Free The Melanie Chronicles by Kim Golden

In Edinburgh
    "Miss...? Miss?"
    Melanie started. The woman sitting beside her grunted and muttered under her breath.
    Hovering over her was the strawberry blonde flight attendant who'd griped at her for not being able to fit her backpack into the overhead compartment. Now the woman was flashing a smile so bright it was frightening.
    "A passenger in first class wonders if you'd like to join him."
    "Him?" Melanie rubbed her eyes and tried to hide the dopey smile spreading over her face. "Which passenger?" But she knew who it was.
    "Mr. Ballantine, Ms. Jamison." Still the flight attendant wore the false smile of one always pleased to serve. "The seat beside his is available."
    "I can't afford to pay for the upgrade." She could barely afford the Economy ticket she held. It had cost $600. "So you'll have to decline for me."
    "Oh no, Ms. Jamison, he's already taken care of that."
     
    They hadn't seen one another since just after Finals Week. That was the agreement: wait until they were in Edinburgh and away from everyone they knew, and see how they felt. During those three months, Melanie had avoided every urge to call him and concentrated on working and spending as much time as possible with her mother and her sister Susannah before for her year abroad.
    Though her mother supported Melanie's decision to go to Edinburgh, she thought it was a long way to go to avoid an ex-boyfriend.
    "Crossing the ocean isn't going to make John disappear," Diane said the night before Melanie's departure. "When you come back, you'll still have to deal with him in one way or another."
    "I need to be away from him. He's everywhere I turn. And he's with someone else," Melanie reminded her mother as they packed the last of her suitcases. "I need to be around people who don't know anything about him or me. Besides, this is a once in a lifetime chance. I get to study in Scotland for a year and experience all of the history and culture."
    But there was more to it than that.
    Damian was a secret she kept buried deep inside her. He was the one who'd first put the idea of a year abroad in her mind. He'd already enrolled and was so positive about a year in Scotland that he'd made it sound like Nirvana compared to another year at the University of Philadelphia. During one of their study sessions in the Irish Reading Room, he'd handed her the Year Abroad program's glossy brochure. It was packed full of enticing photos of Edinburgh: the Castle against a moody sky, charming Georgian townhouses with jewel-toned front doors and shiny brass doorknobs, a mist gathering at the base of Arthur's Seat and the Crags. The more she saw, the more she knew she had to go. He must've seen the longing in her eyes, the desire to escape to a place where she could be anonymous for a while because he urged her to apply.
    "You're an English major, you of all people should be in Edinburgh--think of all the great writers who've been inspired by it. You could be next!"
    She didn't want to tell her best friend Maria about Damian yet. The thought of telling Maria tied her stomach in knots so tight and complicated she couldn't sleep. How did you tell one of your closest friends that the person who caught your fall was the same person she'd coveted for nearly two years? Even though Maria was dating someone else now she still mused about the day when Damian would come to his senses and ask her out.
    Neither of them had told anyone.
    Everything had happened so quickly: John dropped the bomb that he didn't know if he loved her anymore and left for Greece with Chloe a few days later, she'd seen the notice in the school newspaper about people dropping out of the international program, then Damian kissed her that night in the library and things had spiraled from there.
    "I need this, Mom," she'd said with such fierce conviction that she even startled herself. "I don't know what I really want. I just know that I can't be here right now."
     
    "Fancy meeting you here," she said as she settled into