After a moment of silence, Isabella finally decided to give in and popped from around the corner of the bookshelf. She stared down at the book on the ground, then at the person who’d found it; Lyla. Isabella was still, a painted picture of quiet contemplation, until she broke the space between them and slowly reached down to pick up the book, an old textbook on American Literature with doodles and notes scribbled all along the margins. It was flipped open to the opening of Edgar Allen Poe’s The Raven, and drawings of ink-darkened birds danced around the edges of the pages.
Isabella’s lips turned up into a smile at the memory of it, but whether it was one of joy or of coldness was anyone’s guess, even to her. “Yeah. Sorry, I must have dropped it or something.” She wasn’t sure how, really, she was never much of a ‘butterfingers’, but it seemed to have slipped out so easily. “What’s wrong? You seem a little… jumpy.” Her smile widened.
Lyla eyed her a moment, not sure whether she was being nice and attempting to make small talk, or if she was mocking her. She had the dropped book and really that was all Lyla had interest in, which she had an answer for now.
“Nothing’s wrong, just had a long day. Spending the day putting books away is a lot more tiring than you’d think.”
