It had been a month since I had last spoken with Isabelle. I didn't even have any sort of idea or explanation why it happened. One minute in the middle of the month of May, she was there speaking periodically with me over the phone, and just like that, it was like she never existed. She hadn't said anything about wanting to leave. She hadn't given me any kind of warning beforehand. She was just gone, hurling me into uncertainty of what had happened.

I had first taken notice of the fact when an entire week had gone by and I hadn't heard from her. I had assumed that this meant that she had finally managed to find work for herself after searching for two months and words of congratulations lingered on my tongue for when we would talk about it next. But it was then that her absence had begun to drag on, and over time, the wonder grew if the reason for this was more personally directed at me.

Our last conversations spun through my mind as I tried to make sense of the situation. Was there something I had said that upset her? Had I unknowingly done something to drive her away? Everything had seemed perfectly fine when we last spoke; we had made lighthearted conversation talking about the changing season, Isabelle's search, and the fact that she was receiving help in said search. Nothing had told me that she would suddenly leave without a word.

The temperature rose increasingly in the closing of May and the opening of June. I started leaving my coat at home in the mornings when I would leave for work, but even this seemed like it wasn't enough. A stale, throbbing heat sat in the air as I walked to and from work in a day that the chilled blast of the air conditioning in the building could hardly beat. As the month rolled on, thoughts of Isabelle were more uncommon to reach my mind. That is, until the middle of the month, when a call from her came in for the first time in a while that I managed to catch directly nearing the end of Open Advisory.

I could just barely register the sound of the phone ringing over the waves of conversations that settled in the room. I had drifted closer upon catching the sound to make sure that it was actually present and not the play of my imagination. After I was sure of the fact that there was a call to be answered, I hastily picked up the phone to pursue conversation and offered my usual greeting as a starting point.

"Happy Home Designer," I said. "This is Digby."

"Hey, Digby. I didn't know you answered the calls directly," a hesitant voice gave its response that instantly clicked in my mind as belonging to my twin sister. The sound was almost drowned out by the ripples of conversation settling in the room.

"Oh, it's you." The realization escaped aloud before I could restrain it. Well, this was unexpected, if anything. She had gone away and made a return just as abruptly.

Questions I had sought to ask her about work and her experience had begun to resurface in my mind for me to finally speak to her, but they dissolved from my tongue before I could even force them out. Maybe that wouldn't have been something she wanted to talk about. Maybe she wasn't even too enthusiastic to be talking to me again at all. For all I knew, she was reaching out because she needed something. The length of her absence would have been enough to explain that.

"Good morning, Isabelle," I decided. "Yes, I sometimes answer if I'm closest to the phone. It's been a long time since you last called."

"I know," Isabelle replied. There was a tone that clung to her voice, one that I hadn't heard from her over the phone but one that seemed likely after the act of disappearing for a whole month. It was a mumbly, dismissive voice of someone who knew they did something wrong and didn't want the effect to linger on them. "I'm sorry about that. I started staying at a different campsite about a month ago and had no access to a phone."

Oh. So there was a reason for it. Isabelle would have needed to travel around in search of work, and the odds of finding herself in a place where there were no options of communication weren't exactly the lowest. The heaviness of the tension between us loosened.

"It's okay," I told her, shifting the phone under my ear to be able to hear what she was saying more efficiently over the chatting that swarmed me. "I understand. When I stopped hearing from you, I kind of just accepted that we weren't going to speak for a while. I would have tried to reach you, but I wasn't quite sure where you were staying."

"I'll be able to call more often from now on, actually," Isabelle announced. A laugh rang out from the back right corner of the room, and I began to question whether Isabelle could hear how busy the room was today. "I just moved into a proper house with a phone. That's how I'm calling you right now. I'll try to call a bit more regularly."

"That's great!" I answered. She was really moving up since she had left home and that was incredible news. Her search must have earned some good progress as well. If she was already devoting herself to a place so strongly that she located herself into a house, then she must have already found a job or something of interest. "What about work?" I asked her. "Have you found yourself a job yet?"

"No," Isabelle said. A silence filled the line as I listened for her explanation, anticipating her reasoning for her decision, but nothing more came. A suspicion crept into my mind that there was something she wasn't completely revealing to me.

"Really?" I inquired. "Is there something that's holding you back?"

"Not really," Isabelle replied, a little too calmly. "I tried. I'm trying. It's just that nobody wants to hire me."

Something definitely wasn't right here, but it wasn't clear whether this was the tireless taunting of my anxiety causing me to read too far into the situation or a genuine bad feeling. "What do you plan to do?" I tried again.

"I'm going to keep searching. I'm going to find something eventually. It's better than just giving up entirely," Isabelle pointed out. "I think the only outcome that would bring me home again after failing for so long is for a last resort."

The statement was a smack in the face. An absolute whack to the gut. A last resort. That was all I was worth to her. That was all my presence meant to her. And the fact that she just let that slip without a second thought made it that much worse. I really did mean so little to her.

If she wanted me gone from her life, then that was what I would try to be. It wasn't like she needed my help in any evident way, so she wouldn't even notice if I sunk back into the shadows of our lack of contact. Blindly, I waited for her to speak up and change her answer, to assure me that she had simply misspoke, but no words came. She knew what she said.

"Okay," I said at last, still reeling. A throbbing ache etched into the pit of my stomach with the gripping urge to draw away and be left alone. The idea of keeping in touch so dedicatedly that Isabelle had flooded my head with felt a little too out of reach now. "Well... Thank you for the update. I'm glad you decided to call. I'm going to get off the call for now, but there's something you should know before I do."

"What is it?" Isabelle questioned. A few levels of confidence had been cut from her voice after the verbal blow she had given as she sank back into her calm demeanor. Either she was aware that she said what needed to be said and received a sense of fulfillment from it, or it was regret. I didn't know for sure—But I did know that it was time to do the same.

"You probably already know this, but I won't be near the phone at all times during the day and might not be around to answer if you call. Please remember that most of the time, I'm going to be very busy over here," I informed her. "I appreciate your offer to call more, but I think it would be best for both of us if you don't call as frequently as you say."

It was Isabelle's turn to fall silent. It almost seemed like my statement had struck her in the same way hers had struck me. But then again, I would never know how she felt, since she wasn't here for me to see it. "I see," she said at last, and this was all she said.

And just like that, our first conversation in the break of our routine of absence was nothing like what I had envisioned. It just wasn't fun anymore, wrenching the eagerness to talk with her that I had gripped before she had even sent out the call at all as my stomach now crawled with dejection. We exchanged our hesitant goodbyes and left the call, both a bit more keen to escape each other's presence. We weren't going to be talking for a while.

The truth was enough to send a pinching dread to my stomach even for hours after the conversation had ended-- She was changing. She would never even have thought to treat me in such a way before she left. The idea plagued my mind for hours at a time as I trudged through the consideration of what could have caused such a drastic change. Was it me? Did she consider it to be my fault that I had no option of reaching out for the past month? Or was it her surroundings, a factor of her new life that was etching into her personality?

No matter what could have swayed her, I couldn't help surrendering to the lifting of a weight on my being with the creeping sense that I had made the right decision for myself. If I had kept my silence instead, being right in the action while being pressed to make a decision on my stance on it could only lead to hasty decisions. What I needed was time to thoroughly contemplate the situation and which words to use to get my message across. Surely I could find a solution with a bit of a break in routine.

Or maybe that was just what I was telling myself as to why I hesitated to pick up the phone in case it was my sister trying to reach me. Her words felt to carve into my soul, hanging over me with every thought of speaking with her, and it was in this that it occurred to me that I almost rathered not speaking to her at all just to free myself of that emotional ache. And so, I slipped away from her. I allowed myself to create a distance and held a promise with myself to not reach out, but it wasn't like I was leaning towards the option anyway. I was going to disappear from her experience and I did well to avoid interacting with her.

That is, until she called again two days later as I had requested her specifically not to do, telling me that she had some announcements.

"Happy Home Designer, this is Digby," I greeted cheerfully after picking up the phone by the prompt of it's ring amidst the chatter of Open Advisory, holding the phone under my floppy ear as I shifted in my stance to sneak a glance up at the clock on the far wall above the exhibits. Just before ten thirty. I was going to be here for a while.

"Hey, Digby," the enthusiastic, bouncy voice of Isabelle rang out on the other line. "It's me."

A flash of frustration that struck me at the sound abruptly jolted my clenched paw backwards to slam it against the wall behind me with a crashing thump before I could process what I had done. "I asked you not to call me for a while because I told you I was busy," I pointed out, flicking back into my composure as heads nearby turned to stare at me from my sudden outburst, and I leaned to rest my back against the wall to regain my casual appearance.

"Well, yeah, but I have something to tell you this time," Isabelle replied, completely skimming over the direct request once again. "I think this is something that you'll like."

A twisting irritability tugged on my stomach at being ignored. "You can't just call me whenever it's convenient for you," I reminded her. The lingering animals had begun to realize that nothing was wrong, casting uncertain glances amongst each other before they hesitantly kept on walking to explore the exhibits. "You're blocking the line for customers who need guidance with their designing needs."

"This is important, though," Isabelle pushed back. Clearly, I wasn't getting through to her.

"I don't know how many times I'm going to have to tell you this, Isabelle," I said, reaching up to rub my paw across my eyes. I strained to keep my voice level, but I could feel it wearing down with every protest that she made for why she couldn't even compromise for my needs. "I understand that you mean well, I really do. I'm just a little busier than you may imagine. I would appreciate it if you would remember what we talked about with how frequently I'll be able to talk to you and take that into consideration."

"I know," Isabelle mumbled. And there it was again. Every time I asked her to change her behavior, her voice dropped with a sort of grumbly guilt, maybe even whiney at a far stretch. She always did this now and it was starting to get on my nerves.

"Good," I replied. "I'm glad you do. I'd just like you to remember it now, please. If I have to keep taking time away from my work like this, I'm going to get in trouble."

"I'm not trying to get you in trouble," Isabelle urged, and a dull sensation gripped me with the sense that we were just going around and around with no progress. I had to find a way to provoke a step in the right direction. "I just had some things I wanted to talk about with you. I don't think Lottie is going to get angry at you if you're only away for a little bit."

"Well, I'm trying not to push it. I think I have a little bit of time to talk today, but I can't determine how often it will be that way in the future," I told her.

"I understand," Isabelle said.

It was then that a sort of clarity dipped into my mind. Her voice was more gentle this time, more patient, and I was inclined to trust that she really did understand. Maybe I had judged her too hastily. Plus, it was likely that she had something to declare about her search for work, which I had asked her to update me on once updates were present. Something about finally being understood eased the tension that had tightened in my frustration with her and it was at that moment I was certain that even if she tried to push me down, I would always come back around for her somehow.

"Good," I said. "Now, you said you had something you wanted to tell me, right?"

"Oh. Yeah," Isabelle replied, hesitating as if she had just been made aware of this fact herself.

"What is it?" I inquired. If she was this excited to share the news with me, then it was most likely that she had managed to find herself some work. It was probably just a small job, since she would have had to work her way up to something larger if starting from scratch, but I was curious to hear what she was doing for work nonetheless.

"I was walking around the town yesterday and I actually managed to make a new friend while I was out," Isabelle began, and my paw found its way to my eyes again. This was not what I had meant. Was she serious right now? She was supposed to be searching for work and she was talking about making friends like it was preschool. "I think we have a really good connection. His name..."

"Isabelle," I cut in to stop her as my paw plopped back to my side. Her voice faded out again, leaving a silence on the other line. "That's all great and I'm happy for you to make friends while you're away, but what about work? Do you have any updates about work?"

"Work?" Isabelle echoed blankly, an uncertain curiosity clinging to her voice as if it were a word she had never once come across before.

"Yes. Have you managed to find any sort of work at all?" I pressed.

"Not yet," Isabelle told me with the sudden abruptness of her voice as the memory of her mission suddenly seemed to occur to her. "I'm still working on it, though."

A creeping suspicion had begun to inch its way into my senses, one that was not unfamiliar by this point. The way she had seemed to forget and then remember her search so swiftly wasn't exactly sitting right with me. It was like she had completely pushed it aside and disregarded it, only to be reminded by my question. If she wasn't searching for work, then what could she have possibly been using her time out there doing? Wasting time with this new friend of hers and letting her responsibilities slide?

"Well, what do you need from me to be able to support you?" I tried again.

"I don't think there's really much you can do from so far away," Isabelle told me. Dismissing the topic yet again. "I might just need to keep searching."

The awareness of the bubbling chatting swarming me was closing back in on me in the middle of my conversation with my sister. My mind leaped to focus on everything at once, continuously swinging my focus through the room to make sure nobody needed my attention, watching over the room to sustain the notion that everything was running smoothly, and pouring my intent interaction into this discussion that I wasn't going anywhere with. A soreness welled behind my eyes as rising tension twisted my stomach into knots and I wouldn't be able to keep up with this for much longer.

"If that's what you think is best for you, then go ahead," I replied. I managed to catch a difference in my own voice that I hadn't put out there myself; there was a sort of shortness skirting the edges as the situation took its effects on me. "But you can't allow yourself to get too distracted from what you're trying to find. Distractions will do nothing for you but waste your time. I'm worried that you're letting yourself get distracted from the problem at hand."

I had forced an end to my explanation to allow room for Isabelle to put in her own input so that she would know that I was giving her a chance to speak. But when seconds crawled by in silence, thrusting me back into the chaos of the moment, I quickly found myself speaking again.

"I'm not trying to be harsh with you and I'm sorry if it seems like I am," I said at her lack of response. "I just want you to remember that the main reason you left home in the first place was to try and find some kind of work for yourself. Do you remember how long it has been since you left?"

"Yeah," Isabelle murmured in reply. I could barely catch the sound of her voice over the discussions further out in the room.

"I think if it's been this long and you still haven't gotten any results, you might need a little help moving forward," I pointed out. "There's nothing wrong with that. I'm just saying that if nobody else is going to give you that push, then I will. I understand that you're trying and this isn't an easy thing to do, but you need to use your time wisely."

"I will," Isabelle told me as I stole another glimpse of the clock high on the far wall. Almost ten forty now. Yikes. How had I already spent more than ten minutes on the phone? I needed to get back to work.

"Good. I'm going to leave the call so that you can get started," I said. "Please remember what I said about contacting me during work hours. Other than that, don't forget what you left home to do and don't get distracted again. Good luck, Isabelle. I'm counting on you."

We exchanged our temporary goodbyes with a wonder tingling in my mind if I had finally set everything straight again. Isabelle had hung up her phone with a click just moments after goodbyes had taken place, and so I put down the phone in her absence.

Immediately, I was thrust back into the reality of waves of voices swarming me and bouncing off every wall as my paw still gripped the phone on the receiver. A fragile sensation sunk into me as if there were cracks running through me, rattled to the bone and waiting for me to break, and a tense soreness stretched behind my eyes. A lot of things had just been said, but only one echoed in my mind even as the conversation had ended.

Isabelle was trying to escape from me. She was doing what she could to separate herself from me. I had done nothing but support her and now she was shutting me out. For what? How could she do such a thing? What could I have possibly done to deserve this?

Life continued to unravel and surround me with the layers of voices that encircled me and I was never more aware that I wasn't alone as I was right now. My mind reeled as the conversation I'd just had played itself back in my mind, an endless loop of torment that poisoned my head, and I desperately pulled every sentence apart trying to figure out what any of this could have meant. And then, standing helpless in a room of tireless distraction, the truth tumbled down on me.

After seventeen years of best friendship, I was finally being replaced.

My next sharp breath was the one to bring the tears, springing to my eyes beyond my control and burning at the edges. A sob caught in my throat, one that I quickly gulped back before I could let it escape--I couldn't let them know me like this. I silenced the sound with a paw locked over my mouth, but it was already writhing to break free with each voice piercing down my wall of composure and the throb of agony behind my eyes screamed to be released.

I had to get out of here.

I barely had the time to blink my tears away into the void they jumped out of before my feet were in motion. Every pounding step carried me through the thick crowd, closer and closer to the doors that would mean my escape, and all I could do was hold my breath and hope that nobody would stop me on my way out. The lights shooting down from the ceiling above me seared my eyes and tears were already spilling down the sides of my face as I stole my way back through the room without time to waste. A hesitant voice had offered a timid "excuse me" just as I was thrusting my way through the doors, but I didn't stop.

It was nothing but a blur clearing out from the first floor and leading myself up the stairs to the second where it was certain I would be completely isolated at this time of day. The break room was a familiar sight, but not one of this occasion, and my legs gave out at last once I caught the sound of the door latching behind me. I slumped down onto the dark carpeted floor, my back falling onto the door that had just shut after me, and a strangled whimper broke from my throat as I drew my knees up close to my chest in the long-awaited solitude.

Betrayal was one of the most bitter tastes of all. Stifled screams lodged in the pit of my chest as I held my head up in my paws, every breath shallow and broken with falling tears. After everything I'd done to help Isabelle get to where she was now, all of a sudden I wasn't needed anymore. I poured too much of myself into tending to her needs and as soon as I needed something, she turned around and found someone better. And now all that was left of me was a pounding rage deep in my chest of abused potential that was twisted for her own benefit and deserved so much better. I deserve better. I deserve better. I deserve better.

I choked on suffocating sobs as if my body were caving in on itself. No matter what I did, I couldn't escape the reality that I just couldn't get through to her anymore. I was on the other side of a glass wall, pounding tirelessly on the surface and begging for her help, but she didn't even care to look at me anymore. She was simply dragging me along with her in whatever game she was playing and that was the way things were.

But she was happier now. That much I knew for sure. And once I got over myself and would swallow my tears, a thought like that could warm my heart as her happiness was everything I wanted. So did that mean she was happier without me?

Yes, it did.

There was nothing that more clearly showed that I wasn't needed than the stretch of absence of contact that took its place once again. The acknowledgment that she would continue to call me when it most benefited her had settled with the notion that her calls would be popping up at unexpected places just so that she could tell me what she had prepared for dinner or something like that, but instead she vanished again. Whatever life she was living now, there was obviously no part I could play. Maybe that was better than having my emotions toyed with whenever she was here.

With the sudden uncertainty of contact came the uncertainty of genuine connection. With unexpected appearances inevitably leading to abandonment over and over again, I struggled to maintain my friendship with Isabelle. And worst of all, it was like I never learned my lesson; every time she came around, I poured every ounce of myself in trying to show her kindness and convince her to stay a little longer and she was always going to leave me. My hopes weren't high for the first stretch of days without a call, but after that point, I couldn't help but sense that we were finally drifting for good.

And so, I began to let her go, to the best of my ability. I directed my focus towards other aspects of my life like work, which was most important, and sustaining untroubled relationships with my coworkers. As the days crawled by, thoughts of Isabelle crossed my mind less and less, and for the first time in a long while, I felt like I was at peace, if only remotely. But this didn't prevent the usual and continual problems to arise with customers.

The discourtesy that I was being shown in Open Advisory, and even Studies occasionally, quickly became old news. It became routine to smile through jabbing comments and respond with kind words. After all, faking a smile was easy; meaning it was the difficult part. Each and every new day brought the acknowledgement that they could never see me the way I wanted them to and I had messed up my chances for that to happen while I was blindly grieving. The time to prove myself had passed and it was time for acceptance. I had proved myself wrong.

Occasionally, I toyed with the wonder of the response I would receive if I ever thought to tell Isabelle what was happening. I could never actually bring myself to tell her myself, given the history we were writing for ourselves, but this didn't stop the thought creeping through my mind from time to time. Nowadays, she probably wouldn't have even spent a thought too long on it. She might even have told me to stay strong and keep on moving like she didn't understand how hard that was.

When she was still my best friend before she had left me behind, she would have chased away the hate for me. I would have had no doubts about that. She would have kept herself by my side through the best and the worst and made sure I was safe like the incredible older sister she had once been. Even now, I entertained myself with the thought of her standing beside me in Open Advisory and jumping to my aid whenever a customer was just a little too impolite.

I was never going to get that back again. That part of her was gone and there was nothing I could do. This was around the point in time where I'd begun to consider asking her to come home just so that I could have her presence if nothing else.

Isabelle and I were living two separate lives now. I was stuck in a loop of dragging myself through the same day over and over and over again while she was off on her own path that I would never know. What I hadn't expected, however, was to begin receiving infrequent mentions of her search for work while conversing with customers during the day. Evidently, word was getting around that the pretentious interior design dog had a sister who was actively seeking work. I supposed that it was a good sign that her name was getting out into the world, so I hardly thought anything of this for a while. It didn't take long for this to prove to be a problem for me.

"Good afternoon, Whitney. I'm so glad that you could join us today," Lottie said from the seat on my left, adjusting the application sheet for Happy Homeroom in her paws to glance over the information.

Whitney, a tall white wolf with piercing blue eyes that especially seemed to pop under a swipe of lavender eye-makeup, stood at the front of the room amidst the glow from the lit screen behind her. "Yes, I hope this will be worth it," she purred, examining her paw as if we weren't worthy of her attention.

"I assure you that it will be. We are going to do what we can to make this experience enjoyable for you," Lottie told her, remaining gentle even through Whitney's attitude. Her eyes jumped to scan through the paper in her paws for just a few seconds more before she laid it down over the table next to her tablet and folded her paws in front of her to redirect her focus back to the activity. "You may begin whenever you're ready. Please swipe through the templates on the screen and select one that you like."

Whitney didn't turn around at first, instead raising her eyes to sweep her gaze observantly across the table, soon pausing on me. "I know you," she remarked, shifting in her stance to fold an arm over the other in an elegant, self-important manner. "Aren't you the one with the sister who wants to work?"

"Yes, that's right!" I replied eagerly, forcing a bright smile onto my face in response. "She's devoted to finding a job for herself and has been working hard to achieve that dream for months."

Whitney gave a sharp, likely judgmental cough of a laugh. "If she has to chase after something, it probably means she doesn't deserve it," she retorted, shifting again to turn her face towards the screen.

As Whitney carelessly swiped through the templates on the extensive screen as if she had places she needed to go, the urge tugged at me to defend Isabelle from such a comment, but my words fell short. Some part of me was drawn to stand by and allow her to take the hit. Why? Was it because she wouldn't have done the same for me if I stood up for her?

Whitney stood silently at the screen for the next several minutes that crawled by. She seemed indecisive, pawing between the different templates without being swayed in any direction. I must have seen each of them at least three times by the time she had finally come to a conclusion. After a long stretch of consideration, Whitney had paused for a while on the template of a room put together by nothing but milky floors and walls with faint sunlight blanketing the surface, and she gingerly flicked it with her paw.

"I think that's a great choice," Lottie spoke up again cheerfully as the white bubbles to provide design options dotted the screen. Whitney sent a glimpse over her shoulder back at her to listen, but her paws twitched restlessly to begin already. "I was hoping that someone would choose that one. I feel like that's a good one to genuinely express your tastes and styles."

"Yes, well, isn't expressing yourself the point of living?" Whitney replied dismissively, turning her back on the judging table again to instead search the bubbles that had scattered across the screen.

It quickly became clear that Whitney didn't only have a specific theme she planned to rely on, but one that I particularly expected from her after her personality shone through. Quietness quickly filled the room once the activity had been officially kicked off, the occasional shift of Lottie or Lyle in their seats on either side of me briefly breaking through that tranquility, and I watched as Whitney began to make her way along the screen over several minutes.

She started on a piece of furniture in the right corner, a common choice for participants as it was closer to the entrance of the room, and didn't take long before coming to the decision of an elegant white and silver-lined writing desk under the blanket of sunlight. After that decision had been made, it seemed that she relied on all of the next ones to follow, flying through the options and leaving behind an identical elegant theme. Even after composing a design for the entire room, she revisited each option's list just to make sure it was to her expectations, and the activity dragged on wordlessly. As soft piano music gave its gentle melody, my feet twitched distractedly at the base of my chair and my imagination sprung to life to carry me through the idea of leaving this building for the day once this was done.

At one point around three twenty, Whitney's restless attempts to perfect her design had settled as she stood to examine her work. After she had been standing at the screen for a while with seemingly no intention to continue, Lottie spoke up at last to keep the activity moving.

"Are you ready to receive your results, Whitney?" Lottie asked politely as Whitney gazed up at the massive screen before her, folding her arms over one another as she had at the beginning of the activity.

Whitney's answer didn't come right away. It was like she hadn't heard her in the first place, studying the screen without any care of anything happening around her, before she eventually tossed an answer over her shoulder as if she had forgotten she was meant to give one. "Yes, I believe that would be fitting," she told her, lingering on the focus of the screen before she hesitantly turned around to face the judgment table again.

"Sure, of course. Here are your results from me," Lottie replied brightly. She paused to tap her screen a few times, evidently already having a score in mind that she was setting, but didn't yet submit it as her eyes flicked up to meet Whitney's again. "I do like what you've done with your design. The matching theme is very appealing to the eye. However, since it does all look the same, there's no place for the main focus to catch. Your gaze just sort of travels across it with nothing in particular to capture your interest. But it is indeed a very pretty design choice. I'll give you sixty points."

Lottie swiftly tapped her tablet screen with her paw another time, submitting the result. With a melodic ding, sixty points dropped onto the results screen on the right wall in her place, sitting over the instruction to receive 200 points in order to pass the activity. Just 140 points from Lyle and me, and she would be invited to return to Happy Homeroom again.

It was my turn to offer results. A smile found its way to my face as the focus of the room shifted towards me as if I were sitting behind someone else's control and the words escaped me without thought.

"Well, I think it's a great idea to rely on a specific theme, vague or less so," I declared. "Without a theme, all you'd have is a chaotic mess of a mismatched design. I'm quite drawn to your style of choice. You've got an astounding eye for interior design. I believe a generous score would best reflect this work."

The zeros in the roster of an unsubmitted score beckoned me for adjusting, urging a number in a grand range I heavily relied on to prevent any confrontation. I'd surrendered to too much fluctuation over the months and experienced both ends of the spectrum. A score too low and I was trying to pick fights in the view of the participant. A score too high and I was kissing up to them. I felt decided on a two-digit number and raised the roster as such, hearing the familiar ding as it sunk onto the board. Ninety points.

Lyle must have had something prepared to advise as he waited for his turn since the moment my results were on the board, he had launched into his response and was already speaking. "I agree with Lottie," he said to Whitney, shifting in his seat to briefly examine the screen of his tablet before glancing up again. "It looks nice, but there's no variety. It doesn't really give you anywhere to look. I'm seeing a common mistake among novice designers. Logically, rooms aren't generally designed in such an identical fashion unless trying to make a direct statement. I definitely agree in that there needs to be some more variety with it. That's what gives it that extra spice that really catches your attention and demands to be valued. I'll give it thirty five points."

Shoot. It wasn't enough. I could see the displeasure from a mile away even before the number dropped onto the board, concluding a result of fifteen points short. Lottie gave her screen another press beside me, bringing a finalization to the unfulfilling score, and with it came the familiar disheartening clang and the throb of deep purple light that escaped behind the right screen. Whitney had failed.

Lottie jumped back into the conversation before Whitney even seemed to have the chance to process what had happened. "I'm sorry, Whitney," she apologized politely. "Thank you for coming by today. I'm glad that we could work together this afternoon. I hope that you enjoyed your activity here."

Whitney blinked at the screen, allowing the change to sink in for a moment before she turned an icy gaze towards Lottie. "A failure?" she rumbled. "My masterpiece of a design is a failure to you?"

"No, not at all!" Lottie assured her cheerfully. "This program isn't based on the idea of success or failure. The activity exists purely for your education, amusement, and satisfaction."

"Does this look like something I could be satisfied about?" Whitney retorted, sending a distraught glance across the screen behind her which held her design. Her thick tail had gone stiff, protruding out behind her in her rising exasperation. "A failure, my goodness! What will my family and friends think of the fact that my creation was deemed a failure?"

"I could give you a few more touches of advice if you'd like me to," Lottie offered.

"I don't need your advice, child," Whitney shot back self-importantly, rounding her sharp stare back at the table to glance between the designers who sat here. "None of you could give me any good advice, anyway. You couldn't even give me good scores. The only decent score I received was from the dog, and that's at least to be expected, given that he's a pushover. I mean, come on. At least your sister's trying."

A throbbing ache dug suddenly into the pit of my chest at the words and I opened my mouth to defend myself, but no sound came out. Even Lyle reeled slightly at the affront as Lottie scrambled to her feet to stop Whitney, but it was too late.

"Oh, please just wait a minute," Lottie began urgently, but Whitney was already stealing her way across the room again to the door which she had entered from, pearly high-heeled shoes which glittered under the lights clicking after her. Whitney slammed her way through the door, letting it fall shut after her, and was gone. The workday had come to an abrupt end at last.

The weight of the day hit me all at once, leaving me heavy and defeated. I sank my elbows onto the table in front of me, holding up my forehead with my paws as the conversation that had just occurred spun through my mind. Given that he's a pushover. At least your sister's trying. I had only been trying to help. What had I done wrong?

I could hear Lottie hesitantly lower herself into a seat again as Lyle shifted uncomfortably in his own seat, but I didn't raise my head from my paws. After a moment, a gentle touch on my back implied that Lottie had set her paw there from my left.

"Are you okay?" Lottie asked softly. I dropped my paws to find her watching me, the darkness in her eyes dancing with concern and sympathy after what I had just heard. "I don't think she was very nice to say that to you. You're working so hard and you're doing so well."

I put a smile on my face at the statement, but it was only then did it prove how worn down my natural smile was. "Thank you. And I'm doing well. Just processing everything," I told her, but I couldn't deny the truth skirting my mind. I'm so tired.

It didn't take much to convince Lottie as her usual sunny smile flooded over her face again. "That's a relief. I'd hate to see it bring you down," she said. As she was speaking, the phone at the wall sprung into a ring with a call waiting to be answered, and I eased up from my seat as her paw withdrew from my back.

As Lottie and Lyle gathered their belongings from the table to be able to leave the room, I dismissed myself to the ringing phone in the crevice in the wall beneath the scoring screen which still held Whitney's failed results. With a thoughtless snap back into my composure, I plucked the phone from the receiver, tucking it under my floppy ear.

"You've reached the number for the Happy Home Designer," I greeted, casting a glimpse back at Lottie and Lyle as I stood at the wall. They appeared to have gathered their belongings and were starting off towards the back door without me to leave the room. "This is Digby. What can I do for you today?"

"Good afternoon, Digby," the voice on the other line replied. The recognition clicked in my mind before the caller had even spoken her name. First Whitney, now this. "It's me, Isabelle. I like your new greeting."

Sharing a conversation with my sister after having done so well to avoid her was not the most appealing way to spend the end of my workday, especially not after the one I'd just had. "Oh, hello, Isabelle," I said as Lyle pushed his way through the door and exited into the hallway. Lottie snuck a glance back at me before following his lead, and just like that, I was completely alone. "Thank you. I've actually been trying some new ones to test the effect."

"It's a bit longer than the ones I've heard, isn't it?" Isabelle asked. Her voice was notably more distinct in the new silence of the room.

"Yes, well, that's just a thing I do, I suppose," I stammered through an explanation, leaning my back against the wall as the words of the reality of my situation tumbled through my mind. Even now, my body still felt heavy from the long, dreadful day. I talked longer for several reasons—For companionship and for professionalism but also to keep my thoughts from getting too loud—But which of those did I really want to let her know? "I like to talk in the places where I can fill out the quietness, which is why I've been extending my greeting a bit. I'm not really fond of when things get quiet."

"Really?" Isabelle inquired. "Why not?"

"Because it pulls you back into yourself," I said.

The pause that Isabelle took after this statement came out told me that I had said something abnormal, something she wasn't used to. All it took was just that one second to make me wish I could swallow my words again like I had never said them at all and silently scolded myself for my carelessness. This was exactly what happened whenever I tried to open up to her. Why did I never learn?

"Oh," Isabelle said after a moment, and then she dropped the subject. "Anyway, how have you been lately? I know it's been a little while since we last talked."

Not long enough, I thought bitterly to myself as discomfort twisted my stomach from the failed attempt to become closer, but I couldn't bring myself to say it out loud. "There's nothing to mention," I mumbled. The quietness in the room had never seemed so thick and isolating. "Things are... As they always are, I guess you could say. What about you? Are you doing well?"

It was like she had just been waiting for me to ask as she instantly hurled herself into an enthusiastic description of what her own life looked like. "I'm great, actually," Isabelle replied, more perky than she had begun the conversation in the first place. "I really can't complain. Everyone here is so nice to me. I feel like I completely belong here. It's almost like a home away from home now."

Retorts bit my tongue, poisoning my mind like a hateful venom. Everyone in her town was nice to her? She completely belonged there? What part of that did I not bring to her as her best friend? That is, I was her best friend until she decided that I wasn't worth enough to her. But once again, these words faltered before I could speak them.

"Good. That's a pleasant feeling to have," I muttered, as it was the only thing left to say at this point, but she wasn't finished.

"I've even been interacting with the other animals a lot more," Isabelle went on as if it was the only thing she ever cared about. "It's a little scary trying to make friends on my own, but I think I'm doing well. That's already such a big leap from where I used to be. It's like I'm finally becoming able to open up and get to know everyone without it being too awkward."

Familiar feelings from the last time we talked had begun to resurface yet again. Tears burned in my sore eyes, pooling in the center of my vision no matter how many times I blinked, and sobs caught in my throat. "Hmm," I mumbled so that she wouldn't be able to hear the sudden emotion in my voice, reaching up to swipe away my tears with my paw before they could fall.

Isabelle kept on speaking. "Every once in a while, they have a sort of social gathering for everyone in the town to hang out and get to know each other, but I've only been to a few so far. They're incredible, by the way," she declared. "There's all this food and talking and just thorough enjoyment of each other's presence. I think I'm really starting to like it here."

The tears had escaped my eyes and fell down my face the longer her compliments went on, despite my best efforts to contain them. I struggled to keep my breathing level as I prepared to answer, but the urge to burst out crying was gripping me tighter and tighter. She was so happy. She was so happy and I failed at providing that for her.

"Well, it definitely sounds..." I started, but cut myself off once I caught the teary pain in my own voice. If I heard it, then Isabelle had to have heard it. I yanked the phone away from my head to allow myself a sniffle before returning it under my ear and tried again. "It sounds like you're having a lot of fun."

"Hey, are you okay?" Isabelle asked me, seeming to break free from her trance. Maybe there was a chance that she cared after all. "Am I talking too much?"

"No, you're fine," I told her, shifting the phone under my ear to a more comfortable position, and admitted, "It's just that you caught me at kind of a bad day. Everything's been so stressful and tiresome today."

"At least you'll be going home soon," Isabelle replied. "Speaking of which, how is everything at home? What's it been like?"

How could I have described to her what it was like at home without her? I didn't have something to look forward to when I came home from a long day at work. All I had now was a house that felt so empty and dark and an evening that looked so lonely. All that was left was a world of lingering memories of a friendship that I could never bring back again.

"Quiet," I said.

Silence enveloped the call at the fading of conversation. I stood alone in the emptiness of the abandoned room of Happy Homeroom, holding the phone under my ear for any sound, and it became clear once again that I was by myself. Lottie and Lyle were probably in the break room by now for the winding down of the day and Isabelle was wherever in the world she was. It was just me now.

I managed to gulp back my tears as the pause in the conversation and wipe them from my face as the sobs tugging at my chest shriveled into void again in my emotional steadiness. The silence only grew longer and longer as if Isabelle had hung up the phone without warning, and after several seconds of waiting for a sound, I began to question if she really had. Once it became crystal clear that she wasn't going to speak to me, I decided that I had to.

I drew in a deep breath, passing a paw over my face even though I had already dried it. "I think you can probably guess what I want to ask you, Isabelle," I changed the subject.

"What's that?" Isabelle asked, as if it hadn't been what I had asked her every single time she contacted me and continued to fail to receive an answer.

"Listen, I know you don't want to hear this," I mumbled. "I know how it bothers you. You need to acknowledge how important it is. Have you managed to find some work yet? I'm getting a little bit concerned."

I knew it—She wasn't happy. "Well, no," she drawled sharply like I had asked her something stupid or ridiculous. "But hey, it's not like I'm not trying. I've just been getting a lot of help financially lately and there isn't really much need to search for work. I've been getting help and gaining Bells from the other animals in the town so that I don't run out while I don't have work. I appreciate their support and with it I am not required to find a job for the current moment."

The response sent my mind reeling. I asked her one thing, the one thing that she had left to achieve, and it completely set her off. She was defending herself. Why did she feel the need to be defensive at all? If this was the animal she was becoming, one to retaliate when disciplined, then maybe it was growing closer to the time to let her go. I couldn't be friends with her if she was just going to continue to emotionally drain me.

I stumbled to find an answer, but I grasped one in time. "It's okay. You don't need to explain yourself," I told her, but a different thought had crept into my mind.

She was not away for work. She knew that she was not away for work. Whatever she was doing out there could have easily been done right here where I knew she was safe. A thought I'd seen a few times before was revisiting me. And so, just for an answer at all, I took a risk.

"Have you considered the thought of coming back home?" I asked her.

"Coming home?" Isabelle repeated blankly. I could just imagine her pale yellow face; baffled like we were speaking two completely different languages. "Why would I do that? I can't do that."

"Well, why not?" I urged.

"The reason I left home in the first place was to find work for myself," Isabelle insisted on the other line. "If I haven't found some sort of job, then I can't just leave that task incomplete."

And there it was, the truth laid out for me to see. I had already accepted the fact that finding work was no longer a source of interest for her, but now she didn't even want to come home. She even hated it when I tried to help her now. I'd done something somehow to make her not want to be around me anymore. This wasn't an issue of finding work. This was an issue of how she was receiving our friendship. It was right then, in that very moment that reality came crashing down on me, that I knew we couldn't get along.

Not five minutes later found me in the single-stall bathroom several hallways out from Happy Homeroom, paws perched over the sink behind the cover of the locked door and a heavy resistance to look up at what was in front of me. I could recall rushing out of the call with Isabelle, expecting another tearful breakdown like the one that had met the end of the last call, but didn't dare return to the break room like before with the possibility that Lottie and Lyle were still there and could see me. I locked myself here instead, standing beneath the harsh lights that peered down at me from the ceiling, and waited for the tears to come.

But they didn't come. Even the tight throbbing behind my eyes that signaled the threat of tears had vanished. My eyes drifted across a shine on the spotless surface of the sink that my paws rested their weight on and I thought about how that need had come and gone so quickly. I almost could have convinced myself that I was becoming stronger, but the dull emptiness that drilled into me told me otherwise.

The conversation I had just shared with Isabelle still echoed in my mind, even now. While she sounded the same, I knew she was someone different now. I didn't miss her. Not exactly. Not after the way she was treating me. It was more like I missed the animal she had once been, the one that I had said goodbye to in the first place. If that was the truth, then maybe isolating myself was the best option before I got hurt any worse. That way, I could at least see if she cared enough to come back to me once I broke connection.

I raised my head to find a set of dark eyes staring back at me, but I couldn't recognize the soul that cowered behind them. The soul that thrived in a cover of lies trying to prove himself to be something he wasn't, that sacrificed his own image just for a few more compliments, that now somehow managed to drive away the animal he cared about the most. That was me—The bleak and empty black eyes that looked a bit too far apart if I stared at them long enough, the clumps of ruffled hair that I could neer seem to tame, and the seventeen-year-old face of chocolate brown fur that sent me a wrench of distaste. I had become something that wasn't me.

What happened to the animal I used to be?

. . .

As usual, the months went on. Every day was always the same. The heat of the summer peaked in July, slowly dipping in temperature in the transition of the season. Autumn was gradually coming around again. I often struggled to process that at this time last year, I had been tirelessly yet hopelessly searching for a college to attend. It was startling to observe firsthand how quickly one's life could change.

What hadn't changed was my relentless suffering. Or maybe that was simply the word I slapped over the experience just to dramatize it for the pity I lacked, since the word gave me ideas of terrible damage and agony, and I felt neither of those things. Several days I was plagued by detrimental, gut-wrenching thoughts, and others I didn't care enough to think about myself at all. But as the cooler breezes snuck in slipping past August, most of my days I was lucky to provoke some kind of genuine emotional reaction and drove myself forward as if I was just watching myself live my own life without me.

After a while, I must have begun to accidentally reveal my struggles a bit too much, at least while I wasn't around customers. Even though they never spoke of them out loud, I began to sense that Lottie and Lyle had picked up on the fact that something wasn't right with me. Both of them were treating me more gently than usual as if I would shatter like glass if they said something remotely hurtful and with Lottie in particular, I caught an anxious glimmer in her dark eyes more times than I could count. I only knew for sure that they had figured something out when even questions from Lyle eventually turned from how I would manage to complete my work to how he could best take care of me and make sure I was doing well. He really did care about me, that much I could see, even if he didn't always show it. He was my friend.

September arrived, as did the brisk winds while I walked to and from work and then Lottie's birthday on the twelfth. I sought to do something special to help her enjoy her day, a minimal attempt to make up for such support and kindness that she continued to show me every day. I brought the idea to Mom and Dad, causing them to gush over the thought before they offered to help me bake a cake the day before. We were in the kitchen preparing a fluffy, frosting coated and neatly decorated cake well into the evening and stored it in the refrigerator overnight on the night of the eleventh.

On the twelfth, I arrived at work with the cake in a plastic container and relocated it to the break room refrigerator to delight in later with Lottie and her uncle. Lyle and I presented the cake to Lottie during a special lunch in the break room and we all allowed ourselves a few slices in dessert. Obviously, I hadn't had twenty candles at home to fill up the top surface of the cake, but this didn't prevent us from celebrating in jubilation of the end of Lottie's teenage years. She couldn't seem to stop smiling that day, surrounded by animals who cared deeply for her, and that was enough to keep me smiling as well. It was most definitely a day to remember.

As it was split only between three animals, the remaining slices of cake lasted in the refrigerator for several days afterward, sitting for anyone to come and claim one or two on their break. Consuming a piece of cake during my workday was not my biggest priority, so over the days, the reminder that it was still stored away began to slip from my mind. But the reminder did eventually resurface one day, many after the day of Lottie's birthday, on a day of particularly harsh voices and stinging remarks as time crawled on in Open Advisory.

My confident appearance was wearing down, peeling away to reveal the pulsing annoyance skirting my mind. I had managed to force myself to stay in the room until there was a block of twenty minutes left until lunch before I dismissed myself at last to the break room, aiming to help myself to a slice of cake. I passed unfamiliar animals in the halls on my way to the second floor, plastering a smile on my face to curb my frustration for those who saw me, and managed to not be spoken to as I brought myself upstairs.

I pushed my way through the door to enter the break room to find that both Lottie and Lyle had already arrived. Lyle was seated in the violet chair in the center of the room which faced the door and his gaze flicked to meet mine the moment it swung open. Lottie was on the phone at the far right of the room, standing at the wall with the phone held up to her ear on the side of her head, and gave a slight start at my advancement into the room as if she had been expecting me.

"Oh, speaking of Digby, would you like to speak to him?" Lottie inquired on the phone. My attention pricked up at this—Who was she talking to about me behind my back?—But it wasn't my place to interrupt her conversation, so I continued on my way to the fridge. "He's just across the room. I can call him over to the phone if you'd like."

I bent down to reach the fridge, tugging the door open to retrieve a slice of cake. Upon peering inside, I discovered that there were just two slices on the wide plate it had been served on after being stuck there for so long, but second thoughts dipped into my mind before I could claim myself one. There was hardly fifteen minutes before lunch would begin; maybe filling up on dessert wouldn't be the best for my appetite.

"Of course, I'll call him over," Lottie went on as I thrust the door closed, straightening up to my full height with the intention of finding a seat as Lyle had done. Lottie removed the phone from her ear, casting a glance across the room at me as I started off on my way to the set of chairs. "Digby, there's a call for you."

Figures. Today of all days. I spared a pause in my stride, considering a conversation on the phone with a customer who evidently had something to directly bring to my attention, but then a different thought crept in.

"It's not Isabelle, is it?" I asked.

"Yes, it's Isabelle," Lottie replied. "She'd like to speak with you."

"It doesn't matter. Hang up the phone." The instant retort slipped out before I could even process what had just come out of my mouth. It nearly startled me for the words to come out, as if they hadn't been mine in the first place, but I didn't take them back as I carried on to the chair beside Lyle's.

Lottie burst out immediately at my sudden affront. "Oh, please don't be rude, Diggy—Um, Digby," she pleaded, accidentally stumbling over her words as she rushed to get them out. I paused at the arm of the chair to look at her. "I'm sure she has something important to say to you."

If she wasn't even certain, then it was far too likely that it was just yet another attempt to reach out about useless things. But now that Lottie had become involved directly, I couldn't refuse the call. I hesitantly accepted, leaving to retrieve the phone from Lottie and gently taking it from her grasp to speak with Isabelle.

I tucked the phone under my ear as Lottie silently wandered away to return to the chairs, impatience thrumming my veins. "Isabelle?" I muttered, watching as Lottie lowered herself into the nearest chair and faced her uncle.

"Hey, Digby," Isabelle greeted me. I caught a hesitation in her voice. "I can tell that you probably don't really want to talk to me right now, but there's something I'd like to talk about."

"Can it wait? Is that possible?" I argued. Lottie and Lyle had sparked up a hushed conversation while I stood at the phone, one where Lottie nodded often as she listened. "You know how busy I am during the day."

"I know you're busy," Isabelle insisted. "But this is something really important. I don't want to leave this conversation until we talk about it."

Unheard. Underappreciated. Walked all over. Just like almost everyone else in my life. I was sick of being the victim to such mistreatment from anyone. Words spun restlessly through my mind and just like that, they were all pouring out at once. Just like that, I snapped.

"Okay, well, why don't we talk about the fact that you won't stop calling me while I'm trying to work and will never give me enough space to step away and find time to talk to you? Seriously, can you please get off my back?" I demanded, my voice booming out into the room.

It was the silence that fell at once, both on the line and in the room, that yanked me back into reality. Lottie and Lyle had ceased in conversation and were now gazing at me from their seats with identical expressions of shock at what I had just said. Even Isabelle had no response to something like that. I had just said something absolutely awful to my own big sister. Guilt quickly pooled in my stomach, tugging at my heart with regret before I managed to speak again.

"I'm sorry," I mumbled, but my focus was pulled away at the conversation as Lyle pushed himself to his feet, slowly inching his way past Lottie's chair to reach me where I stood at the phone. "That was a lot more harsh than I meant it to be. I didn't mean for it to all come out at once like that. I would just really appreciate it if you would..."

My voice trailed off as Lyle murmured softly under my conversation once he stood in front of me, holding his paw out to me, but I hadn't managed to catch what he had said.

"Huh?" I said.

"Can I talk to her, please?" Lyle asked again, a bit louder than a whisper so that I could hear him better on the second try.

My mind reeled slightly at the request, bewildered why Lyle would want to speak with my sister, but I needed any reason I could get to escape the responsibility of answering her call. "Oh. Of course, Mr. Lyle," I replied, slipping out the phone from under my ear to set it in his waiting paw.

I dropped into the last open seat on the left of Lottie as Lyle spoke to Isabelle over the phone as loud as a murmur so that nobody could hear what they spoke of. I leaned my elbows onto my knees as my paws fidgeted together, but I couldn't seem to raise my gaze as Lottie shifted in her seat to send me a glance. As Lyle spoke on the phone, both Lottie and I sat in silence.

I couldn't rip the thought from my head that I was getting myself into something much bigger than it seemed right now. Now that I'd somehow managed to get Lottie and Lyle roped into the entire issue, it wasn't just the usual sibling feuds that I was taking care of in my own way. Having the troubles with Isabelle start to become a big deal down the road didn't stand out to me as a pleasant future.

I wished that this could have been over and done with already. This had been hanging over me for much too long and it was about time for it to stop. I couldn't seem to get through to her that I needed her to leave me alone. What more was there left to do at this point?

Quite fitting for his character, Lyle appeared to get right to the point with whatever he had decided to talk with Isabelle about, spending no longer than a minute or two on the phone before the conversation had come to an end. I kept myself entertained by running my paw over the knit surface of the bulky chair when I heard him put the phone down. I lifted my head to see him slowly step to face Lottie and me, the same frowning expression lingering on his face from when I had first snapped, and he pushed up his sleeve to squint down at the watch on his wrist for a few moments.

"All right," Lyle spoke at last, lowering his arm back to his side and brushing his sleeve back down over his wrist. "Well, it's just about time for lunch. I'd say it's time to head out and get some food."

Lyle crossed the room on his way to the door, briefly setting his paw on my shoulder as he passed the back of my chair. Lottie rose to follow him out and as she went off after him, I thrust myself up as well, but something made me pause.

My gaze strayed back to the phone on the receiver as Lottie and Lyle each took their leave through the door, unknowingly leaving me behind. An idea was swelling in my mind, anticipation stirring in my chest of that when a solution had finally struck. Alone in the room, I wandered back towards the phone, scrutinizing it from every angle in my contemplation. Maybe I did have an option.

A rising paranoia of getting into trouble had begun to etch into my mind. I snuck a glance over my shoulder to make sure that Lottie and Lyle had gone, confirming the fact that I was alone before I returned my focus to the phone. If I wanted Isabelle to leave me alone, then I had to make a choice and devote myself to it. I needed to be willing to take a risk for the sake of my health.

What's the worst that can happen? I thought to myself, easing my paw behind the phone to tug the plug out of the wall before I headed out.