We Only Breathe for so Long

“What the fuck was that for?!” John retorted at Isa, rubbing his cheek. I just stood in fear. I’ve never seen John so mad and god, he looked scary. And that was an understatement.

“Don’t you dare touch John!” the girl shouted at Isa, with hurt in her eyes. I didn’t buy it though; she obviously looked fake. Isa just rolled her eyes.

“Touch John? Excuse me, but you’re the one who’s been all over him these past hours!” She shouted back.

“Well, I have every right to,” the girl chuckled darkly.

“Every right to?! Who do you think you are?!” Isa was glaring right into the girl’s face.

“Isa, she’s my girlfriend,” John sighed. And in that moment, I knew Isa’s heart stopped. I was shocked too. Why would John date a girl like her? Isa just turned around and started walking away from the two. I was about to follow her when we were interrupted by the girl’s words.

“First, she tried to kill Lisette, and now she slapped you! You poor thing,” she said to John, in a not genuine-sounding manner. And in a flash, I was seeing Isa tackling the girl on the ground, them wrestling and pulling each other’s hair. That definitely set Isa off. John and I struggled to get them away from each other.

“Guys, quit it!” John said, in a governing manner with annoyance in his voice. He managed to get the girl off of Isa. I managed to get a hold of Isa, who was panting. Her eyes were flames, full of fury and hatred. While John was checking on the girl, Isa somehow got free of my hold (I guess I was that weak) and walked up to John. She violently got a hold of his shoulders and turned them around to make him face her.

“Don’t you even bother talking to me,” she said coldly, pointing her index finger at him. She then walked briskly away from them, into the path we came from. I quickly glanced at John who had a pissed look on his face and at the girl who was pretending to be concerned about John. I then ran off in order to catch up to Isa.

“Isa! Hold up!” I shouted at the figure storming through the path we were walking on.

“That bastard,” she muttered, not taking her eyes off of the dark road ahead. I was just walking at her side as we were making it back to John’s house. “I cannot believe him. First, he decides to invite some stupid girls to the beach. The beach that he and I discovered. Then, he decides to spend time with them, when I haven’t even seen him for about six months. And then he yells at me, even though I was sorry and that I knew I made a mistake. Don’t get me wrong, I deserved it, but why the hell would he do that if he knew I felt horrible? And then he decides to rub it all off in my face by making out with his so-called girlfriend.”

I stayed quiet as I let her rant on about John. I seriously did not know what to say to her. Like I said, I was never put into this kind of situation. We were silent for a moment as we walked in the dark, and then she let out a big sigh.

“I… I’m just worried about him. He shouldn’t be wasting his time on girls like them. He changed ever since he started touring with The Maine. I just wish that things could be the way they used to.”

I put an arm around her, to give comfort. “Don’t worry Isa, I’m sure John realized what he did wrong.” We were back at the beach. The Maine minus John and the two other girls were huddled around the bonfire. They glanced at us when they saw us coming. I could see the annoyed expression present in their faces when they saw Isa but they immediately changed when they saw me. The guys got up and went over to us.

“Lisette, Lisette! Are you okay?” Pat asked me, with concern in his voice.

No Pat, no I’m not. Well, that’s not a really nice thing to say to a guy who asks how I’m feeling. “Yeah, I’m feeling better. And thanks for getting me out of the water,” I smiled at him.

“Anytime,” he replied.

Just then, John and his girlfriend stepped into the beach, his arm around her waist. We all turned to him. As the guys greeted the two from afar, I saw Isa’s calm-ish face change to one of exasperation and anger. Her fists were clenched and the guys started to notice. Jared, Garrett, Kennedy and Pat looked me with confusion in their faces and I just sighed.

“Hey, uh, guys? Maybe we should have dinner at home. It’s getting pretty late,” Garrett awkwardly asked. I could tell this had to do with Isa being pissed.

“Yeah, sure. Whatever, let’s go,” Isa immediately replied and got my arm and started walking towards John’s house. I looked at the guys as I was being dragged, and they, in turn, just looked at me with worried expressions on their faces.

~~~

“Let’s play truth or dare,” John’s girlfriend suggested. The two other girls screamed and nodded eagerly in approval as me as Isa just rolled her eyes beside me.

We first decided to freshen up ourselves for dinner. As usual, Isa was the chef for this meal. The whole time though, she had really bad vibes, so bad that I was afraid to talk to her. I just watched her do her thing in the kitchen, offering to help every now and then, since Mom taught me some stuff about cooking. By around quarter to nine, dinner was prepared and we finished eating by around 10:30.

The guys just responded with mumbles of “sure” and “okay”. I guess Isa and I had no choice but to play as well. We all got up from the dining room and cleaned up (well, those three girls were too lazy to help out) and then we all sat in the living room.

“So, who goes first?” John’s girlfriend asked with a flirtatious smile on her lips. I just realized that I still don’t even know her name. Whatever, I don’t want to know it anyway. “Isa? How about you go first?” We all turned our heads to Isa. I could already sense what would happen.

“Forget it, I don’t even want to play a stupid game with you,” she said coldly. She then stood up, and headed up the stairs. I gave an apologetic look to the guys, who were somewhat shocked, and made my way to our room. I found the door locked.

“Isa, open up. It’s me,” I called to her. Moments later, the door was unlocked and I went in.

“I’m taking a shower. You can go after me,” she told me. I just nodded and then she went in the bathroom with her clothes and towel.

I wanted to collapse on my bed but then I remembered I still have grains of sand in my hair so I kept myself from doing so. Instead, I got the novel I was reading at the moment and sat on the floor, my back leaning on the glass doors. Ten minutes later, Isa was already done so I put the book on the bedside table, got my stuff and went in after she got out.

When I got out of the bathroom, I found someone pounding at our door. Isa was just lying on her bed, her body under the covers, groaning, trying as much as possible to ignore whoever was outside.

“Isa, please, open the door! I want to talk to you,” the voice pleaded. Garrett.

“Isa, what’s going on?” I quietly said.

“I know you’re in there, Lisette; I heard you. Don’t act as if you can’t hear me! Can’t you please open the door so I can talk to Isa?” How the—

“Don’t you dare open the door, Lisette. I don’t want to talk to him,” she said at me, with so much seriousness in her eyes. I just had to obey her.

“Okay, fine. At least hear me out, Isa. Look, I’m sorry for calling you stupid. It was very rude of me. I’m sorry. I feel really guilty for doing that. I hope you can forgive me,” Garrett said, with sincerity in his voice.

Isa groaned then got up and stood in front of the door. “On one condition,” she told him.

“Anything to get you to forgive me,” Garrett replied, with desperation.

“You have to do something for me in return.”

“Which is?”

“I’ll still need to think about it.”

“I’ll gladly do it, no matter what it is,” Garrett said with no hint of uncertainty in his voice.

“What if I asked you to go marry Pat?” No response.

Isa then opened the door to find a smiling Garrett. She then hugged him and after pulling away, she told him he was forgiven. He then thanked Isa and said that he was going back to his room.

“Where are the other guys?” I asked Garrett, walking closer to Isa.

“Oh, they’re still downstairs. I’m honestly tired of hanging out with those girls, as much as I don’t want to sleep yet. Anything to get away from them!”

Isa and I just laughed. “Wanna come in and hangout then?” Garrett gladly nodded and came in. He sat on the floor like I did a while ago, since he hasn’t changed and still had some sand on him. Isa and I just sat on my bed.

“Isa, can I ask you something?” Garrett asked, after settling down on the floor.

“Yeah?”

“Why were you mad when you saw John when he came back with Kristy at the beach?” Kristy. So that’s her name.

Isa just fell back beside me. “Ugh, I don’t want to talk about it.”

“You don’t want to talk about it, but that doesn’t mean I’m not allowed to know about it, right?” Garrett asked again, thinking face on. I couldn’t help but to giggle at his logic.

“If you really want to know why then, Lisette, go tell him why,” Isa said.

“Well, basically—“ I started, until Isa cut me off.

“No, go talk about it outside, I really don’t want to hear anything about it,” Isa commanded us.

“Alright. Come on, Gare, let’s go,” I said, getting up. Garrett got up too and we went out of the glass doors, into the back porch. We first peeked if the rest of the guys and Kristy and her friends were at the pool. When we saw the area was empty, I started to explain while we were leaning on the porch railing.

“So basically, Isa’s mad at John for doing four things. First, he shows Kristy and her friends the beach they found together. Second, he spends time with Kristy instead of her, when she hasn’t seen him in a long while. Third, he shouted at her when, uh, you know…” I drifted off as Garrett just nodded. “Well, the point was, he knew she felt horrible. And lastly, he kissed her in front of us.” I explained, basically just repeating everything that Isa told me.

Garrett nodded. “Are you indirectly telling me that Isa likes John?”

I certainly see that. I mean, now that he brought it up, yeah, it seems like Isa likes John. “Uh, maybe?”

Garrett chuckled. “Well, I mean, they were childhood friends and all. It’s somewhat predictable that she develops feelings for him. It can’t be purely platonic the whole way,” he said. I don’t know why, but my heart thumped irregularly. I just ignored it and nodded.

“So, shall we head back?” I asked, gesturing to the sliding doors.

“Yeah, let’s go.”

We found Isa sitting on her bed, reading the novel I set down earlier on our bedside table. “This is so freaking interesting,” she muttered as Garrett took his respective seat on the floor (as cruel as that sounds) and mine on my bed. I leaned back on the headboard of my bed.

“So Lisette, how’s life?” Isa asked me, just to spark a conversation in the room. She dropped my book and looked at me eagerly. I know this was going somewhere, but I couldn’t tell, so I just responded honestly.

“It’s going great, I guess,” I smiled. Except for the fact I nearly died again. Yeah it’s great.

“It’s because of Kennedy, right?” Garrett asked.

“W-what?” I stuttered. My heart rate picked up its pace at the mention of his name.

“You should see yourself,” Isa giggled.

“You know, you kinda suck at hiding your feelings. No offense,” Garrett said, raising up his hands.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I frowned at him.

“It’s true though,” Isa said.

“Whatever,” I just mumbled in reply. Both Garrett and Isa chuckled at my reaction. Honestly, I found it funny how Garrett was joining us in our conversation. Well, not that I know what we were talking about.

The sound of pairs of feet making its way up the stairs caught Garrett’s attention. “I guess those girls went home already. I’m going to our room,” he said, getting up.

“Alright, Garrett, good night,” I said.

“Nighty-night!” Isa said.

“Night,” he smiled at us and went out of the room. Isa and I then decided to call it a day and we turned off the lights. While waiting for sleep to take over, I looked out at the glass doors and watch the full moon shine in its glory. Two down, eight to go.