Isla and the Happily Ever After(44)
Author: Stephanie Perkins

“Maybe…I don’t know. Maybe his dad wants to work this as a new angle for popularity. But he’s already won the election, so I doubt—”

“Of course!” I throw my arms around him. “Of course it’s his father’s idea.”

But Kurt isn’t convinced. I spend the next half-hour talking him through it, building my case, but by the time he leaves in fatigued irritation, even I don’t believe it. What if Josh panicked because this sudden influx of interest – Why the hell didn’t I know about this sudden influx of interest? – has him curious about other girls? And who are these other girls, anyway?

I type his name into a search engine, click on the most recent results, and discover him in the comments of several different websites, including the home page of that infuriating morning news programme. My spirit plummets even lower. They’re the typical boy-crazy, stalker-y comments that one usually finds online, but this time they’re different. This time they’re talking about my boyfriend.

At one a.m., my phone finally rings. My hands shake with anxiety and anger.

“I love you,” Josh says.

I’m thrown.

“Are you there? Isla?”

“Hi.” I say it cautiously.

“I thought we were starting every call with ‘I love you’ now.”

“I – I saw the interview.”

“Yeah.” He sighs. “I figured. My mom told me that you texted. She said I could call you to explain. I’m using her phone.”

There’s hope in my heart, but my voice cracks anyway. “Why did you say that?”

“I’m sorry.” His voice turns anguished. “I wanted to warn you, but I couldn’t. I said I was single, because I didn’t want to drag you into all of this.”

“I’m the girlfriend of a senator’s son. No one gives a crap about me.”

“You’d be surprised,” he says darkly. “I didn’t think anyone gave a crap about me, either.”

“So…it’s true? Girls are really calling for you?”

“Ugh. Yeah. Sort of. It’s weird. I wish they’d stop.”

Something glass, maybe a bottle, shatters on the pavement outside my window. A group of students drunkenly crack up. “So why wouldn’t you want to say you’re taken? It’s not like you had to give them my name and social security number.”

“I didn’t mean to hurt you.” He sounds pained. “That’s the last thing I want. I was trying to protect you, I was trying to keep you in the good part of my life.”

“But I want to be in all of it. Ugly parts included.”

“You sure about that? Because I have a lot of ugly parts.”

“Everyone does.”

“What are yours?”

“I get jealous when I think about other girls liking my boyfriend.”

“I get jealous when I think about Sébastien. And all of the guys at school who still get to see you every day.”

I snort. “You can stop worrying. No one is interested in me.”

“Nikhil likes you.”

I’m startled. “What?”

“Nikhil Devi. I overheard him talking about you to one of his friends once.”

Nikhil is the younger, nerdier brother of Rashmi and Sanjita. Not that I’m in any position to judge. He’s a sophomore this year. “That’s weird. What’d he say?”

Josh laughs once. “Oh, so you can leave me for him?”

“Yeah.”

“Nikhil likes your caboose.”

“I take it back. I didn’t want to know that.”

He laughs again.

“I’ve missed your laugh. I miss you.” I want to reach through our phones and touch his hand on the other side. “Thirteen days until I’m home. How will we survive?”

Josh sucks in his breath, and there’s a long and terrible pause. “That’s…the other thing I got permission to call you about.”

Oh, no. Please. No.

“My family has been invited to Thanksgiving dinner at the White House.”

The…what now?

“Isla?”

“The White House,” I say.

“Yeah.”

“As in, where the president lives? That White House?”

“Yeah.”

“Ha,” I choke out. “Ha!”

“It’s insane. I mean, a ton of families were invited, not just us. But still.”

“My boyfriend was invited to the White House.”

“Your boyfriend – who was expelled from high school – was invited to the White House.”

I begin laughing for real.

“My dad used to know the president, back in the day.”

I laugh harder. And I’m crying.

“Oh, Isla.” It sounds like his heart is breaking through the receiver. Whenever he says my name, he takes a part of my soul. I want him to say it again. “Please tell me that you know I’d give anything not to attend this dinner.”

“I guess it’s hard to say no to the White House.”

“Impossible.”

“What about winter break?”

“New York, I swear.”

I pick at a loose thread on my map quilt, a green thread that belongs to Central Park. “You’re sure you won’t be invited back for Christmas?”

“We’re Jewish.”

Shit. “I’m sorry. I know that.”

“I know you do.”

“I’m just upset. I feel so far away from you.”

“I know.” And his voice disappears into the ether. “Me, too.”

Chapter twenty-two

“You look sad to be home,” Maman says with her light accent. She just made a fuss over Hattie’s wild, self-trimmed hair, and she’s gearing up for a second fuss over me.

The cab pulls away with Kurt still inside, headed the final two blocks to his house. Dad picks up my suitcase in one hand and Hattie’s in the other, and we trundle upstairs to our landing. Our house smells like pumpkin bread. Maman has decorated everything in leaves and acorns and gourds. A garland of ribbons and red berries wraps around the bannister leading upstairs, and beeswax candles glow inside every room. Maman loves the holidays. And she loves having all three of her daughters at home.

“I’m not sad,” I assure her, thinking about the airport. Josh departed a mere two hours before our arrival. The timing still feels freshly cruel.

“You are. And you’re never the sad one.”