One week.
Actually, it was a more than week left until the SATs.
She didn't care or complain about wanting to be with friends than studying. It was her choice. She had to keep up with the dates so that her mom could pay. She had to do it to get out of town, to go to college, to reach her dreams, to be herself, to be free.
So she was in the town's local bookstore, studying. By herself.
She knew AP kids in her school went there all the time after school. She's friends with some of them. But this time, she went by herself. She never even went with them, anyway. And they all went there long before she asked them to go with them.
And still after that, they went still without her. And it wasn't because she didn't noticed because of course she did.
She just decided that she no longer cared. She was seeking on learning how to be content with herself and loving herself and learning to be by herself senior year.
Because the thought of how she knew within less than a year, when it would be time for to go off into college, she knew she was going to be all alone. And that's what she expected to do and expected to be: alone. She started off her senior year without a best friend, without looking for a boyfriend, and all because in the end of that summer, she finally decided to stop looking.
All she wanted, wasn't what she needed.
What she really needed was to get into a college and graduate. But before all that, but now, all she was doing on a Saturday afternoon after coming home from ballet class and rehearsal was spending the rest of the day studying for the SATs & ACTs in a bookstore.
Her phone was on silent, but her music wasn't. She's been at it for 3 hours in the same spot, on the same table, working at the same pace.
She barely even noticed the time passing by until all of a sudden a cup of frozen coffee was landed on her table. She finally looked up from her work, took off one ear of headphones and said to the barista who was now walking away, "Oh wait, I didn't order anything."
The barista turned around and said, "It's on the house."
She couldn't help but then grasped the Starbucks coffee in her hands but then there was a naptain underneath. She picked up the napkin and it said "you look like you could use a drink. here's something to refresh your energy."
She couldn't help but smile. Then she took a sip of the frozen coffee cup that was in her hands. She settled in down and got back to studying.
Two hours later, another coffee cup was settled onto the table. Along with three big cookies, in a bag. She looked up only to a male barista who settled the treats down.
Again, she took off her headphones, both ear pieces this time, and smiled at him as he said, "Hi".
"Hi", she said back.
"Mind if i sit here?" He asked.
She shook her said, "Go on."
He sat down, and that they talked for the rest of the night. Without interruptions, without a moment of silence in their conversation, just two people drinking coffee with an endless amount of conversation.
