[mp] there's a name for boys like you|| isaac

The way she spoke about tattoos and meanings made Isaac wonder if she had one; it was a brief thought, quickly replaced with his assurances that there was no way she had one. She was cold, but was she that cool? Would her parents let her get one? He hadn't, but that was beside the point now. Pushing the thought out of his mind, he returned to the conversation and gave her a slight nod. "I do not think you would appreciate my adjectives; however," Isaac teased her with another smile before rolling his eyes.

Of course, she took it that way. Of course, she thought it meant he had been thinking about her. Sometimes he was pretty sure this witch lived in her own little fantasy world where nothing could phase her. No matter how many mean and rude things he said, how many times he insulted her, she just seemed to let it roll right off.

Isaac laughed once when Magnolia tried to fight back, she was a mess, but that wasn't necessarily a bad thing. It was better than pretending like she had it all figured out; girls like that were even more annoying than she was. Upon hearing her next words, though, Isaac's smile faltered, and his eyes grew a little colder. They had been joking and laughing, so of course, he took what she said too seriously and got offended by nothing. "Is that what you think I do?" He asked her, the playful tone of his voice replaced by his typically apathetic one.

Magnolia’s laughter died down when his tone changed, realizing (maybe a little too late) that he had not found her statement very funny. Which the girl couldn’t understand because they had been having a right laugh at her expense and this didn’t seem that different to begin with. There was some truth in her statement, and maybe her honesty had been reflected too boldly in her words.

Maybe he didn’t appreciate her conclusion about him but he, too, had to admit that they were different around their friends than they were with each other. It was unauthentic but it was also very true, and even Magnolia knew that no matter how much she wanted to always be herself it was much easier to relent to the influence of what she thought her friends wanted to see. Magnolia wanted to be liked and it was with this conclusion that she had assumed Isaac’s reputation had much to do with how he wanted to portray himself. If anything was true was that this Isaac was nothing like the Isaac he was with his friends.

“Don’t get mad about it now!” she demanded, though her expression had become more serious her tone remained light. “Be honest, if Duncan and Allison were here you wouldn’t even be talking to me all proper like now, would you?” she explained. The jury was still out on Fiora because Magnolia could not really understand the degree of their friendship just yet. “You’d be taking the piss because that’s who you are, and that’s fine,” she shrugged it off to further show that Magnolia had come to terms with it. Not the fact that it was who he was, at least she wanted to think he was genuine around her, but that it was a thing that they did, people their age.

"Don't get mad about it now!" Her words played on repeat in his mind, "At least I don't go around pretending I'm someone else all the time.". The problem was, Isaac was always a little bit angry. Even when he was playful or serious, the anger was still there, lying in wait not too far under the surface, ready to strike. He felt like he'd been on the offensive for the last sixteen years. He was always waiting for the next bad thing to happen, another reason to lack faith in everyone around him except for himself, another reason to be alone.

The fact that she was right made him more upset than it should have. He probably wouldn't have been talking to her the same way if his friends were around. He hid behind the fact that neither would she; Isaac assumed she'd treat him differently as well, even though she hadn't given him a reason to yet. Magnolia had kept his secret for two months. Despite his constant pestering and rude comments, she hadn't turned on him, however. "because that's who you are, and that's fine," , she said it was fine, but her words still cut into him in a way he was unfamiliar with. Isaac was guarded; he was cold and distant to close himself off from comments like this. If he didn't care, no one could hurt him.

His chin raised, bravado masking the raging thoughts in his mind, "Do not make the mistake of thinking you know anything about me, Hawkins," He told her sharply, feeling the venom on his tongue, begging him to say something cruel to her. To bring her down to his level, it was his specialty. "Are you so perfect that you would not act differently around your friends?" Isaac thought he knew the answer, but he wanted to watch her contemplate the question; he figured she felt she was better than him. And she was. But it still pissed him off.

His retort had been unexpectedly hurtful, though the girl wasn’t really ready to understand the complexities of why she cared. Maybe it had something to do with her conclusions about what the time they spent together meant. Had she been mistaken when she had assumed that they were friends? Had she been silly to believe that sometimes his gestures and words meant a little more than he was letting on? Isaac was a confounding individual, but when he told her that she knew nothing about him, she started to feel like he was playing a game with her. And then he had called her by her last name again, though it felt foreign hearing it from him considering he hadn’t used it in some time, it placed further distance between them.

She stared at him a moment much too long before she looked back down at the magazine in her hand and closed it. “I guess I don’t,” she shrugged it off, pretending it hadn’t meant anything. If Isaac couldn’t care to be honest with her, if he going to draw her in only to push her away then maybe she was better off always being on guard. “I’m not perfect” she retorted, annoyed by the word and that he had assumed as much. It was a mistake many had made in the past as they drew conclusions about her life, actions, and her parentage. In relation to her siblings, Magnolia had middle child syndrome, she often felt ignored, neglected, and excluded most of the time when she was with her family, though nobody ever understood what that felt like.

“I wouldn’t talk to you in front of my friends, no,” she said decisively, feeling more comfortable saying something that made her feel in control again. Isaac had already made it clear that he wasn’t in the least concerned with her opinions of her. He had been clear in showing that she did know nothing about him after all and that this entire conversation until now had been his way of passing the time. “So at least we have one thing in common after all.”   

Isaac's expression shifted drastically when she confessed she wouldn't talk to him, not in front of her friends, and a flicker of something passed through his eyes. Was he upset about it? He told himself he wasn't, that he did not give a shit what she thought or how she thought of him. That he was better off not talking to her at all. All of these things were lies, and he was lying to himself more than anyone else, but it didn't matter. His eyes burned into hers, the dark brown hiding of much her words had affected him.

"Really?" He asked, the anger still lingering in his voice, but there was something else in it too. Something more closely related to vulnerability, if he was even capable of that. His head swirled with made-up images of her completely ignoring him around her friends. Acting like she was too good to be seen with him like she was embarrassed to be around him, and it hurt. Why did he care?

"Well, I am glad you were honest about it, then," He began, the emotion in his voice all but drained out and gone now. Sitting up a little straighter, Isaac put as much distance between them as he could without getting off the bed. His headache had returned, he'd nearly forgotten how shitty he felt while distracted talking to her, but it was back full force now. And with a vengeance, which was fitting. He rubbed at his temple with one hand, the frown on his face deepening.

Of course not, she had thought immediately upon hearing his question. It made her feel a little guilty like maybe she had told him something he wasn’t expecting to hear or if she had jabbed a little harder than he could handle. Then, she reminded herself that he had been doing the same thing to her for the past three months and it might have simply been a byproduct of these complicated feelings she had developed for him, or them, or their situation over the course of that time. But Magnolia wasn’t really a mean girl in the same sense that Isaac was a mean boy, she enjoyed the occasional biting remark but she didn’t make it her purpose to hurt other people’s feelings and so she felt bad.

“I’m being realistic,” she said after a long pause, “you know who I hang out with, don’t you?” it was more of a rhetorical question, even if he didn’t know their names, he’d probably recognize their faces (or their voices). “You see yourself sitting down and having a chat with us? Think your mates’ll let you live that one down?” she explained. This web of friendships was something Magnolia had invested much of her free time into so it was a subject she felt passionate about, not enough to raise her voice at him though.

“Anyway,” she leaned over, reaching for her bag to stuff the magazine back into it, fiddling with the buckles to avoid looking at him, “I like it better this way, when I don’t have my friends breathing down my neck demanding an explanation,” she added quietly. She had assumed they’d demand to hear a story that she was already convinced she wouldn’t tell. But it was also more than just that, she liked the idea of having this to herself, even if it oftentimes proved to be a rather vexing way to spend her time. Isaac was interesting and it felt like less pressure.

"I think that I do not give a shit what they think, your friends or mine, I will talk to you if I want to," Isaac told her sternly. His anger had changed from being upset that she called him out, called him fake, to be about not being able to talk to her. Somehow his mind had twisted her words and made them into something they weren't. Isaac heard her telling him that they wouldn't be able to talk or hang out because of his friends and hers. Because they had to deal with their own social circles, conversations like what this one had become before weren't going to be a thing. And he had been enjoying this conversation. Isaac didn't like being told what to do, but he also didn't want her to know what he was thinking, either.

"But this is a big if," He finished, wanting to make sure she thought he wasn't sure if he even wanted to keep talking to her. He was confused and probably be confusing, but it was what it was. He shifted uncomfortably where he was sitting, bringing his other leg up to rest on the bed, outstretched next to where she was now sitting instead of laying. His foot had gone numb hanging off the side of the bed, and now it was sending pins and needles all the way up to his thigh.

Isaac's rough features began to soften; she liked it better this way? Did that mean she didn't want him around her friends, or that she didn't want to be around his, or something else entirely? "What sort of explanation would you have to give them?" He asked slowly, brown eyes following her hands as she put away the magazine and tried to seem busy.

In the great mystery that was everything that came out of Isaac Hackney’s mouth, it seemed that he was hellbent on speaking to her regardless of the circumstance. Was he insinuating that they were friends now? Magnolia supposed normal people didn’t really sit down and have a conversation where they decided to be friends, not like the way one would decide to enter a romantic relationship. Or, had he taken her words as a challenge? Maybe he had assumed that she was only telling him as a dare, to see if he had the gall to do it. But that explanation didn’t sit with her well at all, because it wasn’t a dare, it was a very astute observation on her part.

But she didn’t have to draw conclusions for long, his qualification of the statement if giving her the answer she thought she had known all along: he didn’t really want to talk to her, he’d only do it to prove her wrong. It wasn’t nearly as hurtful as her words might have been had he aimed them in her direction but she didn’t like to think that this entire thing was a game. Sure they had their little disagreements and his constant teasing but in between those, she had shared parts of herself that she hoped he hadn’t taken for granted. But Magnolia knew she had a tendency to overestimate the feelings of others. They were just classmates, after all, and she’d just have to keep that in mind when she spoke to him.

“Oh I dunno,” she shrugged, not really wanting to elaborate but feeling that he wouldn’t drop it unless she did. “Why I’m talking to you, probably. It isn’t like I’ve told them we…talk you know,” she started, though she hadn’t meant it to sound much deeper than it really was. “Nor about the train, or the notes…” she frowned a little, “anyway,” she finally looked up at him, “with all the drama going on in our circle, it's best to be the observer and not the participant."

Isaac's eyebrow raised when she mentioned them talking, and about the train specifically, some part of him alarmed by her bringing it up, even though she had given him no reason to be. Magnolia had plenty of time and opportunity to spill his secret, but with every day that passed, he started to think he had nothing to worry about. It was an unsettling feeling, someone having something on him, and Isaac almost believing they wouldn't use it as ammunition. If the roles were reversed, he wondered if it would be the same, he really did.

And even though he knew he'd come to regret it, the wizard began to ask more questions, wanting to move the conversation away from the train and what she knew. "What sort of drama?" He asked, settling in for whatever gossip she probably had waiting in the wings for precisely this opportunity. While he hadn't heard her speak much about her friends in the conversations they had had, he knew Magnolia's reputation well enough to know she always had some story. "Wait, let me guess," He said with a smile and held his hand up toward her in a pausing motion.

He thought about it for a moment, who were her friends again? The loud Gryffindors and a few Ravenclaws, he knew their names because they had been in school together for years, but not a whole lot else. "Someone lied about something trivial, and so now everyone is at war?"

Did he actually care about what was going on in her friend’s group? Probably not, it sounded almost like he wanted to change the topic. Was that going to stop Magnolia from sharing the information she knew? Not at all. The girl was not the resident gossip for no reason. But for the sake of their privacy, she figured leaving their names out was the polite thing to do. Anyone who truly knew who she spent time with could probably figure it out.

“Aren’t you rather nosy,” she teased, her expression serious for a fraction of a second before she settled in, tucking her hair behind her ears and began, “Well, I think that one of my friends likes the other but she has a boyfriend, who really isn’t all that, to be honest, but anyway,” she paused for dramatic effect, “those two friends have been writing like love letters to each other all summer and went to the movies and it was all very sweet, romantic stuff. So, I’m hoping he’ll ask her out, they’d be absolutely adorable together,” she added, her voice rising just a pinch at the thought of Killian and Billie as a couple. “But well, there’s the issue with the boyfriend,” she added. “He’s quite scary so I’m a bit worried for my friend, don’t know how he’d fare in a fistfight but I’m still supportive,” she continued. "Wow, imagine having two guys fighting over you, how exciting is that!"

“So, as you can assume, the entire thing is all very tense right now. And should I bring a complete outsider to the table, well..." she trailed off, figuring that he'd be able to come to his own conclusions about why she couldn't just start publically spending time with him. Magnolia would go with whatever conclusion he came up with, she knew that if he came around she'd be too obvious and her friends would immediately call her bluff. After last term's crush fiasco, she wanted to pretend that her mind wasn't on boys all the time, especially not those belonging to Slytherin.

Almost as soon as he had asked, Isaac knew he would come to regret it. He did not care about her friends or the gossip that surely surrounded them. Isaac had done a good job staying out of the rumor mill these last four years. Well, as out as anyone could be in a school as small as Hogwarts, and he particularly enjoyed that small bit of anonymity he had left. Blinking, through her story Isaac made sure to nod when she paused, make a face when she said something she thought he might be shocked by, and then nod some more.

"So, wait," He said after a beat when she'd given him a pause he could use to ask questions (why did he care?). "She has a boyfriend, but she is writing to another wizard she likes?" Sounded like maybe Magnolia's friends were more interesting than Isaac had thought. "And you are all rooting for your friend to get with your other friend, even though she has a boyfriend?" Isaac felt like his brain might implode at any minute from all of this. Who talked about this kind of stuff? He turned to look at Magnolia, and the sheer investment he saw in her eyes made him chuckle. She wasn't serious, was she? This must have been something she'd read about in her gossip magazine. It sure sounded like it could have been.

When she mentioned bringing him to the table, Isaac couldn't help but move away from a little. He felt defensive, or offensive, or a combination of both. "Who said I wanted to come to your table?" He asked, returning to his normal attitude and the lack of enthusiasm in his eyes.

“I think she likes him in that way you like someone right before things turn romantic, you know?” she explained. Magnolia didn’t want to say that Billie was emotionally cheating on Phillip because she wasn’t really sure how the entire thing had gone down. All she actually knew was that they had gone to the movies and that according to Barbie they had been writing each other. Along with the fact that the two had made prefect together and therefore had more reasons to spend time in each other’s company, Magnolia had assumed things would develop from there. She’d read something like this in a novel, that sort of thing never went well, at least not for the boyfriend. “But you know, between us,” she started, leaning in closer as if to avoid the ears of some bystander that might take the information back to anyone of the people involved, “I think the right answer is pretty obvious,” she whispered. 

Magnolia moved back when he spoke, a little surprised by his reaction but taking it in stride, knowing that it might be the only way to dissuade him from assuming she wanted him there because she liked him or something. Even if she did, she’d never say it. “Oh, I thought we were both set on being best of friends, and now you don’t want to sit with me anymore?” she asked, pouting as if he had hurt her feelings but knowing well that it would take a miracle for Isaac to ever want to spend time with her friends, especially after she had probably overwhelmed him with the gossip. And that hadn’t even been the fourth of it. But there was something to be said about telling someone outside of her friend’s group and she considered how she might like to do this more often, even if he probably wasn’t interested enough to discuss it with her. 

More importantly, Isaac seemed like the sort to want to be annoyed by her in his own time, not at all hours of the day. “That’s just as well, I’m sure Allison and I have plenty to talk about, maybe I’ll start with that ghastly nail color she’s always wearing,” she teased, giving him a wink to show him that she had just been kidding. Magnolia wouldn’t be caught dead at his table, no matter how sincerely he asked. It was nice to know they had more or less agreed on that.

"Yeah, but," Isaac started, blinking, still a bit lost with everything she had just told him, but instead of continuing, he just shook his head. Yep, that was all the gossip he could stand. About two minutes' worth, that was his limit, and the very last thing he wanted to do was encourage the Gossip Queen of Hogwarts to continue. Honestly, he didn't care which wizard the witch in the story ended up with, the right one, the wrong one, none of it made a difference to him. Even if he knew who she was talking about specifically, it probably still wouldn't have mattered to him. He barely paid attention to the drama and intrigue in his own life, let alone anyone else's.

"I would say let me know how it turns out," He began, speaking slowly as his lips turned upward into a smirk, "But I do not care." The teenager let out a soft chuckle and shook his head at her. Even though he didn't care about this story or whoever was involved, Isaac couldn't help but wonder what sorts of things Magnolia had heard about him. And what kinds of rumors she had perpetuated.

He noticed her move away at his words, mirroring the way he had gone on the defensive, and he half assumed she would say something snarky back, but instead, her reply surprised him. Instead of being sassy or trying to insult him, she chose to make it into a joke. And he felt less defensive, less irritated that she had assumed something in the beginning, and it was strange. "I do not even want to sit with you now," He returned, the playfulness in his voice giving away that he didn't mean what he was saying.

"Yeah, no," Isaac gave her a deadpan look, shaking his head when she brought up becoming friends with Allison instead. "You should not do that," He informed Magnolia, even though he should have been pretending like he couldn't care less if they became friends. Some part of him knew that was the right way to play this, the more intelligent way, but something else was in charge of his words right now. And Isaac couldn't shake the feeling that Magnolia becoming Allison's friends would be akin to a death sentence for him.

 â€œOh you’ll find out, either way, I’m sure it’s going to be a big deal,” she reassured him, disregarding his disinterest with much ease. Everyone always wanted to stay out of the drama but certainly wanted to hear about it so the girl knew that he was probably just pretending not to care to make himself sound good. He’d have to do better if he wanted to convince the Gryffindor girl of it, though, she could read most people like it was her profession. One did not become the Queen of gossip by letting just anyone try to add rumors to the pile, there was a whole process of verification, there had to be at least two-thirds of truth for it to form part of the database. Or, maybe it was less, it really depended on how exciting the piece of gossip was. In the end, the truth didn’t matter all that much and if it wasn’t real, most of the students eventually forgot about it anyway.

“Everybody’s gonna have to choose a side too, hope you choose the right one,” she added, the singsong quality in her voice only alluding to how excited the girl was to be discussing these things with him, even if it wasn’t really why he had come to the Hospital Wing in the first place. “But you know if you ever have information to add or just…something, you should come to me first,” she added. Not that Isaac gave the “secret gossip” feeling but one never knew the sorts of secrets others harbored or the types of things that they overheard. Isaac seemed like he was full of other people’s secrets.

His reaction to her suggestion that she spend time with Allison amused her. Not that she would ever do such a thing, Allison was probably the last person she ever wanted to spend time with for obvious reasons. And less obvious reasons relating to what she had seen at that haunted house over Halloween. “I’m offended,” she pouted, pretending to care, “you think your girlfriend’s too good for me? I’m a nice person, I get along with almost anybody,” she added, outlining her traits as if it mattered at all. What would the two have to talk about anyway? Probably nothing. “But fine!” she rolled her eyes dramatically, “If you insist I guess I’ll stick to my friends and you stick to yours. Deal?”

Even though he hoped her words didn't mean he was somehow tangled into this gossip nonsense, the wizard knew better. Some nagging voice in the back of his head told him she was going to bring it up again. And he would be expected to participate. He groaned when she told him he'd have to pick a side. It was how she said like she expected him to be as invested as she was that really got to him. "Seeing as I do not know who the story is about, I can not be expected to pick a side," He told her, giving her an annoyed look before rolling his eyes at her.

"One, she is not my girlfriend, and you know this," Isaac held his hand up as he began to count on his fingers dramatically. "Two, Allison is not the sort of friend you want to have. And three, I never wanted to be friends with your friends, so, deal." Isaac finished counting and nearly put his hand back down before having to stifle a cough. He tried to fight it, his sore throat already aching, but the cough came anyway. And it was followed by another, and another, until nearly thirty seconds had gone by. His eyes were red and glossy by the time he'd finished, the pressure in his pounding head making it feel like it might explode.

"If you are not sick, you might want to go before you get sick," He warned her, his voice a little raspier than it was before, but he hoped she wouldn't go. Isaac hated being sick, it was the worst, but at least Magnolia was keeping him distracted. She was good at that.