Faking Love (Complete)

Epilogue

I ended up getting into all of the colleges I applied to, but was disappointed to find out that none of them would allow me to defer for a year and hold my scholarship for me. I was going to have to skip the trip to Europe with Colton, which I was completely heartbroken about.

Then when Colton took me to finally meet my Dad for the first time, I found out that I qualified for a full scholarship at Washington University where he taught for being a faculty member's daughter. Since I was over 18 and hadn't been raised by him, I just had to get a DNA test to prove it. Luckily the test came back showing that he was in fact my father. The best part was that I could use that scholarship anytime, with no deadline, so I could take the year off to travel the world with Colton and then come back and go to college when I was ready.

Going to WSU and staying close to home would also give me the chance to get to know my Dad. He ended up being everything I had always hoped he would be; caring, funny, intelligent, and nice. Him and his wife and his whole family accepted me in right away with open arms, and I instantly felt loved and wanted, the complete opposite of how my Mom always made me feel. I felt like I had known them for years. They were all amazing.

I also found out my Dad's parents were actually Colton's neighbors. It was crazy to think that they had been so close for all those years and I didn't even know they were my family. The hardest part to wrap my head around was the fact that my Mom knew he was my Dad the whole time but kept me from him. Apparently she was embarrassed about getting pregnant by a guy she thought was a 'nerd', so she told him I died and kept me a secret from him and everyone else at school. She gave birth over the summer while school was out and then carried on with her life, letting her parents raise me and treating me as if I didn't exist.

After graduation, Colton and I travelled all over the world together over that summer, the next school year and the summer after until it was time for us to start college. It was by far the best year of my life. Originally we had planned to just backpack across Europe but he changed his mind and we ended up visiting places all over the world; Japan, China, England, France, Germany, Italy, India, Thailand, Brazil, Peru, Belize, Australia, Switzerland, Dubai, New Zealand, Greece, Africa, Hawaii, Fiji and Bora Bora. My favorite cities were London, Prague, Amsterdam, Ljubljana, Paris, and Rome.

I never thought I would have the chance to see any of those places, let alone all of them. I went from never having left Washington state, to seeing a big portion of the world, all in a little over a year. It was the adventure of a lifetime and doing all of it with Colton was the best part. He had a passion for traveling and learning about other cultures, the way they lived and the food they ate. After going on that trip I understood why it had been so important to him to get out and see the world like that, because there were so many interesting, amazing, beautiful places out there to be seen.

Spending that year together seeing the world, had brought us even closer and by the time we came back to Washington State to start college, we were both madly, deeply in love.

Colton had decided to go to WSU with me and after the football coach saw him in tryouts, he decided to make him the starting quarterback for our team, which was surprising after taking a full year off. I'm sure the fact that Colton had led our high school team to win the State Championship three years in a row didn't hurt either.

He had gotten offers from a lot of big name schools, but he turned them down so he could go to college there with me, even though their football team wasn't near as good. He said football was something he wanted to do for fun, but it wasn't worth giving me up for. I was really thankful for that. He had his priorities straight.

It was a big switch, going from being a high school quarterback's girlfriend to being a college quarterback's girlfriend. I thought he got a lot of attention back in high school, but this was on a whole other level. It was like dating a celebrity. Fans asked to take pictures with him and wanted his autograph, and beautiful women flirted with him constantly. I appreciated the fact that he never flirted back and just told them nicely that he had a girlfriend, but his single teammates might be interested.

Over the next four years at Washington State I got to spend a lot of time with my Dad and his family and we became really close. Him and his family came to all the WSU football games and sat with me in the bleachers, cheering Colton on.

At Christmas, my Dad and his wife Natalie (who I ended up calling Mom), always spent Christmas at his Mom's house and all the Aunts, Uncles and cousins came and we had a big gift exchange and huge feast. It was like the family Christmases I had always seen on TV and dreamed about.

I only saw my Mom one more time. I ran into her at a grocery store in Seattle one day and she was with some rich guy that looked like he was her Sugar Daddy. She just glared at me and then turned her head and kept walking, acting like I was a complete stranger. I was fine with that because I didn't need or want her in my life. I was honestly better off without her.

Caitlyn ended up getting charged with fraud and Academic dishonesty and was sentenced to ten years in prison, but with her Dad's connections and money, she got out after only serving two. I honestly wasn't surprised by that. I was actually surprised that her Dad didn't bribe the judge to get the charges completely dropped. I felt really bad that she went to prison because of me, even though everyone else told me I shouldn't. I never heard from her again and she never bothered me again after she got, which I was really thankful for.

I stayed close with Jasmine and Dominique after we graduated and I visited them from time to time when I could get away. Jasmine ended up moving to New York to be a fashion designer and Dominique became an NBA cheerleader for the Lakers and stayed on as a coach there after she retired.

I ended up graduating from Washington State with a Master in Social Work degree because I wanted to help kids that didn't have a perfect family home and struggled the way I did growing up. After Colton graduated he became the football coach at the local high school and had his own travel Youtube channel to share all the amazing trips the two of us went on together.

Not too long after graduation, he surprised me with a really nice house that he had bought for us in Seattle and right after we walked through the front door, I turned around to see him kneeling down on one knee with an open ring box in front of him. I instantly started bawling and said yes.

We were married six months later and two years after that we had our first baby, a little boy, and then a year after that we had a little girl. Colton was the best father and husband I could've ever dreamed of and every day with him felt like a fairy tale. Sometimes I had to pinch myself to see if it was real. I definitely found my Happily Ever After.

**** THE END ****

Thank you guys so much for reading and sticking with me through this long story full of ups and downs and twists and turns. It was a roller coaster but I'm honestly going to miss writing it. Please let me know what you thought and any feedback you have to share. Thank you!!