'd still be weird one way or another, because despite Evan acting like a jerk lately, he'd been Griffin's friend—an amazing, loyal, supportive friend—for seven years. Talking to Charlie about this kinda made her feel like a double agent. And Griffin knew Evan well enough to know Charlie would completely blindside him with this, regardless of the fighting.
Charlie looked back down the beach. His t-shirt sleeves ruffled in the breeze coming off the ocean.
"I know it's hypocritical of me to pry," Griffin said, "but whatever's going on with y'all now, is it something you don't think can be fixed? Or is it more, like, you think not rooming together will help fix it?"
Charlie faced the ocean again. "Of just those two options? Probably the second one."
"Are there other options?" Griffin asked.
He took a long breath in, then sighed. "Yeah. One that makes me an asshole."
"I'm sure it doesn't—"
"Nope. It does. I know it does," he said, nodding to himself. But then the nodding turned into shaking his head, and he glanced up at the sky like he might not come back from what he was about to say. "Because I'm gonna be the only person Evan knows in Charleston at first, and I don't think I can take a year of living with the around-the-clock resentment on top of being his crutch."
Griffin stared at the dimmed whitecaps rolling toward them. A bunch of questions popped into her head at once, and she had to clamp down on the reflexive urge to immediately defend Evan.
"See?" Charlie pulled a hand out of his pocket and pointed at his face. "Asshole."
Griffin smiled a little. She couldn't help it. A self-aware asshole was at least better than the alternative. And it took one to know one.
"Why do you think you'll have to be his crutch?" she asked.
"Because Evan's really great at keeping friends, but he's not so great at making them," Charlie said.
"I don't know if you're giving him enough credit there..."
"And you and I both know he's not going to make the lacrosse team."
"OK, now you're really not giving him enough cred—"
"Come on, Griff," Charlie said. He looked sad again. "I'm not saying that to be mean. I really hope I'm wrong, actually. It's just Evan's only ever known lacrosse his whole life. Like, it's kind of the only purpose he's ever given himself, and I don't think he even realizes how much he's hinged his identity on it. How's he going to react when it's not there anymore?"
