Page 7 of Gracefully Yours

I closed the door behind me, rubbing my shoulders. I’d carried a large amount of clothing up the stairs, and I was still trying to figure out why Angelina needed that manyshoes.

As I turned, my body collided with someone else.

“Oh!” the voice—female—said, startled as I turned around to face her.

I opened my mouth to apologize, but there she was, standing in front of me. The girl from earlier. Long, blonde hair braided into two pigtails, bright gray eyes that almost sparkled, wearing a white t-shirt with a short pink overall dress.

“Shit. Sorry.” I groaned. “I should have been looking where I was going.” Wincing, I rolled my shoulder back once more.

“Are you okay?” She looked concerned as I tried to rub the muscles. “I was just… staring at my door.” She pointed to the one directly opposite Angelina’s. “It’s all sort of surreal still.”

I nodded. “I get it.” I’d been there last year.

“Are you helping your girlfriend move in?” She asked, her head tilting to the door I’d just come from.

I blinked. “What?”Oh. I looked at Angelina’s name on the door. “No. Just my sister.”

“Oh.” The blonde nodded. “That… makes sense.”

I looked back at her door at the little door decoration that their RAs made with their names. They were cute as shit. The RAs on the floor of my dorm couldn’t care less about making the decorations this fun.

“So are you Charlotte?” I guessed, reading off the names. “Or Noelle?”

“Charlotte. But my friends call me Char.” A pretty pink shade spread across her cheeks. “Noelle’s my roommate.”

“Well, it’s very nice to meet you, Charlotte.” I couldn’t help my grin. “I’m Daniel.”

“It’s nice to meet you, too, Daniel. I guess we’ll probably be seeing a lot of each other?”

I raised an eyebrow, as if to ask why, and then I remembered. “Right. Because you live right across from my sister.”

“Yep.” She offered me a small smile. “I promise I’m not normally this much of a klutz.”

“Hey, I go running every morning, and I still trip over my own two feet sometimes.”

“Oh, you like to run?” Charlotte looked at me shyly. “I have to figure out a route myself around here… I moved up from California, so I’m not too familiar with the area, honestly.”

“I ran track in high school. So I can probably show you a few routes. You know. Give you some pointers.”

She grinned. “I’d like that. I’m a dancer. Running helps me stay in shape.”

That day was the beginning of many morning runs, study sessions, and evenings spent together. We shared our favorite foods, music, movies, and eventually, what felt like most of our lives.

It was the first year where I felt like I really had someone who knew me.

All of me.

* * *

JUNIOR YEAR

“What do you mean, you’veneverkissed anyone?” I stared at her, still in shock. Maybe I didn’t have any right to speak, considering I’d barely kissed anyone, but still—I’d had a few girlfriends. None since meeting her, though.

Shrugging, Charlotte just shook her head as she continued to sit on my bed, plopping marshmallows into her mouth.

We’d been friends for a year,best friends, but somehow I still felt like there was so much I didn’t know about her. And I spent more time with her than anyone else—even my roommate and my sister.

“Really?” I asked again.

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