If I'm There | Noah Sebastian x (ofc)

Chapter 1 Raelynn

Today is the day I am moving to Richmond Virginia with my lifelong best friend Nadia.
We are already room mates but now we are going to be moving halfway across the damn country to her boyfriend's new house about 14 hours away. Nadia is basically the only family that I have. She and I have been best friends since 5th grade when we both decided to take up tennis lessons. We grew up in your stereotypical predominantly white small Midwest town in rural Iowa, filled to the brim with rednecks and racist assholes who worship the confederate flag claiming southern pride despite never once setting foot in the south. With Nadia being Korean and myself being Native we were always kinda the odd ones out. We were both frequently bullied which in turn brought us closer together. We were as thick as thieves, sisters from different misters, two peas in a pod. Twin flames so to speak. We stuck out like sore thumbs and our music tastes and sense of style only grew to make that worse with age.

Nadia is gorgeous, shes tiny maybe 5 foot even on a good day. Not that I'm much better standing at a whopping 5'3. She has beautiful thick raven hair that falls just past her shoulders with choppy curtain bangs resting right at the top of her round tortoise shell glasses. Nadia kinda has a goth meets E-girl type style but she likes to experiment frequently, currently the underside of her hair is dyed fire engine red but it changes pretty much weekly. You wouldn't believe how many times we have almost killed ourselves from breathing in all those damn bleach fumes. She has a quite a few tattoos, multiple ear piercings and a few piercings including her septum, her nose and multiple places on her ears. She's incredibly outgoing, always the life of the party, Literally one of the sweetest people you could ever encounter she constantly goes out of her way to ensure everyone feels welcome and is having a good time.

I on the other hand am much more reserved. Nadia is basically my only friend and I really don't leave our apartment much. Between her and our little black kitten Ichabod I don't really need anyone else. People suck and everytime I have ever let my guard down and been vulnerable with someone I am reminded why I built up my walls to begin with so now I prefer to keep to myself.

I am pretty much the definition of average. Average height, average build maybe even considered slightly chubby, with long dark brown hair that falls all the way down to my butt. I have never ever dyed it as I'm pretty sure it would send my grandparents to an early grave. Hair is considered very sacred in the native community and while I may not be the most traditional person I am still very spiritual and try to follow as many of my grandmothers teachings as I can.

I am much more simplistic with my style the Nadia is. I prefer a more dark bohemian type of vibe but I'm also kinda lazy and not very self confident so in reality I end up dressing more like an emo Adam Sandler most of the time. I have my septum pierced, I have multiple ear piercings and my ears are stretched but only to about a half an inch. The only thing truly remarkable about me appearance wise is my tattoos and I don't even have that many at least not compared to Nadia.

Nadia and I decided to move to Richmond to get away from the small town mindset, expand our horizons and to be closer to her boyfriend Nicholas. He was a tattoo artist and as selfish as it sounds, the main reason I was so on board to move so far away was the hopes that he would get me an "in" to the tattoo industry. I've already taught myself a majority of the basics and have tattooed both myself and Nadia, but I still had a lot of learning to do. Unfortunately the town in which we lived only had one shop and it's run by a bunch of biker skinheads. I didn't feel safe trying  to do a residency there so my knowledge is pretty internet based. I have yet to officially meet Nicholas in person but I've talked to him over the phone and over video chat with Nadia numerous times. He's on the quieter side but he's a total sweetheart.  We share a lot of similar interests and I know he's an insanely talented artist. I've seen quite a bit of his work on Instagram and on Nadia as most of her tattoos were done by him. I guess he also plays guitar in a band on the side but neither he or Nadia really talk about that part of his life too much.