Uniquely Normal

Chapter 12: Enough

I pulled into the mall parking lot, searching for an open spot. Once I finally found one after what felt like an eternity, I parked. The music from Coen's phone shutting off with the car. We all stepped out of my car, Kenji and Blair's steps faster than Coen and mine as he pulled me back from them.

"I don't know when it would be a good time to tell you this, and I'm not really great with holding important information so here, read this." He reached into his burgundy coat pocket, pulling out his phone to show me a picture. I brought the phone up to my face, beginning to read.

"Dear Coen McAllister, The Yale Admissions Committee has completed its evaluation of this year's candidates and am genuinely sorry we are not able to offer you a place." I glanced over at him, a blank expression on his face. "Damn. I know your father really wanted you to go to Yale."

He sighed and quickly swiped his phone screen to the next picture. "Read this one. Words littered the screen along with purple confetti. Coen pointed to a line, and I began reading.

"Dear Coen, Congratulations! On behalf of the admissions committee, it is our great pleasure to offer you admission to NYU!" I could barely finish reading before I whipped my head to the right. With a giant smile on his face, he waited for my response.

"You got in?! Oh! My! Gosh!" I jumped up and down in excitement, my arms immediately wrapping around him in elation. "I fucking got in! Greatest birthday gift of all time! You're the second person I told. Told my mom earlier when she took me out for breakfast. She was really happy, more than I expected really." My heart fluttered seeing the smile on his face when thinking about the good time he had with his mom. Must of been the first in a while.

"Why are you guys screaming?!" Kenji snapped us away from the joy, a concerned look on his face.

"Guess who got into NYU? Me!" It was now Kenji and Blair's turn to engage in our screaming. Bystanders trying to simply walk to their cars had no choice but to look at the group of teenagers screaming in the winter sky.

I was so happy for him. And even more happy now that we would both be in New York City together. We stepped into the warmth of the mall, removing the fur hood of my coat before the heat caused my scalp to sweat.

My fingered wrapped around his hand, turning his attention toward me as I patiently waited for his phone call with Dominic to end. "Hey, I know your relationship with your parents isn't the best and you don't have too many people in your life that genuinely look to for advice and love so let me be the person to tell you that I am incredibly proud of you and your accomplishments. You set a goal and you reached it through hardships, pain, anger, and grief, but you made it and I am so happy for you." I could feel my own eyes welling with tears that I quickly smiled away.

Coen leaned forward, placing a small peck to my forehead, a huge smile on his face. "Thank you, Serenity. It really means a lot to hear you say that. I admire you in more ways than you could imagine." His gaze after he finished talking begged me to look deeper than the surface level of his words. I searched for an answer in his eyes but the purposely hid behind his smirking face.

I could stare into his eyes for hours. He was never one to hide his emotions well, you could usually pinpoint his mood with ease. But those eyes told a million stories in a simple second. Those eyes could make you fall in love with the way they viewed the world and in turn fall in love with the boy they belonged to.

"C'mon love birds, the birthday boy has some shopping to do." Blair tugged at Coen's arm, moving us along through the store.

We hadn't found anything good in the first couple of stores we looked in, so we swiftly moved forward in the mall. There was barely any shopping occurring, most of the time spent was us having conversations and dancing to the crunchy music playing through the speakers.