"Too much?" Julia asked as she stepped out of her dressing room, making me peek out from mine. I blinked up at her and nodded instantly because saying that she looked like she was ready to dance on a pole in that dress was putting it lightly. With that, she groaned before strolling back in, "I just want to make a good impression."

Good impression is being polite or spunky on the first day, not wearing a low-cut dress.

Glancing at the mirror, I blinked at my reflection as I spun around, trying to formulate a judgement on the outfit. Unlike my roommate, I didn't need something flashy nor do I have the demand to create a grand entrance so I didn't really know what I was going for.

"Alright," I heard her again, making me slide open my curtain to reveal her in a more appropriate piece of clothing. Nodding at this, a grin broke onto her face before she turned back to the dressing room she was occupying.

Shrugging, I changed back into my own clothes before gathering everything that I tried on in a pile in my arms. Heck with it, I was going to buy all of these because my shopping itch was back again. I lived in New York with friends who were as fortunate as me so we really did adore buying things.

When I placed everything on the counter, my roommate glanced from behind my shoulder and gaped at the number of clothing that I was about to pay for. She looked down on the two blouse, one pair of pants, and a single dress that was currently hanging on her arm before her cheeks started to turn pink.

"I just liked a lot of things from this store," I defended when I stepped to the side after doing the transaction, "Whatever you're thinking, it's not it."

I knew it was going to fruitless, in her little mind she was thinking of me as someone from a wealthy background. In truth, I wasn't and I vowed to never consider myself as one, that was a huge lesson that I've heard from my father. No matter what you hear, what you consider yourself will be the truth.

Though sometimes that lesson backfires but I still consider it good most of the time.

"I'm so sad that Meg wasn't able to come with us today," Julia frowned when she realized what I was trying to do, "Something about not being able to miss a chat with her boyfriend."

Fortunately, she steered the subject away from the topic I knew she was dying to open up. Was I going to deny if she accuses me of the damn word? Of course not, that would be straight lying and I know she would never buy that.

Because even I know living in the heart of New York City was not cheap, especially with the size of our apartment. I believe with both of my parents' salaries, it was very plausible that a life of comfort was easily attainable. Let's also add that aside from my parents, I was also earning my own from the sales of my book.

My little brother will soon follow, though he was more of an Emma than a me. Not in the sense that he was amazing with painting or drawing, but give him a camera and the pictures he produces were award winning.

My god, he was amazing and I was quite jealous. The only worry he has is that our mother wasn't supportive of his passion as she was with me. She was forcing him to either choose a more 'useful' career such as being a doctor or lawyer, like our father, or submit himself to the art of writing.

I don't know how he does it, but he rebels. One would think that with that word, you would picture as someone with heavy eyeliner and has a closet full of black, but he was a complete hipster – with the glasses and oversized knitted sweaters.

I really wish our mother would stop, because if she could only see his talent. He has that eye, a perspective that somehow, I could not see what he does most of the time. We could be walking by a tree and he would stop me just so he could take out his camera and snap a picture. I was confused how such a nonsense thing could capture his interest but when he showed me his shot, I understood.

The way the sunlight just poke through the leaves, the action of the greens being gently pulled out by the wind, the curves of the branches as they bowed out in different directions – parallel, never touching, yet they created such a harmony.

That was what he saw and I only figured out its beauty when I looked at it from his point of view.

"Sienna," she called out, "Why did you choose to be a writer?"

"What?" I halted when the question left her lips.

"You were lost in thought again," she explained, tugging my hand to a near bench where we could take a break, "I admire you for what you achieved, but what made you sit down and write?"

A famous quote by Anaïs Nin was one of the greatest triggers. She said, 'We write to taste life twice, in the moment and in retrospect.'

When you feel something so lovingly blissful or heartbreakingly painful, your mind demands you to remember it, to tell you to stamp it on and let yourself carry it for a lifetime. Writing was like that stamp, once you place it into words, what you felt in that moment, may it be a second or several months, it lets you relive it. You tripped? Carefully craft your words to describe how much your knee throbbed and how the red blood slowly tainted your skin. You fell in love? Recall how eminently speechless you were yet your heart was beating so loudly in your chest.

And at the end of it all, you have to look back on it and reevaluate what you just did when it happened. Give your retrospect to that situation, press pause and revel in your emotions. Writing is such a wonderful thing, it's creating a dance with words, the rhythm that only you can slow and speed up.

Taking a deep breath, I lifted my gaze to stare into her waiting look, "Because it gives life to what could be a dull moment, it's a projection of the wildest imaginations, and it releases whatever tension you have in your brain."

I write because it lifts my heart in the corniest ways.

Her expression softened at this, "I wish I could love it the way you did."

"The reason why I fell so deeply with it is due the fact that I also experienced its pain," I said, "The pressure of succumbing to the demands of the publishing business, it made me more attached to it than ever. It gave me the urge to protect it, to hold it in while it's still untainted."

"So what did he do?" she asked, "The guy from your story, I mean."

"That one was all me," I replied with a shrug, "I ended it because I thought it was best for the both of us."

You want to know how caught up I was? I wrote him a letter – a forty-chapter letter filled with everything. From the day we met to our last dance during prom when I apologized for basically stopping myself from fighting for us.

And maybe because of him I wanted a happily ever after for everyone. Then again, that ending was something misconstrued by the various sugarcoated fairytales.

"I want to be in a relationship again, Julia," I admitted with a sigh, "But I want to fall so hard that the person would make me forget how much of an ideal guy my ex-boyfriend was. I want someone who would replace his image whenever somebody asks me who's the perfect man for me."

"What about that Adam?" she poked my side, causing me to jolt up.

Absolutely not, "I'll pass and besides, he's in love with someone else."

Someone who used to love him as every bit as he does. He basically escorted himself to his own heartbreak.

"I believe that you're far prettier than whoever that girl is," she gave me a small encouraging pat on the shoulder, "I'm sure she's no Heart Valentine."

Now would you look at the irony.

"Speaking of the Hollywood's Princess," I coughed to change the topic once again, "Have you seen her in person?"

"You're the one living on the same country as her," she pointed out, "But I went to one of her concerts along with my friends."

"She any good as the tabloids say?"

And then she grinned, her affectionately crooked canines coming into view, "She was better."

With the way her eyes twinkled with excitement, I knew I had an answer for a question I didn't even know I was asking, "Her voice is amazing, I could never imagine hearing someone who could reach the high notes she sings and the way she could make the pitch of her voice change is spectacular. Not only that, she's a class A beauty."

Adam, I don't even want to figure out the heartbreak you openly led yourself to. He could have had the perfect girlfriend by now, someone who would give him her attention while being a gorgeous being.

The more I found out about her, the more I wanted to scream at him for wasting such an opportunity.

Though if I did that, I had to criticize myself as well. I already had the best guy in the world and yet, I let him go.

"Idiot," I unintentionally murmured to myself. Julia snapped her head towards my direction and I shrugged lightly, silently gesturing to her that it was nothing.

You know, I allowed my prejudice to reign over when it came to her. When I stood up and grabbed my shopping bags again, I gave her a soft smile. Maybe now, I might actually look forward to coming back to my dorm instead of locking myself up.

"I know you're uncomfortable with me and Meg," she mentioned, taking a step forward so she could stop my walk, "But even so, I have this hunch that we will get along."

"And what makes you think that?" I raised a brow.

"Because you can't possibly write like that and not be a good person," she smiled softly, "You wrote from your heart, so impossibly pure and I could feel the love and pain that you did just by reading your work."

After that, she shifted her body so she was back at my side before looping our arms together and practically skipping on her way, dragging me along. My grip on her tightened and that was when I realized that it could be a start of an amazing friendship.

Because she saw the good in something bitter and like her perspective of me, there was no way that someone like that could not be a good person.

That evening, after dinner and everything, we were all tucked into our beds because tomorrow was already the first day of classes. Julia was sleeping peacefully from the other side of the room while I was busy scrolling through my phone, trying to find it in me to find sleep.

I paused when I saw a picture uploaded by my roommate herself. It was in one of the stores earlier, multiple shopping bags in our arms and we posed playfully in front of a dressing room mirror.

With a huge smile on my face, I saved the picture and locked the device, placing it on my bedside table. We've decided to let the window remain open with the curtains closed, it resulted with the cloth flapping about with the wind but its striking sound coupled with the whistling whisper of the breeze, it was the perfect symphony to lull me into slumber.

The next thing I knew, Meg was shaking my body in order to wake me up. Rubbing my eyes, I saw a clearer view of her enthusiastic features, "Come on, let's go down and get breakfast before our first lesson."

I sat up and looked around the room, I could hear the birds chirping loudly from outside. Julia was still fast asleep since her class didn't start for another two hours. Meg told me to get ready and said that she would be waiting for me downstairs.

Normally, I would have taken a shower first but it was a communal bathroom and judging from the amount of ladies rushing in and out with their wet hair and clad in only their bathrobes and towels, I was guessing that there was an extremely minimal chance that I could squeeze myself in there and be ready on time.

So with a promise to myself that I'll head back right after my class, I changed out of my pajamas and tied my messy hair into a bun. I made sure my side of the room was tidy so my roommate wouldn't get a heart attack at the sight of it when she wakes up before I promptly descended down the stairs towards the dining hall.

Meg waved her arms furiously from one of the tables and I gestured back as I grabbed myself a piece of toast and a ladleful of soup. We had a good thirty minutes left and the walk wasn't that long so I considered this an opportunity to take my time, "So you and Julia had fun yesterday?"

I looked up from my meal and nodded briefly, "Yeah, and how was your chat with your boyfriend?"

It was in that moment did I realize that this was the first-time Meg and I've been alone without Julia. She was the tying force between us three, she was the one who kept up with Meg's useless chatters while mystically inserting me into the conversation with ease.

"Perfect," she grinned, nibbling on her toast, "This is the first time we've tried doing long-distance so I don't want a lack of communication to be the reason for us to break up."

Well, at least she was on the right track. For me, there were two elements of a relationship – trust and that cutesy feeling you get in your chest, as sickening as it sounded. What brings them together is communication, it was the foundation that removes any kind of doubt and misconception that ultimately leads to ugly fights and a horrible break up.

And it holds off any assumption that you create.

"Are you in a relationship?" she suddenly questioned and I didn't know it was possible for someone to choke while sipping on soup, but I did and I started to lose myself to a coughing fit. A concerned look graced her face and I waved it off while gulping a half of my glass of water as I told her to explain herself further, "How about that boy who visited you the other day?"

"Adam," I informed shortly after I've managed to regain my breath, "And there's no way, I'm still trying to get over my last one."

She blinked at me twice before her eyes widened as if a lightbulb appeared right on top of her head, "Is it the guy from your book?"

Shutting my eyelids and taking a deep breath, I felt like I was transported back to the cafeteria in my old high school. The chatter among the girls also residing in this dormitory faded into the noise of rowdy teenagers all competing for their voice to rise above the others.

Two tables away from where I sat, he was there with his goofy smile and crooked glasses. When he stood up and seemingly made his way towards us, he plopped down on the space next to me but his focus was on my other friend.

But he grabbed my attention and when I teasingly tugged on the sleeve of his jacket to tell him that I wanted to be included in the conversation, he chuckled and made a disgruntled face as a joke. We shared a laugh, me with my short hair that stuck all over the place and him with that lopsided grin.

Our laughter blended in with the rest of our group and it was as if we made that small corner of the cafeteria our own kingdom.

It may have already been a few months into freshman year but it was just the start to the four-year ride that we were about to enter.

"Sienna?" she called out and I snapped out of my thoughts, my mouth hanging open to find the words. She glanced towards her wristwatch before she released a sigh, "It's best for us to start walking towards the building, don't you think?"

"Yes," my gaze then went to my unfinished breakfast, "And that's my answer to both of your questions."

------------------------

Clutch on a Saturday just a few minutes away from Sunday, though technically it's still Saturday on some parts of the world. I finished my last exam this morning and I'm really confident that I aced that test.

Question: Do you think you'll come to like Julia and Meg?

Don't forget to vote, comment, and follow. Love you guys and see you next chapter.