Begin Again

“Not to be dramatic, but we need to leave immediately.” Shay’s hand is poised on the door to our little off-campus apartment in her autumnal knit sweater and denim skirt. “This is my favorite holiday.”

I reach up and brush off a lingering glitter fleck on her forehead. “But Halloween was yesterday,” I say. And holy moly, do we have a camera roll full of pictures of us all dressed to the nines as Kingdom of Lumarin characters to prove it (save Milo, who wore his normal clothes and claimed he was dressed up as a “reader”).

Shay responds in kind by pulling an errant fake cobweb strand off my purse. “Forget Halloween. We’re about to get free tickets to the most glorious shit show of the year.”

I knit my eyebrows at Shay in confusion and she just says, “You’ll see.”

On our way out Shay knocks on the apartment a few doors down from ours, prompting Valeria to call “Just a sec!” from inside. She joins us a few moments later, her curls and makeup immaculate, no evidence of glitter, cobwebs, or the aftermath of us all eating cold pizza on the floor a few hours ago to be found.

“Hello,” she says cheerfully, leaning down to Shay for a quick kiss.

As they pull away Shay pretends to grouse, “Morning people should be illegal.”

“You and Milo can make it a class-action lawsuit,” says Valeria, glancing down the hall of the apartment to his room. Once Milo decided not to be an RA this year and move off campus, he and Valeria figured it would be easiest for them to move in together. We’ve basically been living in an insufferably adorable state of double dating in this complex ever since.

“But without morning people, who would make our beloved bagels?” I remind them.

Shay sighs. “Touché.”

We cut through one of the outer paths of the arboretum to get to campus, the leaves on the trees tinted gold and rusty orange and flame red, the air sweet and earthy, the dirt paths soft beneath our feet. Fall is the final season I haven’t seen Blue Ridge State in, and I already know it’s going to be my favorite.

“Fancy new trail markers,” Shay notes with a nod.NôvelDrama.Org: owner of this content.

I beam, taking in the reflective circles in different colors that I helped post on the trees to mark the different trail paths yesterday. Just one of the many little maintenance jobs and improvements we’ve made to the arboretum in the past few months to make it more student-friendly and accessible, a place people can go to get out of their own heads and relax.

Speaking of—“Can I borrow your phone’s fancy camera?” I ask Valeria. “I should snap a few shots for the wilderness volunteer Instagram page.”

“A social media hero,” says Valeria, handing her phone to me. “What would the yellow team do without you?”

I return her slight smirk as I pause briefly to focus on a particularly vibrant branch, the rest of the scenery blurring satisfyingly in the background. I’ve never quite let her off the hook for knowing what the ribbons meant all along. In Milo’s defense, he truly didn’t care enough his freshman year to find out what the fuss was all about. But Valeria was secretly on the blue team coordinating a bunch of the academic-related events half the time—hence why she had that extra white ribbon in her bag in the library that day, and how she got into volunteer student tutoring in the first place.

“Still can’t believe you chose yellow, considering your track record with the elements,” says Shay, gesturing out toward the campus lake just beyond the trees.

“Hey,” I say indignantly. “I’ve only fallen in the lake twice.”

Shay lets out a snort in lieu of listing my many mishaps since joining the yellow team, which include and are not limited to falling butt-first out of a tree during apple-picking season, toppling off the dock as Piper was teaching me how to lead wilderness tours over the summer, and somehow, against all odds, locking myself inside the chicken coop for several hours before Jamie found me in a sea of feathers and eggs.

Mishaps aside, sometimes I’m still surprised I chose yellow, too. My dad was right in that I had more than enough ribbons to join the voting boards for any of them, and even if I didn’t, I was still welcome to join any of them as a member. At first the answer seemed simple: join the yellow team for myself, and join the red team I’d worked so hard to be in, just like my mom.

I had a few weeks to decide for sure, and those few weeks were pivotal—they were weeks when the ribbon hunt was over, and my world opened up in a new way. Aside from studying, my weekends were completely my own. Instead of chasing after ribbons, I found myself wandering around the paths in the arboretum, signing up for different volunteer activities to get to know the area better, even taking a few excursions off campus with a group of students who met up every few weeks.

It was all the magic of the hikes my parents took me on, but with a new kind of magic all its own—the independence of it. Of knowing I could explore anything I wanted, whenever I wanted, and it didn’t have to amount to or count for anything. A sense of purpose that wasn’t driven by any kind of reward, or a fear of consequences. Something that was just mine.

When the choice came, it stunned me how there suddenly wasn’t one to make. I’d join the yellow team, and only the yellow team. It was the current under my skin, the one that felt like the perfect mix of inherited and earned—a love not just for a place because of what it means for your history, but for your future. A love for a place so deep that you feel compelled to make it the best it can possibly be. And so I decided to focus solely on what brought me the most joy: I’d help preserve the natural beauty of this place I’d fallen in love with, water to trees to mountains to sky. I’d make my own path at Blue Ridge State, one winding trail through the woods at a time.

Well. Not without my fair share of tripping on tree roots and poison ivy and near frostbite. But at least Mother Nature always keeps me humble.

“Behold,” says Shay as we round the bend into the main street of campus. She comes to a dead stop and puts her hands on her hips, breathing in deeply. “Soak it all in. Twenty-thousand-plus students pretending they haven’t just mutually destroyed all their livers as their parents descend on campus.”

Only then does it occur to me that November 1 being the school’s annual Family Day is either the most careless or the most cruelly calculated move on the planet. Because even in the five seconds we’ve been on campus, I’ve spotted a student with Resting “I’m Going To Upchuck” Face lodged between beaming parents, another student with enough mascara under her eyes to put raccoons to shame begging her mom to get her a Gatorade, and what appears to be a still-drunk bee wandering around campus singing the “I’m bringing home a baby bumblebee” song to himself.

I stifle a laugh as what appears to be a world-weary roommate steps in to collect the bumblebee. “Okay. This is quality entertainment.”

“Be nice,” says Valeria, playfully swatting at Shay. “This would have been us if Andie hadn’t been in charge of food and hydration last night.”

“I’ll be nice again on November second. Today?” says Shay, scanning the expanse of our deeply hungover campus. “Today is for me.”

We maneuver our way through the figurative and occasionally literal zombies to let ourselves into the back of Bagelopolis. None of us actually work here anymore—Milo spent his last month as the Knight pushing his work-study program agenda more aggressively than ever before, and between his efforts and his newly public identity letting him take a more hands-on approach, it’s actually started to work. Since the new program expansion kicked in, Shay’s been able to do her hours at the local bookstore, and Piper’s taken me on as an assistant for her wilderness tours. But Sean still treats us to our old employee discount, which was never formally explained beyond “take as many bagels as you want as long as Sean gets his beloved chocolate pretzel bagel first.”

We set to work, Valeria making standard sesame bagels with honey-nut cream cheese for her parents, Shay going the savory route for hers, and me grabbing my dad’s signature strawberry cream cheese with the cheesy garlic bagel along with some plain bagels with cookie dough cream cheese for me, Kelly, and Ava. I’m about to wrap up an extra with unicorn cream cheese when I’m interrupted by a hand swooping from above to grab it, and the familiar press of a kiss against my temple.

“I’m assuming this is mine,” says Milo, his mouth already poised to take a bite.

I turn around to find Milo close enough that I can lean my forehead into his shoulder. I breathe in his familiar sweet, earthy scent as I tilt my face up to meet his gaze. “We’re picnicking in literally ten minutes.”

“Yes, but I’ve been up since zero o’clock,” says Milo. His internship has him up absurdly early every weekday morning, but he only goes on the air a few times a week. I can tell from the gleam in his eyes that today was one of those days. “I need sustenance to stay awake.”

I return his grin, eyeing the cup of Eternal Darkness already in his hand. “That hasn’t kicked in yet?”

“Oh, this?” says Milo, lifting the cup. “This is just so Ava doesn’t kick my ass if we play tag again. That kid’s a live wire. Gotta stay on my toes.”

I lean in closer, staying on my own toes to reach him for a quick kiss, feeling the slight fall chill under my skin warm at his touch. He helps me finish wrapping up the bagels, chatting with Valeria about her application process to add a creative writing minor and teasing Shay about the semi-drunk reenactment she attempted of a Kingdom of Lumarin scene that led to a half-hour-long search for one of her shoes.

Then we split off—Valeria to meet her parents, Shay to meet up with her sister, and Milo to head out with me to the quad, where I already know my dad and Kelly arrived a few minutes ago from the text updates we’ve been sending. Ava spots us before we spot her, beelining from the massive blanket where Kelly’s already laid out fruit and brownies to go with our bagels. Ava collides with Milo first, who lets out a staged oof as he leans down to hug her briefly before she pivots like a puppy and nearly bowls me over with a hug, too.

“I got to take the day off school to visit,” she crows to us, not waiting to see if we’re keeping up when she turns right back around and runs back toward the blanket.

My dad gives me a bear hug and Kelly follows it up with a happy, tight squeeze of her own, her homemade bracelets jingling under her warm flannel. I visited them in Lake Anna just last weekend, so there isn’t too much to catch up on, but Kelly and Ava update me on her science project while my dad and Milo discuss the upcoming annual Thanksgiving game between Blue Ridge State and our rival school. The conversation has an easy ebb and flow I couldn’t have quite imagined before we all met, but seems perfectly natural now.

Eventually Milo splits off to show Kelly and Ava where the public restrooms are, leaving me and my dad to perch with all our stuff. He waits until they’re out of earshot to move closer to me on the blanket.

“How are you feeling?” my dad asks.

It’s a testament to how much we talk now that we can ask each other questions like this—like we’ve dog-eared book pages on each other’s lives, and can jump right back into the middle of them without any context. And as far as book pages go, the next chapter of mine might be a big one.

“Good. But nervous,” I admit.

The feeling is so unfamiliar to me these days that it’s almost a welcome one. I’ve gotten so at ease at the mic for The Knights’ Watch each day that it’s just a happy part of my routine. Now being nervous doesn’t feel like a sign of disaster—it feels like the energy of a new opportunity ahead.

Because today’s show isn’t just going to be The Knights’ Watch—it’s also serving as an audition. A few weeks ago I was approached by a Blue Ridge State graduate who ended up working for a media entertainment start-up looking for new and upcoming talent to develop and spearhead their own content. After I went mildly viral on the alumni page for last year’s slipup, she started tuning in on the days I segmented, and kept at it once I took over. Now she wants to know if I’d be interested in adapting a podcast for a broader audience loosely based on the show—one that she’d produce weekly, and one that comes with the opportunity of possibly expanding into the network’s smaller pool of on-screen talent as well.

It’s been a few weeks since then, and I’ve spent most of them developing a new structure for the potential podcast so I could call the shots on it—a large task, but one I relished taking on, given the experience I already had with building my own version of The Knights’ Watch this year.

The biggest change made to The Knights’ Watch right off the bat was the time it aired. Now instead of six thirty A.M., the show goes live at five p.m., giving callers an opportunity to phone in without having to pry their eyes open to do it. That way we can do a prepared segment either on something timely or an issue multiple students have emailed about, then transition into taking live calls. The same way other Knights had their own focuses, I have mine—and both by design and because my identity isn’t a secret, it’s much more of a dialogue between the show and the listeners than other Knights had in the past.

That said, there are nods to other Knights in my version, too. Because it’s so community-oriented, we have a lot of people calling in for more practical advice and concerns, spanning everything from the work-study program reforms Milo spearheaded to more local on- and off-campus causes like my mom once did. And we still update students on campus goings-on at the beginning of each broadcast; I used to think I wouldn’t enjoy that part as much, but I’ve come to understand that being ingrained in what’s happening here is part of being able to effectively help. So the heart of the show is still there, even if it looks a little different on the outside now.

But the higher-ups from the start-up listening to my broadcast today aren’t listening so much for the format as they are to get a sense for me and my on-air personality. It’s a test to see what I might be able to do for them—not just for the podcast they’re considering me for, but the potential beyond it.

I’m feeling confident, but I think part of that is because I am not so worried about the stakes now as I was when the idea of doing this really scared me. Now that I’ve started to deal with that fear and rely on the experience under my belt, I understand those goals I made weren’t meant to be a road map. They weren’t meant to fit neatly in that perfectly packaged memoir I always pictured writing one day, everything decided for me, everything pressed into place. The reality is that nothing about this is going to be linear. It’s all going to evolve in its own time.

The same way the show will someday, when another Knight takes it over and makes the show their own. The same way my life will when I eventually move on from it, and figure out which step to take next. I’m just going to have to trust myself along the way.

“I’ve been digging through some of our old things,” my dad tells me. By “our” I know he means his and my mom’s things. My dad and I may talk about her a lot more openly now, but I know going through the things he put in storage with Grandma Maeve these past few weeks hasn’t been an easy process for him. “I have a lot of stuff saved for you to go through at your grandmas’, but I figured you should have this now.”

He hands me a worn metal compass, the same one my mom used to take on our hikes and famously ignore. It’s still beaten up at its edges, the glass slightly cracked, looking more used than it ever actually was. I smile to myself, the mischief in my mom’s declarations clear in my head even if the words aren’t exact: Forget the compass. Let’s go on an adventure.

The memory doesn’t well up without an ache, but it’s a sweeter one now. As if the more my dad and I have talked about her, the more we’ve had the chance to heal; like some part of the grief was always going to be suspended in motion until we started coming to terms with it together.

My dad’s smile is pressed into a proud line. “Unlike your mother, you and the yellow squad might actually put it to good use.”

I thumb the compass, watching the arrow adjust as I tilt it slightly in my hand. I will always need her, I realize. I will need the memories of the way she loved me, especially in moments like this when I can still feel that love in full force. But I don’t need her footsteps. I don’t need her path to lead the way. I slide the compass into my pocket, knowing wherever it takes me, the paths will be all my own.

“Thanks, Dad,” I say quietly.

His own voice is firm and earnest. “Knock ’em dead, A-Plus.”

We spend the rest of the late morning wearing out Ava on the quad and walking around campus to show him all my new favorite haunts. My dad regales us with stories from his own time here, waiting until Ava’s out of earshot to tell us about his own first Family Day, when Gammy Nell caught him so hungover she threatened to stop sending him care packages stuffed with homemade cookies every week. (Apparently this idea was dropped when she realized it would be every bit as much punishment to her as my dad.)

When it’s time for them to make the drive back I hug them all in turn, my dad giving me an extra squeeze and saying they can’t wait to tune in today. For a little while Milo and I stay on the quad, Milo finishing up his reading for a class, me going over today’s segment on little-known campus health resources. We alternate between using each other as headrests and footrests in the variety of Andie-and-Milo-studying-together positions our bodies have grown accustomed to these past few months until Milo stretches.

“I better head out to meet Harley,” he says.

I smile at the words, and the way I hear them a whole lot more often these days. Milo and Harley have slowly but surely been weaving their way back into each other’s lives. Enough that we even went on a joint hike once with him and Nora, and are all invited to a Friendsgiving at their apartment before we all leave for break.

“But we’ll be tuning in this evening,” Milo says. “The whole Flynn family.”

I glance up at him from my perch, his cheeks perfectly sun-kissed and his curls messy from the heat, his eyes warm on mine.

“Chickens included?” I ask, leaning in close.

“If they don’t fight over which one of them is calling in again,” says Milo, closing the distance to press a kiss to my lips.

I grin as he pulls away, then reach up and sneak another kiss.

“For good luck,” I say cheekily.

Milo’s own smile widens as he shakes his head. “Trust me, new kid. You don’t need it.”

I head over to the studio on my own, breathing in the cool fall air to settle my thoughts. Shay’s already at the computer when I get there, doing what she does best whenever I’m nervous, and pretending it’s just any other broadcast. Still, I notice she’s got an extra printout of my notes on hand just in case.

I pull my own out of my purse, but it’s more out of habit than anything else—these days I get into such an easy rhythm that I rarely need to look at them. Then I sit on my stool, feeling the reassuring weight of the compass shifting in my pocket as I settle in.

“Ready?” Shay asks from the control panel.

I nod, grounding myself by glancing around this familiar room. At the four walls that have been home to some of my best and worst moments, and the pictures on them that have watched it all. My mother’s beam. Milo’s wry smirk. And now my picture just above his, grinning like I’ve swallowed the sun.

Maybe I should be more nervous than this. Somewhere under the peace that settles over me, I probably am. But there is a deep comfort in that moment in seeing my own happiness reflected back at me. In this feeling of being deeply rooted and known and loved, and the understanding that this happiness I have found here—in the friends I have made my family, in the dreams I’ve reclaimed and rebuilt, in the heart I’ve learned to follow—is just the start of so much more to come.

“Going live in five, four . . .”

Shay stops counting out loud and uses her fingers for the “three, two, one.” I watch the quiet beats go by, a smile blooming on my face as I take in a breath, lean forward, and let the adventure begin again.