The Fairest Stars

Chapter Twenty Eight: 'My love.'

Isis was practically dancing along the corridor on the morning of the first performance when she bumped into Harry. She had it all planned out. She and Kael were going to dash home, tell her mum to get into the car, and drive back to school with Freya and Seb (who had miraculously gotten the few hours off of work) in the back seat too. She couldn’t wait.

‘Harry!’ Smiling up at him, she gave him a hug. ‘I seem to be bumping into you a lot, recently.’

‘I haven’t spoken to you in ages though,’ Harry said, steering her out of the door to sit down on a bench with her. ‘How have you been?’

‘Brilliant,’ she replied, with a wide grin. ‘It’s the first night of the play today, you know.’

‘It is?’ Harry smiled. ‘Well, that’s great.’

‘I’ll be so sad when it’s over,’ she said, wistfully. ‘But I’ll still have all the wonderful friends I made.’

‘Mm,’ said Harry.

Isis frowned up at him. ‘Is everything alright?’

He nodded. ‘Yeah. It’s just… well.’

‘What?’ Isis asked, feeling a little panicky. He looked… cross? He couldn’t be. He never got cross.

‘What’s with you and Kael?’ he asked. ‘I heard something this morning, someone talking about you two.’

‘Did you?’ Isis hadn’t realised that she and Kael had become hot gossip. She didn’t ever think that she’d been hot gossip before in her entire life. ‘What did the people say?’

‘That you two were dating,’ Harry said. He laughed, a little harshly. ‘I knew it couldn’t be true, but I thought I’d just run it by you. There’s no way you’d date him, is there?’ he asked demandingly.

‘Well, Kael and I are trying out dating,’ Isis admitted. ‘He’s taken me on two dates, and I-’

Harry’s face looked thunderous. ‘What?’

‘Is… is something the matter?’ she asked, nervously. She’d never seen her friend look so furious, so angry.

‘You’re considering dating Kael Willoughby?’

Isis nodded. ‘Yes.’ She frowned. ‘What’s wrong with that?’

‘Do you not know the reputation that arsehole has?’ Harry asked, his tone vicious. ‘He slept with far too many girls to name at boarding school, he got kicked out for dancing topless on a roof with a statue, he-’

‘Yes,’ Isis said, calmly. ‘But he’s changed since then.’

‘You knew about all that, and you still wanted to date him?’ Harry shook his head in disbelief. ‘I… I’m lost for words, Isis.’

‘How do you know all this about his history, anyway?’ Isis asked, feeling a little suspicious. ‘Who told you?’

Harry looked a little sheepish. ‘I asked one of the people who goes to his old boarding school,’ he said.

‘Why?’ Isis asked, utterly bemused.

‘Because I wanted to find out just who you were befriending. I would have told you far earlier if I’d have know you were actually going to date him but… oh Isis.’ Harry looked despairingly at her, shaking his head as if she was dating someone who’d just committed murder, rather than been a player at his last school.

‘He’s not the same person!’ Isis protested.

‘You expect me to just sit here and watch you get hurt by that arsehole?!’ Harry shouted.