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special song recommendation for this chapter: let me down slowly by Alec Benjamin
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Iris
"...Uncle Steve, remember your fishing rod? Iris was the one who broke it and hid in it in the basement!"
I gape at my idiot of a brother as he is telling everyone my worst moments like I had done on his birthday in January. "Caleb!" I try to close his mouth with my hand but he squirms away.
"Iris, you did that?" Dad looks at me, surprised.
"Sorry, dad! Caleb, don't you—"
Caleb sighs, dramatically, "Oh, I remember the day Iris snooped out of the house to go to a club at two am because the club was handing out 5SOS merch and posters only to find them selling Justin Bieber's ones!"
Everyone starts to laugh while I glare at him.
"I didn't know, Milady, you were such a rebel!" Adi says and I scowl.
"It was written on a blog!" I defend myself, making Colt laugh. "Don't you laugh! You were the one who made fake ids for both of us."
"What?" Alya, Colt's Mom, and my dearest Mother ask, looking between their children. Colt and I shrink back, a bit, at their stare.
Alya says to Colt, "We are going to have a long talk, young man."
"Iris!" Colt glares at me.
"What? You are going down with me, too!" I reply to him, giving him a dry look.
In our backyard, the lights are hung on the taller trees, across each other, and a huge banner wishing me a happy birthday. Upon a long carpet, a long table, decorated with flowers and candles, is set with pillows near it and all of us are now eating dinner – actually, finished eating it as we are on dessert.
Except for Mr. Radcliffe and Sam (who has apologized to me a lot of times for not coming to the party because he has a paper pending), all of the Radcliffe family is here along with my family and friends.
I want to talk to Noah but it is so difficult to talk with him when people are surrounding me with hugs and wishes.
I steal a glance at Noah.
He is sitting diagonally to me and between Amelia and Tiffany, who is stroking Yeti's fur. He is, apparently, rolling his eyes at something Chris and Adi are talking about.
He has worn a white tee under his blue plaid shirt, rolled to his elbows, with denim pants and black Vans. His chocolate hair is messy but shines under the lights. He looks good, nevertheless.
When he starts to turn, I look away, quickly.
"One thing I am really happy about there are no balloons," Colt says, interrupting my thoughts.
I roll my eyes. "Of course, only you will have an enmity with balloons."
Then, Victoria says, sitting next to him, "He is upset that he didn't get to know about the plans."
"That I am," Colt grumbles.
Alyssa tells me, "When Adi told us he wanted to take you to meet his mom—who is amazing, by the way—"
"I know! She is so cool!" I agree with her.
Adi scoffs. "She just loves you both more than me." Alyssa and I share a smile, not denying it, and Adi complains, "Oh, come on!"
"Also, how hard it was to keep everything to a minimum when you were at home," Michael points and all of them, agree. "As luck would have it, we called Colt for emergency things."
"Well, if you would have earlier, the surprise would have gotten better," Colt says back. "You already knew about the party, didn't you?" He asks me.
"Just some seventy-three seconds before Dad opened the door," I tell him, honestly.
"So, still a success," Adi says, licking cream off the cake off his lips.
"I had told them just to wait a few minutes but no, they had to soundcheck," Alyssa says, rolling her eyes at Tom and Chris.
Tom tries to defend, himself. "The kid said he had better music."
"Which, honestly, is true." Chris pipes in and Tom gets a bit red, glaring at him. He turns to me with his boyish grin. "Have I mentioned how lovely you are looking?"
Surprised, I look at him as he is sitting on my other side. "That's... very formal of you, Chris, but thanks."
Sheepishly, he rubs the nape of his neck, saying, "Yeah..." He trails away until he says, "I got a lecture from Amelia, again."
Amelia looks up from her phone. "What? No, I—yes, I remember now. Good that you are taking my advice." She nods at him and gives a thumbs up.
I can feel Noah looking at me but... not now. It is not the right time to talk to him, not in front of everyone.
Tuning into my friends' conversation, I hear Nick tell me, "I cannot believe you got henna tattoos instead of permanent ones."
Adi says, loudly, "Same!"
Colt shrugs. "She told us she would get a tattoo—didn't say temporary or permanent."
"Give this man a prize, y'all." I hoot and Colt bow downs, dramatically.
As they laugh, I roll my eyes but smile. "I am glad you, all, are here."
"You better be." Keisuke lets out a breath, who is sitting across me, along with Justin and Juliet. "This was a hard thing to pull off."
Alyssa gives him a look as Tom says to him, "You didn't do anything."
Adi says to Keisuke, "You can't even ask out Lana, setting up a party is way far from that!"
Juliet laughs. "He can't ask her out."
"Why?" Chris asks, looking at us.
Justin says, shrugging, "Because she is surrounded by a group of—"
"—Giggling Gargoyles," Juliet and I complete it, giving each other high-fives.
Lana is one of our junior dancers in the team and Keisuke has a huge crush on her. But the worst part is that she is one of the students who know gossip and is crazy about Gossip Girls (like, duh).
Keisuke sighs, saying, "Well, I don't know what to do."
"Does she like you?" Amelia asks him, eating.
"She texts me a lot... it counts, right?"
"Depends on what topic she texts about," Michael points it.
"Dance, obviously," Kei replies as if she can't text about anything else. "The texts are just of five mi—"
"Actually, seconds," I say, pointing my fork to Kei and he gives me a look.
"Then, she doesn't," Amelia states, and Kei sulks. "You know what? You can date Alyssa," She suggests, grinning, and Alyssa's eyes widen.
"What? No!" Alyssa shakes her head, denying. "Why does everyone want to set me up?"
"Hey, I think the drinks are finished. I should—"
I cut off Nick, saying, "No, no. I will get them. You don't know where they are, anyway..."
"Oh, okay." Then, his grinning face dissolves into a scowl as Adi speaks up.
Adi starts to say, "I have a question..."
Everyone starts to groan as I get up, laughing, to enter the house. As I enter the kitchen, I see Percy talking on the phone with a smile on his face.
"Hey, Perce," I say, smiling knowingly, as he looks at me. He lets out a laugh at my expression.
"Iris's here. Talk to you, later, Anna. I love you," He says into the phone, before ending it. "Hey, Iris."
"You could have continued your love talks with her while I just put these not so heavy bottles on the island," I say to him as I take out some of the drinks from the refrigerator and putting them on the kitchen island.
He chuckles. "And miss out talking to you? Come on, let me help you," He says, hugging me.
As we pull away, I say, "You are such a gentleman. How the hell did you end up with Daisy?"
"It just happened," He says, shrugging and smiling.
I gesture him to continue. "Just happened why?"
He laughs, before asking me. "So, what did you get? You know like in—"
"Shh, we are not supposed to speak about it so openly. Colt hasn't got his gift, yet," I explain and he laughs, lightly, as he gets more drinks out of the fridge. "I got ballet shoes that belonged to our grandma. Did you know that Daisy's pendant was a gift from Grandpa?"
I talked with Daisy while Mom and Dad took me to the 'restaurant' and when this topic came up, she told me that the pendant she wears, often, was given to her on her eighteenth birthday and was told to not to mention anything about it to anyone of us, Colt, Caleb and me, till we are 'of the age' (her words).
Later, she told me that Caleb got Grandpa's trophy and some novels he selected for him and nobody knows what Colt will be getting till he is eighteen.
"Yeah, and I have never seen her without it, actually. You, both, adore your grandfather a lot," Percy states, turning towards me properly.
I nod. "He is a huge reason for what we are. So, yeah, we adore him a lot."
Looking at me, he smiles. "You're happy. I mean I can, actually, see the happiness evident on your face."
I beam. "I am, I am happy for a lot of things..."
"You are going to love my gift more than anyone's, incidentally." He tells me and I raise an eyebrow.
"You know Adi and Colt told me the same thing."
He ponders about it and, now, says, "Good to know there's some competition but honestly, they are not the competition. Someone else is."
I blink. "What?"
He shrugs his shoulder. "We have to take these otherwise one certain person would start being a drama queen."
"Who?" I ask him as we both hold the drinks in our hands. "Amelia?"
He grins. "No, not Amelia... A certain younger brother of mine, Chris."
We, both, laugh as he goes towards the backyard first but I stop when I see Noah standing near the door.
***
Noah stands awkwardly near the door of my room. I am sitting on my bed, looking anywhere but him.
Noah hadn't come to school today.
I had to be blind not to notice that—or the feeling that he looks at me when I am not looking at him, which I do a lot. Every time I look at him, I think that maybe I am overreacting about this. That maybe I am overthinking. Maybe Danielle still has feelings for Noah and Noah doesn't but if that would have the case, why won't he come and solve this?
One day—the one day all I wanted was to forget my feelings for him and I almost had until... until this moment.
Right now, the tension between us is impalpable—whether it is that we want to run to each other or fight like hell with each other.
"Bella."
I start to cry.
All of the boiled-up emotions I had kept within me for days start resurfacing over and over again. At this point, I do not even care if he kissed her or not. I do not even care if he reciprocates the same feelings as me. I do not care what people think of him and me.
Just, goddamn, I have missed him so much that it practically hurts.
"Cazzo," Noah storms over and starts to pull me towards his chest.
"No."
My voice is low and cracks but he hears it.
He stops.
He, immediately, takes a step back. He says, again, "Bella..."
I angrily wipe off my tears. "If you had a girlfriend, you could have just—just told me. I wouldn't have had any hope that...that—" I sigh. "Never mind."
Noah frowns. He tells me, voice small, "I do not have a girlfriend."
I give him a look. "Really? Then, what was that with Danielle?"
He huffs and looks away. "Danielle is nothing to me."
I raise an eyebrow. "Really?" I look away. "Whatever. It is your life, anyway. You don't owe me an explanation. You don't owe me anything."
He says, "Don't say that."
"Why not?" I question back. "Why not, Noah?"
"Because you are everything to me."
I feel like I have stopped breathing or am breathing faster to bite down the pain inside me. I breathe out, "Then, tell me, Noah—did you kiss her back?"
His adam's apple rises and falls. He closes his eyes and clenches his jaw—and I know the answer. He says, "I did."
I drop my head in my hands as I feel my chest tighten. "Why?"
Everything between us is so quiet that the only sound is of our heavy emotion-laced breaths.
"When I heard Thomas saying those words to you," he says. "All I thought was you would choose him over me. That it is good... to choose him over me because I am not the right one for you and I do not know if I ever will be. Then, there is a part of me that wants you—really bad that I burn every time I see you with Thomas. But the first of me won and I kissed her back, knowing that I—I don't deserve you."
I get up, not able to be near him.
I want to tell him that he shouldn't care about his flaws. It is because of them, he is human. If someone can't accept them, then, she doesn't deserve someone as amazing as Noah. I want to hug him so tight that he doesn't think of himself any less. I want to tell him that we do make mistakes, some big some small, but we should learn from them.
I want to tell him everything yet nothing.
Then, I hear him say, "I am sorry, Bella."
"Stop!" I say—loudly, this time. I turn towards him. "Stop calling me Bella. Stop doing all this. Just... stop giving me any hope."
He just stares at me, stunned.
I let out a breath. I say, gesturing between us, "This... this is fucked up, Noah. You literally throw me a surprise birthday party. You get me cupcakes and cotton candy when I am upset. You hold me like... I mean the world to you but then, you do this. You don't get to decide what's good for me. So, stop—stop acting like you are the villain in my story and making me believe that you are a monster."
He steps forward but I hold out my hand, stopping him. I say to him, "No matter how we feel for each other, we cannot be together—if we are not happy and secure of ourselves. And, right now, I don't feel happy neither do you."
His eyes look across my face when he asks me as if he is in pain, "What do you mean?"
I look straight into his eyes. "We. Us. This needs to stop."
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- a u t h o r ' s n o t e -
cue "love me or leave me" cuz bish, i am so emotional for these two 🥺
anyway, so i have been thinking (not why i am torturing y'all with heartbreaks) to write stories from this same universe. probably like spin-offs? just saying that i am THINKING. who do you think deserves a goddamn story?
until next chapter,
inerys