Page 150 of Taste of Addiction

Graham swipes the pads of his thumbs against my damp cheeks. “I can’t do life without you in it.”

“My life is finally worth living again because of you. You make everything better. I never want to lose you. You are my forever.”

He slides up farther into the bed to lie beside me. “Forever is not long enough.”

26

“I can’t believe we’re officially moving out of here,” I say to Claire, as we pack up the last of my belongings into boxes. We are in my room, sprawled out on the cold floor—trying not to cry.

A donation service truck is scheduled to arrive later today and pick up some of my old furniture that I no longer need. Campus is cleared out already. The dorms are empty for the long winter break, and those graduating are packing up for good.

“There have been so many good memories built here.”

“Some of the best,” I agree, glancing around my room.

“Remember when you threw all of asshole Russell’s stuff out the window?”

I nod. “One of the highlights, for sure. How about when you forgot to put the lid on the blender with daiquiris and started it?”

Claire bursts into a fit of giggles. “Wasted forty-two minutes of my life trying to scrub the stains out of my clothes before finally deciding to trash the whole thing.”

“I’m going to miss sharing space together. I still can’t believe this chapter of our lives is over.”

I put on my graduation cap and hand her the one I made for her. We decided to forgo the ceremony scheduled for next week—it’s not like we have family who would attend anyway. I am not big on crowds and everyone staring at me. Plus, the official graduation will be in the spring, but I doubt I will attend that either.

I secured my English degree. But other than that, there’s not much to celebrate. It sucks that the past four plus years resulted in something that I did not predict would happen. However, I am happy that I feel like I was a part of something profound with the bringing down of the drug ring. I can’t brag about it due to the case needing to go to trial, but at least I know that my determination for the truth paid off for the better—even if I have nothing to show for it.

Claire grabs her phone to use as a mirror as she fixes her hair under her cap. “You did a good job on the design of these. I'm impressed."

“We can still go, you know, if you’re sad to miss it,” I say looking at her expression. “It’s a big deal getting a master’s degree.” I watch her distract herself by wrapping a few picture frames and placing them into an open cardboard box.

She shakes her head. “Nah, I am just reminiscing in my head over the good ol’ days where it was still socially acceptable to work mediocre jobs because you are a student.” She holds up one of her gym T-shirts that made its way under a pile of my romance novels. “Now we embark on the journey to the real world where all our dreams stay dreams and reality is less than stellar compared to how the big kids made it seem when we were still young.”

“Okay, okay, okay,” I say, holding up my hands. “What gives? You’re not usually this—”

“Honest?”

“Pessimistic.” I sigh. It is hard seeing my bestie this unhappy. “Usually those feelings are reserved only for my repertoire of emotions.”

Claire shrugs. “I just have a lot of things happening inside my head that I need to work through.”

“I have time to listen. I always have time for you.”

She leans over and gives me a hug. “I got accepted.”

I pull back to look at her face, trying to figure out her meaning. “You’re going to have to be a tad bit more descriptive than that.”

She extends her arms behind her and leans back to rest her weight on her hands. “To the facility in California.”

“For the internship?”

“Yup.”

“When did you find out? This is so exciting,” I squeak. I try to force the pain in the pit of my stomach to go away. I know I will miss her so much, but I cannot allow my own selfish feelings to keep her from blossoming into the flower I know she can be. So, I fake it. I slap on a cheery face and try to share in her—

Why is she not excited?

“A few days ago. I got the notification in the mail. I was shocked seeing it, actually. Part of me just expected the answer to be a no.”

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