Greetings, Lovelies! We are so excited to welcome you to the first NerdyLilDarlins fic to be written by all three of our trio! This story is so special to us, and in many ways is a love letter to our friendship and the magic of finding soul sisters.
This fic will post three times a week: Monday, Wednesday, and Friday over the summer. For those of you following Invisible, don't worry, it'll be getting some much needed love this summer as posting resumes!
Finally, all three of us will be at the meet up this July in Minneapolis and cannot wait to meet all of you able to join this year!
Oodles of love to you all! Thank you to Pamela for prereading!
-Prologue-
2016
It's hard to believe how quickly things can change in only a week's time.
Seven days.
Seven days and they can't imagine ever being the people they were before.
They had told each other, from the minute they stepped foot in the tiny, ocean town, that they needed to save time for a sunrise at one point during their stay. They figured it would be easy, considering their age and tendency to stay awake until the early hours of the morning, so the three young women agreed on making sure it happened.
One early sunrise among three college roommates on the brink of adulthood. Easy.
It finally happens on their last morning in Lighthouse Cove, the three of them wrapped in blankets from their rooms as they nestle into the comforts of the outside furniture. Warped from time and weather, the chairs are still somehow comfortable, even in this early hour while most of the town still sleeps.
"We can be one of those people, you know," one of the girls, Rosalie Hale, says through a yawn. She tightens her blanket around herself, closes her eyes, and repositions herself in her wooden Adirondack. Even though they are on the threshold of summer, the early morning hour holds onto the chill. "The ones who sleep."
Another one of the girls, Alice Brandon, laughs and reaches for her coffee. "We can sleep when we're back home. But this," she says, pausing as she looks around, "this is something we absolutely cannot experience anywhere other than here."
Silence settles among them all for a moment as the first glimmer of sunlight dances along the horizon, bringing with it a week's worth of memories to last a lifetime. It isn't their first trip together, but this trip is different from the others; it holds more significance than any of them realize.
"It's actually kind of perfect that we waited for our last day to see this," the third and final girl, Bella Swan, says from her spot on the upstairs balcony with the other two. Three chairs and one tiny wooden table had come with their weekly rental as if waiting for the three of them to arrive. "A perfect send-off."
"Okay, fine. It is pretty fucking perfect," Rosalie agrees, moving the blankets out of her face so she can see the world change from dull gray to a soft orange. She sighs but shakes her head at the undoubtedly beautiful scene in front of her on the water. "Why do sunrises have to be so early though?"
"We should have just stayed awake instead of going to sleep three hours ago," Alice says with an exaggerated groan. She inhales the steam from her coffee as if expecting it to breathe more energy into her tired frame. At that exact moment, the rising sun catches a glint of sparkle from the ring finger on her left hand, and she places her mug down on the small table to admire it silently once again with a soft, knowing smile.
"No, we definitely needed the sleep. God knows what state we would be in on the flight home if we didn't," Bella laughs, thinking of the disaster the three of them could manage on their plane ride back to college. Hungover, or still tipsy from the night before, all falls within the realm of possibilities when it comes to the three of them together.
"Can you imagine the chaos?" Rosalie joins in laughter with Bella, and Alice soon follows.
This is how it has always been with the three of them.
Since the first day they met on the campus of the University of Minnesota their freshman year, they had always known how to read one another. Three different girls, with three different personalities and backgrounds, somehow gifted with understanding each other better than anyone else. They had been inseparable since that day, the three of them attached at the hip throughout their bumpy, incredible, roller-coaster college years.
And now, it's over.
This chapter of their lives has officially come to a close.
One week ago, before they boarded a flight to Lighthouse Cove, Maine, they had watched each other walk across the stage at their college graduation. According to the world around them, they were now fully equipped to begin careers of their choosing.
Their off-campus apartment was cleaned and packed away, their belongings stacked in boxes waiting for the girls to come home for one night before placing those boxes —four years of memories and keepsakes— into their respective cars to head to their new homes. Separately. Three different places around the US - Florida for Alice to launch her photography business and settle into married life with her now fiancée, California for Bella at UC Davis to start a graduate program in ecology, and Ohio for Rosalie to start her journey in radio broadcasting.
For the first time in four years, the girls would have to part ways and enter adulthood without the other two by their side. It was a thought that had devastated the three of them, throwing them into a panic about how they could manage without each other.
"Pick a place," Bella had said through her tears one night on their couch in their college apartment after too much wine at the realization of their upcoming separation. "Pick a place and we'll go there right after graduation."
"One last hurrah," Alice had agreed while Rosalie had pulled out her phone to find a destination for the three of them.
Lighthouse Cove off the coast of Maine is what they had landed on, and now, as the sun rises from what seems like the depths of the ocean and covers them all in youth-like warmth, they know this will not be the last time they experience this together.
"It has to be an annual thing," Rosalie says. "Every year we need to come back here."
The pull of the horizon, the promise of endless possibilities, and a blank slate for them all to write their own stories upon, leaves them all in quiet reflection.
"I don't want to leave," Bella shares, lifting her head into the sunlight and letting it sink into her skin. There is still a morning chill in the air, as it is the middle of May and not quite summer season yet, but it warms her nonetheless.
"I agree with Rose," Alice says. "With you too, Bella. We might not be able to stay here now, but we'll visit every summer. And instead of one week, we'll make it two."
"Aren't you getting married in the next year?" Rosalie asks with a laugh.
"Yeah, but that won't matter. Peter knows how important you two are to me," Alice answers back, unable to keep the smile off her face as she thinks of her fiancé.
"He's a good guy," Bella says thoughtfully. "I'm happy for you."
"When you know, you know," Alice replies, not for a single second regretting the idea of settling down at the young age of twenty-two. "Sometimes life is too short to think and wonder if every move you make is the right one."
"Now is the time for mistakes then?" Rosalie jokes.
"Maybe," Alice laughs with a shake of her head. She shrugs. "The last four years were meant to be the years we find out who we are. We're college graduates now, ladies."
"So what's next?" Bella asks.
Alice giggles and reaches for her coffee again. "Fuck if I know. Maybe figure out this whole adult thing. Learn to make money and save it."
"Or get married," Rosalie finishes, memories of the handsome, quick-witted gentleman she had spent entire nights talking to during her last trip scouting apartments.
"Or travel the world," Bella adds. She points to the horizon once more, and it might as well be the rest of the world for all they can see. "It's ours for the taking."
"Married? Please," Alice scoffs at Rosalie. "Since when is settling down even on your radar?"
The smile on Rosalie's face and the dreamy, far-off look in her eyes tell the girls all they needed to know.
"Oh my god!" Alice squeals, literally leaning on the edge of her seat, coffee clutched in her hand in a death grip. "You really think you might marry this guy?"
"I don't know, guys. All I know is he makes me all swoony and fuzzy and floopy," Rosalie sighs, tossing her head back against the warm wood of the chair.
"Floopy?" Bella giggles. "Well, you can never go wrong with floopy."
"Well, one thing is for certain," Alice says, rising from her seat with a stretch. The other two join her as they make their way to the edge of the railing on the balcony overlooking the water. The balcony is off Rosalie's room on the second floor, and with a single look in front of them, they can see the whole town of Lighthouse Cove. Covered in the morning copper sun, with the gentle waves pushing against the rocks on the side of their rental property, it's a vision the three of them will hold onto for the rest of their lives. It will manifest into three different paths, on three different trajectories that will ultimately bring them back to what truly matters.
Here. This moment. The three of them. Together.
Always.
"And what's that?" Rosalie asks, leaning her head onto Alice's shoulder. When Bella does the same on the other side of her, Alice sighs in resolution.
"We'll be back every summer."
And when it comes to these three, they know no truer words have ever been spoken.