Midday Clouds - The Charlie Swan Story

Chapter 41 (New Moon 30/30)

Everything was falling apart all around me, like in one of my terrifying nightmares.

Harry was gone, Bells was gone, Renee was gone – all that was left behind was this cold, creaking house, and the ghoul who dwelled therein; me.

I'd managed to find strength in my weaknesses in the past, always somehow finding a way to pull myself up off of the floor, to bring myself back to some sense of life after calamity, after the devastating destruction that had littered my world with broken hopes and stolen futures.

But I didn't know if I could, this time. I didn't know what remnants of life there even was left for me to save.

The clock tolled. I thought this might truly be the end.

But then it tolled again. And again. And I woke up from my nightmare, my reverie, to realize that I didn't even have a clock that tolled in this godforsaken house. It was someone knocking on the door that had broken me from the spell.

Still, I didn't get up. I wasn't sure what time it was, or who the hell was at the door, but I figured if I ignored it then it would eventually go away and I could fall back into the pleasant void of unconsciousness.

But the person at the door simply would not quit. For a moment I figured it was Harry and Billy, come to cheer me up, but then, with a gut-punch, I realized that would be impossible. So just Billy, then. Just me and Billy left. Or perhaps it wa Smith, back with some asinine update on the goddamn woods. Or maybe, just maybe, it was Bella. Maybe she was back, and forgot her keys, and told Edward to go fuck himself, and realized that she had so much more life to live than one tangled up with him and his emotional, if not physical, abuse.

That thought, that hope, spurred me to action, and as I groggily trod my way down the stairs and pulled open the door, I was greeted by a face that I was surprised, pleasantly, to see. Sue Clearwater, in the flesh.

"Charlie!" She exclaimed more enthusiastically than expected. Perhaps she was excited to see me, but more likely it was surprise at the sorry state I was in; ratty robe, unkempt hair, and about two days without a shower.

"Sue... I wasn't expecting to see you here. Come in, take a seat. Can I grab you a tea? A beer?"

"Oh thank you Charlie. I'm not here for long – should probably get back to the kids sooner rather than later – but I thought I'd swing by to see how you were doing."

"Oh, that's kind of you Sue, but I'm alright. You didn't have to do that." She didn't specify, but from what I remember of Sue back in the day, she was definitely more of a tea drinker than a beer kinda gal. So I put the kettle on.

"Well that's the thing... When you didn't show up at all today, you got us a bit worried. I mean don't get me wrong, it's totally okay to not come by! But we'd made plans yesterday about the pizza, and then when we didn't hear from you, I tried calling but your phone was dead – I just thought to myself 'What would Harry do?' So I came by to check in on you. I hope that's alright and I'm not intruding Charlie, really, I know we all grieve in our own-"

"You're not intruding," I said, popping the mint tea down onto the dining table. I took a seat beside her, rubbing my head. Had I really slept through the entire day? The landline was hanging limply from its cord on the wall. I'd spent the better part of the night trying to come up with a game plan with Renee, and only being met with a handful of mmhmms and uh-huhs. I hate to admit it, but I'd gotten heated once she'd brought up that Bella, being 18, got to "decide these things for herself." I couldn't help but feel the bitter sting of irony, thinking that if Renee had held true to the decisions she'd made when she was not much older than Bells, then she would never have left in the first place.

"I'm sorry – something came up with Bells and I've been trying to clear it up ever since."

Sue placed her hand on mine, took it, gripped it in hers in a familiar, if long-forgotten, way. "Is she alright? Where is she?"

"She will be. I've got it handled. I just need to – I just need to figure it out," I assured her. I must not have noticed the hint of worry that let slip in my voice, but Sue sure did.

"It's okay, Charlie. It's okay. I know something has been going on with her. You can talk to me about it. It's safe here. I'm safe."

I hesitated. I remembered something that Rose told me, all those years ago, at one of my very first counseling sessions. She'd been talking about Billy and Harry and how they were doing the best that two 20-year-old men could possibly do to offer me emotional support.

""Even when someone throws you a buoy, Charlie," she'd said. "You gotta be the one to grab it."

So I told Sue everything.

I told her about Edward and the broken arm and Bella's depression. I told her about Jacob and the way Bella smiled when she got home from the Black's place and how she was eating again. We talked about Smith, the missing hikers, and Harry, and fishing, and salads and beer and burgers. She told me that Harry's test results were a lot worse than he let on, and how they'd had long conversations about what would happen after he was gone. She told me she felt guilty for not feeling more devastated – that she missed him, and loved him, and had been crying on and off since the funeral, but that it felt as though she'd been grieving his death for years already. That they'd just been waiting for the shoe to finally drop. I told her about Renee, with baby Bella, on that fateful rainy night. I told her about my ailing parents, how once they were gone, I'd thought about chasing after Renee and Bella. How I tortured myself over my inaction for years, as my daughter got older and my ex-wife more distant. I told her how lonely I'd been in this big house by myself ever since. I spoke of the hope I'd had when I learned Bella would be moving back, and how I, again, felt I'd failed her for how cold and wet and boring Forks turned out to be for her, how Bella had been devastated by her first high school boyfriend, how she had no interest in seeing her friends. How Alice had come back, and how Bella was now gone. Again. To god only knows where.

I'd told bits and pieces of all this to Harry and Billy before, of course. But not everything. And never all at once. I'd never bared my soul so fully to Rose, even, limited as we were by our hour-long appointments. To speak so openly about my worries, my demons, my regrets to someone that I knew and trusted felt, quite literally, like lifting a weight off my chest. I felt as though I could actually breathe easier for it. Tears freely fell from both our faces throughout the night, a few chuckles were even had, and it felt good to not just talk but to listen to Sue about all her own worries and fears and life. It felt like we hadn't properly caught up, just the two of us, in all the time since high school.

"I just wish Bells had found a normal highschool boyfriend," I said then, thinking back to those days. "This all would have been so much easier." 

Sue looked at me then, long and steady. She took a long sip of her tea, which had been refilled more than once during our long talk. Placing it down, putting her well-warmed hand onto mine, she looked me in the eyes with as serious an expression as I'd ever seen on her familiar face.

"Charlie... There's more to the Cullens than you realize."