ISABELLA

CHAPTER TWO - "BOY IN THE RED HOODIE"

OCTOBER 4TH, THURSDAY

I ARRIVED AT the group counselling session ten minutes early, my grey headphones still playing music as I stopped in front of the familiar area. A new, unknown figure was standing in front of the wooden door, wearing a ruby red hoodie with their hood firmly pulled over their head.

I stood behind them, confused at the arrival of this unfamiliar figure.

After a moment of just standing there, I pulled down my headphones towards my neck, clearing my throat before saying, "Hey, uh." I rocked back and forth on the balls of my heels. "Are you here for the group counselling?"

The person turned around, and a pair of vibrant, bright green eyes immediately greeted me. Light brown curls peeked out from under the red hood, his lips were parted in a way that resembled slight surprise, and I shot him an awkward smile, still not understanding the situation at hand.

I waved. "Um, hi."

The boy blinked. His hands reached upwards to pull down his hood as he smiled back so brightly that I think I went blind for a few seconds.

His cheeks were slightly flushed, shaded with soft pink. "Oh, yeah, hi!"

"So," I started, grasping and fiddling with the straps of my backpack between my thumb and my index finger. I looked over the unfamiliar boy's shoulder and at the wooden door, pointing at it. "Are you, like, here for the group counselling? Because you can just, like, go in."

"Oh, okay!" He opened the door and stepped to the side. I walked in, mumbling a quick thank you and my best attempted, hopefully, natural smile. I sat down on my usual viridescent seat, pulling off my bag and placing it on the floor, leaning on one leg of the green, plastic chair.

I pulled my headphones back on, pulling my phone out from inside my pocket and scrolling past different playlists, tapping on various songs and contemplating the reason for even attending meetings like these.

Group counselling had to be one of the most tedious things known to man. I mean, sharing your feelings with other people and being open with them? Who the hell does that? Come on.

Glancing up from the screen, I realised that the boy had been standing in the middle of the classroom, shuffling around on his feet and biting on his bottom lip.

I blinked, confused, but then let out an, "Oh." in realisation, pulling down my grey headphones and pausing the music. "Uh, are you new?"

He nodded over-enthusiastically, probably overjoyed that I had finally acknowledged his existence with him standing there in awkward silence instead of just scrolling through my phone.

Just when I thought I couldn't be a worse person.

"Right, yeah, should've guessed." I let out an embarrassed chuckle, questioning my life choices in the process before gesturing to the circle of seats arranged in the order of the colour wheel. "We're pretty early, so you just, uh, take a seat and wait for people to come in."

"Oh, okay," He said, taking the red seat next to me that matched the colour of his hoodie. He grinned, looking over to me. "My name's Nathan, by the way."

Nathan Smith.

"His brown hair is like chocolate, and his eyes... They're so gorgeous, and they're like this shade of green, and it's so, I don't know, so pretty!"

Today is not my fucking day, apparently.

I looked at his eyes, mouth dry as his green eyes bored into my plain, brown ones. The boy I had heard endlessly about, described with such affection that not even the gods could deny, was finally in front of me.

And in a moment of realization, his figure and stature seemed oddly familiar.

My mind wandered back to Maths club, and how he would always stand next to the door of the classroom, his eyes forever scanning the crowd for a particular boy.

So I have met him.

Thanks, partial amnesia.

"Right," I blurted, turning away.

Should I even be talking to him? I mean, aren't I supposed to hate him because Ro likes him or something? Does it even matter? Am I being a massive idiot and overthinking it? Where are these questions going?

"So."

His hand rose to scratch the back of his neck, green eyes wandering to distinct parts of the sizeable room in silent discomfiture. I looked at him, expecting him to continue and hopefully carry on the conversation.

"How long do you usually have to wait for?"Nathan asked, peering over just a bit at me.

"Uh, around ten minutes or so? Mrs Lillie is always just, like, off to somewhere, so there really isn't a set time," I explained, and he nodded in response. I continued, "The others come quicker though, so it's not as awkward as, you know-" I let out an awkward laugh and gestured at myself. "-This."

He smiled gently. "I don't think you're awkward."

I scoffed at the sentence, raising an eyebrow in immediate doubt and disbelief before muttering under my breath, "Oh my god, if you don't think I'm awkward, then you have way too low standards for people."

Fuck.

"I didn't mean that in a bad way, or anything, I'm just, like, not very good with people, and stuff," I blabbered, cuffing and uncuffing my sleeves repetitively anxiously, scared that I had accidentally insulted the boy sitting next to me.

I sighed, sinking into my seat in embarrassment. "Sorry."

Nathan laughed amused by my flustered and bewildered demeanour at my own statements. There was no sense of mocking or ridicule in his voice, nor was there any irritation in his eyes as he smiled. He said, "It's okay."

I chewed at my already short nails, unconsciously bouncing my leg up and down in an anxious frenzy. I quietly rethought my life choices that led up to this moment.

"Honestly, don't worry about it," He said softly, attempting to comfort me. "Who isn't a little awkward?"

I ran my fingers through my hair. "Yeah, I guess that's true."

His words were strange.

Confusing, even.

The students poured into the classroom, filling the circle of chairs with different friend groups, laughing and chatting about topics that I couldn't catch. The groups varied to a certain distance - from girls tapping away at their phones with strange vigour to students dressed in black, keeping their heads down and staying silent.

It was quite confusing, honestly. Everyone in the room suffered from unique problems that had no correlation to one another, with no collections of similar issues or struggles.

For example, on one hand, you had me, who just kind of struggled to talk to other human beings, and on the other, you had the boy whose best friend literally died.

It was almost as if the school just wanted to seem like they had a group counselling session just to seem more proper towards parents and potential pupils, without actually providing any proper care for the current students themselves!

My, what an outrageous assumption! How absolutely scandalous of me.

Sarcasm is fun.

"Have we met before?"

I turned to face Nathan, confused at his sudden and unexpected question. His cheeks flushed with pink as he continued with his words, "Sorry, you just seem familiar, but I don't, like, actually remember if I've actually talked to you before."

Fuck.

I furrowed my brows together, pondering if I should just lie and tell him I've never met him in my life, or if I should explain to him about Maths club and potentially make him recall of his best friend.

Deciding to not be an asshole, I settled on the latter.

"I, uh, I don't think so?" I chuckled nervously, hoping that my lie was believable. I hesitated for a moment, struggling to come up with words to follow up with before saying, "I've got a sister, so maybe that's why? Her name's Bethany, maybe you've seen her around before."

Oh, Bethany.

My older, absolutely adoring sister with a strange taste for mischief and being an absolute, annoying asshole.

I briefly wondered if she would mind me throwing her under the bus for my incapability to lie and engage socially, but the thought quickly disappeared as I realised that she would most likely just be laughing her ass off.

And as a smile tugged unconsciously at my lips, I couldn't help but struggle against the heavy, weighing pit in my stomach.

Nathan didn't seem to spot my internal panic and simply smiled. He said, "No, I don't think I've seen her before." He then shrugged carelessly, settling back down into his seat. "Maybe it's just my imagination."

He muttered quietly, "Doesn't really matter, anyway."

He twiddled with the dog tag was around his neck, sinking into his seat like a kicked puppy.

Relieved by the drift of topic away from my sister, a sense of curiosity still lingered at his muttering of the sentence. I nodded, deciding that it was none of my business to begin with, anyway.

"Right!" We all turned as the door slammed opened, followed by Mrs Lillie stumbling in, just barely being able to clutch her files in her left hand, added on to the mug of black coffee in her other.

She kicked the door behind her closed, immediately dropping her files onto her wooden desk with a loud thud and taking a massive sip of her coffee. There were visible dark circles under her eyes, and I couldn't help but wonder about the last time she slept.

"Okay, hello, you all know the drill." She sighed, taking another sip of her coffee before turning her gaze on Nathan. "Oh, right, we've got a new student."

Nathan waved, unknowing of what else he should do while the focus of the class was projected all onto him at once.

Out of the corner of my eye, I could spot the aforementioned group of girls whisper with each other, giggling for a few moments before taking more suggestive glances at the boy sat next to me.

"Nathan, if you can just introduce yourself to the rest of the group, that'd be great," Mrs Lillie said, not meeting Nathan's gaze once while she spoke. Nathan glanced around the circle of students, looking slightly off-taken for a brief second before putting on another smile.

"Uh, well, I'm Nathan." Some more giggling came from the crowd across the circle, and more quiet mumbling from everyone else."I like baseball, my favourite colour's red, and I've got an older brother, and his name's Elliot."

Elliot Smith - a name I had faintly recalled from somewhere in my memory bank - was the captain of the football team, and according to Bethany, won just as much as his brother did in the genetics lottery.

What a time we live in.

"I'm not really sure what else to say, but I guess I also like sweet things?" Nathan scratched the back of his neck. He looked down at the tiled, white floor briefly, still twiddling with the dog tag. "Not really the most interesting person in the world, or anything."

Some students chuckled and laughed slightly at his words, letting other pupils take the chance to hide under the noise and chat to their friend who was sitting next to them, resulting in what started as light laughter from some of the students turning into a loud crowd.

Mrs Lillie cleared her throat loudly. The room immediately turned silent at her action, the students not making a noise.

"Thank you, Nathan," She acknowledged briefly, and Nathan nodded quietly in response.

She then stood up from her office chair and walked towards her table, pulling out the wooden drawer and grabbing some brightly coloured markers. She scribbled words on the whiteboard behind her, writing, "Partner Activity!" in a bright, neon pink.

"Since the entire group counselling thing has just recently started about two weeks ago, you guys probably still don't know each other really well yet," She said, putting down the marker on her desk. She said the words with dread to her voice, as if they were planned words from a script, typed out in some document she had to read off of.

"Now, I 'll put you guys up with someone into a pair, and I want you to take pictures of beautiful things with them," She said.

Wow, social interaction with random teenagers that I've known for like, two months? Sounds absolutely wonderful.

Lewis, a boy with straight raven black hair, raised his hand. "Is there a more specific description of what clarifies as beautiful?"

"No, everybody has a different perspective on what counts as beautiful, so there isn't a general clarification on beauty." Mrs Lillie rushed back to her seat and sat down, tapping her fingers on her lap and taking a quick sip of coffee from her mug. "Take pictures of whatever you want and perhaps even discover some similarities you share with your partner, try to make friends."

Thank you for the fantastic clarification, darling.

Tiffany, a girl with a pink hair clip in her long, blonde hair asked, "When is the deadline on this, uh, thing?"

"Fifteen of November, so do whatever you want in those forty-something days or so."

I wondered why we had such an interminable period of time just for taking pictures, but then realised that it probably wasn't mandatory or needed, and she was just trying to get herself as much time not in this group counselling situation as possible.

And honestly? I can't argue with that. I wouldn't want to deal with myself either.

"Do we have to print the pictures?"

"No, but I do expect you and your partner to have a shared digital picture album with the pictures that you can share with me." She quickly grabbed a jar with sticks of popsicle sticks in it that was on the table.

"The popsicle sticks has a letter written on it, if a person gets the same letter as you, you two are partners. Is that clear to everyone?"

Everybody nodded at her question.

"All right then, get going!"

Students lined up and picked out a popsicle stick, shouting out letters and searching for their partners as other students continued to draw wooden sticks out from the glass container, some fumbling with the sticks and they wondered which one to pick out.

I walked towards the table, randomly selecting a popsicle stick and taking it out of the jar, holding it in my palm anxiously as I sat down on my green seat.

I slowly took it out of my palm, flipping it over to see the letter.

M.

I looked around the room, too awkward to exclaim out my letter loudly. My eyes darted around the room as I searched for someone that still hasn't been paired up that might be my partner to the task, wondering who it could be and secretly feeling sorry for them.

"What did you get?" Nathan asked, one of his hands in his pockets as a polite smile tugged at his lips.

"M, what did you get?" I asked, he looked down and showed me his letter.

"L."

His disappointment and unease were apparent - his brows furrowed together and his hands dug deep into the front pocket of his hoodie. A bitter smile hung loosely from his lips. "Too bad."

I shot him a quick smile back in response, not knowing what to respond with. "Um, yeah."

Suddenly, a girl whose name I remembered was Amy walked up to me asked, "What did you get?"  causing me to turn away from Nathan and turn towards her.

She twiddled with her popsicle stick in her hand. Her long, perfectly manicured nails grazed the wooden stick. "Is it M?"

I blinked in confusion of how she guessed my letter but nodded nonetheless.

I decided not to question it, and just assumed that it was just the weird telepathic powers that all the loud, white girls have for some reason.

"Oh, really?" She looked at me, apparently surprised by my nod of approval before a smile appeared on her lips. She saw my head nod again and asked, "Do you mind switching with me? My friend has an M, and I really want to be with her for this project."

And before I even had the moment to answer, my popsicle stick was already snatched out of my hands and was replaced by the one that Amy previously had.

"Thank you!" She said before running off to her friend, leaving me stood there in a puddle of confusion.

I pushed the thoughts aside and looked at the letter on my new popsicle stick. Nathan looked over my shoulder at the popsicle stick and smiled lightly, his hands in the pocket of his hoodie. "I guess we're partners now."

Whatever goddamn entity is looking over me, I curse you with the blazing hatred of a million suns.

"Yeah, I guess."

He smiled and scratched the back of his neck, doing the same action as before, when he was flustered and, or nervous. "Sorry, you're like the only one who I remotely know in here, I hope I'm not bothering you or anything."

"Oh, it's fine! I would totally panic too if I was in a situation like this," I said, already well past the point of merely panicking. "So you're not, like, bothering me or anything."

Suddenly, the obnoxious school bell rang through the room, signalling the end of the last period, ECA for other students, and for us, the end of group counselling. The students all grabbed their bags and headed from the door, the sound of the door opening barely being heard over the bell.

I thanked the bell once more from rescuing me from the horribly dreadful session, ready to stand up from my chair and leave the classroom entirely.

"Oh shit," I murmured under my breath, realising that I haven't told him my name yet. I mentally cursed myself for being an idiot.

"I'm Isabella," I said, putting one strap of my backpack over my shoulder. The inner hatred dissolved as I saw his bright smile, no sense of annoyance or irritation in his eyes. "I just realised that I've never told you my name, so, there you go."

"That's a cool name." Nathan complimented, then his cheeks immediately flushed with rose, fumbling with his bag as he got up.

I silently wondered if I was really supposed to befriend this boy that stood in front of me, but still smiled at the truthful genuineness in his compliment.

"I mean, it's Italian and everything, and like, fancy." He blushed. "This is an awkward conversation."

I laughed, and Nathan seemed immediately relieved at the simplistic reaction that I had given him. He ran his fingers through his brown hair, radiating boyish charms with his simple, swift action.

For a split second, in just the slightest silver of time, I understood the reasoning behind why she had described him as such a jaw-dropping, beautiful boy. However, the moment ended as soon as it started, and I could only offer him a smile as an apology.

"Bye, Nathan," I had murmured.

He smiled back, and emptiness spread within me.

"Bye, Isabella."

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