Ignoring the sting of her words—ones I certainly deserve—I nod in agreement. “Thank you.”
I reach toward her, planning to guide her toward the door to the second-story patio, but when my palm grazes her lower back, she steps back, a look of horror on her face like I just punched her.
Lifting my hands in a placating gesture, I ask, “The patio work?”
She nods, and I let her lead, following her out the door.
“Okay,” she says as soon as the door slams behind her.
The sun is low in the sky, perfectly framing her head. She looks beautiful standing there with her arms crossed. Like a goddess sent to avenge womankind everywhere. It’s…shocking.
I shake my head, realizing I might be too drunk to be having this conversation if I’m suddenly fixated on the perfect curves of Izzy’s body. Curves that I’ve noticed exactly one time before—backstage at my tour in Australia.
“Mmk,” Izzy says when it takes me too long to respond. “Well, if you’re not going to apologize, I’m going to go eat my dinner in peace. Certainly going to order another hard cider or five.”
“No. Wait, I’m sorry, Iz. I’m so, so sorry,” I say, the words tumbling out.
And I realize just how true it is. I’ve missed Izzy Harper so much, and it’s all my fault. I’m a complete and utter dirtbag, andas much as I know I don’t deserve her forgiveness or friendship, I want it.
She shrugs like my apology means nothing. Maybe it doesn’t.
“Izzy,” she reminds me. “Or Isabel would be preferable.”
“Right. I’m so sorry I left without saying a word, Isabel.” I emphasize her name, trying to fight against the instinct ingrained in me to call her by her nickname. “I just couldn’t say goodbye to you, I couldn’t—”
She scoffs, cutting me off. “So you left me high and dry instead? That you could handle?”
“No, it’s not like—”
Izzy’s eyes blaze as soon as the word no leaves my mouth. “Do you know what you leaving did to me?”
As annoyed as I am that Izzy keeps cutting me off—that she refuses to let me explain—I want to know what she has to say. Ineedto know.
I need to feel the cuts of her anger across my flesh. To feel the burn of her disappointment in my soul. To know how irrevocably broken our friendship is.
“What did it do, Iz?” I ask, my voice so low I’m not even sure she can hear it. “Tell me.”
“It…it-it crushed me!” she huffs out. “I thought you were dead. And then I knew you left, and it was almost worse. Your dad told me you left without saying goodbye, and I could barely believe it. We were best friends—you wouldn’t do something like that. But then I called you. I texted you. I wrote you a fucking letter. And you couldn’t even spend six seconds to send me ahey, go fuck yourselfreply. That’s how little I meant to you.”
“It’s not like that—” I start, but Izzy speaks over me again.
“I was devastated. You abandoned me. Oh! And”—she’s really on a roll now, barely even taking time to breathe—“in the actual midst of this, in between all the pitying glances from everyone in school and the tiptoeing around me at home, I had the biggestinterview of my life. Of. My. Life. Do you happen to remember which one it was, Jaxon?”
It’s clear from her tone that I should know. IwishI knew if only to give me a shred of hope that I’m not the worst person in the entire world. Unfortunately for me, I’ve done everything in my power to block out those few months—both the ones leading up to my departure and the ones immediately following—so when I try to rummage through my mind, I can’t find anything.
“Haaa,” escapes Izzy’s mouth, like some amalgamation of a laugh and a sob. “Of course you don’t. Why would you?”
She runs her hands through her hair, and it takes everything in me not to jump in, to cut her off, to beg her to spare me from whatever horrible thing I did to her. But I don’t. Because I know I deserve to feel the pain of whatever disappointment she’s about to share with me.
“I had my interview for Harvard, Jaxon. Remember it? The one you told me you’d drive me to? The one you knew how freaked out I was about it. How big of a deal it was for me to get into a school that was as impressive as Kelsey’s? How stressful it was for me to sit in a car with my mom or dad and have them prep me for the interview with practice questions. So you were going to drive me. But instead, you left. So not only was I stressed about the interview, but I’d also just found out I was the type of person whosebest friendcould just up and leave without a backward glance.” Her nostrils flare as she chuckles. “So, as you may be putting together, it didn’t go well. I failed. Spectacularly. Cried not once but twice during the interview.”
As I imagine the scene, the tears dripping down Izzy’s face, everything around me goes muffled, like the silence of a recording studio before I begin to play, the only sound my own pulse thundering in shame. My stomach churns so violently I half expect to throw up right there, punishment from the inside out.
“I forgot, Iz. I’m so fucking sorry. I—I forgot.”
“You know what?” Izzy asks, flipping long brown hair over her shoulder. “Apologynotaccepted. I was clearly too naïve to see how big of a dick you were then, but I’m not now. I may be the least successful Harper sister, but I’m not an idiot. So, no. I don’t forgive you. Bye, JaxonSteele.”
She says my last name like it’s a poisonous barb she’s trying to detach from her tongue.
