black & gold

Epilogue

It had taken a while to get here, that much is certain. Hannah exhales deeply and stares up
at the large, brick building in front of her. It hadn't been her first choice of college, but it
was where she needed to be. She was tired of the endless horizons and limited
opportunities that California held for her. She needed a change.
She needed New York. And it'd be a damned lie if New York didn't need Hannah Hart
just a little bit, too. At least for the time being.
Hannah took a deep breath and dragged her two fifty-pound suitcases behind her towards
the glass doors of the building that read 'NEW YORK UNIVERSITY' across them. Like
most else in the past year, Hannah was alone. But the fact that within these walls lied
nearly five hundred students that were just as eager and excited for the next chapter of
their lives as Hannah was made it a bit easier.
She was certain that this moment was the last that she would feel alone for a very long
time.
"Last name?" The girl at the table set up in the front of Hannah's dorm asks. Her purple,
v-neck shirt reads 'MOVE-IN VOLUNTEER' across the front in large, block letters.
"Hart," Hannah responds.
"Hart, Hart, Hart... Ah, here you are!" The girl pulls out a manila folder and hands it to
Hannah, "Let me just find your key and you'll be set..."
"Hannah?"
The voice is sudden and abrupt but Hannah recognizes it. It's the same voice that would
say her name in a whisper late at night. The same voice that would say her name on a
laughing note whenever Hannah told a ridiculous pun. The same voice that would say her
name through broken sobs when everything went to shit.
When Hannah turns around, Grace Helbig is standing no more than ten feet away from
her, holding a suitcase that has a purple 'NYU' sticker on the side of it. Once her shock
fades, Hannah smiles softly at the girl and watches as Grace smiles back, tucking a piece
of her now shoulder-length, dark brown hair behind her ear. Though her hair has changed
and her face has matured, it's still her. It's still Grace.
They don't say anything else to each other in the moment. Grace's elevator arrives and
the Move-In Volunteer that's carrying several of her boxes ushers her towards it. Grace
gives Hannah a simple nod and a small, supplementary smile before she turns and
follows the boy struggling to lift her things.
When Grace turns, Hannah's breath catches in her throat by the way that the sun through
the front window lights up her silhouette. Golden. And Hannah has a sudden realization
that maybe Grace and her wore their uniforms in reverse. Because although Grace's team colors were always black and hers were gold, it was undeniable that Grace was the
golden one. Every time she smiled, or laughed, or her lips brushed against Hannah's, it
was golden. And Hannah's darkness faded to a soft gold just from being near her.
And now she's here - at NYU with Hannah. And it's strange, Hannah thinks, that
although they've never once discussed their mutual desire to go to New York City, they
both ended up here. In the same dormitory of the same university.
Life is beautiful, really. That's what Hannah tells herself now and that's all that she's told
herself for the past year. That although horrible things can happen, life truly is beautiful.
"Hannah? Hannah?"
Hannah finally snaps back into reality when she hears the voice of the girl at the front
desk calling out her name.
"Hm?"
"Was that someone you know?" The girl laughs as she watches Grace get onto the
elevator with her things.
"Yeah... yeah, she's an old friend of mine," Hannah smiles shyly and shoves her hands in
her pockets.
"It's nice to have an old friend around here in the big city. It can get pretty lonely with all
the new faces," The girl grins and grabs Hannah's key off the table, "Anyway, I don't
want to keep you waiting too long. Here's your room key. You're gonna be in 518A.
Welcome to your new home!"
The word doesn't sting like it used to. Home. Hannah had spent so much time on stained
mattresses and strangers' couches in the past year that it was hard to believe that she was
finally here. That all of her hard work paid off.
But she does believe it. Because when she looks around at the purple banners hanging all
around her new campus that read 'WELCOME HOME,' something inside of her clicks.
And when she thinks about the feeling of warmth and familiarity that filled her stomach
when she saw Grace, for the first time in over a year, she feels electric. Like this is the
beginning of something amazing.
Like she's home.
Like she's finally, finally home.
-
Grace had pretended to sleep while Hannah fell apart in her bathroom - it was hard to
ignore the sobs coming from behind the door. When Hannah pulls herself together after
ten minutes of letting out her emotions, she quietly sneaks back into the bed and wraps herself around Grace as if she had never left. As if she hadn't moved from the position
she fell asleep in after they made love for the first time.
When Hannah drifts off and her breathing becomes shallow and steady, Grace opens her
eyes and softly drags her fingers across the exposed skin on her chest,"I know you can't
hear me right now, but I'm so glad that I met you."
Hannah stirs slightly in her sleep and involuntarily holds onto Grace tighter.
"I know that this probably won't work out because everything's falling apart around us
right now, but... I hope that in the end it does. Maybe not now, but eventually."
Grace settles her head down in the space between Hannah's shoulder and her neck and
inhales everything that the girl beneath her has to offer.
She thinks about when she was younger, maybe about eight or nine, and her father used
to press his lips to her mother's cheek and tell her, "I've loved you, I love you, I'll love
you." She used to think it was strange how her father could say words with such promise
behind them when he truly had no idea where his heart could take him in the future.
But looking at Hannah, Grace finally understood.
She'd never understood anything more.