Half an hour later, Isaac and I were sitting across from each other in a worn, red leather booth in the corner, two identical plates of burgers and fries sitting in front of us. I had reached for the fries before the plate was even firmly on the table in front of me, dunking them happily into the chocolate milkshake I had ordered, relishing in the first bit of food I had eaten in over twenty-four hours.
"What?" I asked, looking up at Isaac with a confused expression when I realized he was not eating, but just watching me with an amused expression, his arms crossed over his chest as he relaxed back into the booth, his hat abandoned on the seat beside him so his curls flopped down over his forehead freely and his blue work shirt undone to reveal a white t-shirt underneath, both shades complimenting his looks in a manner that made our waitress linger a little bit longer after she dropped off our food, not that Isaac seemed to notice.
"Nothing," Isaac shook his head, laughing a little as he finally reached for the burger in front of him. "So, does this mean we can be friends now?" He took a large bite of his burger and then leaned back into the booth again, extending his arm and resting it along the back of the booth. He smiled confidently as he chewed, the dimples in his cheeks still appearing even while he ate.
"If I said no, would you rescind your offer to take me home?" I teased, reaching for my milkshake. I looked up at him as I sipped through the straw, the cool helping to combat the heat that still seeped into the small diner every time the door swung open.
"Yes." Isaac's reply came without a missed beat, the smile on his face disappearing immediately as he became serious, but I could tell by the way his jaw tensed that he was forcing himself not to smile. I hesitated for a moment, judging by the way Isaac's eyes carefully studied me that he was anticipating my response.
"Well I suppose I have no other choice then," I started, and paused to take another sip of the shake in my hands, watching as Isaac relaxed his expression and smiled again. "I should start walking now. Which way is it?" I made a move to slide out of the booth, watching from the corner of my eye as Isaac eyebrows raised in surprise and then he laughed, reaching for his plate. Instead of eating the fry he took between his fingers, though, it flew through the air before it hit my shoulder and then fell onto my lap. I stopped halfway through sliding from the booth and looked at Isaac.
"Seriously?" I plucked the fry from my lap and held it up in front of us, narrowing my eyes at him.
"Extra fuel, for your walk home, Harvard. You're gonna need it." He grinned at me as he shrugged again, reaching for the food on his plate again, this time lifting it to his mouth. As he opened his mouth for the numerous fries he had taken between his fingers, I chucked the rogue fry back at his face, covering my mouth as I laughed loudly when it bounced off of his nose and onto the table, and Isaac's hand froze, mid-air and still full of fries, as he blinked, processing what had just happened.
"I officially rescind my offer of friendship, and of a ride home. You may leave." He dropped the fries into his mouth and wiped his hands together as he chewed, waving his hand out to motion towards the exit of the booth.
"Just as I was starting to change my mind," I feigned regret, sighing heavily as a dropped my shoulders. Isaac shook his head and laughed before taking another hefty bite of his burger, allowing me to slide back to my original position and do the same as a moment of silence passed between us while we ate, the other patrons of the diner loud enough that it didn't feel awkward as we both let a moment pass without conversation.
"So," Isaac started again, "how long are you in Rayston for?"
"The whole summer."
"You must be in college if you're already out of school," Isaac observed, and I nodded while sipping on my milkshake in response. "Where do you go?"
"Columbia. English lit and journalism," I added, anticipating the following question.
"So the Harvard sweatshirt?"
"Belongs to my best friend." He bobbed his head in response as he reached for his own milkshake, chugging the frozen drink in a manner that would have made my head ache.
"English lit, though? That explains the book," Isaac mused, his eyes drifting down to where I had placed the novel underneath my phone to my right.
"I actually read this for the first time in high school. It was recommended to me by a teacher. It was what made me want to study literature in college."
"Why that book?" Isaac wondered, and as I studied him watching me, I could tell that he was genuinely interesting, unlike the boys I was used to, who seemed to always be under the impression that feigning interest in my interests would automatically result in physicality between us. I had experienced enough of that to know that Isaac was being sincere.
"Moving into the personal questions already?" I responded, shifting in my seat and glancing down at my plate as I deflected the questions, thinking of the reasons why I had fallen in love with this story and its messages, which were more intimate that I was willing to share with most people, let alone someone I still barely knew.
"I wasn't aware it was personal," Isaac said nonchalantly, not seeming offended by my defensiveness. "You don't need to tell me." I smiled slightly, the relief and surprise I felt that he wasn't going to push for more information.
"What are you majoring in?" I changed the subject, picking the last of the fries from my plate. My burger was almost gone, the lack of food I had consumed making me devour the lunch quicker than usual, but a glance at Isaac's plate showed me that he had eaten just as quickly as I had.
"Sports management and physical education." The sports management answer didn't surprise me, it made sense with the circumstances surrounding our first encounter and the college practice jersey he had been wearing, but the physical education reply did leave me curious, my head tilting slightly to the side as my eyebrows raised marginally.
"Phys Ed?"
"I like kids," Isaac shrugged, his mouth twitching slightly as his eyes cast down for a moment, appearing sheepish at his admission. "I've volunteered every summer since I was about 15 with the little league teams in Rayston." I leaned back into the booth watching him, surprised by his answer. It left a vastly different impression from the one I had after first meeting him yesterday, and I was already slowly realizing that we had both likely been too hasty in judging each other.
"What?" Isaac asked, his eyes back up on my face, interrupting my train of thought. I shook my head, finishing off my shake.
"Nothing," I muttered distractedly, looking past his head as the door of the diner chimed again and a family with two young children filed in to the space. I watched them for the moment, the two young girls holding hands with each other, and their parents on either side, as they were lead to a booth, giggling as they tugged on each other and swung their arms around, reminding me of Lena and Lyla when they were younger When they had passed us and I turned back to Isaac, he was leaning back into the booth, his hands splayed out on either side of him, watching me. When I met his gaze, he didn't look away.
"You have other sisters besides Leighton, right?" His question surprised me, and I couldn't hide it from showing in my expression as I straightened up slightly, narrowing my eyes.
"How do you know that?"
"Dan," Isaac laughed slightly, clearly amused at me defensiveness. "He's mentioned that even with twin boys, he's still vastly outnumbered by the Lancaster women, so there has to be more of you." I leaned back into the booth, crossing my arms loosely over my chest as I glanced between our two plates, both cleared of food, although Isaac seemed to be in no hurry to leave our booth in the corner. He was still leaning comfortably back into his side of the booth, moving only to run a hand back through his hair.
"I have twin sisters. Lena and Lyla," I responded.
"So four of you, hm? Remind me to leave town if you're all ever here at the same time." He was teasing again, his lips turned up at a smile that I just scowled at.
"They're far away in California, so you're safe. For now."
"I don't know about that," Isaac mumbled, his lips widening as he smiled more widely, winking in a manner that only made me laugh and roll my eyes, taking my fork and pushing some of the crumbs around on my plate that our waitress hadn't come to collect yet. In front of me, Isaac leaned forward slightly, opening his mouth as if he wanted to say something, but the door behind him chimed again and the noise increased as a large group around our age filed in, talking and laughing loudly with each other. I recognized most of them immediately, Mac and Izzy mixed into a crowd of some of the others who had been at the pier last night.
Isaac followed my gaze to the crowd, and when he turned back around in his seat, his eyes cast down as he started to dig urgently into the pocket of his pants, he scowled, looking annoyed.
"Wanna get out of here?" He urged, pulling out his wallet. I looked between him and his friends, who had seen us and were tapping each other and pointing as the group veered in our direction, wondering why he wanted rush out at the sight of them.
"I think it's too late for that," I murmured, watching as Isaac looked up as the group started to file into the booth, forcing both Isaac and I to shift down to the very end, locked into our respective corners by the windows.
Isaac looked even more annoyed as he stared out the window, his jaw tense as he tried to ignore Izzy as she pushed up next to him in the booth, batting her eyelashes and smiling up at him while swiping one of the lingering, leftover fries from his plate. Meanwhile, my own annoyance started to grow as Mac slid in beside me, close enough that our legs brushed against each other as he swung his arm over the back of the booth behind me, his hand dangling close to my shoulder. I kept my eyes on Isaac as his narrowed even more, his jaw clenching even tighter.
Andie and Connor squeezed into the booth on my side, the only other two I remembered because Andie had chatted with me the entire truck ride to the peer while holding Connor's hand, which never left her thigh. The three others in the group, two who squeezed in beside Izzy while the third pulled up a chair from one of the tables, swearing to the hostess that he would return it, looked vaguely familiar, but not enough for me to remember their names.
They were still talking, some looking up as our waitress neared the table, clearly annoyed but also accustomed to the large crowd in a small booth, to put in more orders, collect our empty plates, and place the check of my food and Isaac's in front of him. The only silence that still existed was between Isaac, who was still doing his best to ignore Izzy while she blindly talked his ear off, and myself, growing even more uncomfortable as Mac's fingers brushed my shoulders and he shifted even closer to me.
"You know," Mac drawled, his voice low as he turned to me after giving the waitress his order, "Catching you here hanging out with Verano, I'm beginning to think that maybe you just don't like me." I knew he was referencing my comment last night, and so did Isaac, whose eyes shot to my face when Mac started to talk to me, tuned in to our new conversation, despite Mac's attempts to keep his voice low.
"Well, you'd be right, then," I affirmed loudly, purposefully, so the entire table could hear, looking at Isaac as the corner of his mouth turned up into a smile.
The table surrounding us grew silent as conversations came to a slow halt as they processed what I had said and watched as I reached up and pulled Mac's arm away from my shoulders, dropping it onto his lap. "I tend to feel that way about guys who can't take a hint." I angled my body away from him, looking up at Isaac, who was staring at me with a mix of what seemed like surprise and admiration, while everyone else at the table seemed suddenly uncomfortable. I grinned at him, watching as the smile mirrored on his face, the unspoken agreement between us to find our way out of that booth somehow.
Without a word, he dropped a bill on the table to pay for our meal and then twisted his legs out from under the table so he was standing on the seat, then crawled over the back of the booth, over his friends and the heads of the people seated behind him, to many protests. Andie and Connor, sensing what was happening, quickly slide out from the booth, leaving me only Mac to climb over as Isaac reached out his hand for me.
******
A/N: Happy Saturday! I'm trying to stick to the schedule I set for myself- updating every Tuesday, Friday, and every other Saturday. The next update will be Tuesday! I hope you're enjoying the story so far! Don't forget to vote and let me know what you think in the comments. :)
**I made a few small edits so technically this is reposting on Sunday, but whatevs. :)