Chapter 2

Chapter Two

Sophie

I winced as the movers dropped another box on the floor none too gently. I’d looked up reviews for movers before I’d hired this company, but I was also pretty broke and hadn’t been able to afford the companies with all the good reviews. So here I was with these three guys who were rushing like their asses were on fire. I kept trying to speak up and ask them to be more gentle, but they were mostly ignoring me and by the time I was annoyed enough to say anything, they were packing up and heading out and I was staring at mountains of boxes and furniture and I was sweaty and sore and hungry and wanted to cry.

It was going to be a long day.

A few hours later I was even sweatier and my arms ached and I’d barely done anything. I was so faint from hunger that I thought I was going to pass out, so I pulled up the delivery app and looked to see what I wanted to order. I really shouldn’t be ordering food considering how much money I’d just dropped on hiring movers, but I literally didn’t have any food or energy to make anything even if I had groceries available.

My soul was craving comfort food, so chicken tikka masala, naan, basmati rice, and mango lassi was the ticket. While I waited for the delivery, I shoved some boxes to the side so I could claim a corner of my couch to sit on. At least my bed was put together, although I still had to get my sheets and blankets unpacked. Hopefully the box of bedding that I’d labeled so carefully was actually in the bedroom. Chances weren’t good.

I couldn’t move until I got the notification that my food was delivered, groaning at the idea of having to walk down the stairs to get it. My legs and back were going to be screaming tomorrow. At least I was done with school for the semester so I wouldn’t have to drag myself to campus. I’d also scheduled my move when I wasn’t working my part-time summer job at the library. My parents had been in contact with me all day and asking me for updates. They would have been here to help, but my dad had an appointment with a back specialist in Massachusetts that he couldn’t miss so they’d gone down to Boston for that.

This was my first time living on my own and not in student housing and I had to admit, I was nervous about it. I was truly on my own now. No roommates, no housing office I could walk to and complain if I had a problem. Granted, the issues I’d had in student housing had rarely been fixed, but still. I was a grown up now, even if I didn’t exactly feel like it.

My phone buzzed with a new message.

Please tell me you’re not dead and buried under a pile of boxes my best friend Larison sent.

Not at the moment I responded, sending her a sweaty selfie.

Larison and I had been friends since high school through thick and thin. We’d been through all our most awkward phases together. Bad grades and bad haircuts and learning to drive and first relationships. I’d held her hand in the hospital when her daughter, Juniper, had been born. Juniper’s father had bailed the second Larison told him she was pregnant, so I’d gone to all her appointments with her. I’d cried when she asked me to be Juni’s godmother. We’d both cried when she announced she’d been accepted into grad school to get her Masters in Library Science, but that she and Juniper would be moving so she could attend.

I hated that we weren’t in the same city anymore, but I understood that her choices as a single mom were different from mine. She’d be graduating at the end of the summer and I was already petitioning for her to move here so I could resume my godmother duties.

Larison sent me a video of Juniper singing along with one of her favorite princess movies and I wished I was there to sit and watch it with her fifty times in a row and sing and twirl in the living room. I missed doing that so much.

My food arrived and I hauled my butt downstairs to grab it. On the way back up the too-steep stairs, the door to the apartment next to mine opened. Guess I was going to at least get a look at one of my new neighbors. I hadn’t seen anyone coming or going when I moved in, but it might be nice to introduce myself. Make some friends. I’d been so focused on school in the past that I’d cut myself off from doing much socially and then had been frustrated when I was lonely all the time and didn’t have anything fun to do when I wasn’t studying.

This could be a chance to turn over a new leaf and try something different for once. Larison had been up my ass about making new friends for a long time. It would be nice to get her off my back.

I put a smile on my face as I panted from climbing the stairs and stepped aside so my neighbor could pass me. She had dark brown hair and wore a heavy winter coat and hat that looked like it might have been handmade. She locked her door and then turned to face me.

“Hi,” I said and, as the word left my mouth, it hit me who she was. “Reid?”