Chapter 146: one more thing

Chapter 146 — One More Thing

Roxanne woke to a soft chime from her phone and a confirmation email glowing on the screen. Thank you for volunteering for the weekend creative-writing workshop. She had registered before she could talk herself out of it, and apparently the part of her that wanted things had gone to bed without informing the part that worried about them.

Isla read the email over her shoulder while pulling on her socks. "You signed up for a workshop."

"It’s only a weekend."

"You have classes, friends, training, and a drama club that now thinks you’re famous."

"A showcase isn’t a club."

"You realise you can enjoy one thing without collecting five more hobbies."

"I’m not collecting hobbies."

"You signed up less than twelve hours after performing onstage."

"I was inspired."

"You were sleep-deprived."

Roxanne laughed, but Isla’s smile slid away too quickly, as though something else had hold of her sleeve. Roxanne said that she didn’t want to spend her whole time at the academy worrying about whether she was doing too much. Isla only nodded and went to find her bag.

At lunch, Roxanne put down her fork. "How are things with your family’s business?"

Isla pushed a pea across her plate. "Fine."

Roxanne waited.

"Not fine." Isla sighed. "My parents want me home this weekend to help sort out some difficulties. I haven’t said yes. I want to finish the term without falling behind." She looked at the pea as if it had personally disappointed her. "And I feel guilty. Every time I laugh here, I think about the kitchen table at home and all that paperwork."

Roxanne did not reach for a solution. She knew that guilt, the belief that enjoying herself meant neglecting something important, and she knew that solutions were not what it wanted.

"You’re allowed to have a life even when things aren’t perfect at home."

"You make it sound easy."

"It isn’t. I’m still learning it too."

Isla gave a small, grateful laugh and finally ate the pea.

The workshop’s introductory meeting took place that afternoon in a sunny room above the library, where a dozen mismatched chairs had been pulled into a circle. The coordinator was a lanky teacher named Mr. Ellery, with ink on his cuffs and a habit of tapping a pencil against his knee when he was pleased.

"We are not writing another royal drama," he announced. "The academy has enough of those in its corridors. I want small, true scenes. Friendships. Embarrassing misunderstandings. Homesickness. The strange business of growing up."

He split them into groups, and Roxanne found herself with two students she barely knew: Pippa, a first-year with a tangle of dark curls and a notebook covered in doodles, and Corin, a broad second-year who spoke so quietly that everyone leaned in to hear him.

"I keep thinking about someone who pretends to have everything under control," Pippa said. "Perfect timetable, perfect notes, smiling all the time. And inside she’s drowning."

"That’s good," Corin murmured.

Roxanne turned the idea over. It was uncomfortably close to a few people she knew, herself among them, until recently. "What if she’s forced to ask for help? Not because she’s weak. Because it turns out she can’t do everything alone, and nobody ever told her that was allowed."

Pippa stopped doodling. "Oh. Yes."

"That’s the whole scene," Corin said.

They began building it, trading lines on a single sheet of paper, with Pippa drawing little arrows and Corin occasionally dropping a quiet sentence that made them all stop and write it down. It was gentle work, and none of them mentioned princes or rumours. Roxanne realised that nobody in the room knew anything about her except that she had volunteered, and the realisation felt like putting down a heavy coat.

When the meeting ended, Mr. Ellery caught her at the door, tapping his pencil. "Would you be willing to help lead the next brainstorming session? Your idea brought the whole group to life."

She hesitated. She had only just joined, and she did not want every new thing to turn into a duty. The old reflex to say yes sat ready on her tongue, and she let it sit.

"What would it involve? And how much time?"

"An hour. You’d set the opening prompt, keep the conversation moving, and gather everyone’s ideas. You wouldn’t be responsible for the final scripts. That’s my burden, and I carry it gladly."

"One session," Roxanne said. "Not the whole workshop."

"One session is all I ask."

She walked out with a small, steady feeling. She could accept an opportunity and still draw its edges herself.

That evening she found Isla at her desk with her class schedule spread before her and her phone face-down beside it, the way people placed things that buzzed with bad news.

"I’m going home," Isla said, without looking up. "For the weekend. I told them yes."

"That sounds hard."

"It’s necessary." She rubbed her eyes. "But I’ll come back behind on the history reading, and I’ll miss everything, and by Monday I’ll feel like a stranger."

"Then let’s make a list."

They did. Roxanne pulled a chair over and Isla dictated: the history Chapters, the Pack Law essay outline, the reading for Strategy. Roxanne wrote it in neat columns, crossing out what could wait and underlining what could not. She did not offer money, or hint that a Moonstone might smooth things over with a word. It was Isla’s situation to navigate, and her only job was to hold the pencil.

When the list was done, Isla stared at it for a while. "I was cross with you this morning."

"I noticed."

"You were so excited about the workshop. And I felt trapped between two things I couldn’t have at once." She picked at the edge of the paper. "I wanted to be excited about something without feeling guilty for not being home."

Roxanne did not bristle. "I wasn’t trying to make your problems seem smaller."

"I know."

"Then be excited. And go home when you need to. Those things don’t cancel each other out."

Isla looked at her for a long moment, then smiled faintly. "Since when did you become the sensible one?"

"Don’t spread that rumour. I have a reputation."

They both laughed, and the warmth came back into the room like a lamp being lit.

Later, Isla folded sweaters into a small case while Roxanne checked the assignments against the list, sliding each folder into its place.

"Will you send me updates?" Isla asked. "Not only about lessons. About the ridiculous things everyone does. Tessa and the otter. Liam and his capes. I want to hear it all."

"I promise."

"Every detail."

"I’ll be unbearably thorough."

Isla zipped the case, and some of the weight seemed to lift off her shoulders just a little.

Before bed, Roxanne opened the workshop’s group chat. The students had already started trading ideas, short bursts of text and doodled photographs. She added her own, a line about how the girl in the scene might hide a broken pencil case rather than ask to borrow one, and she hit send. Then, instead of staying up all night polishing it, she set the phone on the nightstand and turned toward the wall.

She was nearly asleep when it buzzed again.

She reached for it, squinting. A new message had appeared in the chat from a student named Tobias, whom she had never actually met.

What if we write a scene about someone who thinks nobody would notice if they disappeared for a few days?

Roxanne read it once. Then she read it again.

It was a good premise, and it was also more personal than the rest. The other messages had been jokes and doodles, and this one sat among them quietly, like a stone dropped in a shallow pond. She could not tell whether Tobias was offering fiction or trying, in the only way he could manage, to tell them something real.

She lay still in the dark, the screen glowing against her hand, and did not answer yet.