Moksha's Love Story

CHAPTER 1

"Moksha, What. Are you doing." 

"Anna just shut up I'm doing an experiment." And it was. I was trying to see if I could match with hotter guys if I changed the angles of my profile photos. I knew it was kind of stupid but the fact that Anna wanted me to stop just made me want to continue, just to annoy her. 

"Moksha get out I'm trying to do homework." Anna said, getting up to push me out of her room.

"But Annnaaaaa! It's our senior spring and we already got into college. What the point anymoreeee. Ela and Chieko have already given up, why can't you?" 

"Because when I get to Yale in the fall I don't want to be shown up by all those chumps and Chieko and Ela are smart they don't have to study. Oh by the way do you know where they're going? I haven't talked to them in a while since they're all the way on the first floor and I didn't want to be rude. Ela seemed happy but Chieko just kinda stayed the same mood. She's kinda weird. Anyways, Oxford will be looking at your grades at the end of senior year so don't you want to get good grades? So OUT."

She had a point. I promised Oxford I would be getting a five on the AP Latin exam and at this rate, I could write a better summary on Gilmore Girls than a sentence in Latin. "Ugh FINE, I'll leave. But yeah I think Ela is going to Dartmouth, which I'm so excited about, and Chieko is deciding between Columbia and art school although I don't remember which one. I think she's leaning towards Columbia because of the city but you'll have to ask her."

"Ohh makes sense. Ok. Moksha. Up. Out." Anna practically shoved me out of her room. 

I went back to my room right across the hall to study for my AP. I've made it too far to not make it to Oxford on a technicality. 

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Two months went by super quickly. It's the day before our graduation and I'm just finishing up packing up my room for the last time. All I needed to do was have Ms. Nemeth come check my room and Anna, Ela, Chieko, and I would go with a couple of friends for the last time to Lexi's and then Stillwells. We went out onto the Weth quad right as the sun was setting. This is the perfect time for spikeball but with only the seniors left on campus, the quad was completely empty. I took this time to look around at the buildings and trees trying to remember this place. I had my best and worst memories here and grew so much. More than that, what am I supposed to do without my friends next year? And all the way across the Atlantic? 

"Moksha, hurry uppp. I'm hungryyyyy." Chieko's wining brought me back. 

"Wait who did you invite to this thing again?" I asked. 

Chieko looked at Anna stalling and started walking away so I asked again. 

"Chieko, who's coming?"

Chieko looked stared at Anna who avoided her eye contact so she didn't have to be in the line of fire. 

"Oh the usual: Masoudi, Garrett, and...uh...Akili. Oh and I think Ela's bringing Cyrus too." 

When I heard the name Akili, I flipped. Yeah Anna and Garrett are friends again from their prep year break up but Akili and I just broke up this winter after dating for all of upper year. I mean, I guess I wouldn't have called it a messy break-up but it was awkward. We just kind of lost feelings for each other. And I get that Akili and Anna are good friends still but did he really have to come tonight? Not only that but Cyrus would be there which means that Ela will be occupied which means that I'll have to talk to Akili at some point. Or maybe I'll just have to stick with Garrett and Masoudi. But every time I talked to Garrett it was awkward too. So maybe just Masoudi?

We met them outside of Lexi's and all headed inside for a table. I ended up sitting the farthest away from Akili and just talked to Anna and Masoudi the entire time. After we got Stillwells, we all went to the football stadium to look at the starts for the last time. 

"Hey Moksha can we talk for a sec?" It was Akili. He slowed down so we were walking next to each other back to North Side. 

"Yeah, what's up?" I tried my best to keep my voice from getting all high pitched but I couldn't help it. 

"I just heard you were going to Oxford. Big Congrats!" He said,

"Thank you! But also you're literally going to Princeton so you're just as impressive yourself." I replied 

"Haha no no but thank you, I really appreciate it. Look, I know tonight was kind of awkward but I just wanted to let you know that there are no hard feelings from the break-up. You so smart and talented and I really want to go back to being really good friends again. You know, like keep in touch and stuff over then next school year." 

"Oh thank god you felt the awkwardness too. Yeah, I'd really like to be good friends again. I'm glad we worked this out before we left tomorrow. Thank you." 

By now we had just passed Peabody and it was only us girls and Akili and Cyrus left. Cyrus and Ela we hand in hand and I felt my third-wheeling days from lower year were over so I just stuck to talking with Anna, Chieko, and Akili. The bell tower rang signaling 11 O'Clock and we all ran back to our dorms to go back to our completely packed up rooms to sleep for the last time at Exeter. 

End of Chapter 1

Recap: Last day at Exeter. Anna - Yale, Ela - Dartmouth, Chieko - Columbia, Akili - Princeton, Moksha - Oxford. Akili and Moksha dated but then broke up in winter term and became friends again. Just a general goodbye to Exeter before getting into the juicy stuff at Oxford.

Next Chapter: We will see Moksha in her first week at Oxford, meeting new people, experiencing new things, and dealing with new challenges.