The Winter Project

22. Isabel

The lump in her throat was so big it was almost impossible for her to swallow. Her eyes were blurry with tears that were desperate to escape her eyes but she refused to let them as she tried to push through the crowds to get out. Her lungs felt tight and her breathing was short. The sound of Christmas music and the twinkling lights hanging from street lamps and shop windows made her feel like she was going to be sick. She couldn't get the images out of her head; sat at the dinner table with her grandmother on Christmas day enjoying the meal that had been lovingly prepared for just the two of them. Isabel loved having her grandmother's attention, and she loved the fact that she was the only grandchild so that it didn't need to be shared. She thought about early evening on Christmas Day as her grandmother slept in her armchair and Isabel watched television, comforted by the presence of someone who was fast asleep but who was still there for her. She felt so much torment in her heart as she pictured these images and she truly didn't know how to cope with the overwhelming feeling of grief and despair. She rarely felt grief like this for her parents, for she barely knew them. When it came to her grandmother, the slightest trigger of a memory could send her into a depression so deep that she feared she would never be able to climb out of it.

She missed her grandmother so badly. She wanted to go back in time and sit there with her, in a quiet and peaceful room. She hated that her life had brought her here; a crowded unknown city full of strangers that somehow was able to induce such intense memories in her mind despite being completely unfamiliar and so far away. She couldn't believe that Cleo had been so mean to her whilst knowing how much Isabel didn't like to associate with the festive season.

She made it back to the hotel somehow by staring only at the ground, darting through the crowds and avoiding eye contact with everyone who passed her. She was too afraid to be surrounded by people but more afraid of taking a route through the back roads and ending up in danger, so she persevered with the route she remembered and tried to focus on her breathing and her goal to get back to safety. It was only a ten-minute walk back to the hotel, but she spent the entire journey trying to steady her breathing and calm herself down. When she made it back, she climbed under the covers of the bed and sobbed herself to sleep, clinging tightly to the gold necklace around her neck that her grandmother had left behind.

She must have been deeply asleep after that, as she didn't hear Cleo come into the hotel room and yet Cleo was asleep in the bed next to hers when she woke up. Isabel hated knowing that someone was angry with her and was always too afraid to start up a conversation that related in any way to some form of conflict. She didn't want to wake Cleo and she wasn't sure Cleo would even be ready to talk to her yet. The mere presence of a potential conflict was worrying Isabel, and so she left.

She snuck quietly out of the room and headed to the hotel lobby. Too sick with nerves to want any breakfast, she went outside and climbed into the back of the van. She opened up her battered old diary and tried to soothe herself by writing down what had happened and how she felt. This particular diary only dated back a few years but was already packed full of emotions, yet only recently included things that Isabel would consider in the future as significant memories. She was glad that it didn't contain any of the harrowing entries from when she was a teenager or when her grandmother had died, because she knew she would end up reading them and start crying all over again, powerless to stop herself from feeling the way that she did.

Isabel felt so lonely so instantly. As soon as Cleo had expressed a distaste for her, Isabel's self esteem had plummeted to a new low and now all she could focus on was the fact that everybody always left her. Her parents left her, her grandmother left her. Her first and last boyfriend when she was sixteen had left her. She truly believed she was in love with him for the best part of that year. She lived and breathed for him. Even now she would think back and regret wasting time on him when she could have spent precious time with her grandmother. She fell so deeply in love with him so quickly and at the time she couldn't see the danger in it. Yet when he left her, it dawned on Isabel that she just wasn't meant for love. She was meant to be alone in the world, navigating her way through cautiously and slowly. She didn't deserve love, and any love she would ever receive would be ill fated, destined to end at a moments notice.

She decided in that moment that if she were meant to be alone, then she would need to toughen up a little bit. She would need to learn to drive herself through frightening roads in new countries. She needed to learn to eat by herself, not just once but every day. She had to learn to be okay on her own without Cleo, who clearly didn't care about her and had only set up this whole stupid trip for her own self gratitude.

Isabel was going to be brave. Independent. Unafraid. She wouldn't need anyone except herself, and in doing so she would never open herself up to be let down, abandoned or heartbroken ever again.