The Survivor (Book #2)

Chapter 55

Later that night, after finishing a massive dinner like the one we'd had on Thanksgiving, we settled into the living room to play with our new toys. Even though the boys were adults and setting up Bluetooth speakers instead of Hotwheels, they still counted as toys to me. I had gotten my Airpods hooked up quickly so was blasting a playlist I'd made while making piles of the stuff I'd gotten.

"Scrapbook time!" Charlotte announced grandly, to which the boys all groaned.

"Don't give me that! You love seeing old pictures!" Charlotte said sadly, looking at Dominic and Caleb for the truth, while Brooks and Damon avoided her eyes.

"Well..." Dominic said, attempting to be diplomatic.

"We were lying to make you happy." Caleb finished, undiplomatically.

Charlotte gave an indignant grumble and plopped the scrapbooks unceremoniously on the table. She looked at everyone to see if this was true, and they all looked away. I smiled at her and tried not to laugh at the disbelief prevalent on her face.

"At least they wanted to make you happy?" I suggested. She smiled back at me and came to sit beside me, pulling out one of my headphones so she could make an announcement.

"Well, then we're watching something together! Movie time!" she said, pointing at the theater room. We all reluctantly set down our presents and tried to look happy as we marched to the movie room.

"Tell me it's not going to be some lame romantic comedy," Caleb begged from beside me, angling his neck to look at Charlotte.

"It won't, or maybe it will! Maya is going to pick!" she said, placing a hand on my shoulder from behind. I managed not to jump at the unexpected touch and smiled a little.

"Why does she always get to pick?" Caleb whined.

"You got to pick last week," Brooks reminded him, kicking the back of his foot.

"My, you've gotta pick something good!" Caleb said, ignoring Brooks.

"I already know what I'm going to pick, and it's sort of a Christmas movie!" I declared proudly. Dominic and Damon turned behind them as we entered the room and gave me looks. They clearly didn't trust my movie picking ability.

I popped in the DVD as everyone sat down and smiled slightly when everyone murmured their acceptance. Die Hard. The perfect Christmas movie.

I got a text as the movie began that I subtly checked, angling my phone away from the others. It was Asher.

Can you meet again tonight?

Another midnight rendezvous? How romantic ;)

I try. Are you free?

I'll be free :)

Perfect.

We decided a time and with that, my heart was racing, and I was wiggling excitedly. I tried to keep my body still as we watched, but I really didn't remember what I was supposed to do with my hands. Did I normally put them in my lap or by my side or something else entirely? Brooks seemed to notice I was a nervous wreck because he grabbed one of my hands and mouthed "it's okay".

I smiled back and tried to look appropriately grateful, although I was really wishing I could sprint out of the room and see Asher already. When I got the text that he was on the way, I whispered, "bathroom break" and walked out, trying to restrict my pace to human speed.

"Do you want us to pause it?" Caleb asked, blue eyes searching mine kindly.

"You're fine! I'll be right back!" I assured him, closing the door behind me, and taking off down the hall. I looked at the large clock in the hallway and sat in the front room as I waited for Asher to arrive.

I flicked through pictures of the day on my phone and considered turning on the TV to give my anxious mind something to do, but I knew it would make too much noise.

I felt my phone buzz and stood up rapidly only to see a text from Asher saying that he'd be a little late.

I sat back down and looked around the room with boredom until I saw the scrapbooks lying dormant on the table. With nothing better to do, I scooped one up and began flipping through the pages. There were many albums that looked new and were in good condition, but I grabbed the oldest-looking one so I could start at the beginning. Dust flew into my nostrils as it flopped open on my lap. I immediately became absorbed as I saw pictures of Charlotte as a young adult.

She looked entirely different! Her blue eyes were still her defining feature, but everything else had changed. I saw a picture of her sipping a milkshake on a barstool, with dark choppy hair and makeup lining her eyes. Her hair still had slight tones of red in it, but it was much closer to the color that my hair was now.

In another picture, she was sitting on an old couch with what I thought might've been her friend Kathy. They were arm in arm, and I thought Charlotte's smile looked different. I realized that it wasn't her smile, but her eyes that had changed. She looked sadder now than she did in these old photos. She'd been through so much; this didn't surprise me.

The next page did surprise me, however. I saw her sitting on the back of a motorcycle, arms locked around someone in a leather jacket. They wore a helmet, but she didn't, and it was clear from her focus and the way she pointed that she was teaching them how to ride.

Soon, there were two pages of the scrapbook left. One soft rose-colored page showed her smiling with her hands pressed tenderly to her stomach. I wondered which baby she was having, Bella or Caleb. I didn't see her husband in any of the photos in this scrapbook, but I assumed he was in the other newer books or kept safely in the Ander's rooms somewhere.

I flipped to the last page sadly, to see a photo of a shining Charlotte holding a little baby. Her hair was pressed in tendrils to the sweat on her face, and she was standing although it didn't look easy for her. The photo was too old and damaged to tell who the baby was, but you could see from Charlotte's glowing expression that it was loved. I pulled it from its plastic covering to try a get a closer look.

When it was loose in my hand, I realized that there was a corner that hadn't been shown in the photo. I unfolded the back of the picture and saw the tip of a shoulder pressed against Charlotte, which must have been her husband. It was obvious to me why this photo had been ripped. She wanted to keep his photo with her. What wasn't obvious was why you could see a small tuft of brown hair coming into the side of the photo, at about waist level. Was Dominic already adopted by the time Caleb or Bella was born? Or was it Liam at a young age, at the hospital to see his new baby cousin?

My phone began buzzing as I got a call from Asher, and I clicked it off before jamming the photo in its slot and rushing to the door to open it.