It took some adjusting the first few months after Charlie moved out. He still came home for dinners some weekends and his room was always available to him, but he was usually on campus either studying or swimming. We went to every meet he had in the state and traveled to some of his out of state ones, and went to see Kallie a lot more than we had when Charlie was still at home. She was doing well and was set to graduate soon, so we weren’t too worried about her. Charlie was doing well too, but he still seemed down over his breakup.

That is, until we heard that he had started to see Angelica. She was studying for her master’s degree at the campus, and he was usually in the library late at night studying after swim practice. That’s where they “met,” so to speak. He seemed a whole lot happier since they’d been together, but I and a few of my friends were still a little at odds about it.

“I don’t see what the big deal is,” Alice told me about two months into their relationship. “He’s happy, and she seems to be really good for him.”

“But…she’s practically his sister!” I sputtered.

“No she isn’t, she’s almost six years older than he is and she wasn’t even in LA most of his life. It’s not like they were ever even in school together. So she saw him at holidays and group events and stuff. It’s really not a big deal, Dana,” Alice tried to assure me. “And does it really matter that she’s older? If he’s happy, who cares?” I could see her point, but it still struck me as weird.

That was until I saw them together and saw how happy they made one another. After that, I couldn’t really fault them for being together, and it seemed completely natural to me. Tina didn’t accept it for quite awhile, but once she saw them together, she got on board too.

Kallie graduated UCLA with honors and went on to obtain her master’s as well as her doctorate from CU. By the time she graduated, Bette was ready to retire and had a position open for her. She couldn’t give her the deanship due to her lack of experience, but she got her a place on the ladder, and Kallie just kept moving up the university hierarchy. We were proud of her, although Alice always though she worked to hard.