Isla and the Happily Ever After(61)
Author: Stephanie Perkins

She’s hesitant. Fearful. She joins me anyway.

“It’s freezing out there,” she says.

I’m surprised by how grateful I am for her company. “I know. I wish it’d hurry up and snow already.”

“Me, too. It feels wrong for it to be this cold without it.”

There’s an uncomfortable pause. It’s the kind that follows any general statement about the weather, the kind that’s filled with everything we aren’t saying. I’m trying to come up with another neutral topic when she asks, “How’s Josh doing?”

The blood drains from my face.

Sanjita doesn’t notice. She pokes at her fries. “I felt so bad for you guys when he had to leave.”

This unexpected moment of compassion tugs on my heart. “I…don’t know how he’s doing. I think he’s okay. We broke up last month.”

“You did?” She raises her head in surprise. “But you were perfect for each other.”

The floor dips. “You thought so?”

“Of course. And you’d been in love with him for, like, ever. That must have been crazy when you actually started dating him.”

The relief I feel at being understood – really and truly understood – is profound. The emptiness inside of me transforms into an instant flood of emotion. “It was crazy. It was amazing. It was…the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”

Sanjita scoots forward, and her dangly gold earrings sway. “So what went wrong?”

“I liked him – I loved him – but I don’t think he loved me the same way in return.”

Her shoulders fall. “He broke up with you.”

“No. I broke up with him.”

She winces. “Oh. Ouch.”

“I know.”

But her frown only grows. “I don’t get it. You guys were glued to each other. I saw the way he looked at you. He never looked at Rashmi like that.”

My heart stops. I could never ask Nikhil, but…Sanjita.

“Wh-what were they like as couple? Your sister and Josh?”

She shrugs, and her long earrings sway again. “I don’t know. They bickered constantly. I think they were more similar, more stubborn and determined, than they realized. It was why they sort of worked together, but why it never could’ve lasted. There was no balance.”

Josh and I had balance. Didn’t we?

“Not like she ever told me anything.” Sanjita scowls. “But, from the outside, it seemed like they’d both be better off with partners who were softer. Like you.”

I’m not sure I like that word. Softer.

She sees my expression and shakes her head. “Not, like, weak soft. I meant…someone who’d give them the space they need to flourish. Who wouldn’t try to change them. Who’d support them – even when they were being dumbasses – but who’d be ready to guide them back when they needed it.”

“And…you think that’s me?”

“Are you kidding? You’re the most patient and forgiving person I know.”

A strange thing is happening. Something deep inside of me recognizes her words as true. I am patient and forgiving.

Just not with myself.

She looks away from me again, re-hiding her face, and I know she’s thinking about Kurt. About how she tested me for months. About how I wanted to be friends with them both, but how she forced me to choose anyway. I can see her shame. She clears her throat, pushing herself back into the present. “So why don’t you think Josh loved you?”

“I felt like I was…a nice distraction. He was so unhappy here, you know?”

“Phones are distracting. The internet is distracting. The way he looked at you? He wasn’t distracted. He was consumed.”

I get the sense that she’s being extra nice to me to make up for the past without having to say she’s sorry. It feels cowardly. But it also appears as if she believes what she’s saying. It’s simultaneously my greatest fear and my greatest hope. Is it possible, after all of this second-guessing, that Josh really did love me as much as I loved him? Is it possible that he saw something in me that I have trouble seeing in myself?

Is it possible that I’m worthy of being loved by someone whom I love?

My heart pounds at double its usual speed. “Either way,” I say. It sounds defensive. Like I’m making an excuse, which I suppose I am. “He needs to get his act together. The last time we talked, he still hadn’t figured out what he was going to do about school. He’s a semester away from graduation, and he’s just sitting on it. And he can’t go to New England without a degree. So, basically, he’s not going anywhere.”

Sanjita looks confused. “New England?”

I tell her about his school and everything else spills out, too. “And I thought I was getting used to the idea of la Sorbonne, but I don’t know. Back when we were dating, it sounded exciting to go someplace new. I did all this research, and Dartmouth seemed really cool, you know? Different. And when I went up there a few weeks ago, it was even better than I’d imagined. But when we broke up, it became his place again—”

“I thought you said he wasn’t going anywhere.”

“Well, I don’t know that for sure—”

“Who cares? Go to Dartmouth.”

“Yeah, but what if he thinks I want to move there for him?”

“Do you?”

“No, but—”

“So go to Dartmouth.”

I frown, and she stares at me like I’m dense. “I’m not sure what’s so difficult about this,” she says. “You got into the school that you wanted to get into. So go to it.”

Holy shit. She’s right. Is it really that simple?

Sanjita crosses her arms, smug. She knows she’s won her argument.

“You used to want to be a lawyer,” I say. “Do you still want that? Because you’re good at arguing your case.”

She grins. “What else do you need me to fix?”

“I don’t know. My sister? Can you fix her?”

“Hattie, I assume?”

“She’s relentless.” I grind une frite into its paper sleeve. “She showed up in my room the other day – unasked, of course – and immediately started rifling through all of my belongings. I told her to cut it out, but that only made her push this huge stack of books off my desk.”

“Maybe she’s just curious about you. Maybe she didn’t mean anything by it.”