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Isobel wants to hit someone with her sword.
She wants that to be the answer. It’s maybe the worst part of this whole nightmare, sitting there at Max’s side, her neck hurting from how often she keeps whipping her head back and forth to look over at Liz and then back to her brother, both of them lying there in mortal danger, and she—she’s useless. She wants to get up and run somewhere and do something, anything, that will make a difference, and the knowledge that she’s reached the end of her usefulness is eating away at her, corrosive and persistent. Her stomach hurts. Her heart is beating too fast, like it’s trying to pump blood not only for herself, but for Max too. And Liz. And Dallas, wherever he is. And… and…
“Heath and Michael will figure this out,” Maria says, half in an attempt to soothe, and half to reassure herself, Isobel thinks. Maria is holding it together remarkably well, but Isobel understands what that means from personal experience. She’ll probably have a good cry about this all later. When you’ve got so many things to be worried about at once, your only options are to fall apart completely, or to hold yourself together through sheer force of will until it’s finally safe to let go.
It’s funny. Isobel thinks she used to be better at that. She wonders if it’s a good sign or a bad one, that she can’t suppress the worst of her fears anymore, can’t walk through the world with a smile and pretend she’s not screaming inside.
“They have to,” Isobel says. “They have to figure this out. I can’t lose him.”
“You won’t,” Maria repeats firmly. “We are going to fix this. We are going to make everyone be okay, and we’re going to be happy. All of us.”
Isobel huffs out a single breath of laughter, about as much as she can manage given the circumstances. “Sounds like a plan.”
“I know you’re scared for Max,” Maria says gently. “I know how much you love him.”
“I’m worried about all my brothers,” Isobel says, the restless frustration bubbling closer to the surface. “Dallas is missing, Max is trapped inside Liz’s mind, and Michael—” she sniffs, looking into Maria’s warm, supportive eyes. “And Michael, I need to know he’s going to be okay. And he won’t be, if we can’t find…”
Maria frowns, looking down at her hands and then back up at Isobel. “Has anyone filled you in? About Alex reaching out? He’s connected to me somehow, he’s—close, in some ways, and so far away in others. I’m going to find him. We’re going to get him back.”
Isobel shakes her head in wonder, studying the determination and fear mingled in Maria’s eyes. “Look, between you and Michael, I know you’ll figure this out. I know the two of you would die before you gave up on him. That’s part of what scares me so much, but it also gives me hope.”
“We have to save Max and Liz,” Maria says, repeating it like a mantra, like a to-do list, like a promise. “We have to save them, and then we have to find Alex and Dallas. Bonnie, too. We have to, because if we don’t…”
“You know, all those years, I only had Max and Michael,” Isobel says.
Sometimes she gets this wistfulness for those days, when she was married to a man who turned out to be a monster, when Max and Michael were both miserably missing the loves of their lives. She misses something of the closeness, the us-against-the-world of it all. Obviously things are better now. Obviously she’s glad Max has Liz, Michael has Alex. She’s glad she has Maria. And Kyle. And Dallas. The world is better with more love in it.
“I think I was in denial,” she continues, looking down into Max’s sleeping face. “About how fucked up we all were. How bad it was. I had to pretend we were all going to be okay, I had to roll my eyes and act like Michael’s self-destructive tendencies were an irritant instead of a real concern. I had to pretend that Max had always been this subdued sadsack, that it wasn’t my fault that…”
“It’s a lot to take on,” Maria interrupts gently. “I think it’s safe to say that blaming yourself doesn’t help anyone.”
“But now,” Isobel says, petting a hand through Max’s hair and looking over at Liz. “God, now Max is… I mean, it’s not easy, with him and Liz, I know they have their issues, but he’s alive, you know? He’s alive and happy and awake in a way I’ve never seen him before. And Michael. I see it now, how much he’s always been missing…”
She pauses then, looks at Maria and tilts her head to the side. She wonders if talking about Michael and Alex is in poor taste, given Maria’s own history with her brother. Maria’s the kind of person who would never mention it, if her feelings were being hurt.
But to Isobel’s surprise, Maria grins, wide and joyful, shaking her head and looking up at the ceiling for a moment, blinking back tears. “I know. Michael and Alex. Seeing them together, it’s like… it’s something magical.”
“Right?” Isobel says. “It’s like I got to know this whole new person, like this big part of who Michael has always been was just lying there, dormant, and now it gets to be free. I’m so—impressed, I guess. At how well they fit, at how much Michael lights up around him.” She pauses, a weighty feeling pressing down on her heart. She thinks of the way she’d felt, cushioned safe against Kyle Valenti’s chest. “I want that. I want to find it. I want to let myself have it, for real.”
Maria reaches over and puts a hand on her arm, squeezes in support. “Let’s save Max’s person, and then Michael’s, and then we’ll work on getting things sorted for you.”
Isobel laughs again, this time just the tiniest bit freer. “I like it. Very practical.” She nudges her arm into Maria’s. “You’re right. We’re going to fix it all, and then we’re all going to be happy. I don’t accept any other outcome.”
“Well,” Maria says. “I certainly wouldn’t bet againt Isobel Evans.”
“Or Maria DeLuca.”
Later, before Isobel goes off to continue confronting her past with Tezca, she pulls Michael aside and gives him a hug, holding him as tight as she can, and lets him hold her back just as tight. “Maria and I have decided how this is going to go,” she tells him, swaying back and forth as they hug. “We’re gonna win, okay? You’re going to find him, and he’s going to be completely fine.”
“Yeah?” Michael says, in that small voice he used to only ever use with her, a tentative request for reassurance and comfort.
“Yes,” she promises. Then she pulls back, keeps her hands on his arms, and fixes him with her best no-nonsense look. “I’m your big sister. Would I lie to you?”
She leaves Michael with Maria and goes off in search of her own answers. The heaviness of all they still need to accomplish is somewhat lightened by today’s success: Max is okay now, with Liz where he belongs. That’s one thing, at least, they can cross off the list.