A/N: Good morning! Let's do this, shall we?
"Well, well, well. Look who decided to turn up."
Charlie raised an eyebrow at Billy as he stepped on his friend's boat. "What are you talking about?"
"You've been flighty these last few weeks. You make plans, then you cancel them."
Charlie just grunted. He sat down and opened his tackle box, busying himself in getting organized for the day's fishing trip.
"So. Where you been lately?" Billy asked. He was piss poor at subtlety.
"Funny, I don't remember having a wife."
His friend chuckled. "It was a simple question. I have a teenage son, Charlie. I know what it means when someone answers so defensively."
"Stop bugging him." Billy's girlfriend Sue smacked him on the arm as she passed.
Charlie shouldn't have been so pleased at Sue's intervention. He'd known the woman for years; she was sneaky and way too observant for his own good.
She waited until they were out on the water. Charlie had cast his line and sat back. He'd just popped open a beer and taken a big drink when she pounced.
"So. Who is she?" Sue asked, the picture of innocence.
Charlie inhaled too quickly and ended up coughing up beer. "Who is who?" he asked between coughs.
"Oh, don't even start, Charlie. Billy was right. My kids play this game, I know they're hiding something." She nodded her head at him as though prompting. "So spill."
"There's nothing to say." Those words were so wrong they tasted sour in his mouth, but he didn't want to have this conversation. He wasn't ashamed of what he was doing with Alice, but he wasn't sure he wanted anyone else's opinion on the matter.
Billy's eyeballs bulged. "So you are seeing someone? Like seriously seeing someone?"
"I'm sorry. I missed the part where we were all back in high school."
"That's the point, isn't it?" Sue said. "You haven't seen anyone seriously since high school. That was half your life ago, Charlie. It's a big deal."
Charlie chafed and looked away from his friends, wishing he wasn't trapped on a boat with them. It irritated him more than anything that they were right about a few things. He hadn't dated anyone since Renee, and the similarities in situation weren't lost on him.
Then, like now, he hadn't wanted to tell anyone at first. Alice didn't make a lot of sense for a guy like him anymore than Renee had made any sense for the snot-nosed kid he'd once been. Neither one of them were the type to live the life he preferred: sedate and steady.
Alice, like Renee, had dreams bigger than Forks could contain, and that was something else he didn't want to talk about. Alice and Renee were very different people, but Charlie knew damn well what it all sounded like out loud. Forks was a small community. Odd though it was, he was a small town celebrity. He knew from experience his romantic exploits were fodder for gossip. Like it or not-and he had to admit he'd felt a bit smug about it more often than was humble-he was Forks's second most eligible bachelor. The only man who beat him was richer, slightly younger, more handsome and a lot more reclusive.
No one could know about them yet. Not yet. They wouldn't understand, and Alice needed space to sort through her grief and depression without having to deal with anyone else's opinion about what they were doing.
"Okay," Sue said. "At least tell us how long this has been going on."
Obviously they weren't going to leave this alone. "Little over a week," he said, concentrating on reeling in his line instead of looking at either of them.
"You've been cancelling on us for longer than that," Billy said.
Charlie cast his line again with more force than was necessary and didn't answer.
"Is it serious?" Sue asked.
He huffed.
Billy laughed. It was a guffaw so loud and out of place, it startled Charlie. "You're a grown man," his friend said. "I was just giving you a hard time. Okay, keep her secret. I'm sure you have your reasons. You always do. It gets serious, you bring her out here on the boat with us. That's my only advice to you." He jabbed a finger in the air. "Don't trust a woman who doesn't know how to fish or won't learn."
Sue put her hands on her hips. "Oh yeah? Why's that?"
Billy shrugged. "Hell if I know. It just seemed like a wise thing to say. I'm a chief, woman. I'm supposed to give out sage advice."
She shook her head and looked back to Charlie. "Everything's okay, though? You're sure?"
"Now who's bugging him? Let the man fish." Billy pulled Sue down beside him. "Anyway, this is Charlie. You don't have to worry about Charlie."
~0~
Late that afternoon, driving home, Charlie couldn't help but notice the tingle of anticipation that travelled up and down his spine. Even though he'd had a good time, he was eager to come home. Home to Alice.
It had been a very long time since he'd felt that way. It was only a few months into his marriage that he started to come home to an unhappy wife. Then he was alone for a long time before Bella came to stay with him. When Bella was there, he looked forward to coming home more than when he'd been alone, but it was more a feeling of contentment than excitement.
He walked in the door with his catch and stopped himself from calling out for her. It was far too presumptuous. They were together, but it was a loose definition at best. It was only a matter of circumstance that they lived together. They wouldn't have been cohabitating at this point if their relationship followed a normal timeline. She still slept in her room and he in his. In fact, except for that one night, they hadn't done more than kiss.
So Charlie walked in the house without a word. He did close the door a little harder than was absolutely necessary, but then he headed straight for the kitchen. He'd denied Billy and Sue's offer of cooking up his catch along with theirs in favor of heading straight home for dinner. He'd told them he wasn't hungry.
He'd been lying.
There was something primitively satisfying about catching his own dinner. That feeling was doubled when he could feed someone else. He remembered the first time he'd gone fishing after he'd bought this house. He was puffed up with satisfaction and pride as he bounded up the steps. Here he was, providing for his family, putting dinner on the table in every sense of the words.
Of course, at seven months pregnant, Renee was less than pleased at the odor he brought home with him. She spent the night locked in their room, nauseated, and the fish tasted like ash in his mouth.
Charlie busied himself cleaning his fish. He froze the majority but kept enough for his own dinner and Alice's, reasoning that if she didn't want it, he could always leave it for lunch the next day. As he put together the ingredients of his old friend Harry Clearwater's fish fry, he started to hum to himself.
He must have been engrossed because he didn't hear footfalls on the stairs or across the kitchen floor. He didn't notice Alice was there with him until she'd wrapped her arms around his waist. She was such a tiny woman, she had to peer around his shoulder rather than over it. "That smells amazing."
It didn't smell nearly as amazing as her small body pressed against his back felt, but thoughts like that were too foolish to put into words. Instead of voicing them, he turned his head to smile at her. She smiled back and pushed up onto her tiptoes to kiss him. He wished his hands weren't covered in fish oil and crumbs so he could touch her.
"Is some of that for me?"
"Mmhmm. If you want it."
"Ooh." She leaned up to press a kiss to the underside of his jaw. "Of course I want it," she said in a lower, seductive voice. She pinched his ass and grinned when he jolted. "But we're off topic now."
She winked and released her hold on him, opening the refridgerator and beginning to root through through the crisper for whatever vegetables she tended to store there. "That was one of the reasons I liked coming over here for dinner. Bella was always making fish. The Cullens are carnivores. Every one of them." Her tone became wistful. "So was Jasper." She cleared her throat. "Even Esme likes her steak so rare it's still mooing.
"Don't get me wrong. I like meat just fine, but this is the Pacific Northwest. It's got to be something close to sacrilege that they don't eat fish hardly ever." She clucked her tongue. "Anyway, Charlie. I didn't think you knew how to cook."
Charlie scoffed. "Because Bella told you I couldn't." He shook his head, but his smile was fond as he thought of the look on his daughter's face when she examined the contents-or lack there of-of the fridge and pantry the day she got there. "She's not wrong, really. I know how to use the microwave, pour a bowl of cereal, and make a sandwich. I can also fry eggs and bacon. And…" He moved the fish from plate to pan, grinning as it made a satisfying crack-pop sizzle. "No one fishes as much as I do without learning how to fry fish. What did you think I did before Bella? Catch and release?"
"Didn't really think about it too long, and you shouldn't make me."
"Why's that?"
She sidled up to him wrapping an arm around him and leaning on him, batting her eyes prettily. "Because then all I'll be able to think about is you in that hideous hat, and I may never want to kiss you again."
He rolled his eyes, but bent quickly to capture her lips with his. "That is a fly fishing hat," he said when he had kissed her breathless.
She made a face of mock horror, still holding onto him. "Don't tell me. The regular fishing hats are worse?"
"You're ridiculous."
"You like it."
He had to grin because he did. He really did.
They worked together side by side. It never escaped Charlie that Alice found excuses to touch him. Her hand on his shoulder to steady herself as she reached for a bowl. A bump to his side to get his attention. Those weren't new. This last week or so she stopped often to peck his cheek or squeeze his arm.
It wasn't just flirtation, though some of it was. She was starved for touch, and he understood that. She craved affection-a counterintuitive thought seeing as she'd pushed the most affectionate people out of her life for the most part.
But Charlie was happy to oblige her unspoken request. They were perhaps halfway through the dinner of the fish he'd made and the vegetables she'd steamed, when he grabbed the leg of her chair, pulling her over to his side of the table. She squeaked in surprise, her eyes lighting with laughter as her hands darted out. She steadied herself with her hands against his chest.
He didn't say anything. He wasn't really good with words. He liked touching her. More than filling her need for touch, she filled his need for this: silliness and spontaneity. It was a lightness he hadn't realized was missing from his life, not until she was there. It seemed wrong in a lot of ways. It was her darkness that had given him light, but then again, he seemed to do her some good.
That in and of itself made him very happy.
Rather than try to say anything, he began to trace her fine features with his fingertips. He had a secret he'd never told a living soul. In his early teens, he'd been an avid reader of fantasy books. Alice was so lithe and ethereally beautiful-she was exactly how he'd pictured the elves of his books. She would fit in amongst otherworldly, mischievous creatures with ease.
She sighed and closed her eyes, pressing her hand over his against her cheek for a moment. Then she moved off her chair to straddle him. Then it was her hands tracing his face. He walked his fingers up her spine and brushed open mouthed kisses along her chin until he found her lips. His eyes were closed. Her tongue parted his lips and he was drunk off the taste of her, his thoughts as muddled as if she was the most potent wine. He thought he could stay like this forever-with her slight weight on his lap, her fingers tangled in his hair, playing at the nape of his neck, and her lips moving with his.
Then again, if they intended to stay somewhat innocent, now was probably a good time to stop. He knew what she looked like naked beneath his hands, after all. He pulled the slightest bit away from her, enough to break their kiss, and rested his forehead against hers, still holding her tightly.
He liked this too; how even their more peaceful moments could crackle with electricity.
After a minute like this, Alice kissed the tip of his nose and slid back onto her own seat. They managed to finish their dinner though every time their legs bumped, they stumbled over their words, fighting foolish grins. They left the dishes in the sink, distracted by an argument about the garage.
"I told you I wanted to tackle the garage next," Alice said as they settled down on the couch.
"There's nothing wrong with my garage."
She made a pinched face. "Except the fact it can't function as a garage. You can't fit a car in there."
"The cars fit fine on the driveway."
"Come on, Charlie. It wouldn't even take that big of a renovation-just a few well placed shelves and hooks." She made a pleading expression and tapped her fingers at his crossed arms. "Please? I think it would help to have a new project."
He huffed. The woman knew exactly how to play him though he supposed she could have a much more nefarious purpose than organizing his garage. "I don't know why I even bother arguing with you."
She grinned. "I don't either."
They lapsed into silence then, enjoying each other's company and whatever show was on TV. Charlie wasn't really paying attention. He was thinking about what Billy had said and, well…
He was thinking about a lot of things.
"Do you like fishing?" he asked, breaking the long silence between them.
"Wouldn't know. I've never tried it." She kicked her legs over his lap and scooted closer. "You want to take me fishing, Charlie?"
"Would you go?"
"That depends. Would I have to wear one of those atrocious hats?"
A/N: Many thanks to barburella and jessypt. :) See you next chapter.