Team NYU? Cute… They All Secretly Joined Team Delilah Chapter 05

Team NYU? Cute… They All Secretly Joined Team Delilah Chapter 05

My red eye flight landed at LAX just after dawn.

I dragged my suitcase out of the terminal as the damp morning air hit my face, unfamiliar but

peaceful.

No one came to pick me up.

No one even knew I had come here.

But standing in the middle of the crowd, I realized for the first time that I could walk my own path

by myself.

My roommates had arrived before me.

A short haired girl was hanging a curtain beside her bed when I walked in, and she immediately put

it down.

“You must be Jade Schmidt. I’m Evelyn Woods. Come in. I saved the bed by the window for you.”

Another girl poked her head out.

“Have you eaten breakfast? We bought soup dumplings and have an extra order.”

Warmth seeped through the paper bag into my palm.

I lowered my head and took a bite, and the hot broth nearly scalded my tongue.

At that moment, Los Angeles suddenly felt like a good place to be.

After finishing my registration, I went to the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Mom had brought me there many years ago.

She had stroked my hair and said, “Jade, someday you should live in a city you truly love. Don’t trap yourself somewhere just because you can’t bear to leave someone behind.”

I had once genuinely wanted to study in Los Angeles.

But later, Andrew said siblings should not live too far apart.

Nicolas said NYU was perfect and promised he would be there with me.

Sue said Team NYU could not lose a single member.

So I removed Los Angeles from my college list again and again.

Until the final minute, when I put it back.

For the first time, I chose myself again.

I placed the empty jewelry box at the very bottom of my suitcase.

Mom’s necklace was no longer inside it.

But someday, I would get it back.

Back in New York, Andrew and the others returned from Utah three days later.

That night, I was organizing my class schedule in the dorm when my spare phone suddenly

vibrated.

An unfamiliar number was calling.

I did not answer.

A message appeared soon after.

“Jade, where are you?”

It was Andrew.

I turned the phone facedown on my desk.

Evelyn noticed my expression and asked softly, “Everything okay?”

I shook my head.

“I’m fine.”.

But messages kept appearing one after another.

Why did you leave the group chats?

Why can’t I get through to your phone?

Did you go home?

Jade Schmidt, stop making a fuss.

I stared at that last message and suddenly laughed.

They had finally noticed.

But it was too late.

Back at our apartment in New York, Andrew stood in the doorway of my room, still holding the

souvenirs he had brought back from Utah.

Half the room looked empty.

The clothes I usually wore were gone from the closet, the framed photos on my desk had been, turned facedown, and my college documents had disappeared from the drawers.

Sue’s voice trembled.

“She didn’t really leave for good, did she?”

Nicolas immediately called me.

The call still would not go through.

Andrew found our school counselor’s number and called, his voice trembling as he spoke.

A few minutes later, he hung up.

The room became frighteningly quiet.

Nicolas asked, “What did she say?”

Andrew gripped his phone so tightly that his knuckles turned white.

“Jade already checked in at UCLA.”

Sue froze.”

“That’s impossible… I thought she applied to NYU.”

Andrew suddenly remembered the question I had asked on the day applications closed.

NYU or Columbia?

At the time, I had only smiled and said nothing.

It turned out I had already given them up from that very moment.