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were you on a date?

ISLA

Nineteen years old

“Earth to Isla.”

Heart jumping, I blink, the world coming back into focus.

Blake stands with her hip propped against the kitchen counter, dressed in light blue jeans and a white shirt, her hair in a messy bun.

“Sorry, I didn’t hear you come in.” I tap on my laptop to stop the film from my last practice.

“I noticed.” She chuckles, coming closer. “When I got home last night, you were already asleep. How was your training camp? How is your family?”

“Training went really well. My short program is almost ready.” I smile, a warmth growing in my chest. “As for my family, Mom was happy to see me. Dad was ecstatic. My little brother couldn’t care less. Pretty sure his best friend was more excited about my presence than he was. Meg spent almost two hours with me, talking my ear off about boys from school.” I shake my head. “I love how unbothered Ian and Meg are. They are real kids, easy and funny.”

“Ian’s best friend is a girl?” She lowers herself into the chair across from me.

“Yeah.” My smile slips away. “She’s Michael’s sister.”

Blake’s jaw drops, her eyes nearly bulging out of her head as she leans forward, setting her elbows on the table. “You’re telling me you and Thompson grew up together and were best friends, and now your brother and his sister are following in your footsteps?”

“Um, I hope not. I’d hate for them to fall apart the way we did.”

My heart constricts painfully, shame sitting heavy in my chest. I’m still trying to process all the truths I discovered last night.

I let the lies of a girl I knew I shouldn’t trust shape my choices. I let her tear apart everything Michael and I had built over years and years. The knowledge is like a lead weight in my stomach. How did I let myself believe her? And not just that—how could I have let her words matter more than years of history?

Tears prick at the backs of my eyes, like they have every thirty minutes or so since I left the arena last night.

The sadness is joined by a sharp, ugly anger toward her each time it wells. An anger directed at me too. She knew exactly what she was doing, and I’m the idiot who fell for it.

“I’m not sure if you know this, but Michael is back on campus,” she says carefully. “Do you still think the kiss meant nothing?”

I swallow.

“No,” I admit quietly. “I lied to myself. It meant everything.”

Both kisses did. The kiss in his room and the one at the rink. They were the farthest thing from meaningless. They were overwhelming. All-consuming.

I run my fingers through my hair, exhaling shakily. “But that’s the problem.”

Three years ago, I was lied to. I trusted the wrong person. Michael wasn’t playing games with me the way I convinced myself he was. I know that now. But knowing the truth doesn’t magically erase the past.

It doesn’t erase how deeply I was hurt. It doesn’t erase how easily I shut down, how I chose not to talk to him. And it only amplifies how terrifying it feels to want him this much now.

I didn’t run because the kisses meant nothing.

I ran because they meant too much.

“Have you seen him?”

I nod.

Blake tilts her head, her expression laced with worry. “Did something else happen?”

With a sigh, I shrug half-heartedly. “Kinda, but I need to figure out what it all means before I’ll be ready to talk about it. I’m sorry I’m struggling to be open.”