Chapter 307: [4.125] The One Who Everyone Likes But Nobody Needs

"I wanted to." Harlow clasped her hands in front of her, suddenly aware of how close they were standing. "I always want to. That’s kind of my thing. Wanting to do things for people. Making things for people. It’s easier than, you know. Talking about feelings. Or admitting that I’m scared."

She hadn’t meant to say that last part.

Isaiah’s expression shifted again. Deeper. More focused. Like he was really looking at her now, past the twin tails and the pink clips and the smile that everyone assumed was permanent.

"Scared of what?"

Harlow opened her mouth. Closed it. Tried again.

"Of losing you."

The words came out smaller than she intended. Quieter. The kind of voice she usually saved for three in the morning when she was alone in her room and the darkness felt heavy enough to crush her.

Isaiah didn’t respond right away. He stood there, holding her cookies, looking at her with those dark eyes that saw too much, that always saw too much, and Harlow felt exposed in a way she hadn’t anticipated. She was used to being the easy one. The fun one. The sister who smoothed things over and made everyone laugh and never demanded anything heavy in return.

But standing here, in the hallway outside the library, she wanted to be more than that.

"You’re not going to lose me," Isaiah said finally.

"You don’t know that. You can’t know that. Mother has resources. She has lawyers and money and connections and she’s been doing this for decades. She knows how to make people disappear. Not literally, I mean, she’s not a mob boss or anything, but she can make your scholarship go away, she can make your job go away, she can make everything go away and then you’ll be gone and I’ll be here and I’ll have to pretend that’s fine because that’s what I do, I pretend things are fine, I’m so good at pretending things are fine that sometimes I forget what not-fine actually feels like—"

Isaiah moved.

One second he was standing against the wall with the container in his hands. The next second the container was somewhere else and his arms were around her and Harlow’s face was pressed against his chest and she could feel his heartbeat through the fabric of his shirt, steady and strong and real.

Oh.

She’d been hugged before. Thousands of times. By fans and classmates and family members and strangers who recognized her from Instagram and wanted a photo. Hugs were normal. Hugs were safe. Hugs were part of her brand, practically, the way she spread warmth and comfort to everyone around her.

This was different.

This was Isaiah holding her like she was something fragile and precious, like he was trying to shield her from something she couldn’t see, like he understood that underneath all the sunshine there was a girl who was just as scared and tired and desperate as everyone else.

Harlow’s hands came up to grip the back of his uniform jacket. She pressed her face harder against his chest, breathing in the scent of him, coffee and something warm and underneath it all, the faint trace of Sabrina’s perfume.

Right. Sabrina. Her sister. Who had kissed this boy and held this boy and apparently done other things with this boy that Harlow tried very hard not to think about because thinking about them made her feel things she wasn’t ready to examine.

But right now, in this moment, with Isaiah’s arms around her and his chin resting on top of her head, Harlow didn’t care about rotations or schedules or the complicated web of emotions connecting all five of them. She just cared about this. About being held. About someone seeing her clearly and not running away.

"I’m not going anywhere," Isaiah said into her hair. "Your mother can threaten whatever she wants. She can take the scholarship, the job, the car, all of it. But she can’t make me stop caring about you."

Harlow’s eyes were burning.

She refused to cry. She was the sunshine sister. Sunshine didn’t cry in hallways where anyone could see. Sunshine smiled and laughed and made everything better and definitely didn’t fall apart because a boy she barely knew three weeks ago was saying exactly what she needed to hear.

"You care about me?"

The question came out wobbly. Uncertain. Nothing like the confident, bubbly Harlow that everyone expected.

Isaiah’s arms tightened around her.

"Of course I care about you."

"But you care about Sabrina more."

She didn’t know why she said it. The words escaped before she could catch them, tumbling out of her mouth like birds from an opened cage. Harlow felt Isaiah tense against her, felt the shift in his breathing, and immediately wished she could shove the words back in and swallow them whole.

"That’s not—" Isaiah started.

"I know the rotation is fair. I know we all agreed to it. I know Sabrina was first because she saw you first, because she’s been watching you since September, because she’s Sabrina and she always knows things before the rest of us catch up." Harlow was talking into his chest now, the words muffled by fabric. "But sometimes I wonder if I’m just. Extra. You know? Like you have her, and she’s intense and smart and mysterious, and you have Vivienne, who’s perfect and organized and can run a corporation before breakfast, and you have Cassidy, who’s wild and passionate and probably really good at, um, physical things. And then there’s me. The one who makes cookies. The one who smiles. The one who everyone likes but nobody needs."

Silence.

Harlow kept her face pressed against Isaiah’s chest because she couldn’t bear to look at him. Couldn’t bear to see pity or confusion or the polite discomfort of someone who didn’t know how to respond to a confession they hadn’t asked for.

She felt Isaiah’s hand move up her back, felt his fingers slide into her hair, and then he was tilting her face up, forcing her to meet his eyes.

His expression was serious. Intent. The lazy, unbothered mask he usually wore had cracked open, and underneath it was something raw and honest and devastating.

"You’re not extra," he said. "You’re not a backup. You’re not the sister I see because I’m already here for the others."