𝐜𝐫𝐨𝐬𝐬 𝐦𝐲 𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐭, charlie conway

𝐀𝐅𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐃

hey everybody!

i don't really know where to begin with this because i have a lot to say but i thought starting with my favorite comment(s) would be a funny way to kick this off.

love you anna! (i'm not tagging bc idk if you're caught up and i know you don't want spoilers!)

thank you all so much for enjoying this book. i've been really surprised by the support/following it has grown because frankly the ducks fandom has seemed a little dead recently. but i'm glad you're all here, and i highly enjoyed telling this story. i've never written a family i love more than the nelsons, and a relationship i love more than charlie and crystal's. there was so much nuance and depth to this fic that i had never attempted before that i'm super proud of, and i'm glad people have noticed some of it. and i have been writing this in what i would call the hardest period of my life thus far, so to have the work i've put into it turn into a great product makes me so happy. thank you!

this is my first book to crack the 50,000 word mark, which is major for me because my books always come up way shorter than novel length. the estimated word count is 108,000 words. i'm shitting myself. frankly, go you for reading this!! also thank you for the 5k reads this book already has! i've never finished writing a book with this many reads before. <3

now i'm gonna do some questions that i felt needed answering, followed by some fun facts/other things that are canon about this book.

1. Did Charlie ever see his dad again?
Yes. When his father's prison sentence was up and he was released, he obviously wanted to see his son. Charlie agreed, but only because he wanted to know what his dad was like. He didn't discover much, only that his mother was right about him, and that he felt no connection to him whatsoever.

2. Did Donna ever find out John died?
Yes. When Donna started getting the help she needed, she began to examine her past more critically, and wanted to move forward as best she could. She realized knowing what John was up to would help, but she finds out the truth and has mixed feelings. She's a little sad because he was her husband, but she knows it was for the better. I don't think she ever pokes far enough to know that he predisposed Crystal to brain cancer though (predisposed is the wrong word but i can't think of a better one).

3. Did Charlie ever tell Donna, Carrie, and/or Chris that he was going to propose to Crystal?
No. He was going to ask them that day, but obviously things didn't go to plan. It was too hard for him to talk about for many years after. Casey didn't expose his "secret," but she made sure they all knew how serious Charlie had been about Crystal and wanting a life to her. So I guess they did know, just not the extent of how far he was going to go.

4. Why did Crystal have to die?
Though they all loved her, Crystal's needs often kept those in her life from pursuing and exploring their true potential. For Chris, she kept him from having a social life and being involved in normal teenager things (though some of it was self-imposed). For Charlie, he had to live in a constant state of fear that he was doing something wrong or was wrong for his feelings — he had to isolate from a lot of what he knew (hockey, friends, etc) to care for her and give her the attention she needed.
The other point that factored into my decision about this ending was that the story could not feasibly end with Charlie and Crystal together. No matter how much they love each other (or how much we love them together), their relationship was questionable in terms of appropriateness, and that would only get worse as they got older (well, as Charlie got older). Crystal can never change or mature, and it wouldn't make sense for her to be with an adult, just like a grown adult Charlie couldn't be with Crystal. I thought that doing an ending where Crystal lived but Charlie had to leave her would be harder to stomach, and that people would misunderstand Charlie or otherwise unfairly blame him for it.