Chapter 34
Izzy
“Do you understand?” Coach Alexis says again. “I expected better of you.”
I dig my teeth into my trembling lip. When we finally got back to campus, I practically threw myself out of Nik’s car in my
haste to run to her office. I’ve apologized ten different ways since I sat down, but nothing has made her budge.
You stick with the team during away trips. Always. Plenty of my teammates have snuck out like I did to go to parties or clubs,
but they all know that when the bus to campus pulls up the next morning, you have to be on it. I know that, and I fucked it up anyway. No amount of explaining or groveling can erase that fact.
I suppose I ought to be grateful that she’s not suspending me or kicking me off the team, but in a way, this punishment is
worse. My second chance, ground to dust. I’m still on the roster, but I’ll never be the starting setter.
It takes me a moment to be able to manage more than a nod. “Yes.”
“I can’t expect someone I don’t trust to lead the team. That’s just how it is.”
I suppress another string of pleas.
“And it’s a shame, because you’ve been playing well. If not for this, we’d be having a very different conversation.”
The only good thing about this conversation is that I haven’t lied. Not once. Yes, I went out with Nik instead of staying with the team. No, I didn’t ask permission. Yes, I missed the bus. I haven’t lied about it, not a single word.
I’m so tired of lying to my family. Tired of pretending that Nik doesn’t mean a thing to me when he’s becoming everything.
Last night shouldn’t have happened, but I can’t bring myself to regret it.
“I understand.” I clear my throat, willing strength into my voice. “And again, I’m sorry.”
“You can go.”
I nearly knock over a side table in my haste to get to the door. By some miracle, I haven’t cried in front of her, but I know
that tears will start flowing the moment I’m free from the confines of this stupid, magazine-glossy office.
“Callahan?”
I freeze with my hand on the door handle.
She gives me a look that could crack ice. “I hope that boy was worth it.”
When I shut the door, I press my fist to my mouth, swallowing a sob. I expect to see Nik waiting, but I’m alone. In case Alexis
is planning to leave her office, I jog down the hallway, peering around corners for him.
Eventually, I hear his voice. He’s speaking Russian, so I don’t understand a word, but still, I relax at the sound. I enter
the gym lobby, making a beeline for him; he’s pacing by the door, face taut.
“No,” he says in English, an edge to his tone, “I didn’t—”
At the sight of me, he stops midsentence and hangs up the phone. I lurch into his arms. He hugs me tightly.
“How did that go?” he asks quietly, into my hair.
“About as well as you’d expect.”
“I could talk to her.”
“Absolutely not.”
“What did she—”
“I messed up.” Alexis’s parting shot to me echoes in my mind: I hope that boy was worth it. “It was my fault.”
“I’m the one who went to see you.”
I shake my head. “None of what I did this season matters.” Tears streak down my flushed cheeks. “How well I played, all the
extra work I put in—she’s not giving the starting setter position to someone she can’t trust.”
“That’s bullshit.”
I untangle myself from him, shoving at the doors to the building so hard, they bounce against the brick. Cold air blasts me
in the face, setting off shivers. I didn’t bother to throw my coat on for the dash from Nik’s car to the building, and now
I’m regretting it.
“I’m sorry. It’s my fault, I’m the one who kept you out all night. Are you sure I can’t—”
“God.” My breath blows out like smoke in the freezing air. “I can’t do this.”
“Do what?”
If the night we just shared meant to him what it meant to me, then this lie isn’t hiding a crush. It’s hiding a spark that
could easily grow into a wildfire. Yet around everyone, we act like we don’t know each other at all. Moment after moment this
fall—even during the dinner with my parents—we acted like near strangers. I shoved it down and pretended it didn’t matter.
That we didn’t matter. Volleyball just fell to pieces, and if I have to keep pretending that Nik is nothing to me, I’m going to break.
I whirl on him. “Lie. I can’t lie anymore.”
He opens his mouth. Shuts it. I wipe my face roughly.
“Isabelle,” he says finally. His eyes are wide; he swipes his tongue over his lips. He fists his hands, then relaxes them,
over and over.
I know he knows what I mean, and yet he doesn’t say anything else.
I jerk my hand through the tangled ends of my hair. Words crowd my throat, but it’s an effort to string them together. “Part
of me was relieved, in her office.” I laugh hollowly. “Relieved that at least I didn’t have to lie about you.”
“What did she say?”
“It doesn’t matter.” I haven’t truly let myself think about what this means yet. What kind of future I’ll have on the team.
What a disappointment I’ll be to my parents the instant they hear what happened, and why. It’s all background to the sight
of Nik so still, his expression so pained. The five feet between us may as well be a canyon.
“Of course it does. She has to know it was a mistake.”
“I don’t care.” Another fucking lie, but at least it makes him take a step forward.
“Isabelle,” he says again. His expression is so stark that it would scare me if I had enough room in me to feel anything but
heartache.
“I can’t lie to my family like this.” My voice cracks. “I can’t sneak around anymore, especially if it’s going to get in the
way of everything else, for someone who isn’t...”
“What are you talking about?” His voice sounds odd and flat.
I convinced myself that casual with him felt different because I actively made the choice, but in the end, the path twisted
in the same direction. I felt something for him from the start, and I thought he did too, especially after last night, but
maybe he’s better at keeping people out. There’s so much he hasn’t shared, especially when it comes to his family. Maybe I’m
the idiot again, shoving my feelings at anyone who gives me a second look. Letting myself believe this was going somewhere,
that the trust went in both directions, when I’m not enough for him.
“You might be capable of holding yourself apart from everything and shutting out your family, but I can’t do that.”
A twitch, as if I just slapped him. “My family has nothing to do with this.”
“And mine has everything to do with it,” I shoot back.
He doesn’t react with so much as a blink. He may as well be a statue. Cold. Unbothered. Letting me drown in front of him.
“I can’t do it anymore,” I whisper. “Not unless it’s for real, Nik. Is it for real?”
Something flickers in his eyes at the break in my voice, but he doesn’t answer.
Last night, he called me his Isabelle . Now he doesn’t say a word. Tears press at my eyes to the point of pain. If I take in a full breath, I won’t be able to hold
back my sob. No answer, but it’s answer enough.
I somehow manage to open the door and escape back into the warmth of the gym.
I think I hear my name, but he doesn’t follow. Wishful thinking, like every other moment from May to now. Last night didn’t
matter. None of it did.
At least I manage to find a quiet corner before the tears fall.
The shot of tequila tastes extra smooth going down. My belly’s on fire, my limbs loose. I slam the glass on the table alongside
the rest of the guys—football guys, maybe lacrosse, it doesn’t matter—and throw my hands up as they cheer for me.
I smile. The whole room’s gone hazy, thanks to that fifth... no, sixth... shot. Something about the tequila makes me
think of summer, but I can’t remember the specifics now. I don’t want to remember the specifics ever again. Floating, fuzzy—it’s
so much better than wallowing. So much better than reliving that ice-cold expression. How Nik didn’t say a word when I laid
myself bare.
I stagger backwards, nearly tripping, and someone steadies me, his hand lingering on my waist before I sidestep. Terrible Christmas music. Tons of sloshed students looking to blow off end-of-semester steam. I lived at parties like these all last year, twirling in my heels and glitter, drawing stares from every direction. Why the hell did I stop?
I drown the answer in another shot.
When I showed up at Victoria’s dorm, already dressed to party, face blotchy, she took one look at me and hauled me to the
bathroom to do my makeup. No I-told-you-sos, just waterproof mascara and higher heels.
Before everything, we were going to go to tonight’s hockey game, but this is way better. This has booze, and sugar cookies,
and no hockey players whatsoever. It’s free of things like volleyball, and lectures, and staring into the eyes of someone
you think you knew, only to find a stranger looking back. Screw that. Screw everything but this. Frenetic energy and breathlessness
and someone pulling me to the dance floor.
“Take it easy on the shots,” Victoria says in my ear, hauling me away from the football-or-lacrosse guys. “Let’s dance instead.”
I hug her, rocking us both to the weird dance remix of “Jingle Bell Rock” playing from cheap speakers.
“You smell like beer,” I say, smacking her cheek with a kiss.
“And you smell like a bottle of Patrón.”
Someone passes by with a tray of shots, and I grab two. Victoria grimaces, but handles hers while I handle mine. It’s such
a cheap brand, it makes my nose smart, but I like that, too. It adds yet another log to the fire burning in me. Multicolored
lights twinkle at the edges of my vision as I twirl around, commanding attention, as always.
I can burn brighter. That’s my specialty. I burn and I burn until I’m nothing, until I’m alone again.
I’m not sure how I end up on top of the table, but once I’m there, I’m dancing. I rip a garland away from the wall and drape it around myself like a feather boa as I sway my hips. Someone changes the song to an especially sultry rendition of “Santa Baby,” and I launch into a proper dance, singing along to the lyrics. I trail my hand down my throat, the front of my green sequined dress, and toss my hair over my shoulder as the crowd whoops.
If you decide it’s going somewhere, don’t hide it.
I hope that boy was worth it.
I can’t do it anymore.
I spin. The table buckles.
I hit the floor, and the strands of Christmas lights wink out like stars.