All characters belong to Terri Farley. Story premise taken from Netflix's Look Both Ways.
Hey guys. this is my first fic. I'm working on more chapters, but I hope you enjoy what I have so far.
Did that really just happen?
Samantha Forster stared up at her dorm room ceiling. Her mind swirled with thoughts, not just of the last twenty-four hours, but of the past two years. She'd worked her tail off to get to this point, her graduation was just around the corner. It wasn't everyday someone got to say they graduated college at twenty. She'd earned this.
She hadn't gotten here on her own. She'd had tremendous support from her family and her best friends, Jake and Jen. She thought she must be the luckiest girl in the world, not just because of the support she had, but for the fact that she got to go through college with Jake and Jen right by her side. How often does it work out that you end up going to the same college as, not just one, but two of your childhood best friends? Yeah, she was lucky. They had been there for her every time she had to deal with a tough professor. Every time she spent an entire night just trying to keep up. And every time a guy tried to wine and dine her, just to try and get her back to their dorm room for the night. She tried not to judge too harshly. Maybe that worked for some people, spending the night with someone just to move on with life the next day. But not Sam. Not usually.
Not all college guys were that way. Sam hadn't had too much time for social activities, but she had gone on a few dates that had actually been a nice time. The dates usually ended with a new friendly face to smile at on campus or a new study partner, but nothing more came of them. She didn't have time for a boyfriend anyway. She saw how Jen struggled trying to balance two lives, her life with school and her life with Ryan. Their on again off again relationship really took a toll on Jen, and her studies. Sam did her best to support her friend, but she couldn't understand why Jen was willing to put herself through that. Ryan had always been hot and cold when it came to Jen, and now that they were long distance it seemed the problem only got worse.
Jen said she was fine. It had been a few days since their latest blow up. Sam could tell it was hard on her friend though, she looked worn. She tried to stay out of Jen and Ryan's relationship. She knew it was petty and childish to have a bias against Ryan Slocum, but she didn't care. She'd had too many dealings with the Slocum's to approve of Ryan, but she tried to respect the fact that when things between him and Jen were good, that her best friend was the happiest version of herself. That's why she tried her best to stay out of Jen's relationship with him. This fight though, was the last straw. Every time Jen and Ryan fought and called things off, Jen became more of a shell of the girl she once was. She lost her ambition, lost her vibrancy, and lost her sarcastic wit. Sam was losing her best friend, little by little, all thanks to this Slocum. This time, she couldn't help but intervene.
Sam brought all of this up with Jen. At first, Jen refused this "intervention". They had fought, and even gave each other the cold shoulder for a couple days. But when Jen was ready to talk, Sam had been able to show her that no matter what Jen would always have her ultimate support. Jen and Ryan usually had breaks that lasted a few weeks, but Sam encouraged Jen to take the summer to think about things, giving her time to redevelop the parts of herself that she lost. Jen had agreed to this "summer of Jen'', as she called it, on the condition Sam and her got to go somewhere to get away from the places that only seemed to rehash the feelings she had for Ryan. She wanted a clean slate. That is how Sam came to be preparing for a summer in Colorado. Their trip would begin just a few weeks from now, after Sam's graduation.
She still couldn't believe it. Samantha Anne Forster was graduating early. She would be graduating with Jake's class. She wasn't honestly sure what her motivation had been. Maybe it was just the patented Forster stubbornness. Now though, all she could feel was the worried excitement that came from an undecided future. What was she going to do? Where was she going to go? Who were the people she would surround herself with? Her friends seemed to already have everything figured out. After graduation, Jake was going back to Darton County. He'd pretty much be doing the same things he always had: ranching, tracking, and training horses, just to a greater extent. Jen was still some years from getting the schooling she needed to become a vet. She had expressed interest in transferring now that Sam was "abandoning her" by graduating early. Sam knew she just wanted a change of scenery. It was one reason Jen wanted to go to Colorado, to check out the area for school. Her friends had always been better planners than she was, but it only really hit her at this moment. She was just weeks from graduation and had no idea what came after. Or, maybe she had too many ideas for what came after. All she knew for sure was that she was getting one heck of a headache, and the last twenty-four hours sure didn't help with that.
The day had been normal enough to start. The two of them were in the library, sitting at the same table they always sat at. He was her favorite study partner, always knowing the perfect balance between conversation and silence. She never felt judged when she had to ask for help. There was teasing, sure, but never judgment. Secretly, she thought she was his favorite study partner too. She never saw him studying with anyone else. Not that the brainiac needed to study, like she had to. She had pulled all-nighters every night it seemed, and that was without the extra work that came with studying for finals and any last minute extra credit she could scrape up. Why did she do this to herself? Normally, she would have joked about it. Today though, they had both been pretty quiet. It was sinking in for both of them that these moments at school, in this library together, were rapidly coming to an end. She was leaving soon.
Sam wasn't really sure what caused the later events of the day to unfold exactly. Maybe feelings of premature loss, and mourning their time together got to them. Maybe all those little moments had always been working their way up to something bigger. Whatever it was, it led up to that moment. It led up to him grabbing her arm as they got up to leave, led to them standing so close she couldn't tell where her breath ended and his began, led to one of them, she couldn't remember who, closing the gap between them with a kiss that made her feel things she never thought possible. That moment had felt so right to Sam, in the back corner of the library, she almost wished it had ended there. But it didn't. What was she going to do? She let her gaze fall to the sleeping body next to her.
Yep, that really just happened.
Samantha Forster had just hooked up with Jake Ely.