Chapter 4: Once Bitten
Isla didn't exchange a word with George for the rest of the night. The idea she thought up of covering the hole with a blanket was dismissed; George might misconstrue it. She moved about her apartment, deliberately avoiding any glance towards his room. Despite her longing to steal a glimpse, she diverted her focus elsewhere.
To her astonishment, George seemed resolute in not acknowledging the fact that they could see each other through the hole. It both irked and impressed her that he could so effectively ignore her. The hole seemed as if it had never existed, yet she remained acutely aware of him. Every sigh, the confident stride in his room, and the aroma of the soup he prepared.
Seated at her desk, her drafts sprawled out before her, she couldn't concentrate. All she could think about was him. From where Isla sat, she could no longer see him, affording her a small respite. Neatly, she gathered the sheets into a pile and placed them at the edge, creating enough space to rest her legs on the desk, crossing them at the ankles. It was her favorite relaxation posture, but relaxation was far from her mind.
Perhaps George was already bored with her. The thought made her heart sink. Flinging her legs off the table, Isla crossed her arms tightly across her chest, as if to keep the memories from bursting through. The words of her ex-boyfriend echoed in her mind. 'You are such a bore, Isla. Are you only good with writing?'
His name was Charles. She had loved him with every fiber of her being. Given him everything, and yet, she just wasn't interesting enough. The breakup had rattled her to her core. She thought they'd get married. She'd been like a zombie for weeks. Then her best friend Crystal came to 'save' her. Crystal, a spoiled rich daughter of a CEO like Isla, but a strong experimentalist. Both were 29. Isla was at the peak of her writing career, having just earned her PhD and being named the youngest Professor of the Year. Crystal, however, was struggling, losing money managing her dad's businesses. She partied hard, smoked like a chimney, and drank like a fish. Yet, despite their differences, they were two peas in a pod. Isla cherished her as a friend, assuming the sentiment was mutual.
The breakup with Charles left Isla vulnerable to Crystal's manipulations. Isla wanted to be fun, to prove Charles and her previous lovers wrong. To demonstrate that she wasn't a bore, that she could be spontaneous, that books weren't the only thing she knew. And that's how she fell into Crystal's trap.
What she was exposed to was pure debauchery. The clubs, the orgies, the binge drinking, and then, she fell pregnant. A sharp breath escaped her lips, her breathing becoming irregular. Tears welled in her eyes.
Crystal taught her how to be wild. She tried to ruin her life. Almost succeeded. Or perhaps she did, for a time. But Crystal died. Barely recovering from the shock, her parents had... Isla couldn't bring herself to finish the thought. It had been almost three years, but the pain was still raw.
Simply put, life had turned upside down for Isla. For months, she was hardly living, merely going through the motions. Then she relocated from Chicago to Dallas.
There was a familiar wetness on her cheeks. It always came when her thoughts drifted to the past. She glanced toward the bedroom door, craving something strong. She stood up from the chair to go and get it, passing by the hole in the process. Her eyes instinctively glanced towards George's bedroom; it was dark. He had switched off the lights and likely gone to bed. She took her phone out of her pajama pocket and checked the time.
10:30 pm.
What was she to do with George? Why was she so clueless when it came to relationships? Sure, her parents didn't set the best example, but she was almost thirty-three, for crying out loud. She was no child. The brief thought about her age introduced another worrying thought. She'd been repeatedly told that she still looked like she was in her early twenties. What if George also thought she was much younger?
Abandoning her quest for a drink, she sat down on her bed. Her head felt heavy, and her chest ached.
Was she cursed to be alone?
Perhaps the best thing for her was to write him off now before he stole her heart any further. She was going to keep to herself as much as possible, ignore him no matter how loudly he played his music, since he confessed it to be an attention-seeking mechanism.
First thing tomorrow morning, she was going to call someone to fix the ruined drywall.
Maybe she was cursed to be alone. And maybe -- considering her past -- she deserved to be.
The ringing of her phone rattled Isla out of her thoughts. She glanced at the device vibrating on her desk, and her heart did a sickening flip.