CHARACTER
The Way I Used to Beby Amber Smith

Caelin McCrorey

Caelin McCrorey

Quick Facts

  • Role: Older brother of Eden McCrorey; star basketball player; best friend of Kevin Armstrong
  • First Appearance: Eden’s freshman-year section, at breakfast the morning after her assault
  • Key Relationships: Eden (sister), Kevin (best friend), Josh Miller (Eden’s boyfriend), Vanessa McCrorey and Conner McCrorey (parents)

Who They Are

At first, Caelin McCrorey is the family’s center of gravity—the effortless “golden child” whose athleticism and confidence make everything feel stable. He moves “wide and swift and sure,” a physical shorthand for the certainty he projects and that others, especially Eden, rely on. Their shared “inside-joke grin” functions as a talisman of trust—until his loyalty to Kevin eclipses his duty to Eden. Caelin’s essence is the painful paradox of a protector who fails: a brother who believes in love and loyalty, but misplaces them until the truth forces him to rebuild who he is.

Personality & Traits

Caelin’s charisma makes him magnetic, but his self-focus and condescension keep him from seeing Eden clearly. His identity as a protector is initially about managing appearances—protecting family pride and his friend—rather than safeguarding Eden’s well-being. The same fierce loyalty that makes him admirable turns disastrous when it’s given to the wrong person. Only when his worldview shatters does his care become active, humble, and sustaining.

  • Popular, larger-than-life presence: The “nonstop larger-than-life excitement that is Caelin McCrorey” draws people in; on the court he moves “wide and swift and sure,” projecting confidence that others mistake for wisdom.
  • Self-absorbed and absent: Once he’s at college, he prioritizes his own life and dismisses Eden’s distress at breakfast as her “being really weird and intense,” missing the emergency right in front of him.
  • Blind loyalty to Kevin: He reflexively defends his best friend—even after another accusation—because his identity is tethered to Kevin’s goodness.
  • Condescending big-brother stance: He waves away Eden’s pleas as childish, telling her, in effect, that she’s “a kid,” a tone that keeps her silent.
  • Misguided protector: He threatens Josh—“I’ll kick your fucking ass”—policing Eden’s reputation instead of asking what she needs or what happened to her.
  • Capable of remorse and repair: After Eden tells him the truth, he smashes his trophies and wrecks his closet door, a visceral confession of guilt that precedes genuine support.

Character Journey

Caelin’s arc traces a fall from comforting certainty to humility and repair. In Eden’s freshman year, he fails the moment that matters: at breakfast he senses something is off but refuses to see it, throwing his weight behind Kevin and deepening Eden’s Trauma, Silence, and Secrecy. Through her sophomore and junior years, he’s largely absent, returning for holidays to critique the person Eden has had to become—his judgments feeding the novel’s exploration of Identity and the Loss of Self. His “protection” takes the form of controlling her image and confronting Josh, still missing the real danger. In senior year, a second accusation against Kevin triggers Caelin’s reflexive defense—until Eden tells him the truth. His furious destruction of his own trophies mirrors the collapse of his self-image. From there he reorients: he believes Eden, drives her to the police, and stands beside her as she tells their parents, becoming a crucial ally in her Healing and Finding One's Voice.

Key Relationships

  • Eden McCrorey: Eden first sees Caelin as her safest person—their “inside-joke grin” shorthand for wordless trust. His refusal to hear her, and his allegiance to Kevin, shatters that bond and pushes her deeper into isolation. Once he finally listens, he becomes the steady presence she needed all along, replacing empty protection with active advocacy.

  • Kevin Armstrong: Caelin’s loyalty to Kevin is fraternal and unquestioning; he’s built part of his identity around Kevin’s goodness. That bond blinds him to Eden and delays his moral awakening. When the truth finally lands, the collapse of their friendship is also the collapse of Caelin’s old self.

  • Vanessa and Conner McCrorey: As the “golden child,” Caelin absorbs his parents’ pride and attention; when he leaves for college, the family loses its “glue,” worsening their blindness to Eden’s pain. Later, Caelin becomes the catalyst for family reckoning, standing with Eden as they tell their parents and shifting the household’s center toward truth.

  • Josh Miller: Caelin confronts Josh to “protect” Eden, revealing how he confuses control with care. The scene exposes his focus on appearances and male bravado, and how far he still is from understanding what Eden has endured.

Defining Moments

Caelin’s story turns on a series of choices—each revealing where his loyalty lies and how he learns to move it.

  • The Breakfast After the Assault: He labels Eden “weird and intense” and does nothing. Why it matters: His inaction locks Eden into silence and marks his first, most consequential failure as a protector.
  • The Backyard Conversation: Eden begs him not to go back to school; he answers, “My life is there now, Edy. I can’t just drop everything and move back home so we can hang out, or whatever.” Why it matters: He interprets a plea for safety as neediness, choosing Kevin and college over his sister.
  • The Christmas Confrontation: “You know, I don’t even recognize you anymore.” Why it matters: He polices Eden’s image instead of her safety, proving he still doesn’t see her.
  • The Fight with Josh: “I’ll kick your fucking ass... if you don’t get the fuck off my sister right now!” Why it matters: His rage is real but misdirected—heroics that soothe his conscience without addressing the truth.
  • The Final Confession: After Eden names Kevin as her rapist, Caelin smashes his trophies and kicks in his closet door. Why it matters: The destruction externalizes his guilt and the death of his blind loyalty, clearing the way for change.
  • The Reconciliation: He drives Eden to the police and tells her, “I’m your brother. And I love you.” Why it matters: He finally centers Eden’s needs, transforming from symbolic protector to actual support.

Essential Quotes

“Okay, you’re being really weird and intense right now.”

In the book’s first crisis, Caelin mistakes trauma for moodiness. The line exposes how his certainty and surface-reading make him unreliable at the exact moment Eden needs him to notice.

“My life is there now, Edy. I can’t just drop everything and move back home so we can hang out, or whatever.”

This is the thesis of Caelin’s early priorities: college, friends, and Kevin come first. He reduces Eden’s plea for safety to “hanging out,” a dismissal that widens the gulf between them.

“You know, I don’t even recognize you anymore.”

Caelin diagnoses the symptom—Eden’s changed persona—while missing the cause. The line reveals his fixation on appearances and his inability to imagine what could have remade his sister.

“I’ll kick your fucking ass... if you don’t get the fuck off my sister right now!”

Here, his protective instinct bursts out, but it targets the wrong person and wrong problem. The threat showcases his performative masculinity: dramatic, immediate, and ultimately ineffective in addressing Eden’s actual harm.

“I’m your brother. And I love you. That’s all. I don’t know what else to say.”

Stripped of speeches and certainty, Caelin finally offers presence instead of answers. The humility in “I don’t know what else to say” marks his transformation from confident fixer to steadfast ally.