Butterfly Kisses | ✓

01 | valerian

V A L E R I A N 

[valeriana officinalis] ➳ readiness.

ON SATURDAY, I CAUGHT Isaac Marshall stealing flowers from my garden.

Since my parents and I had unpacked our bags in Newberry five months ago, we'd noticed plants go missing every so often. But we were never alarmed — a patch of daffodils here and a dandelion there was probably just someone's pet getting in through the collapsed fence and chewing up flower stems.

My parents were only distressed because they knew how much the garden meant to me. The expanse of grass and unplanted soil were the lone bits of solace I got out of moving houses. Otherwise, our new place could accurately be described as a dump.

Besides the rickety wooden fence that offered more splinters than protection, the house itself was all peeling vinyl and a cracked-glass door. And the security system was broken, though we weren't worried about theft. Inside, we only had the few things we'd managed to salvage from our old home, after all.

Even in a run-down town like Newberry — which wasn't as new as it was news-worthy, with the highest crime rate in the province — there were far bigger, better, nicer households to rob.

Or so I'd thought.

I had been warned about numbers to keep on speed dial and not walking home alone late at night, but nothing could've prepared me for dealing with a burglar alone in the early hours of Saturday morning.

Especially when that burglar was the most notorious boy at my school.

I had never spoken to Isaac Marshall before, but everyone knew about him. Leo had cautioned me on my second day of school as we watched Isaac join the lunch line, the edge of a plastic tray pressed against his signature white shirt. Leo was clearly threatened by his mere appearance in the cafeteria.

"That kid is trouble, Ren," he'd told me. "My dad's always going off about arresting him. "

I had asked why, but Leo only shook his head, looking enigmatically stressed as he always did.

I knew Leo's dad was a cop. But since I only ever saw Isaac at school, I couldn't see why he needed to be arrested, except maybe for wearing the same shirt every day. I wasn't one to talk, though; since moving to Newberry, I'd thrifted for all of my clothes, too guilty to splurge on anything brand new.

I was wearing mesh shorts and an ill-fitting camisole when I noticed Isaac below my window. I had just crawled out of bed, but that didn't stop the blood from rushing to my head. I ducked behind the curtain, my heart popping out of my ribcage.

After a second, I slowly peeked through the glass again, certain my eyes had been deceiving me. But from my second-storey bedroom, I could clearly make out Isaac's partially buzzed head. He was kneeling on the grass, plucking pink peonies out of the soil next to the door to our kitchen.

I was suddenly grateful that neither of my parents were morning people, because I could only imagine the havoc their ultra-paranoid tempers would wreak if this was the backdrop to their breakfast — Isaac's plain t-shirt billowing in the breeze as his fingers picked meticulously at my poor flowers.

If I wasn't shaken, it would've been picturesque. I couldn't deny that this looked like something out of a magazine, the sort of editorials Teen Vogue put out just before the summer. Isaac's auburn hair reminded me of the sun. 

Worse, I couldn't tear my gaze away from his hands, which moved daintily from stem to stem. He was being so careful that I almost couldn't even be afraid, or angry. Though I was both by default, since there was a boy in my backyard.

And he was suddenly staring right at me.

"Hey," he called, his husky timbre matching the waves of panic that rolled off me as I dropped to the floor, my thighs hitting the carpet with a thud. "Hey, is someone up there?"

I didn't respond. Under the windowsill, I pulled my bare legs into my chest. I knew he'd already seen me, but that wasn't going to stop me from trying to hide.

"I — I can explain," Isaac continued, raising his voice. "I promise I wasn't breaking and entering. Well, I was entering, but your gate was already broken. I didn't touch it."

He trailed off too quietly for me to hear the rest. I could picture him based on the way he carried himself at school, with one hand in the pocket of his faded jeans and the other on the back of his neck. 

"Also." He paused, milking the moment for all it was worth, as though he could tell I was listening. "I found something," he said. "A necklace?"

I shot up.

I was on my feet again so quickly, in fact, that it nearly had me light-headed. It was a testament to how much time I'd spent alone in my stuffy bedroom, the window only open a crack. The curiosity that had blossomed in my ribcage had been quenched with Leo's warning — but when I heard Isaac mutter "Maybe it's a bracelet," I stopped thinking entirely. 

I pulled the latch and lifted the window all the way back, the late spring air immediately tugging at the dark coils of my hair. For once I was self-conscious about how big and tangled it was, though as I stuck my nose outside I realized my appearance was the least of my concerns.

Because Isaac's face had broken into a grin.

"Oh, holy fuck," he said, scratching his head. "You're that hot new girl."