In Harmony(63)

Neither of us spoke as he walked up to me. By now, I knew Isaac took a little time to warm up. He stood still and silent. Not climbing up next to me, or even putting down his pack.

“Did you want to run lines?” I finally asked.

“Not here.” He glanced around at the wide-open space. “Anyone could walk by and see us. I know a better place.”

“Okay.” I started to scootch down from the block. Isaac offered me his hand again. Then his other. I took them and hopped down to stand in front of him as we had done a few weeks ago.

He held both my wrists and his thumbs ran back and forth along the delicate skin there. I wondered if he could feel my pulse point; my heart was beating so fast.

He looked down at me from under his hood. His gray-green eyes placid and warm. He no longer wore a bandage, and the cut on his cheek was still dark with congealed blood. Most of the swelling had gone down.

“Are you sleeping better?” I asked softly.

He shook his head. “Not yet. You?” He was still holding my wrists.

“Not yet.”

Gently, he pushed up the sleeve a little to reveal a few of the black X’s on my forearm. I held my breath, waiting for the cold shiver, and instinctive urge to snatch my hand back. Instead, I let him see them and then he raised his eyes to mine, concern darkening them and furrowing his brows.

“No questions,” I said softly. “Not yet, okay?”

“Okay.” Simple as that. He drew my sleeve down and let go of my hands. “We should get going.”

We climbed back up the stone steps and started down a small, quiet street beyond the amphitheater. Bright spring sunshine streamed through the trees lining both sides of the road. We passed a small children’s park, not talking as we walked side-by-side, the backs of our hands brushing now and then. The houses grew further apart. The streets grew quieter until the buzzing of insects was the loudest sound.

“What do you think?” Isaac said.

We stood before a hedge maze.

“I love it,” I said, before even stepping foot inside.

The hedges were about five feet tall, their corridors branched off in two directions and covered thirty yards or so. In the center, I could just see the top of a small shack with a windmill.

“In the summertime, this place is busy with tourists,” Isaac said. “But we should be good for now.”

“Okay. How close are you to being off-book?”

He shrugged. “Ninety percent?”

“That’s not bad, considering you have approximately that much of the play.”

“What happened after I dropped you off after the dance?”

“Oh…uh, nothing shocking,” I said. “Justin played nice with my dad. They both talked over my head as if I were incapable of making any decisions on my own. Talk about art imitating life.”

“When do you turn eighteen?” he asked.

“July,” I said.

Isaac nodded. “Tonight at rehearsal, should I ask Marty to run the scene where Hamlet kills Laertes?”

“No,” I said, “because Laertes kills him right back.”

“Laertes kills him first actually. Hamlet just dies more slowly.”

“Not as fast as Ophelia. I got you all beat.”

A silence.

“You know it’s a Shakespearean tragedy when you’re discussing which character dies the fastest.”

He smiled a little, but I watched it fade as his eyes held mine. I felt the moment thicken between us. It would’ve been nothing for him to bend down and kiss me.

I want him to kiss me.

The thought sent electric shivers dancing down my skin, but tangled my stomach in a knot at the same time. What would happen if he did? Would I freeze up? Would panic grip me, shake me and throw me to the ground? Would the shadowy memory of Xavier’s mouth come through Isaac’s lips?

I turned my head and brushed a lock of hair out of my eyes. “I’m ready to check out this maze.”

“Sure, yeah,” he said, with equal parts relief and regret too. “Let’s go.”

We faced the two entrances to the maze, each heading opposite directions.

“It’s not hard,” he said, “and you can see the center so you can’t get lost.”

Getting lost in a hedge maze with you wouldn’t be the worst thing that could happen today. “Okay, I said. “Race you to the center?”

“I’ll win,” Isaac said. “I’ve lived here my entire life.”

“So you’re scared?”

He laughed. A small one but a real laugh nonetheless. “All right, let’s see what you got. Ready. Set…”

I took off running down my branch of the maze before he could say go.

“Cheater,” he called.

I laughed, feeling the warm sun on my face and the smell of spring coming back all around me. The maze was composed of dried brush, slowly turning green. Bugs chirped and small white butterflies fluttered across my path. It wasn’t a complicated maze, and I kept my bearings by watching the windmill shack in the middle. Isaac, at six-foot-two, should’ve towered over hedges but he was nowhere to be seen.

“No way he’s that fast,” I muttered, reaching the clearing where the little windmill sat. A cutout door faced me, its faded red paint peeling away. Isaac sat on a bench inside, one ankle resting on the knee of his other leg, looking like he’d been there for hours.