Naina is a shy and nerdy medical student. She studies constantly and always tops her classes, but she feels like an outcast. An encounter with an old classmate, Aditi, makes her realize that she wants more from life than high marks. Thus, she makes an impulsive decision to follow Aditi on a commercial hiking trip into the Himalayas, up to Manali. During the hike, she renews her friendship with other former classmates, Kabir Thapar aka "Bunny" and Avi. Bunny is a handsome charmer whose dream is to wander and discover the world. He does not PLAN to marry or settle down. During their trip, seeing Aditi's silent reactions to Avi's constant flirting with other girls, Bunny and Naina realize that she has a secret crush on Avi, but do not bring the matter to surface.
In the course of the mountain trek, Bunny and Naina draw closer to each other. Bunny teaches Naina to laugh, to play, and more importantly to love. At the end of the trip, she is close to telling Bunny how she feels but is interrupted by Avi. He accidentally finds a letter accepting Bunny to graduate school in journalism, at Northwestern University in Chicago....
As Claire aims to leave her oppressive stepfamily behind, she befriends Zion. Will he be her ticket to freedom or a distraction in achieving her dreams?
*****
Claire Olsen has had a crush on Zion Petrakis since the first time she laid eyes on him, but he never noticed, instead only having eyes on the school's it girl, Maddie Jennings. Knowing she couldn't compete with Maddie, Claire hid her feelings for Zion, satisfied with admiring him from afar. However, when a series of events led Claire closer to Zion, her feelings for him grew from infatuation to love. And despite fighting hard to keep her feelings contained by distancing herself from Zion, he was determined to show her that he's earned a spot in her life.
[[word count: 100,000-150,000 words]]