Juliana Woodland and Nate Jacobs have been best friends for as long as they can remember.
They are now in their junior year at East Highland High School and things are starting to get complicated.
*Had this story up on my old account and it got dele...
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Chapter 7 coming soon- please feel free to vote or comment! 🩶
"Oh my fucking god, I'm so done with this day already!" Juliana exclaimed in frustration and threw herself on her bed.
It wasn't even 8:00 in the morning and her day was already ruined. She and Nate had only been awake for a half hour and were getting ready for school.
"What's wrong, Angel?" Nate asked in a concerned tone, sitting on the bed beside her and pulling her into his chest.
She breathed in the familiar and comforting scent of his cologne and felt tears prickle the back of her eyes. "My dad's family."
Juliana's mom and dad were happy together for the first eight years of her life. Her dad was away for his job a lot but they made it work. Until one winter day a stranger knocked on their door, a redheaded woman who claimed that Juliana and her mom were her dad's second family.
She didn't remember all the details of the aftermath, just that her dad was abruptly out of her life.
He would call her on special occasions like birthdays and Christmas. When she heard his voice through the phone, she never knew if she should feel happy to hear from him, or disgusted.
When she turned twelve, the calls stopped. She didn't hear anything from him for several years after that. She spent many nights crying on Nate's shoulder, wondering what she did wrong for her dad to treat her and her mom the way he did.
Then last year, in tenth grade, she started getting strange calls and messages, from people claiming to be her father's family, saying that her and her mom ruined his life, insulting them and sometimes even threatening them.
For some reason she could never bring herself to block any of the numbers, because she thought it was the only connection that she had to her dad, and that someday he would try to contact her again and make things right.
Logically, she knew that didn't make a lot of sense. But her hope that he would try to reach out to her again one day was stronger than her logic.
She wouldn't tell her mom about it because she knew her mom would probably get the police involved. She confided in Nate, but only after making him promise he wouldn't do or say anything about it.
Whoever it was would contact her every so often, saying the same cruel things, but she just held onto the hope that one day it would be her dad reaching out to apologize.
Nate couldn't understand why she wouldn't let him tell them off, or better yet, track down whoever was behind that phone number and beat them senseless.
But he was aware of her complicated feelings about it, and he didn't want to make the situation worse, especially when he did promise her that he wouldn't do anything about it.
"I can't deal with school today. Will you come back over after?" Juliana pulled her soft peach coloured comforter over her head.
"You know I'm not going to leave you here alone. Why don't you just relax for a bit?" He replied, resisting the urge to grab her phone and deal with whoever was upsetting her.
The whole situation enraged him, but he knew it would only upset her more if he got worked up over it.
He got up and packed a bag with towels, sunscreen, a blanket and snacks while she lay in bed, still underneath the comforter, silently wishing that things with her dad could be normal again.
When he had everything ready, she started to stir and pushed the blanket off of herself. She looked at him with a sad expression on her face.
"Are you sure you don't want to go school? I don't want to get you in trouble."
He sat down beside her on the bed, and she noticed that he had changed into a fitted grey T-shirt and the black Adidas shorts that she loved on him.
"I'm not too worried. We're going to our favourite place."
He didn't have to say where; she knew he meant the beach.
A grin broke out on her face and she hopped out of bed. "You are the best ever, did I ever tell to that?"
"Yeah, all the time," he laughed as she dug a bathing suit out of her dresser. "But only for you."
They drove the half hour to their favourite beach, the same way they always went on drives: with Juliana picking out the music and Nate with his hand rested on her thigh.
"Baby put on heart-shaped sunglasses, 'cause we gonna take a ride!" She sang along to Lana Del Rey at the top of her lungs as he admired her as much as he could while still focusing on the road.
The beach was completely deserted except for the two of them. The early morning sun painted the horizon with strokes of orange and pink.
It was the kind of place where worries went to die, where the salty breeze could carry your troubles out to sea if you let it.
Juliana's mood lifted the moment her bare feet touched the warm sand. She pulled her white cover-up off as Nate laid their bags and blanket down.
He snuck as many looks as he thought he could get away with as she applied her coconut scented sunscreen, taking in how painfully perfect she looked in her yellow floral bikini.
"God, I love it here." She sighed contentedly, taking a deep breath and stretching her arms up above her head.
They made their way towards to the water and he stepped into the waves. "Is it cold?" She asked tentatively.
"Come see for yourself!" He picked her up and ran into the water with her while she screamed and laughed in protest.
They swam for ages, the saltwater stinging their eyes and the sun warming their skin. When they emerged from the water, laughing and gasping for breath, Juliana's eyes lingered on him.
His chestnut coloured hair was pushed back out of his face, making his sharp jaw line stand out even more than usual. Seawater dripped on his hard abs, down to where his black shorts were sagging off his hips a little.
When she realized what she was doing, her cheeks flushed and she quickly averted her eyes. It wasn't the first time she had noticed lately how good he looked, and she didn't know what to think of it.
When they got back to their blanket, Juliana dug her phone out of her purse and Nate reached for the bag he packed.
"Are you hungry?" He asked, watching her lie down on her stomach and shield the sun from her eyes to look at her phone.
She didn't hear his question because she was distracted by a new string of text messages. The tears she held in that morning burst like a damn, rolling down her cheeks and onto the blanket.
"Do you want-" He turned back towards her with a cliff bar in his hand and saw the tears on her face. "Angel," he immediately lay down beside her, pushing a stray lock of damp hair behind her ear and wiping her tears away.
She opened her watery eyes and looked into his deep brown ones that were sparkling from the sun but laced with worry. He leaned closer to wipe another stray tear from her cheek and she felt his breath on her lips.
She looked down at his mouth and without thinking about what she was doing, she placed her hand on his cheek. He brought his face closer to hers in what felt like slow motion.
"Hey!"
Juliana nearly jumped out of her skin and Nate's head jerked up before he quickly sat up. There was an old man chasing a big white dog onto the beach.
"Hey, come back!" The man bellowed again before the dog turned around and ran back to him.
Both of their hearts were pounding out of their chests as they watched him put the dog back on its leash.
Her mind was racing; did they really almost just kiss? Or was he just comforting her, like he had been doing for longer than she could remember?
It was hard to say, but what she knew for sure was that she wished they had not been interrupted.
