Fern Woolbright and Charlie Treadaway's relationship

Fern Woolbright and Charlie Treadaway's relationship is shaped by the gap between what Fern hopes Charlie feels and what he is willing to offer. It begins in her imagination, becomes a clandestine affair conducted while Charlie remains involved with Fabiana, and is marked by moments of tenderness that never resolve the uncertainty between them. Its consequences reach beyond the affair: when Fern becomes pregnant, she cannot tell whether Charlie or James Frobisher is the father.

Private signs and imagined intimacy

Before the relationship is openly physical, Fern invests an unsigned card in the possibility of Charlie's attention. Its maker has drawn dead dogs and written a message about them on the back; Fern rules out her flatmates and considers whether Rob made it, but what she wants most is for Charlie to be responsible. The card matters to her not simply as a drawing but as evidence, however uncertain, that someone has noticed how upset she was. She keeps it beneath her best underwear and the plastic box containing her diaphragm, so hope and practical preparation for sex occupy the same private space.

Fern has obtained the diaphragm at a women's health centre in Manchester. In Surrey, she could not arrange contraception discreetly: her family doctor plays squash with her father, and her mother's acquaintances volunteer at the family-planning clinic in Godalming. The details place the prospect of intimacy within the limits of her family and community, and show that Fern has made her own provision rather than relying on a partner to do so.

At Christmas, another drawing arrives under her door: a pen-and-ink card showing a naked, red-haired angel atop a fir tree. Fern recognizes herself in its intimate detail, including her pale pink nipples, and responds with intense desire for Charlie. Alone in bed, she discovers how to give herself sexual pleasure, an experience entirely new to her. The card thus joins artistic attention to bodily self-knowledge: Charlie's image makes Fern feel seen, while her response leads her to a knowledge of her own body that does not depend on him being present.

The affair and its divided terms

The relationship becomes physical during a gathering at Charlie's home. After the record slows and the lights go out, Charlie takes Fern by the hand and leads her from the kitchen to his room; when the lights return, she is naked. The abrupt transition from a social evening to private sex gives the encounter the quality of a trick, but it also begins a pattern of intimacy that must be hidden from others.

That secrecy is not incidental. Charlie has a girlfriend, Fabiana, and Fern's friends Felicity and Dee object that seeing him is disloyal to her. Fern answers that, as an only child, she cannot be expected to understand the idea of sisterhood in the same way. She and Charlie meet when Fabiana is away and the opportunity is clear. His bedroom, with its scattered jeans and smell of wine, cigarettes, and cannabis, becomes one of their hiding places. Fern will not let him smoke in her own room: she dislikes the smell and thinks it makes him lazy, and she keeps a spare toothbrush for him by her kitchen sink. These everyday boundaries coexist with her willingness to take part in a relationship kept secret from his girlfriend.

The affair also offers Fern episodes of tenderness that sharpen, rather than settle, its instability. One morning Charlie brings her tea in bed, though he makes her Earl Grey with milk despite her preference for lemon. They have sex before she must leave for college, and Fern experiences the encounter as a victory over Fabiana. Afterward, however, Charlie becomes hurried and distant, fumbling into his jeans and knocking things from the dressing table. He pushes Fern back into bed, wraps her in the duvet, calls her his most beautiful butterfly, and kisses her nose before leaving. Fern's amusement at the commotion in the house does not erase what the scene makes plain: affection and withdrawal follow each other closely.

Charlie does not choose between Fabiana and Fern. Fern sometimes pretends that this arrangement does not trouble her; at other times, she cries herself to sleep. The difference between those responses captures the relationship's central imbalance. Fern wants recognition and exclusivity, but Charlie's conduct gives her neither consistently. His small gestures invite her to feel uniquely cherished, while his continued attachment to Fabiana prevents that intimacy from becoming an acknowledged commitment.

Separation, danger, and uncertain paternity

The contrast between private closeness and public separation becomes stark when police arrive at Fern's house. The night before, she lies awake beside Charlie, anxious when the telephone rings and wondering whether Fabiana is calling. In the dark, she removes the Silver fern-leaf necklace from around Charlie's neck and puts its pendant on the bedside table. In the morning, officers come to take him for questioning. They tell Fern to leave the room and make clear that Charlie is not yet under arrest, but must go with them. She watches from the stairs as they lead him out to a police car. The intimacy of the previous night gives way, in a few hours, to an official process that excludes her.

Later, when Fern tells her parents she is pregnant, her father assumes that James Frobisher is the father and expresses relief. Fern cannot correct him: she does not know whether the father is James or Charlie Treadaway. Her uncertainty is compounded by the public news about Charlie and the possibility that he supplied drugs that killed her cousin, Elise Landreth. The affair that Fern had kept private now sits at the intersection of pregnancy, family judgment, and a death associated with Charlie, none of which she can explain to her father.

The evidence does not resolve Charlie's paternity or show the affair reaching a settled conclusion. Instead, the relationship remains defined by its unresolved claims: Fern's desire to be chosen, Charlie's divided loyalties, and the uncertain place he may hold in her child's life. The early cards make private attention feel like a promise; the later police visit and pregnancy reveal how little that promise can establish.