Chasing Isla ✔

Chapter 16

A noise begins piercing my ears. I open my eyes slowly to find my cell phone buzzing from my nightstand. Laura's name flashes on the screen as I press the cell against my ear.

"Hey, Emma" she greets, "what are you doing after school?"

"I uh" I start, rubbing my eyes, "homework"

Why is she calling me so early?

"Okay, good" she cheers, "we're going shopping for marathon dresses"

"Marathon dresses?" I repeat, sitting up slowly in my bed.

"You weren't planning to dance in jeans were you?" She raises her voice.

I mean yes, yes I was. Actually, if I'm being honest, I wasn't planning on going at all.

"Well-" I start.

"Don't answer that. Oh by the way, the marathon starts at six am tomorrow, so we're all sleeping over at Kyles, so we can drive together in the morning"

"Kyles?" My eyes widen.

Kyle — AKA the guy who threatened me at school and who may kill me in my sleep if he felt like it.

"Yeah, so make sure you tell your brother" she orders, "I gotta go, we'll discuss this at school" with that the phone call ends.

I quickly fall back on my bed and groan. My gaze moves to the clock beside my bed that reads six am.

"It's way too early in the morning for this," I yawn while jumping out of bed.

I creep down the stair case slowly while rubbing my blurry eyes as an attempt to correct my vision. I arrive to the kitchen where I find Hank eating his fried eggs on toast. He wears a navy blue fluffy robe, his dirty blond hair messed up and his blue eyes tired.

"You're up early" Hank points out while I approach the counter to pour myself a cup of coffee. "Hey, who says that you can drink coffee? You're not even eighteen yet"

I've been drinking coffee since I was ten.

"Bite me, Hank" I roll my eyes, sipping the hot coffee.

The heat from the roasted coffee beans warm up my entire body instantly, making me sigh in satisfaction.

"That reminds me" he announces, "your birthday is tomorrow"

When Thomas and I became 'twins', we had to select a birthday for us to share. We decided to keep Liam and Thomas's real birthday which is November third - tomorrow's date. That way we could honour Liam.

"I forgot about that" I admit, taking a seat across from Hank at the kitchen table. "We're spending the day at the dance Marathon"

"Yes, I am aware of that but are you two doing anything special for your birthday afterwards? After all, you don't turn eighteen every day" Hank points out, taking a sip from his grey coffee mug.

"Actually, I'll be turning eighteen again in February" I retort.

Therefore, I've got a few months till I'm due to celebrate.

"No, Emma" he clenches his jaw, placing his mug down loudly against the table. "You're eighteen tomorrow"

God he's gets so worked up over the little things that I say. I wished he would other things just as seriously, like the fact that Johnathan is potentially dirty.

"Right, how stupid of me" I roll my eyes "and no, we don't want to do anything big"

Why would we? For Thomas his birthday is another reminder that his brother is dead and it's not even my real birthday.