Phoenix was at a young age when her sister was hit by a bus only a few years after her dad walked out on them. Her mum was very distant in more than one way and it left Phoenix with no one but cigarettes,drugs and alcohol as her close friends. Phoenix is shocked to find the girl who she was looking for on her first day of secondary is now her senior music teacher who has taken an interest in Phoenix's life.

||WATTY'S SHORTLIST 2023|| [LGBTQ+ New Adult Fiction] When Mia Cunningham leaves her hometown in coastal Maine at 11 years old after her mother's death, her best friend, Leila Sutherland, gifts Mia a seashell "so she can hear the ocean and remember her home." Over a decade later, the two young women are beginning to navigate their post-grad lives. Leila has remained in Maine, afraid to branch out of her comfort zone, and Mia, after spending her college years in New York and unsure of her future, returns to the only place she ever felt home--Kenneburk, Maine. After a fateful meeting between the young women, Leila and Mia slowly begin to rekindle the friendship that had once been long forgotten. Their friendship is immediately tested, however, as Leila begins to develops familiar feelings and Mia, unsure of where she belongs, cannot help but wonder the direction her life is calling her towards. Will their friendship survive these new trials of adulthood, or should it have ended permanently the day that Mia left 12 years prior? Find out in "Can You Hear the Ocean?" (Published: 2021)