After I Saw His First Love, I Left

Chapter 4

The once noisy classroom fell dead silent in an instant.

An icy chill shot up from the soles of my feet straight to my heart.

But Baxter was still yelling the contents of my diary at the top of his lungs.

"Sometimes I really feel so sad. I just don't get why Eliseo can't like me for real..."

Listening to his teasing tone and the snickers from the rest of the class, humiliation and rage burned so hot I could barely breathe.

I lunged to snatch it back, yelling, "Give that back to me!"

But someone moved faster than I did.

Eliseo shoved me roughly out of the way, snatched the diary from Baxter, flipped lazily through two pages, and his face clouded over into a terrifying scowl.

Our eyes met by accident, and the sheer disgust in his eyes hit me like a punch to the gut, and my heart hammered so hard it felt like it was going to burst out of my chest.

"The hell are you all staring at?" Eliseo swept a sharp glare across the room, and every student immediately wiped the smiles off their faces.

He just clutched the diary, acted like nothing had happened at all, and walked back to his seat.

I stood frozen in place, cold sweat beading all over my forehead.

What had he read?

Had he seen the page where I wrote that I came from twenty years in the future? Would he think I was a total nutjob?

I didn't dare glance back at Eliseo once the whole rest of the day, and I didn't utter a single word to anyone.

When school finally let out, Eliseo was the first one to bolt out of the classroom.

I dragged my feet and stayed behind until everyone else was gone, then slung my backpack over my shoulder and left.

But when I passed the bike shed, I spotted Eliseo standing there, like he was waiting specifically for me.

I stared at the diary in his hand, my throat tight as I forced the words out, "Eliseo, that diary—"

"No wonder you're always stirring up trouble between me and Isadora. Turns out you have a thing for me? I treated you like one of the guys, and you were out here wanting to be with me?"

Eliseo let out a cold, mocking snort, pulled out a lighter, and set the diary on fire without a second's hesitation.

The bright orange flame burned my eyes, and they immediately stung with tears.

"Don't do that!"

That diary held all my memories from the past eleven months! It held every bit of my longing and every step I'd taken to let go of what I had before!

He snarled, shoving me hard enough that I stumbled. "Why the hell would anyone keep this gross garbage? Calixta, stay the hell away from me from now on!"

With that, he swung his leg over his bike and rode off.

I didn't spare him a second glance. I stamped out the remaining flames on the diary as fast as I could, my hands shaking.

I clutched the tattered remains of the diary to my chest, hot tears welling up so fast they threatened to spill over any second.

All I ached for at that moment was to go back, back to that other timeline where Eliseo had loved me with every fiber of his being.

Sure, I'd only been a stand-in for someone else back then, but at least he'd never callously disregard my feelings and destroy the things that mattered most to me.

I stumbled home in a daze, my mind a total fog. I dragged myself to my desk and booted up my computer, only to see Chatter blinking nonstop in the corner of the screen.

Of course, the messages were from Eliseo.

Eliseo: Isadora, I already cleared things up with Calixta, don't get the wrong idea, okay? I really don't like her >:(!

Eliseo: Why aren't you replying? Are you mad? :(

*****

Even my Chatter pet seemed to pick up on how awful I felt, lying listlessly in the corner of the screen like it had lost all its energy.

My eyes burned and stung, and I fumbled to type out a reply.

Isadora: Not mad. I'm gonna do my homework now.

I hit enter, logged out of Chatter immediately, glanced at the calendar on my desk, and collapsed face-down on the table, all the strength drained out of me.

Twenty more days. Just twenty days, and I'd be able to go back to my original world.

Looks like I was fated to leave this place with nothing but a chest full of regret, huh?

For three straight days, Eliseo didn't say a single word to me. He didn't even call for me to head to cram school together like he used to.

The only time he even acknowledged my existence was on Chatter, when he thought I was Isadora, chatting away like we were thick as thieves.

He was dead set on cutting all ties with the real me, no ifs, ands, or buts.

Then came that evening. I walked home alone after cram school, my shoulders hunched.

The only streetlight in the alley flickered on and off, casting weird, jumping shadows across the walls. The whole place was way quieter than usual, and a random, jittery sense of unease crept up my spine.

I pushed aside all the gloom that had been weighing on me for days and picked up my pace, only to walk straight into a guy who looked like a total thug.

"Hey, gorgeous, how much you charge for the night?"

The thick, sour stench of alcohol rolled off him, so strong it made me gag.

I wrenched my arm out of his grip, my face ice-cold. "Watch your mouth."

"Ooh, feisty. I like that."

The second the words left his mouth, he grabbed me in a tight bear hug, his grubby hands roaming all over my body, and his reeking, dead-animal stench of a mouth lurched straight for my face.

My blood ran cold. I thrashed around wildly, screaming at the top of my lungs. "Let go! Help... HELP!"

All of a sudden, a sharp gust of force blew in from my right. The guy let out a pained grunt and crumpled to the ground with a heavy thud.

I jerked my head up in shock, and there stood Eliseo right in front of me.

The warm yellow streetlight draped over his back, and for a dizzy second, I flashed back to that other man, the one who'd put his life on the line to protect me over and over again in the other timeline.

"Calixta, are you okay? Did he hurt you?" Eliseo was staring right at me, a faint flicker of worry in his eyes.

Before I could get a word out, the goon spat on the ground and hauled himself to his feet, his face twisted with rage. "f*****g hell! You dare ruin my fun? I'll kill you!"

A cold glint of metal flashed through the dim alley, and my heart shot straight into my throat. "Watch out! He's got a knife!"

Eliseo moved on instinct, shoving his arm up to block my line of sight. The blade sliced clean through his sleeve and into his forearm.

He grunted in pain, no time to hesitate. He spun around and drove his boot hard into the guy's chest, then snatched the knife off the ground before the man could even catch his breath.

The searing pain knocked the last of the alcohol right out of the goon's system. One looked at how badly he was outmatched, and he turned tail and ran as fast as his legs could carry him.

Bright red blood dripped steadily down Eliseo's hand, and my heart clenched so tight I could barely breathe.

"Eliseo, your arm—"

Beads of cold sweat were rolling down his forehead, but he just shrugged it off. "It's nothing."

I stared at his gushing, blood-soaked wound, and a memory slammed into me out of nowhere, the first time I'd seen that exact scar on his arm back in my own timeline.

He'd said it so casually back then, "I got this saving someone I absolutely hated."

Oh. That was me. I was the person he'd hated enough to mention like that.