the whole story, pt. 5

By her twenty-first birthday Nicole had transferred to the UW's psych program, and despite juggling work and school managed to find time for partying, but not a lot for her art, despite the supplies that decorated her room. Her tendency for volatile relationships had not so much faded as it had fallen into the background--she kept a number of acquaintances at a distance. She was the only one who noticed that she had changed, and spent much of her time trying to hide from the fact.

Eric worried about his place in the world at twenty-three--despite being in the UW law school there was always the fear that he was missing something, that he didn't understand people as well as he thought he did, that he was really just an impostor, convincing the world of something he didn't really believe himself.