The New Separation (Book 2)

Chapter 5

Elliot

Twelve. Twelve unread emails today. I've never gotten so many emails in one day before. This was ridiculous.

I started looking through them to find that they were mostly colleges wanting me to apply there. I honestly had no clue where I wanted to go or even what I wanted to study.

Colton never seemed to have these problems. He knew what he wanted with his life and his college really wanted him. It was the obvious choice for him to make.

But me? That was a whole other story. I quit football, so that wasn't going to get me anywhere. My grades weren't super amazing like my siblings. All three of them were so much smarter than me. It was hard living in their shadows.

I slowly made my way through the emails, deleting the ones that were way too far away. I didn't want to end up going to a school on the other side of the country. That much I knew.

Then I came across one email that made me stop before clicking on it. It was from the same school that Colton goes to. How perfect would that be if we ended up going to the same school? Why didn't I think of that before?

I didn't really know anything about what the school offered, besides Colton's sports management degree. I really should look into what major I'd be interested in, but maybe I'll do that later. I didn't want to have to think about being in college yet. I haven't even started my senior year of high school!

So I flagged the email instead, planning on coming back to it for research purposes, then went onto the next email. This one too, made me stop before opening it.

According to the subject line, it was regarding one of the applications I had sent out yesterday. I wasn't expecting any responses to be honest, let alone a response this quick.

Clicking on the email, I quickly read through it. The job was a busboy job at the diner in town. Not ideal, but at least it wasn't the cashier job at the grocery store I also applied for. I really didn't want that one.

I debated with myself for a couple of minutes. I could just ignore the email altogether, considering I really didn't want any job. But if my moms found out somehow, they'd be so mad at me. And I'd probably get stuck with the grocery store job because it would be too late to get this one if I let that happen.

I sighed, deciding to do the responsible thing. I read over the email again, this time more carefully. This guy asked of I could come tomorrow morning for an interview.

I suddenly felt extremely nervous. I've never had an interview before. What if I messed up? What if he didn't like me? What kinds of questions was he going to ask me?

Then the thought occurred to me that I didn't even have a way of getting there. Sure, I could ask to borrow Mama's car, because she'd be home, but if I end up getting this job, I'd need to drive there all the time. I didn't have a car. Sure, I had my license, but that did me no good without a car.

Shutting my laptop, I stood up, planning on finding Mama, who was supposedly in the house somewhere. I had two questions on my mind: the first about getting to the interview tomorrow so I could reply to that email and the second about getting my own car.

Colton

I've never been a good liar. The longest secret I've ever kept was Kyle's my sophomore year of high school. I think the only reason I lasted that long was because Kyle's life was practically on the line, which I ruined anyway that year.

This secret though? This time it was my life on the line, but the situation wasn't nearly as bad as Kyle's. I wasn't going to get kicked out of my house because my dad already knew. All I had to worry about was my roommate hating me for the rest of the year. As bad as that sounded, it wasn't the worst possible thing in the world. Which meant the truth could slip out at any moment.