The Last September: A Novel

“Hey, Brett,” Eli shouted.

He was leaning in the arched doorway to the living room. Three other roommates lived here, but Eli was the one who positioned himself to greet every guest, gregarious and mannerly, with too-long hair and a beer buzz already evident at first glance. Not wanting to distract him from his hosting duties, I waved and continued toward the kitchen, where I knew the keg would be. I planned to get a beer and then go station myself beside Eli. That was my standard strategy at parties, to let him do all the talking, laughter the only noise I’d have to make. In the kitchen, my Sorrels skidded slightly across the crooked, snow-muddied wood floors. And there was Charlie: standing by the stove, stirring something in a large, warped tin pot, his lean form haloed by steam. A few girls sat at the table, talking loudly and throwing back their hair—probably for his benefit. I didn’t recognize him as Eli’s brother, though I would have if I’d looked carefully. They shared the same angular jaw, fair hair, and round blue eyes. Charlie’s handsomeness registered in the crowded room as a matter of course, so intrinsic as to be almost secondary. He looked too old to be here, and I wondered what he was cooking.

“Hey,” he said to me, as I took my place in line for the keg. “Bring that cup over here. This is better suited to the weather.”

At eighteen, I was nothing if not obedient. I walked over and held out my red plastic cup. He filled it with what looked like hot cocoa, but the steam smelled thickly of rum and Frangelico. I saw a box of Ghirardelli chocolate squares on the counter. I’d never seen anyone make hot chocolate out of anything but powder. I lifted the cup to my face, bathing my skin in the fragrant steam. I drank the hot liquid while chunks of snow melted and dripped toward my ankles.

Over the years, I would ask Charlie repeatedly: why did he single me out in that moment? He always gave the same, unsatisfying answer. “I just happened to look up, and there you were.”

What I remember is Charlie’s curly blond head, bent in concentration over his steaming brew. Without particular design or awareness, I stepped into the only place available, waiting to get a beer. And true to his own recollection, just at that moment Charlie looked up. And there I was. That day, the first day I ever saw him, he had three days’ worth of stubble. He wore a thin black thread around his neck, beaded with a smooth lapis stone that matched the color of his eyes. When I looked at him, his lips slid upward at the corners. My heart lurched. I don’t know why. It just did. It lurched toward him and refused—stubbornly—to ever lurch away.

“I’m Brett,” I said.

“Brett,” he repeated, instead of telling me his name. He added a cheerful, staccato sound to the t’s, making them really sound like two. “Like Lady Brett Ashley.”

I stared at him. “That’s who I’m named after,” I said. “My parents were English professors. It was either that or Claudine, after the Colette novels.”

His face went slightly blank, and I knew I’d lost him but I kept on talking. “Mom wanted to be a writer. She said that Colette’s husband used to lock her in a room until she’d written however many pages he wanted. That’s how the Claudine books got written.”

“So your mom wanted to be locked in a room?”

“I think she just wanted to be encouraged. Have you read a lot of Hemingway?”

“No,” Charlie admitted. “I didn’t even read The Sun Also Rises, to tell you the truth. I just listened to them talk about it in class.”