S A I N F O I N

[onobrychis venosa] ➳ confusion.

"SOMETHING ON YOUR MIND?" Jackie asked, jostling me into reality and the chilly interior of her father's car.

The air conditioning made icy surfaces of all the leather on our seats, but Doug didn't notice. When he turned a dial on the center panel, yet another blast of cold air shot through the vents.

"Nope," I said, trying to catch Dad's eye in the rear-view mirror. He sat in the front seat with his eyes narrowed intently, focused on the weather report coming through the radio. "Just tired."

We hung a right into the school drive-through. "Me too." Jackie lifted her backpack onto her lap, readying herself to leave the car. "I have so many tests next week, and I don't get algebra at all."

Uninterested, I unbuckled my seatbelt, watching raindrops race down our windows. The clouds above us were slate-grey and bloated with precipitation, and though the day had just started I already wanted to curl up in bed again, my phone screen all but blinding me as I texted Isaac in the dark.

"Alright girls, how's this?" Doug signalled right again and pulled into a spot near the gymnasium. "Careful on your way out."

"Um, perfect," Jackie chirped. "Thanks, Dad."

We both hopped out of the minivan. I tried not to roll my eyes when she turned and made a show of waving sweetly to both of our fathers as we headed up the walkway. I had grown accustomed to giving Doug only a respectful nod and "Thank you," when I left his car each soggy morning.

But Jackie could go overboard sometimes. She was like a feeling that was impossible to shake. It didn't surprise me when she caught up to me after I tried unsuccessfully to speed through the school doors without her.

"Ren, wait." Her fingers closed around the hood of my jacket and I winced. "I was being serious. I — I actually need help."

"With math?" I let off a small laugh, though it came across more like a scoff. According to her father, Jackie was a straight-A student, student council treasurer and treasured community member. "I thought you were at the top of your class."

She paused, seeming to teeter between versions of the truth. "I'm trying hard. I'm topping the class in terms of effort, for sure," she said, but the humour escaped the desperation in her tone. "Do you think you could go over some assignments with me?"

I didn't hesitate, still taking a shortest route to my locker as she tagged along. "My friend Leo is a tutor, if you need one."

"I don't really know Leo."

That surprised me, considering the small size of our school and the fact that Leo generally knew a little bit about everyone and everything. But before I could tell Jackie that she didn't really know me either, she added, "We're friends, right, Ren?"

I could never really forget that Jackie was younger than me, or that despite their irritating personalities her family had helped us a lot when we needed to get back on our feet. I sighed. "Yeah. We're friends. Which is why I recommend getting an actual math tutor if you're having trouble."

She pouted, but that didn't explain my sudden discomfort. "Okay," she relented, twirling her hair around her finger. "Can you pass on my number, then?"

I whirled around and immediately identified the source of the burning sensation on the back of my head. Isaac leaned against a row of lockers right behind us, sporting his usual white shirt — which I could've easily made fun of him for if not for the searing look on his face.

There were dozens of others in the hallway, but the masses cleared out momentarily so Isaac could pass through. He caught up to me and Jackie after I motioned for him to come closer, still that war between fight or flight dancing in his eyes.

He was afraid.

"Hey," I said, trailing my fingers up his elbow as subtly as I could. "Good morning."

"Um. Isaac." Jackie lingered a little too close to my side for my comfort. She was snippy, and for some reason I suspected that had nothing to do with how I had cut her off. She forced a tight-lipped smile, and Isaac noticeably lowered his shoulders.

We were quite the sight — three of us walking in a row, blocking off the hallway — and I could feel the stares coming our way. Isaac towered over everybody else, while Jackie's hair was a forest fire under the dim lighting. "Hi," he said, lifting his chin. "Been a while, Jacqueline."

I stopped in front of a classroom door, the gears in my head coming to a screeching stop. Jackie did the same, but quickly angled away down a different corridor. "See you later," she said, her smile growing steadier when it was directed only at me. Ignoring Isaac, she slipped into the crowd.

"What was that?" As soon as she disappeared, I shifted to face Isaac, not caring that people were watching. "That was so weird."

He chuckled awkwardly, brushing his hair back and inadvertently bringing even more attention to his height as his elbow loomed over my head. "It's a long story."

Someone behind me knocked into me on their way down the hall, but I held my ground. "Are you going to tell me?"

Isaac considered it. "I want to talk to you at lunch."

Despite the bitter confusion swirling inside of me, I felt the corner of my mouth lift — because this was real. We were spending time together and building up to something tangible, something that increased in magnitude with every word passed between us.

And then I was afraid, too.

A chill skated up my spine. I felt it dig into my back every inch of the way up, a terse reminder of the last time I'd given myself to someone completely. I shivered, wrapping my arms around myself and clutching at my elbows. 

A warmth on my shoulder sent an electric shock that I felt in my fingertips — but it was just Isaac's hand, soothing me as though he knew exactly what I was thinking.

He smiled. "See you then."

I LEFT CHEMISTRY WITH my books bundled up against my chest and stress making my eyelids feel heavy.

Though I'd barely given Jackie's worries the time of day, I wasn't doing amazingly in my classes, either. But what should've been a trip to the library ended abruptly when I received a text from Isaac and steered myself into the north stairwell.

He sat on the bottom-most step, staring at the ground as other students stumbled around him. He was a traffic obstruction, and a completely oblivious one, too. I stifled a laugh at the sight, instinctively opening the camera on my phone before realizing I had no one to share the joke with.

Of course, Isaac noticed. He patted the spot next to him, then removed his hand a millisecond before someone stepped on it. I shook my head, leaning against the stair's railing instead. We waited like that for a minute or two, just long enough for the lunch hour rush to clear out.

Then I sat down, removing my earphones and sliding them into my pocket. Isaac tilted his chin at my phone. "You haven't posted anything in a while," he noted.

My Instagram account had laid untouched since I met him, mostly because getting cyber-stalked once was enough. "Yeah. Nobody has to know every detail of my life when it's almost exams. I should be studying, not trying to make my life look pretty."

"You don't have to try," he said, cocking an eyebrow. The stairwell emptied out, allowing the light from the hall to filter in and settle on the planes of his face.

I snorted. "Just stop. You know, girls don't like it when you tell them not to wear makeup." 

"Makes sense," he replied, his dimple a tiny crinkle in his cheek. "Anything else I should know about girls?" 

"They're not one-size-fits-all."

"That's super vague." 

I shrugged. "The question was vague." 

"Yeah," he admitted. "Sorry. I just wanted to make sure I didn't scare you off of social media or something."

"Honestly, you kind of did." I stared at my tennis shoes and scratched a stain off them, then unzipped my backpack and produced the sandwich I'd packed for the day. "But it's okay. I'm not crazy about sharing my life with everyone." 

He smirked, but something was off about it. Maybe his laughter lines weren't all there. Maybe it was just the fact that his expression melted into something sadder just a moment later. "But what about your friends from back home?"

I cringed. "I still talk to them."

Isaac didn't look convinced. "How often?"

"I don't know. Once every few weeks. Whenever it's someone's birthday." I tugged at the saran wrap on my sandwich. "I told you about them. They go to parties. It's hard to relate when I'm stuck in small town purgatory."

He nodded. "I remember."

We fell silent. Nothing to do with Isaac was ever truly simple, and I felt cobwebs connect between unrelated points as I struggled to grasp what he was getting at. "So what was the deal this morning?" I asked, trying to make sense the first and foremost issue. "With Jackie, I mean."

"I was getting there," he said, biting and quickly releasing his lower lip. He seemed almost angry with himself. "I just... I don't want to be an asshole, okay? I know we have tons of other stuff we should talk about before I start pulling shit like this, but... I need you to know that you can't trust her."

My emotions pulled at the insinuation that we had other things to talk about, but my frustration was more than evident in my voice. "I don't understand."

"I know you guys are friends, or whatever —"

"We're not."

"— and that's none of my business. You can and should be friends with whoever you want, right?" He exhaled slowly. "But if she knows stuff about you, her family might try to ruin your life. That what they do, and you need to be careful. They're just... a lot."

How many times a day did I have to be reminded of my best-kept secret?

The sharp pain in my spine tingled back into existence. This time, it slithered into my heart like a slow shot of adrenaline. "Isaac, they don't know anything about me that matters."

That was true. But he didn't believe me, and it was written all over his face. He returned his gaze to the ground, both of us excessively interested in our shoes. 

"After I left your house the other night," he began softly, "I realized I knew your dad's name, and your old town's name, and that I'm a nosy piece of shit."

My voice was thin, my appetite gone. "So?"

He hesitated. "So, I googled your dad. I found a news article."

I knew what was coming. I could feel my guard crumbling to a pathetic ruin, the frostiness that most people associated with December creeping across my skin and seeping through, suffocating the blaze that had ignited my thundering heart. I could feel my nerves pulling me apart from inside out, and lies bubble up inside of my throat. 

I wanted to cut him off, or walk away.

But he'd told me the truth about himself, and I couldn't walk away from that. So in the end, I let him say it, let him painstakingly ready his words and sprinkle false lightness all over them.

He cleared his throat. "I know about the fire."