Isla and the Happily Ever After(15)
Author: Stephanie Perkins

I wait for a voice.

Nothing.

I settle back into my book, warily, when I hear it again. Knock-knock. Low to the ground. I’m still gripping the hard cover, which might make a serviceable weapon, as I climb out of bed and tiptoe forward. “Hello?” I whisper.

“It’s me,” the other side says. “Josh.”

He adds his name, because he does not yet realize that I’d recognize his voice anywhere, under any circumstance. I’ve had this fantasy before: Midnight. Him. Here. My heartbeat accelerates. I shake out my pillow-limp hair and take a steadying breath. It doesn’t work. I turn the handle silently, but my hand trembles.

“Hi,” he says. His face is close to mine, as if his cheek, or maybe his ear, had been pressed against the wood.

“Hi,” I reply.

Josh leans against the doorframe. His body is several inches lower to the ground, which makes our eyes nearly level. We study each other in silence. He looks different this close. He looks real. Complete, somehow. I glance down the hallway. It’s dark and empty. This fantasy is definitely familiar…until he holds up a beer stein.

I frown, but it clicks only a second later. “You went! You really did go.”

Josh lifts the stein in a mock cheers. “I did.”

I smile. “How was it?”

“Crowded. Loud.” He sounds depleted. “A fairground with wall-to-wall frat boys and drunken parents trying to escape from their own bratty children. Mike and Dave would’ve fit right in.”

“Yikes. That bad, huh?”

“It’s safe to say that I’ll be selecting a new destination next weekend.”

“Germany’s loss.”

The corner of his mouth lifts into a smile. He holds out the stein, and I tuck my book underneath my arm to accept it. The stein is made out of traditional earthenware, heavy and gaudy and carved, with a pointed tin lid.

I laugh. “This is really, really hideous.”

“They all were. And the ones in the beer tents were even worse, plain glass with this badly designed Oktoberfest logo. At least this one has a sword fight. See the tiny knights in front of the Bavarian castle? It was the most adventurous one I could find.”

And that’s when I realize…this is a gift. Josh picked this out for me. Suddenly, the stein is beautiful. I clutch it against my chest. “Thank you.”

He nods at my book. “How is it?”

“Good. You can borrow it. If you want.”

Josh looks down at his sneakers, and then back up, and then back down. “You know that I like you. Right?”

My heart pounds so hard that he can probably feel the reverberations. But – for once – the words fall easily from my lips. “So stay here next weekend. Go out with me.”

Chapter eight

Josh isn’t in school the next day. He has three more days off for a holiday that he doesn’t celebrate. I wish I could get away with it, but the idea of potentially missing an important class or being late on an assignment makes me break out in hives. But I understand that his priorities are elsewhere – his art. So I’m shocked when I enter first period on Tuesday, and he’s slouched at his desk…a full five minutes before the bell rings.

A rush of adrenalin removes any last trace of morning sleepiness. “What are you doing here?” I hug a notebook to my chest, glowing with happiness.

“H–hey.” He sits up straighter. “Yeah. Funny story.”

I raise my eyebrows.

“Perhaps the head of school grew suspicious about the length of my absence. Perhaps she called my parents. Perhaps my parents confirmed that we don’t celebrate Sukkoth.”

My shoulders fall. “Perhaps you have a shit-ton of detention?”

Josh shrugs, but it’s a shrug of affirmation.

“That sucks. I’m sorry.”

He clasps his hands on top of his desk. “Actually.” Josh lowers his voice and leans in. “The situation isn’t all bad.”

I crinkle my nose. “It’s not?”

He stares at me. He stares harder.

“Oh.” My gaze drops in a sheepish sort of pleasure. “Um. How much detention did you receive?”

Josh sits back again, resuming his slouch. “Only three weeks, but—”

That snaps my head back up.

“Including Saturdays.” Another shrug. “It’s not a big deal, I can use the time to work. But I’m also on my final warning. Didn’t take long,” he adds.

My heart stops – literally stops – for a full beat. “Final warning? As in expulsion?”

“Seriously. Not a big deal.” But my panic must be showing, because he scoots forward in his seat. “Let’s just say that for a ‘final’ warning? It’s not my first.”

I wait. I have no idea how he can be so calm about this.

“Last year,” he explains. “In fact, I was on my final warning once in the winter and once in the spring. So, somehow, I got two. This is number three.”

“Well…be careful.” It sounds so lame. “I mean, the leaves haven’t even changed, and you wouldn’t want to miss that. Though they are prettier in New York—”

“I’ll be careful.” His voice is deliberate. He smiles.

I fiddle with a curl in my hair.

Two desks away, Emily Middlestone leans over. She’s wearing a pair of designer glasses that I’m sure are fake. “You know, that’d be really stupid if you got kicked out in your last year of school.”

Josh’s expression wipes blank. “Yeah, Emily. That would be stupid.”

Professeur Cole bursts into the room and grinds to a halt. “Am I late?” she asks Josh.

He shakes his head once. “Nope.”

“Well. How fortunate that you have finally learned how to tell the time.” But her smile is sly. She marches up to her podium, and I take my seat.

The one directly across from Josh.

We glance at each other with more openness throughout the week, but there’s still a shyness between us, an unwillingness to look or talk for too long. Our relationship has yet to be solidified. Anticipation – of something – hovers in the air. At night, it takes me hours to fall asleep. I place the beer stein on top of my mini-fridge, beside my bed, so that I can see it from my pillow. Proof that he’s thinking about me, too.

He doesn’t visit my room. His afternoon detention runs until dinner, and he still isn’t eating in the cafeteria. And then, after dinner, opposite-sex visitation hours are over. He’s cut back on rule breaking, and apparently that’s one he’s not willing to risk any more. So I continue my usual schedule of homework and studying, and I try to bite back the analysing. Kurt has been giving me dirty looks.