Fairytale, Chapter 7: Back to College

Hi, guys. Eric has done a great job recapping our love story, and now it's my turn to step in.

As he said, we had a dreamy first summer.

Seriously, it was like in the movies. I was living with my sister at my grandparents' summer home, and even though I only saw Eric on the weekends, we were free to spend our days as we pleased. It felt like we were at college--only we didn't have to go to class. Oh, to be young and in love...

Anyway, we had a great summer, and even though going back to school meant we would be living next door to each other and be able to spend unlimited time together, I think we were both a little apprehensive.

I really didn't want to spend every minute with him and take advantage of our new living situation, but I knew it would be hard not to. After a couple weeks of dating, I, like Eric, knew that he would one day be my husband. Because we had this long-term mentality, I really didn't want to ignore our friends and spend every hour with Eric. I knew that would be a struggle.

I also wasn't sure how my roommates would react to my new relationship. I had convinced myself (and them) that I would never date Eric, so I'm sure they were curious about what had happened over the summer. They were my best friends, so I was going to need to learn how to balance living with three great girls, a college volleyball schedule, classes and a serious boyfriend. Honestly, I'm not sure how great we did at this, but we were all friends so we all just hung out together quite a bit.

Eric, himself, had changed even more over the summer than I had (he became a Christian, for starters), and he was kind of nervous about how his roommates would adjust to our new relationship and the new him. He wasn't going to be the same guy anymore. He also had a job at Menard's working six days a week, so he was balancing just as many obligations as I was.

Nonetheless, Eric and I kept falling deeper in love. We loved listening to music together and just hanging out. He was my best friend. He was a gentleman. He wrote a song and poems for me. We had a class together, so we would walk to that together. I sat right behind him, and I remember passing notes with him. I was really impressed when, after my ankle was injured in our second volleyball game of the season and I was on crutches for four weeks, he went out of his way for me when I needed help. I was so happy with where our relationship was headed.

And then he dropped a bomb.

He wanted to transfer schools.

What?! We hated living two hours apart during the summer, and now he wanted to move away from me again. Little did I know it would be the most difficult time period of our dating relationship...