Falling

42

TRIGGER WARNING: THERAPY SESSION: mentions drugs/drug use, alcoholism, child neglect, sexual assault/rape

Carson Hughes

Isaac could always tell when I was in a mood and he never kept it to himself when he noticed. That was why when we sat on the football field one evening while our friends, minus Logan, tossed around a ball, he shot me a strange look and immediately started questioning me.

"Why have you been so weird the last few days?" Isaac asked as we stretched our legs out on the turf field. "Relationship problems?"

"How'd you know?" I asked in a bland tone.

"Because that's the only thing that makes you act this way," he said with a knowing glance. "You're not a very happy guy when you're fighting with Vinny."

"We're not fighting," I said. "We had an argument. There's a difference." My tone was clipped because I was feeling defensive. I didn't want Isaac thinking Vinny and I had all these problems. We did have problems, but I didn't want to air them out for everyone else to see.

"Well, in that case, I had an 'argument' with Spencer the other day and now he's not talking to me," Isaac replied. "Not that it matters that much because we aren't actually dating, but I'm still in a bad mood."

I sent him a strange look, glancing over to make sure the rest of our friends weren't in hearing range. Logan and Dana were already aware of what was going on between Isaac and Spencer, but Hadley, Archie, and Darren were in the dark.

What could the two of them possibly have to argue about if they weren't even exclusive?

"What did you do?" I asked him and he narrowed his eyes at me.

"What did I do?"

I nodded, raising my eyebrows to wait for an answer.

Isaac rolled his eyes at me and looked away toward our friends on the field.

"It's hard to have casual sex with just one person without one of you catching feelings," Isaac vaguely responded.

It didn't seem all that hard to me. I had done the same with Thomas and neither of us had ended up wanting to be with the other long term. Isaac just seemed like he was in denial.

"So you're catching feelings?" I asked. "Or Spencer is?"

He glanced back to me. "He is and I can tell, so I brought it up and now he's mad at me."

"Seems like he's not the only one with feelings."

Isaac was moping more than usual. It couldn't just be because he wasn't getting laid. He didn't like the thought of Spencer being angry with him. It was similar to the way I felt when Vinny was angry with me. Or when I knew he didn't trust me enough to tell me important things about his life. Or when I couldn't tell if I was angry with him for that or just disheartened.

Isaac glared at me. "Enough about me and Spencer. What's going on with Vinny?"

I sighed. "I don't even know. He doesn't trust me still, ever since he started going to therapy. I thought he did, but I guess not."

"Cant really blame him for that," Isaac replied and I couldn't tell if he was telling me exactly what I didn't want to hear because he was being a good friend or if it was because I had pushed his buttons about Spencer.

"He doesn't want me to know anything about him," I continued. I couldn't get into the details of what happened with Vinny. No matter how angry or annoyed I felt, I knew a personal, vulnerable moment when I saw one. "Was he always like that?"