The Story Of Us

10. Isaac

10

ISAAC

“Hello?”

“Isaac.” My dad’s voice is deep, his tone sharp as he says my name. I can remember a time when I was younger when hearing my dad say my name had happier memories and didn’t leave me with a feeling of dread. “We need you to come home this weekend.”

I stop walking and throw my head back, squeezing my eyes shut as I try to calm myself. I already know how the rest of the conversation is going to go and why they want me home, but I had hoped it would be a few more weeks before all of this started.

“Can I just come on Saturday? I have some work I need to do, so I’d rather be here on Sunday.”

It’s still early enough in the school year that a lot of homework hasn’t been set, but using the excuse of wanting to study is the only way he’ll let me cut this visit short. I used to look forward to going home on the weekends, but as I got older and the pressure from my parents increased, going there just felt like being in a cage. I have to act a certain way and pretend that I’m not constantly on the verge of breaking down.

“It’s not ideal, but I suppose so. We need you here by ten at the latest. The Smiths will be arriving at one. It’s a vital time to start introducing you to people, you’ll be having interviews soon, and it’s better if they already know your face. We don’t want you going to Oxford and being completely alone.”

To anyone else, that last sentence would sound like it’s coming from a father who’s just looking out for their son, but I know the deeper meaning. He still completely expects me to go to Oxford even after our conversation about it a few months ago, which means I have no choice but to keep up appearances and pretend I’m applying.

Both of my parents went to Oxford, where they met and fell in love, and going there started the foundation for their careers. They’re both wildly successful in their fields, and they expect me to follow the same path they did—it’s what the last six years of my education have been dedicated to. And for a while, I thought I was doing the right thing by just going along with what they told me to do, but as I got older and started realising I had little interest in it, the thought of focusing my entire life on it felt impossible.

“I’ll be there by ten, but I’ll need to leave by six if I want to get back to school before it gets too dark.”

My childhood home is about a two-hour drive away, so using that excuse to leave early is the easiest one I can think of.

In reality, I want to minimise the time spent with my parents, especially since the whole day with them will be focused on Oxford .

“Bring your sister. We might as well get her started on these introductions, too.”

I had thought that for just this year, they’d put all their focus on me and leave Izzy alone, but I guess not. I’ve tried my best to protect her from them as much as I can, reassure her that she can do whatever she wants, and I’ll support her in anything. But it’s harder to do that when we’re at home, and the weight of our parents’ expectations bears down on us.

“Okay.” I have nothing else to say. There’s no need to attempt to make small talk or tell him how the first week of school has been because he’s not interested. As long as he gets the results he wants from me in a few months, it doesn’t matter how I get there.

“Goodbye.”

He hangs up before I can say it back.

In a completely shocking turn of events, I open my bedroom door to find Luke asleep with his head on my desk. I drop my bag on the floor and collapse face down on my bed, wishing that I was asleep and the entire past forty minutes had just been a terrible nightmare.

Every interaction I have with Violet has me feeling like I’ve been dragged across gravel like I’ve been flayed open and exposed to her so she can see all my vulnerabilities. I knew she was trying to hurt me when she asked what kind of stuff I draw, and I know I deserve it too, but that didn’t help the ache in my chest feel any less worse.

I didn’t expect her to compliment me. I was fully resigned to never hearing anything like that from her ever again. But hearing those simple words from her had me feeling a different type of ache, a longing for her that I could feel with my entire soul. Her words affect me in a way that doesn’t happen with anyone else, and I think I’m fine never to receive a comment on my art from anyone ever again as long as I can keep replaying that moment in my head.

I need to apologise to her soon, but I haven’t wanted to do it in a way that feels rushed, and that’s all our conversations have been so far. She deserves a real explanation, deserves to know everything that happened in those twenty-four hours that led to the worst mistake I’ve ever made. I think she’s starting to open up to me again, though. I can sense it in the way she’s trying so hard to push through with this project, and I hope she sees it as a second chance for us, just like I do.

A breath of air huffs out of me as something heavy lands on my back.

“Lucas.” It comes out muffled from where my face has been forced into the sheets.

“Isaac.” He shifts his body so his face is next to mine, but he’s still half lying on top of me. “What took you so long?”

“Does your girlfriend know you act like this?” I shift my head to look at him right as he lifts his hand to show me his middle finger.

“I think I act worse around her. I’m so clingy.”

“You’re literally clinging to me right now.”

“Okay, but you’re my best friend.”

“Shouldn’t your girlfriend be your best friend?”

“Can you stop being weird and say her name? She’s still your friend, too.” His tone is more serious as he climbs off me and lays down. Maybe all the comments I’ve been making about the two of them haven’t been as lighthearted as I wanted them to be.

“Sorry, I’ll stop. Everything good with you two?” I turn to lie on my back so we’re side by side, both of us tilting our heads to look at each other.

“We’re great. She’s great. I don’t know how I waited so long to finally tell her how I felt.”

I understand exactly how he feels. When I finally told Violet I liked her, it was after years of harbouring a one-sided crush on her that I thought would never go anywhere.

TWO YEARS AGO

“Did you notice at the end how Sophie told young Howl that she’ll find him in the future?”

“Hmm.” She hums, and I can tell she’s getting sleepy. We started watching the movie quite late because we got too distracted talking about other things, and now it’s nearly midnight.

“And then do you remember how at the start Howl called her sweetheart and said he was looking everywhere for her?”

“I do.”

“He was looking for her that whole time! His ring shines when he finds her!”

Her face is dimly lit in the corner of my laptop screen, but I can still see the small smile on her face. I know I’m rambling and that Violet probably doesn’t care, but it’s one of my favourite parallels ever in a movie. The ring glistening is such a subtle touch that it isn’t immediately noticeable, but when you do see it, it adds so much to the story. It’s the kind of movie that only gets better every time you watch it so when Violet told me she’d never seen it, I knew we had to fix that.

“I love that,” Violet murmurs.

I love you springs into my mind, and I immediately banish the thought away. Where did that come from? I’ve liked her for a while now, she’s always the brightest part of my day, but I’ve never had the courage to tell her and probably never will. But love? I don’t think I even know what that would feel like, let alone if I feel it for her. But then, why did I think it?

Violet’s eyes widen slightly as if she’s just heard the thoughts running through my head, but then she shuffles around a little and nestles herself further into her pillow.

“I’ll let you sleep,” I tell her, not wanting to keep her up any longer when she’s already stayed up late just to watch a movie with me.

“I want you to tell me everything about it tomorrow,” she says, the words coming out slow and quiet.

“I will.” I can’t hide the smile on my face, and I don’t even want to. “Sweet dreams, Violet.”

She nods her head slightly, and within a few seconds, she’s fast asleep. No matter how tired I am, I always wait for her to fall asleep first. I love having this time to just look at her without worrying if she’ll catch me staring.

I’m not sure when I started paying attention to how pretty she is, but it feels like she just gets prettier every single day. Even asleep, she looks so peaceful and serene, all her features relaxed but still so distinctly her. I’ve tried drawing her a few times, thinking maybe I could give it to her on our birthday as a gift, but I can’t quite seem to capture her properly. It never matches up to how she really looks, and giving her anything less would feel like an insult.

The crazy thought pops into my head again as I look at her, maximising the window so her face takes up most of the screen now. What would happen if I told her? Would it ruin everything between us? I don’t want to risk losing her as a friend just because I have feelings for her that she probably doesn’t reciprocate. But what if she does? What if I told her and we actually tried being something more with each other?

She’s never talked to me about liking anyone else in our year, so maybe she could like me. Or maybe she just isn’t interested in anyone at all. I get the urge to say it out loud just once, to tell her even though she’s asleep and can’t hear me, so then, at least, I can say I tried.

“Violet, I like you,” I say, my heart in my throat at stringing those four words together and saying them out loud for the first time.

“Hmm?” Her eyes flutter open slightly, and I immediately slam my laptop shut. She can’t have heard me, right? She was asleep. The timing was just bad. She’s probably already asleep again.

My phone rings next to me, her name lighting up the screen, and I feel like throwing it across the room. I can’t just ignore her, though. I’ve never not answered when she calls, so I swipe my finger across the screen and bring the phone up to my ear.

“Say it again,” she whispers.

“Say what? ”

“What you said.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

There’s a pause, and then I realise she’s trying to FaceTime me instead. Again, I’ve never not answered her, so I accept the change, and then her sleepy, pretty face is on my screen.

“Do you really mean it?” she asks, and she looks so nervous, her eyebrows furrowed together and her bottom lip tucked between her teeth. I have to tell her, even if it’s just so I can change that expression on her face to something else.

“I do.”

“Then say it again.”

I take a deep breath, preparing myself to say just four words that will change absolutely everything between us.

“Violet,” I say her name clearly, and she leans closer to the screen. “I really like you.”

The smile that I get in return is so beautiful I think I’m dreaming for a second.

“I really like you, too, Isaac.”

I never thought I would hear those words from her, and it feels like I’ve ascended to the highest peak and reached a point of happiness from which I’ll never be able to come down. I know I’m smiling too big, and I probably look so ridiculous, but I couldn’t stop even if I tried.

Violet likes me. The girl of my dreams, the only girl I’ve ever had a crush on, the girl who occupies my thoughts at all times, the girl I’ve liked since the moment I first met her, likes me. I feel like I could run a marathon and still have enough energy to do it again as long as I can keep replaying her words in my head .

She yawns, still looking so pretty, and I just keep smiling at her.

“I’ll call you as soon as I wake up,” I tell her, even though I probably won’t sleep at all.

“Okay,” she nods her head, the corners of her mouth still turned up as she gets comfortable again.

“Sweet dreams, Violet.”

“Goodnight, Isaac.”

She’s asleep within seconds again, and I have to use all my strength to hang up on her and not stay on the phone watching her all night like a creep.

Violet likes me.

Violet likes me.

Violet likes me.

It repeats in my head as I settle down in my bed and try to sleep, the smile not leaving my face for a single second.

I can’t wait for school tomorrow.

“Where were you, though?” Luke’s question draws me from my thoughts, and I wish they had never gone there in the first place. I rub my chest as if I can physically soothe the ache there, but it doesn’t work.

I have two options right now—I can either lie and pretend I was with a teacher, or I can tell him I was with Violet.

If I do the second option, I worry I might end up exposing too much, but maybe that wouldn’t be such a bad thing. My entire relationship with Violet was a secret, even when we were just friends, and I loved that it was something just for the two of us. But right now, I really want my best friend’s advice so I decide to tell him the truth.

“I was with Violet in that old room in the science block.”

“Okay, so two questions, with Violet? And why that room? No one ever goes there.”

That’s the whole point.

I try to think of the best way to explain our relationship without going into our entire history. I don’t know if I can give him all of that yet—it still feels too fragile.

“We got paired up for that club project, remember? So we met up to discuss some ideas.” I turn my head away from him, staring up at the ceiling instead because I think it’ll make it easier if I don’t have to look at Luke as I tell him something I’ve kept hidden from him for so long. “And we met there because that’s where we’ve been meeting for years.” The words come out rushed in the hopes that maybe Luke won’t hear them and ask too many questions.

“Wait, what?” He gets up, leaning on one elbow so that his face is over mine, but I push him back down.

“Just…” I take a breath to steady myself. “Just let me figure out how to say this.”

“Okay, take your time.” His voice is gentler this time, as if he already knows there’s so much more to this story.

“On the first day of Year 7, when we did that icebreaker, she came over to talk to us, remember? And we found out we had the same birthday, so we lined up together.”

I feel Luke move his head next to mine, a small nod.

“When it got to the end of the year, and it was our birthday, I decided to give her a birthday card. I thought it would be a nice thing to do, but then she didn’t have one for me, so it was kind of embarrassing. I figured we’d just never speak about it again, but then the next day, she found me on the way to breakfast. She made a card for me.”

“Oh, wait, was that when I jumped on you?”

I can’t help but laugh at the memory. Luke had woken up late that day, so I was walking alone to the dining hall when Violet approached me. She told me that she’d made a card for me because she felt bad that she didn’t have one the day before. I was in the middle of telling her how much I appreciated it, and while I was working up the courage to say more to her, I ended up flat on my face instead. Luke had decided that was the best time to do a running jump onto my back and tackled me to the ground. Luckily, Violet just laughed it off, but I remember feeling so embarrassed that I pretty much just ran away from her after that.

“Yes, it was, and it’s shocking that you haven’t changed a bit since then.”

Luke lifts his leg and drops it over mine, and the corners of my mouth turn up as I fight a smile.

“But you still love me anyway.”

“Yes, I do.” I pat his hand, which rests next to mine, in the space between us. “Anyway, she found me later that day, and we swapped numbers, and then, I don’t know, it just kind of went from there.”

As I think about that turning point in our relationship, I realise I don’t want to tell Luke the full details yet. Not because I don’t trust him or I think he’ll make fun of me, but because it still feels too personal to share with anyone who isn’t her.

I clear my throat, trying to get rid of the lump forming as I think about Violet and the relief I feel in actually getting to talk about her is mixed with the guilt that’s been suffocating me for the past few months.

“We just started talking more, and once we found that classroom and realised no one went there, it just felt like the easiest place to go. So we went there on our birthday, and I gave her cards and gifts -”

“Gifts?” I don’t realise my slip-up until Luke repeats it. I want to keep the details as vague as possible but he already must guess it was serious if we were giving each other presents too.

I don’t dare tell him that I gave her my heart, too.

“I’ll tell you everything at some point, just not right now, okay?”

“Okay,” he says simply and I love him for it, for agreeing so quickly and not pushing me to talk about something that is tearing me apart inside. I try to steady my breathing again as it grows more panicky when I think about telling him where it all went wrong.

“Remember last year when you came to my room on my birthday?”

The memory is painful, the start of where it all went wrong, but I have to talk about it if I want his advice on how to fix it.

“Yeah, I remember.” His voice is tense, and I hate that I’m making him think about it again, too.

“I completely forgot about Violet. She waited an hour for me in that classroom and I just never showed up.”

“Oh, Isaac. ”

“I know, I know. It gets worse, actually,” I say, my voice coming out shaky, and I don’t know if I’m laughing or crying. “We actually started dating last year.”

Luke bolts upright, and I cover my face with my hands, glasses pressing into my eyes. I guess I am crying.

“What?”

“You heard me. And I’m sorry for not telling you guys, but I just… I don’t know. I guess I just liked the bubble we were in. She didn’t tell anyone else either, and it was just nice that we could see each other, and no one knew. When we were in that classroom, it felt like we were in our own world.”

“You don’t have to apologise for not telling us. I get it, I think. But what, you broke up just because you didn’t show up? I’m sure if you explained, she would have understood.”

He’s right, and I wish I could go back in time and do exactly that because what I did instead was so much worse.

“The next day, she caught me before breakfast, and I just..” I struggle to find the words to explain what happened and realise that I can’t. My palms are wet from my tears, and I don’t know how much more I can say about this without having a full breakdown.

“I really hurt her, Luke. And now she doesn’t want a single thing to do with me, but we have to work on this project together, and I’m trying so hard to talk to her, but she won’t talk to me, and I get why she won’t I really do get it, but I just want to apologise and-”

“Isaac, breathe.” Luke takes my hands from my face and holds them. He’s sitting cross-legged next to me now.

I close my eyes and take in shaky breaths. I didn’t think that finally admitting it all out loud would be this overwhelming. But maybe I was in denial this whole time, and saying it all is making me realise that I really lost her, and I don’t know if I can get her back.

“You don’t have to tell me anything else. I won’t ask for any more details. But you said you hurt her, and I’m glad you know that and you’re not trying to deflect. But knowing that means you have to make the effort to gain her forgiveness before you do anything else.”

“I don’t know how.” My voice is quiet, resignation already setting in because I don’t know how much more I can try without tearing myself apart in the process.

“Right now, you don’t. But if you were close before, you can be close again. Just take it slow for now and work on the project together. I think the more time you spend with each other, the more you’ll learn about her again, and you can figure out the best way to approach this. But for now, don’t push her too much. It has to be on her terms.”

“When did you get so smart?”

“I’ve always been smarter than you. I just hide it so you don’t feel bad about yourself.”

I let out a laugh, and I’m so glad that Lucas is my friend. “Thank you.”

“You don’t have to thank me, that’s what brothers are for.” He squeezes my hand, and as his words play on repeat in my head, I start to feel a little bit of hope that maybe things will work out with Violet.