The Story Of Us

5. Violet

5

VIOLET

The rest of the week passes in a blur, and by the time Friday rolls around, I’m already overwhelmed by the amount of work that I’ll need to do this year. None of my classes have exams until May, but deadlines have already been set for essays, which are due in December. There’s not much preparation I can do for them yet because we’ve only just been introduced to the syllabus for this year, but it’s just another thing to add to my never-ending list of to-dos.

I haven’t even considered how much time I’ll need to spend making sure my personal statement is good enough for university applications. I knew the last year of school would be intense, but I thought they would ease us into it more. Instead, it’s only the first week back, and I’m trying to figure out how long I can hold off on having a breakdown.

When the final bell rings for the day, I say bye to Avery and agree to meet her in the dining hall after Creative Writing Club. I started attending it a few years ago, deciding on a whim to try it out. I’d always been more of a reader than a writer, and I only really planned on going to a few sessions, but then I was given a gift on my fifteenth birthday that made me keep going.

I’ve done my best to avoid Isaac this week, and when we do have to see each other during classes, he hasn’t tried to speak to me again. But that doesn’t mean he hasn’t occupied my thoughts. Even attending writing club makes me think of him because he’s the reason I’m still in it.

I hadn’t realised how much of my life I’d let him into during our first few birthday meetings, how much I shared with him before we were even anything special to each other. I think he’s always been special to me, though, since that very first day.

I manage to make it to the English classroom without bumping into him. He has art club right now, so our paths would never usually cross unless we wanted them to. We’d always meet afterward, stealing a quick half an hour together before dinner to show off our work to each other. I loved seeing what he created, whether it was a small project that he finished in one session or one that took a few weeks, and he sent me constant progress updates on.

The thought that I won’t be seeing him after today’s club has me dropping into my chair and taking some steadying breaths as I pull out my two notebooks, one completely full and one completely empty. I try to tell myself that force of habit is why I still carry the full one around, but I know deep down that’s not the real reason - the six words written on the first page are.

THREE YEARS AGO

My hands tremble as I hold the gift I’ve bought for Isaac. I’m standing outside the classroom we usually meet in, but I’m too nervous to enter and see him sitting there. Taking a deep breath, I push the door open, and my shoulders drop when I realise Isaac isn’t even here yet.

I walk over to the desk we usually sit at, in the back corner of the room, and drop the gift on the desk. I pull out one of the chairs to sit and fix my eyes on the clock above the whiteboard, watching as the minutes tick by, and there’s no sign of him.

He’s never been late before, and I can’t help but feel worried. It starts needling into my brain as I remember that I haven’t seen him since lunch. He didn’t show up to the last few lessons of the day, but surely he would have told me if we weren’t meeting today? I give him the benefit of the doubt and just fiddle with the wrapping paper on the gift, making sure all the creases are sharp and the tape hasn’t lifted.

Ten minutes pass by, and just as I’ve resigned myself to the fact that he’s not showing up, the door opens, and he stands there, panting.

“I’m so sorry I’m late.”

He rushes over to me and drops into the seat next to mine, throwing his bag on the floor and sliding down the chair slightly so he can lean back with his head turned to the ceiling.

His eyes are closed, his breaths heavy, and my eyes drift to the way his Adam’s apple bobs up and down when he swallows. I hadn’t noticed before, but looking at him from this new angle, I can see that his eyelashes touch the lenses of his glasses. No wonder he’s always wearing them low on his nose and constantly pushing them up. He hasn’t had his hair cut in a while, I think. The way it hangs over his ears and covers his forehead makes that clear. There’s only a week left of school, so I guess he’s just waiting until he goes home to get it cut. I want to tell him that I like it when it’s this length, that I think it makes him look softer, but then I shake that thought away.

I don’t know when I started noticing the way he looks and taking account of the way his features have changed over the years, but it’s something I need to stop. We’re just friends. I don’t need to care about how he looks. But then he finally opens his eyes and tilts his head to the side to look at me. The sunlight catches him in a way that makes it look like he’s glowing like the rest of the world around him has dulled. He gives me a small smile, and I have to turn away from him. It feels like my cheeks are on fire.

“Everything okay?” I ask him, fiddling with the gift on the desk so I don’t have to look at him.

I hear him sitting up and shuffling his chair closer to mine, but I still don’t look.

“Yeah, all good. I just needed to catch my breath. I had to run from the car park.”

That has me looking at him, and he’s still smiling at me.

“Why were you there?”

His smile falters a little, and I regret asking. It feels like clouds just came out and covered all the sunlight.

“I had to go somewhere at lunch with my parents, so they just dropped me off.” I nod my head with an ‘ah’ and then he says something I don’t expect. “I came back as early as I could. They wanted to have dinner together but I told them I had something important to do.”

He can’t mean this, can he? Seeing me? That can’t be more important than having dinner with his parents. He must be doing something after this with his friends or something.

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

We’re sitting facing each other, and for a few moments, we don’t say anything. The silence hangs between us in a way that doesn’t feel heavy at all, considering what he just said. I’ve noticed that we’ve started having more of these moments when we see each other, ones where neither of us feels the need to fill the gaps in conversation, and it’s a comfort I don’t think I share with many other people, really only my mum and Avery. I don’t want to think too much about why Isaac seems like he belongs in the same category as them or what that category even is.

Isaac clears his throat, breaking the silence as he leans down to get his bag from the floor and pulls a small wrapped box out of it.

“Happy birthday, Violet.” His smile is back, and I think I missed it for these past few seconds.

“Happy birthday, Isaac,” I echo, taking the gift from the desk and passing it to him. He gives the box in his hand to me, and for just a second our fingers brush and it feels like my entire body is alight.

“Do you want to open yours first?” He asks, tipping his head towards the box in my hands.

It’s the first year we’ve had gifts for each other at the same time. The past few years have been full of awkward exchanges, starting with Isaac giving me a card on our first joint birthday in Year 7 and me rushing to make him one for the next day. The next year, we planned to meet and swap cards, but he bought a book for me as well, and I hadn’t even thought of getting him anything. The year after that, I got him a copy of one of my favourite books, Persuasion, because he’d started taking an interest in reading. After that, we decided to actually swap gifts, and I spent pretty much the whole year thinking about what to get for him. I just hope he likes it.

“Let’s do it at the same time,” I suggest, and even though he nods in agreement, I notice that he still waits for me to start undoing the paper on my gift before he starts on his own. We don’t speak, the only noise in the room is the sound of paper rustling as we both take care to open our gifts like they’re something precious. I do it slowly, not wanting to tear the paper, as I peel the tape away and finally get it open.

It’s a plain black box, and I lift the lid to find a journal, sage green, with a small butterfly in gold foil on the cover. I lift it up, and when I turn it around, I catch something on the spine—VA. My initials are embossed in gold. This isn’t just something he’s picked up from a store and wrapped up.

He’s got this just for me.

My stomach feels like it’s doing somersaults, my fingers shaking as I trace the letters and try not to read too much into this. But what else am I supposed to think? This is the most special gift I’ve ever gotten.

“Isaac.”

I say his name quietly as I tear my gaze away from the journal to look at him, but I don’t think he’s heard me. He’s staring at the set of coloured pencils that I’ve bought for him.

I’ve noticed him drawing a lot more this year, and when we’ve talked, he’s mentioned wanting to practice colouring more because he usually just does black-and-white sketches. That stuck in my head and when we decided to get gifts for each other, I knew that’s what I wanted to get for him. I spent hours researching which brands were the best and then finding a set that wasn’t too expensive.

“Isaac,” I say it louder this time, and he hears me, lifting his head. His eyes catch mine, and I think his gaze flickers down to my mouth for a second before dropping to the journal, which I’m cradling in both hands.

“Do you like it?” His voice is low like he’s scared to ask or scared of my answer.

“I love it,” I tell him, and he looks up at me again, that smile on his face that makes it impossible to look anywhere else. “Thank you.”

I don’t know how I can express what his gift has made me feel without making it weird between us. It feels like we’re balancing on a tethered line right now, both of us trying to reach the other end even though we don’t know what’s waiting for us. I lift the journal, bringing it to my chest and hugging it the way I wish I could hug him right now.

He nods as he watches me, his smile dropping and his mouth opening a little. I don’t know why I keep looking at his mouth so much. His eyes flit around my face and then he shakes his head a little and clears his throat like he’s breaking himself out of a trance .

“Thank you, too. I’ve actually been looking at this set for a while, but I didn’t get them.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t think my art is that good yet, so I thought it would be a waste to get them. Not that I don’t appreciate you getting them for me, I don’t mean it like that, I just mean it feels like I can’t use them, but I will use them because you got them for me and -”

He stops speaking when I start laughing, and his nervous rambling is impossibly cute.

“You’re good.” He just stares at me, so I continue. “Your art, I mean. The stuff I’ve seen is really good. I think you should try them out.”

I meant it in a general sense, but Isaac just nods his head and opens the tin, placing it on the desk as he leans down to retrieve his sketchbook from his bag. He places it on the desk and then takes out a light grey pencil, but I can’t take my eyes off him as he opens it and starts sketching.

It’s the first time I’ve ever been this close to him and watched him draw, so I keep my focus trained on him. I notice the way he squints his eyes slightly, how he holds the pencil between his middle and fourth finger, and how his tongue peeks out a little from the corner of his mouth. Why am I looking there again? I focus on his hands again just as he finishes up his sketch, and I realise it’s a butterfly.

“I actually walked past the English room a few months ago and saw you were in the writing club. I know you mentioned wanting to go, but I didn’t know you’d started.” I duck my head to try and catch his attention but he won’t look at me, his eyes focused on the butterfly he’s drawn instead. “I thought it would be nice to get you a journal so you can keep all your ideas in one place.” His voice falters a little, and I can feel his nervousness as if it were my own. Maybe it’s because I feel the same way, too.

“That’s really kind of you.” I don’t know what else to say. My mind is too focused on the fact that he’s just told me he’s been planning this for months now. My stomach feels like it’s tied up in knots, but I decide to confess my own truth to him, too. “Actually, I remembered you said you wanted to try and do more with your art so I thought getting some pencils would help with that.”

At this, he finally looks up at me, and I lean back, not realising how close I’d gotten to him when I bent forward to try and catch his eyes. His eyes are wide, his pupils looking bigger than they did before as he pushes his glasses back up his nose. I wait for him to say something, it feels like I’ve just exposed a tender part of myself, and I need some words from him to cover it up.

We’ve considered each other friends for a while now, starting with birthday meetings that gradually turned into near-daily conversations and random meetings whenever we wanted to see each other. But right now feels like the most real we’ve been with each other, like we’ve laid bare hidden truths about ourselves and the other has picked them right up to protect.

“Thank you.”

That’s all he says, and I immediately regret telling him. I’m scared I’ve made our friendship weird by reading too much into it. I’ve given him more truth than he gave me, and this unbalanced feeling is making me want to leave and pretend none of this even happened.

“I, uh, I’ve got to go now.” I push my chair back and stand up, the journal still clutched in one hand as I reach for my bag. But then his hand covers my wrist, and he’s standing, too.

“Wait.”

The first day we met, we were the same height, but sometime during this past year, he started towering over me. I hadn’t realised just how much until now, and we’re standing so close that I have to tilt my chin up to look at him properly.

“I really love them, Violet. And it means a lot to me that you listen when I talk about this stuff. I didn’t think anyone really paid attention.”

I don’t know what to say that won’t leave me feeling completely exposed. I have been paying more attention to him than I want to, and for reasons I don’t dare to think about. But the journal held tight in my hand is proof that he’s been noticing me too, that maybe whatever’s happening here is the same for both of us.

“Of course, I listen. We’re friends, aren’t we?”

I give him a small smile, and his hand is still around my wrist, his thumb stroking back and forth in a way that makes it feel like there’ll be a permanent mark there later like he’s changed that small strip of skin forever. We’ve never been this close before. He’s never held on to me like this before, as if he doesn’t want me to get too far away from him.

“Can you close your eyes?” he whispers, and I pinch my brows together, my confusion showing clearly on my face but the way he’s looking at me makes me do it.

There’s a light pressure on my cheek, there and gone in an instant.

He kissed me .

I open my eyes, and he’s so close to me, our noses so close to brushing, and I realise his eyes aren’t completely green. There’s a ring of hazel around them. It looks like they’re sparkling. I don’t move and neither does he. It’s like we’re both caught in some kind of spell, and if we blink, it’ll all be over.

My gaze moves across his face, and I try to speak, but all that comes out is “I,” and I don’t know if I’m trying to say his name or something else. The sound breaks the spell, though, and he lets go of my wrist and takes a step back. I immediately miss the pressure of his hand on me.

“I’m sorry, I just had to do that.”

“No, don’t be sorry.”

“Sorr-”

I roll my eyes before he can finish the word, and he lets out a small laugh. I decide not to think too much about what I do next, quickly stepping up on my tip toes to kiss his cheek. “Happy birthday, Isaac.”

He lifts his hand to cover his cheek, his mouth parted in surprise, and he looks so cute. I smile at him, but he’s still frozen in place, so I grab my bag and leave the room.

I rush back to my room and sit at my desk, placing the journal on it as I hold my cheek, just like Isaac did with his.

Isaac kissed me.

And I kissed him too.

And I liked it more than I should.

I open up the journal, wanting to document it because it feels like a monumental shift has happened, and if I don’t write it down, then it won’t feel real. There’s something already written on the first page, though, in handwriting that I’m becoming too familiar with .

Write me a story sometime

Isaac

I trace his handwriting with my finger, following every curve and trying to memorise it like it’ll sear into my fingertips maybe and change my whole life.

When I open the full journal and see those words written there, I feel the sting of tears building in my eyes. That day changed everything between us and I’m torn between wishing it never happened and hating myself for even thinking that. I hate being in this weird place with him where I have to pretend like he’s not constantly at the forefront of my mind, like he didn’t change my life.

The sound of other students trickling in gets louder and when I look up I notice a whole new group standing at the front of the classroom. Mr. Hale is standing next to Mrs. Harper and it only takes me a second to realise that the art club is here. I find Isaac immediately, that familiar pull between us still there as he seems to find me at the exact same time.

Our eyes meet and I can’t help the tear that slips out.