Page 92 of Ink & Ambition

“Cool. I was thinking it would be compelling to do a piece on how Tomlin supports international students or students who just don’t go home while the campus shuts down for breaks. Interested?”

“Yeah, I’ll work on that.” Jessy gives me a smile before sauntering away just as quickly as she came. That topic does sound interesting but I can hardly think about it right now. I’ve had my stomach in my throat ever since I sent in the write up and the first few episodes of the podcast. I know I should be hearing from theNew York Timespeople soon.

Just as I’m about to pull up the thesaurus to find a better word than “wet”, my email pings with thatyou’ve got mailsound. While typically I ignore most emails that come into my newspaper account, mostly because they’re just Jessy telling me to make changes on a story or sending me memes about cats drinking coffee, this time I immediately click onto the email landing page. My lunch threatens to make its way out again when I see the email is [email protected].

Preparing myself for utter defeat, I open the email, reading the contents out loud to myself.

“‘Dear Ms. Davis, we received your admission for the internship contest and are pleased to inform you’–YES!” I screamed at the very top of my lungs, happy tears forming in my eyes.

“Jesus, Margot,” Jessy says as she runs back over to me. “What’s going on?”

“I made it to the final round of the internship contest!”

“YES!” Jessy’s scream matches my own and she pulls me in for a quick shoulder squeeze more leaning over to read the rest of the email.

“‘You’ve made it to the final round in this competition. You are one of fifty contestants that have made it this far. We admire your journalistic creativity in this endeavor and are eager to see more of it in the coming weeks. Please submit your last write up and podcast episodes by December fifteenth and we should have the results on the winner before the holiday season.’ Oh my god, Margot, this is amazing!”

I’m full on crying now and there’s nothing I can do about it. I can’t believe I pulled it off. I can’t believewepulled it off, Alex and I. The urge to call him and tell him the news is overpowering.

“Thanks, Jessy!” I reply, wiping my face and grabbing my bag from the floor. “Have a good Thanksgiving!” I yell as I run out the door, phone in hand already to call Alex. As I burst out of the door, I run smack into the man himself.

“Sheesh, sunshine. Where’s the fire?” Alex takes a step back, laugh-lines bracketing his mouth. But his mood instantly shifts when he sees my tear-stained face. “What’s going on? Why are you crying? Who do I have to kill?” He looks over my shoulder, possibly expecting to see someone chasing me with a knife.

I grab his face in both my hands, pulling his attention back to me. “I made it to the final round.”

At first he’s confused and possibly still thinking I’m in danger so I roll my eyes with a giggle and pull up the email on my phone. Alex skims it ever so briefly before his eyes light up and soon he’s hoisting me into the air, spinning me around like a rag doll.

“You did it, sunshine!”

“We did it!” I laugh into his neck, swatting at him playfully to put me down.

Alex is shaking his head before my feet even touch the ground. “No shot, sun. This is all you. I’m so fucking proud of you.” And he means it. I can feel the pride radiating off of him like a heat wave. I want to grab his face and kiss him until we’re both a puddle on the floor but we’re in the middle of campus and already starting to form a crowd based on the initial outburst.

“What were you doing when I ran into you, by the way?”

Alex runs his hand through his hair. “I was actually coming to look for you and see if you wanted to grab lunch before your next class.”

“I don’t think I could possibly eat anything right now. All this excitement has my stomach completely in knots.”

Alex laughs. “Would you rather go to the library and pour over the podcast website for a bit?”

“Yes, please.”

“Let’s go, sunshine,” he replies with a chuckle, grabbing the sleeve of my jacket and pulling me toward the library across the quad. How could he possibly be able to anticipate my every need before I even know I need it? If I’m not careful, I’m going to fall head over heels for this man.More than I likely already am?Yep. I’m in serious trouble.

Chapter Thirty-Five

Margot

“I’mpickingthistime,”Alex says, using the remote to scroll through the streaming apps that Danika downloaded onto our TV. It takes him about ten minutes to find something for us to watch and when he finally lands on one, I sigh loudly.

“Role Models? Again?”

“If you can watchPride and Prejudiceover and over, I can watchRole Modelsas much as I want,”Alex counters, pulling me into his side as the movie starts. I’ve seen this movie now more than a handful of times with him and while I do find it occasionally hilarious, it’s never my go-to movie night option.

Just as Seann William Scott pulls up in a giant medieval cow suit, Danika bursts from her room.

“The dicks are going to Vermont.”

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