Family Secrets

Bridgette slumped against the passenger seat of Charlie’s Jeep Wrangler.

“Yeah, I’ll see ya tomorrow!” She heard her boyfriend call out, causing her to look up out of the window and see his tall, bulking figure heading her way. The game had ended over an hour ago and Bridgette had been waiting for him in the car since.

“Hey Bridge,” Charlie greeted as he plopped himself into the driver’s seat and leaned over to give her a quick kiss. “Thanks for coming tonight.”

“I wouldn’t miss it, my favorite boyfriend was playing.”

“You’re too kind,” Charlie chuckled as he put the key into the ignition and started the car.

“Oh, you thought I was talking about you?” Bridgette joked, perking up a little in her seat (she always loved to rag on Charlie). “I meant Tyler Seguin. Goddamn he is something else.” Charlie was not amused.

“Shut the fuck up,” he scoffed, causing Bridgette to burst out laughing.

“Charlie!” She drew out the ‘e’ at the end. “You know I’m just kidding, I love you!” Her sing-song tone broke Charlie and a smile drew out onto his face.

“Love you too jerk,” he replied as he took a hold of her hand and gave it a slight squeeze. “Do you want me to drop you off at your place or do you want to come back to mine for the night?”

“Um, can you bring me back to mine? I have to meet with some teachers tomorrow morning and I don’t feel like having to wake up extra early to get back to my room tomorrow.”

“Sounds good,” was all Charlie said as he pulled out of the parking garage and began making his way through the streets of Boston. “We have tomorrow off, do you want to maybe do something tomorrow after you get out of class?”

“Sure, what should we do? Dinner and a movie?” Both Charlie and Bridgette were very low-key people and preferred simpler things when it came to their relationship.

“Is that your way of trying to get me to watch A Star is Bornwith you?” Charlie chuckled.

“Maybe,” Bridgette admitted sheepishly. “Come on Charlie! It’s such a good movie and I want to see it again!”

“Fine, fine. But only because I can’t think of anything else to do tomorrow,” Charlie relinquished pretty easily. “Want to go to Limencello for dinner?”

“Ugh, yes! I love that place and we haven’t been in a while,” Bridgette moaned as the images of one of her favorite restaurants in the North End of Boston came to mind. Content with their date-night plans, the two fell into a comfortable silence as the soft sounds of the country music radio station Charlie had turned on filled the Jeep.

“I can’t spend Thanksgiving with you and your family,” Bridgette blurted out ten minutes later, not able to keep that information to herself any longer. After her conversation with Kris earlier, she knew that there was no way she was going to be able to convince the entire family to make a trip to Boston and if there was one thing she was not going to do, it was miss spending a weekend with her makeshift family.

“What? Why?” Charlie questioned, the tone of his voice making Bridgette flinch with guilt. “I really wanted you to get to know them as my girlfriend.”

“I’m sorry! I wanted to as well, but my…family…has plans already that can’t be changed and I can’t get out of.” Bridgette vaguely explained, hoping that that would be enough for Charlie to accept that she would not be around for the holiday.

“Bridge,” Charlie stopped himself and she knew that it was because he did not know what to say.

“I’m sorry Charlie, I really am.”

“What are you going to be doing? Will you at least be able to come to the Black Friday game?” Charlie asked hopefully.

“I’m sorry but no, I can’t. I’ll be in Pittsburgh.”

“Pittsburgh? What the hell is in Pittsburgh?” In all the years that he had known Bridgette, not once could Charlie recall a single time where Bridgette mentioned having family in Pittsburgh. In fact, now that he was thinking about it, he could recall a time where she ever really mentioned her family.

“That’s where my family is spending Thanksgiving,” Bridgette admitted.

“Hang on, I thought you were from Canada?” Bridgette’s stomach began feeling uneasy; she was not comfortable with all of these questions, no matter how simple they were.

“I am,” she admitted.

“So then why is your family celebrating Thanksgiving in Pittsburgh?”

“Because, we just are!” Bridgette exclaimed, wanting nothing more than this conversation to be over and regretting bringing it up in the first place.

“Why are you skirting around this so much?” Charlie demanded.

“Why are you pushing this so much? Why can’t you just accept that I am spending Thanksgiving with my family in Pittsburgh and that is it?” Bridgette countered, her voice rising a couple of levels but remaining just under a screaming level.

“Because it doesn’t make sense! You’re Canadian, you shouldn’t even be celebrating Thanksgiving! Do you just not want to be with my family? Is that it?” Charlie was now yelling. “It’s not like you would be meeting them for the first time!”

“Stop yelling!” Bridgette shouted, not missing the confused look that crossed over Charlie’s face.

“Did, did you just speak French?” Charlie stuttered as he tried to make sense of the sounds that were coming out of his girlfriend’s mouth.

“Oh shit, sorry.” Bridgette was completely flustered; she had never switched over to her native language without realizing it before.

“You speak French?” All pretenses of their argument were completely dropped—Charlie was far more intrigued by this new discovery.

“Well, I am from Canada,” Bridgette tried to lightheartedly play off the situation as nothing more than an action of circumstance.

“I didn’t know you could speak French,” Charlie no longer sounded angry, but instead appeared to be in awe of this newly discovered trait.

“When I am in America, I try to strictly speak English only,” Bridgette admitted as she noticed that the two were less than five minutes away from her dorm.

“Huh, I’ve known you for three years now and you’ve never slipped up once. That’s pretty impressive,” Charlie remarked, internally grateful for the subject change. It was extremely rare that the two of them fought and he hated it when they did. “I guess that explains your slight accent. I could never quite place it but I guess now it makes sense; it’s French.”

“Yeah, I’ve tried really hard to be able to completely disguise it but obviously, was not that successful,” Bridgette shrugged, wanting nothing more for the car ride to be over so that she could get out of this conversation.

“You know what I’ve just kind of realized,” Charlie asked as he looked over to the girl in his passenger seat.

“What?”

“You really don’t talk much about your family and where you’re from,” Charlie mused as he pulled over to the side of the road in front of Bridgette’s apartment, missing the sigh of relief she gave when he put the Jeep into park.

“Trust me, it’s not worth talking about!” Bridgette commented as she got out of the Jeep. “Thanks for the ride back and congrats on the win tonight! Can’t wait for our date tomorrow! Love you, bye!” She added before quickly slamming the door shut and running up towards her building before Charlie could get another word in.

When she finally reached her room, she was beyond relieved to discover that Ally was not back yet. Trudging towards her bed, she dramatically flopped down face first onto it and let out a muffled scream into her pillow. She did not regret her decision to keep her private life exactly that, but she would never deny that it was most definitely difficult to maintain—especially on nights like tonight.

Bridgette loves Charlie—she loved him the moment he made some stupid math joke and actually thought that he was being funny one night when the two were up late studying. He was a great boyfriend and treated her with more respect than she sometimes felt that she deserved. Not telling him had nothing to do with trust issues towards him either—she trusted him almost more than anyone else in her life. And she knew that he loved her, well, the girl that he knew.

There were times were she just wanted to tell Charlie everything: about Luc, her mom, Kris and the entire Letang family, and why she does not like to tell anyone about them. But, she could never bring herself to do it and if she was being completely honest with herself, she did not fully know why.

Bridgette worked hard to act a certain way every day and after three years of living in Boston, she was so proud of herself for hiding the fact that she came from such a broken home and all of the struggles that came with growing up in the lifestyle that she had had. It was a side of her that she wanted no one to know because (and years of neglect caused her to think this way) she did not think that anyone would be able to love her if they knew the real her.

A frustrated groan lurched out of her mouth as Bridgette forced herself to break out of her train of thoughts.

“You did this to yourself,” she mumbled as she rolled off of her bed and began stripping Charlie’s jersey and her jeans off of her body as she got ready for bed. “You can’t be mad about anything it was all your own doing.” Her comments to herself did not stop her from punching her pillow a few times before she burrowed herself under the covers and went to bed.

Notes

Okay, I know that this is a slow start but please bear with me! I promise that it will get better!! Feel free to leave any comments or feedback-I'd love to hear both!