AllFreeNovel
Share Us
* * *
The buzzing in my head doesn’t clear until I’m back in my dorm. Jackson texts me to check if I’m good. Once I respond that I’m fine, I put my phone on Do Not Disturb mode to silence all my notifications.
Sitting on the edge of my bed, I rake my fingers through my hair. Logging into my secret Instagram account, I go to her profile on autopilot. She hasn’t made any new posts and there aren’t any new stories today.
Needing to hear her laugh, I switch to my TikTok and watch one of the last posts she was in, leaving it on loop to hear the moment she bursts out laughing when we tried one of the couple challenges where I was supposed to flip her around. She ended up stuck, dangling upside down against me with only my grip on her tangled hands keeping her from falling. We have one where we did it right, but she insisted people wanted to see us fail it first. My thumb traces the side of the screen when she shrieks through laughter and tells me to put her down.
The comments on this post have exploded. I haven’t been checking any of my accounts since I tossed up the kiss cam repost. After everything that went down, I wasn’t in the mood to make new content. My brows pinch and I tap on the comment icon. My comment section is flooded with followers begging me to get back with her because they were invested.
Yeah, me too. Me fucking too.
Leaving the app, I go through my camera roll. During one of the nights I couldn’t sleep, I sat up in the middle of the night and scoured my phone for every photo I had of her and saved them to an album. The most recent ones are from the music festival. Some are the tamer sexy ones she sent me in the summer.
My favorites are the ones I took while she wasn’t paying attention during studying and at the beach. I stop for a while on one of her looking out the window of my Jeep with her hair blowing and a hint of her soft smile. She’s beautiful and perfect.
Shooting to my feet, I rummage on my desk for a pen and get the stash of sticky notes from my bag to write down that I miss riding around in the Jeep with one hand on her leg while she surfed the waves with her hand outside the window. By the time I finish, I’m cramming my words to fit on the heart because the small notes are never enough space for all my love.
I can’t give her up.
Fucking hell. I should go back to that party right now and tell her. But I messed up our chance at a real relationship by not being honest from the start. All I wanted was to do this right, because I’m in love with her. She deserves more than me tearing across campus to tell her how I feel in the middle of some frat party.
But I’m telling her. I need her to know everything.
We’re not friends. We’ve never been friends, not even when we had benefits.
Fuck the friend zone.
* * *
Instinct drives me out of my dorm and takes me to the notebook aisle of the store where I bought the heart notes. I need to get more after writing down everything about her that makes my heart thump, plus keeping up with the ones I’ve been leaving her before I run out.
“Make your selections quick. We’re closing in ten minutes,” the teenage clerk says on her way by with a basket to re-shelve things.
“Sure,” I say.
Grabbing two packs of sticky notes, I move to the notebooks. I need a way to apologize for screwing this up, but none of the colorful patterned journals jump out. I can’t make it right just by getting her a new notebook.
One on a bottom shelf catches my eye. It immediately makes me think of her. The cover is stamped with the messageburn after writingon a photo of a pack of matches with a flame design surrounding it.
A plan forms in my head once I grab it and head for the register. I know what I’ll do to win her back. It’s what I should’ve done from the start, instead of asking her to pretend to be my girlfriend.
I’ve given Tatum enough space to get her college experiences in on her own. It’s time my girl hears the truth. I have to fight for what I want—her.
Once I get back to the dorm, I start recording and don’t stop until I’ve put everything out there.
FORTY-FOUR
TATUM
Cooper remains on my mind through the weekend and my classes on Monday. I looked for him after dancing with Simone, but he was gone. Jackson said he left the party and my heart sank.
By Monday I wake up full of determination and newfound clarity. This isn’t how things are supposed to be between us, and it’s down to my choice not to say something when he asked what I wanted that put this impenetrable wall between us. It’s up to me to tear the wall back down.
I feel ready to talk to him and see wherever it takes us. I can’t hold this in. I’ve known for weeks that I should talk to him, but fear held me back, churning my stomach anytime I thought about admitting my feelings to his face.
After my classes end for the day, I halt outside the dorm. There’s no note. My heart clenches.
I shouldn’t expect them, even if I was looking forward to it after a long day of lectures gearing up to finals. Combing my fingers through my hair, I keep my thoughts positive and unlock the door. I don’t need any negative energy clouding my head when I’m about to drop my school stuff off before tracking Cooper down. I need to remain in the right mindset.
