Charlotte Stephie Sylvie: !!top!!

The point was the climbing. The point was the three of them, still together, still choosing each other in the rain.

“It was an accident!”

“It’s not about the lighthouse,” Sylvie said from the passenger side, feet on the dashboard. Her toenails were painted bruised-plum. “It’s about the commitment to the bit. We said we’d go. We’re going.” charlotte stephie sylvie

“I’m just saying,” Stephie said, peeling a gummy worm from her thigh, “if we’re going to drive four hours to see a lighthouse that might be haunted, we should at least stop for decent coffee. Not gas station tar.” The point was the climbing

Charlotte, Stephie, and Sylvie had been friends since the summer they all scraped their knees on the same broken sidewalk crack outside the old public pool. Now, twenty-three years later, they were crammed into the front seat of Charlotte’s station wagon, the back piled with sleeping bags, a half-empty bag of sour gummy worms, and three mismatched umbrellas. Her toenails were painted bruised-plum

Later still, much later, after the funeral and the sorting of boxes and the long quiet months, Sylvie would find the video again. And she would see, in the corner of Stephie’s shot, a moment she hadn’t noticed before: Charlotte reaching over to tuck a strand of hair behind Sylvie’s ear, gentle and automatic, like breathing. And she would understand that the lighthouse was never the point.