Writing's Second Taste

Chapter Forty: Second Taste

"Sienna Clark has once again wooed us with the realness of a young adult love," Gracie read out loud from her phone's screen, her voice filled with giddiness, "Her story creates a fresh balance against her uncle's philosophical stories and her cousin's dramatic readings, showing all of us how talent truly runs in their family's veins."

Our other friends gave me a teasing applause and I laughed, snatching the device from her hands, "Alright, that's enough."

With what I thought was a miracle, I managed to survive my first year of university. I spent ample time of my first couple of weeks of vacation in England with Julia and Meg like I promised them before I flew back home.

My book got published a few weeks before my finals and so, I didn't do much publicity or promotion for it because I was too busy monitoring my school work. It was only after did I manage to do the huge amount of interviews for various blogs and also actually reading the reviews left by the readers.

Safe to say, I managed to get a rather good response to it.

"So what did he think?" she asked, obviously talking about Adam.

"I highly discouraged him from reading it," I replied with a grin right on my face. It was quite embarrassing for me if he was going to read my interpretation of our relationship, "But he called me the other day and won't stop laughing at me for what I wrote."

There were no hard feelings, I know that all of this was just playful teasing. I adored Adam and we stayed close friends even after what we've been through. Obviously we didn't go back to the way we were exactly, though we still hung out but rarely just the two of us. It was usually with Vance or with my two roommates.

But we were friends. No awkwardness or anything, just simply friends. We didn't belong with each other and we accepted that.

"I'd say that's a better reaction that what I did," Justin chuckled, sitting down next to me and handing me a drink, "I think I was gaping for five whole minutes."

"And I'm fully disappointed that I wasn't there to see it," I teased, taking a sip from the cup.

It took me until university to even find out that he read it. What we shared was ten time more tumultuous than what I could ever experience. I was just thankful that Adam's was far from that.

While we did have our highs and lows, everything was relatively a simple and calm ride. We met, became friends, tried the dating thing, realized it wasn't meant to be, broke up, then remained friends. We were part of each other's journeys, but we weren't one another's destination. Sure, it was rather fun but it wasn't the real deal. A little bit of funny business when you look at it in retrospect.

And speaking of business, there was one unfinished business. This one, had been unfinished since high school.

The group fell into another conversation and I sighed, pushing myself up and walking towards the window, staring at the view outside. New York, the beauty that I craved for months was finally within my sight. Those busy streets, those people practically pushing each other just to rush to their destination, and the beautiful view of the skyline.

This was home.

"So what now?" I heard Justin ask right before he walked past me and leaned against the window, "You broke up with him and published the book, what's next for our banana?"

"Finish university?" I said, shrugging, "I don't know."

He nodded along, looking around the room first and observing our other friends. They were still deep within their own chatter, drinks were flying by and the night was still fairly young for us.