First of Two

First of Two - Chapter One

So, guys. As I said, the chapters and the book itself are meant to be really short. Hope you enjoy! Don't forget to tell me what you think, it really helps! :) xx

-Daphne

(xsnowberyyx made that poster/cover on your right)

First of Two – Chapter One

R I L E Y

There was a chain of reasons why Riley couldn’t answer her roommate’s stories with more than just nods.

Well, for one, Becca wouldn’t shut up. She kept babbling, from the moment both left their room and never before had Riley listened to a person tell tales about random things concerning their life. Back in high school, Riley was that girl who sat in the back of the class and who no one ever noticed that much due to her preference to keep to herself, and natural vibe that drew no attention towards her at all.

Now in college, this supposedly new chapter of her life felt more like a new book; the kind of sequel that told a whole different story from the first one. Living on her own in Hampton College’s dormitory, meeting a friend who seemed too interested in her, and a bigger environment that meant more exposure—all these and more elements were currently running in her head for the past first week.

Riley had always been organized and never late for class. Ever. And although she thought—as a new student who was lucky enough to have roommate that apparently memorized the whole school through the ‘online map’—that taking Becca’s offer to walk her to her very first college class was a good idea, she couldn’t feel more certain that they were on the wrong wing of the building.

For about ten minutes now, she was following Becca’s lead as they pushed themselves through the small bunch of people who were rushing to where they should be as well. Wing D didn’t have a very long hallway. In fact, they were already approaching Wing F when Riley knew that her class was at Wing A.

“—there was, like, no one at all. Oh my God, like, I made a fool of myself! Can you believe that?....” Becca kept talking and talking that her words were just simply coming in and out of Riley’s ears without leaving a single bit of logic. Finally, after a five-minute inner debate whether to interrupt her roommate and ask if she was sure of where they were heading, Riley spoke.

“Becca?”

“—But it wasn’t my fau—Yes?” To Riley, her mouth was like a vacuum cleaner. It had to slow down and make this tiny dying sound before it eventually shut up.

“Sorry, but…. I’m pretty sure my class is at Wing A,” she slowly told her. Slowly as in compared to Becca’s word count per minute, it was nothing. “I’d love to hear what happened next. To your story, and stuff... But, we’ve kind of been walking toward the wrong direction for ten minutes and I’m already late for twelve.” For a second, Becca didn’t respond. She blinked, her shoulders fell and her eyeballs rolled.

A sigh and then, “Okay, let me see that schedule.” Riley handed out the paper that had been in her hand the whole time. Realizing that Riley was right, Becca let out a small giggle, “Oh, silly me. Okay, let’s go.” And then both turned their heels and walked back as Becca bothered to continue her story.

Riley was late for a total of seventeen minutes.

A D R I A N

Adrian was all but nervous for his first class.

But that wasn’t the case in his mom's perspective. Knowing that her son had gone through a lot before finally going back to school, she was in hysterics.

“Mom, I made it for six months in high school. I’m sure I can make it through my first day of college,” he assured her as he smoothly slung his backpack to his shoulders. He watched a forced out smile form on his mother's worried face.

“I’m proud of you, Ade. But I don’t want you to feel like you have to do this. I want you to think of yourself. Always.” Adrian let go and nodded.

“I can do this, Mom. I’ll be home by four.” He gave her a quick kiss on the cheek and headed to the garage. In ten minutes, he was out on the roads, feeling lucky that Hampton was only a ten-minute drive away. But when he tapped his pendant out of habit, the pendant that he expected was hanging around his neck, it wasn’t there.

A gush of slight panic ran through his veins as he immediately tried to find a way to back up the car and rush back home just for that pendant.

He wore the pendant every single day ever since it was given to him by his father the day he died. To Adrian, it wasn’t something to take for granted, to put after anything else, or to shove in a drawer and forget about like his brother did, but something special. Not just a remembrance, but a final gift from a man who gave lots of them in different forms to different people throughout his life.

Adrian knew he was different; not the typical guy everyone in his six months of senior year thought. Sure, he always sent off a happy mood, even giving people smiles with his so-to-say humor. He had tons of friends, but never one who knew what he has gone through. Never one who saw what was hiding behind those eyes of his: a burden that put him through hell.

By the time he regained the pendant from his bedroom, he was already five minutes late for class. But the roads weren’t very busy. It was also a good thing that he knew how to navigate his way around the school as he had attended different orientations and two open-houses during and before the summer had started.

Looking back, he knew that he had always expected his life to drown into a pit of nothingness. But Adrian woke up to reality. He was also sure of one thing; that his father wouldn’t have wanted him to sit and stare at time passing by. He voluntarily exited that pit and tried to restart where he had left off.

It was almost a miracle the way he excelled in school, even after eleven months of blurry events that concerned anything but academics.

But he was alright for now, trying with all his might to block the things that he knew used to drive him crazy. He was set and ready to continue his path to what he believed was somewhere along where his father used to be.

Adrian was late for a total of seventeen minutes.