"Autumn!" My 7 year old sister yelled out, gripping onto my waist with both arms. Out of all of my family, I did have to admit that I did miss her the most.

"Well it's nice to see you too." I giggled. I wrapped my arms around her shoulders and pulled her to me tighter.

Effy greeted me in the driveway, her seeing that I pulled up and got out of the car. I ran to her before even getting any of my things. She tugged my arm seeing that she wanted to walk me inside. I looked over my shoulder to see Luke digging through his trunk for my suitcase. I gave him a sheepish look and pointed to Effy, trying hard to resist her pull. He gave me a gentle smile waving me on and telling me he had it. Just as I stopped pulling back on her, she dragged me to my door.

"Why is Luke here?" Effy asked, a slight lisp from her two front teeth missing. Luke had been here since the actual day she was born, so he was practically a brother to her.

"He drove me here." I told her, swinging our hands as we walked up the steps.

"Why didn't Ellis drive you here?" She asked, looking up at me once we got to the top. I took a sharp breath and crouched down to where we were face to face.

"Ellis isn't going to be here anymore." I replied, scrunching my nose up at her.

"Why?" Her voice became higher pitched from her curiosity and tilted her at me.

"Because we aren't boyfriend and girlfriend anymore." I explained. It was hard to tell your little sister that my boyfriend cheated on me and is a prick in the nicest way possible.

"Oh." She plainly said, looking down at her feet. "Well is Luke your new boyfriend then?" She chirped, flashing a toothless grin at me, literally. I shook my head at her question as I glanced down to the ground for a moment.

"No." I chuckled, giving her a half smile. "But I do have a little crush on him." I confessed as I began to stand up. Just as I stood up all the way, I felt Luke brush my shoulder, now standing in between Effy and I with a suitcase in hand.

"Who has a crush on who?" He asked her, butting in on our conversation.

"Autumn has a crush on you." She told him. I mentally kicked myself for spilling my secret to a 7 year old, especially one that couldn't actually keep a secret.

"Oh?" Luke replied, turning to me with a raised eyebrow. I glanced over to him, meeting his eyes, then glaring down at Effy.

"No I don't." I quickly said.

"You just told me!" She exclaimed, throwing her arms in the air.

"No I didn't!" I lied, my cheeks turning a light pink. "We were talking about how you had a crush on a boy in your class." Luckily for me, I was able to get out of situations like this since I was the big sister and in my mind everything I said was right.

"Ew!" She yelled before running back into the house. I turned back to Luke who was biting his lip to keep his smile from growing. I rolled my eyes at him, struggling to keep back my smile also.

"Get off your high horse." I said to him as I grabbed my suitcase out of his hand. I walked to the door, stopping once I took a step inside. I turned around and saw Luke standing in the same place with the same goofy smile. "Are you going to come inside?" I chuckled. He nodded his head quickly then followed behind me and into my living room where all of my family was sitting.

All at once they had gotten up and crowed around me, giving me hugs and saying how happy they were that I was home early. After me they then went onto Luke, giving him just about the same greeting. Luke had practically been part of the family already, he'd grown up with us all.

It was both of my parents, my older siblings, April and Travis, and then Effy. I was actually surprised to see Travis here since usually he spent his time off with his girlfriend. Just as I began to get curious about where she was, she walked around the corner giving me a small wave which I returned with a gentle smile.

The slight insanity died down and they all began making small talk with one another, mostly Luke though who I felt slightly bad for since he was being bombarded with questions. Luckily, April had pulled me aside and into our dining room that still needed to be set up fro Thanksgiving in a couple days.

"Mom told me about you and Ellis." She looked around, double checking to make sure no one was listening in. I sighed in frustration. I wasn't exactly fond of my mom running around and telling my family members about my breakup.

"Okay?" I said as I shrugged my shoulders.

"Well what happened?" She asked as if it was required that I should've told her.

"It just didn't work out." I stumbled over my words, being as vague as possible. She inhaled deeply then grabbed my shoulders.

"What really happened?" She questioned. She looked right into my eyes as I did to her and I gave in instantly. I cleared my throat, looking away from her and I nearly felt ashamed to tell her what really happened.

"He cheated on me." I choked out. I bit at the inside of my cheek as I kept staring the the ground.

"Hey." She softly said, catching my attention and picking my head back up. "It was his loss. And if it makes you feel better, I like you and Luke together a lot better."

"We aren't together." I replied, a hint of annoyance in my voice from the constant assumption that we were.

"'We aren't together' my ass. I've seen the way he is around you and I've seen it for the past couple of years. He looks at you the way dad looks at mom." She glanced over to the side, making sure for a second time that no one was eavesdropping.

"That is so cliche." I scoffed. "No he doesn't." I shook my head at her, not accepting her idea.

"And I noticed it in you today." She added. I furrowed my eyebrows at her as I wasn't picking up what she meant.

"Noticed what in me?" I asked, looking her up and down with the same expression.

"He's in love with you, Autumn." She easily said. I was taken back from her bluntness, not really letting her words sink in. "Everyone sees it, that's why we all bug you about it." She informed me. It did make a lot of sense, the bugging me part. But I just don't see how it could all of a sudden be now that he would change how he felt about me.

"That's ridiculous." I laughed, shaking my head.

"Agree with me on these things then." She held up a finger to which I raised an eyebrow to since I had to go along with her games. "He's not an dick, in fact he treats you better than anyone." I nodded, agreeing with her. "He's smart." I nodded once again. "He's got nice hair, well really a nice face." I cringed slightly from my sister calling him good looking in the way she just did, but I still nodded in agreement. "He's funny." She added now holding up 4 fingers.

"Eh." I slightly disagreed more as a joke than anything, but in reality he made me laugh harder than anyone else could.

"What are you holding back from then?" Her voice seemed so amazed as to how I hadn't picked up on all of this before. I wasn't saying that I knew Luke was in love with me, because I didn't believe he loved me at all, but it really did open my eyes as to what he handed to me on a silver platter. I stared back up at April, shrugging my shoulders lightly.

"I don't know, but I don't want to hold back anymore."

-

"Going so soon?" I said as Luke walked passed me. I had been sitting on my porch for about half an hour in the uncomfortable chairs that I'd actually missed more than I realized.

"There you are." He breathed out, seeming that he was happy to see me from the smile he had on his face. I glanced over to see him joining me in the chair beside me. I looked out ahead, seeing the sun setting already. We'd only been home for 6 hours and nothing, not even Manhattan, felt as crazy as my home did.

"It's nice not to have all of the cars and lights and people, you know?" I asked. I asked Luke a lot of rhetorical questions and he usually felt the need to actually answer them, but not this time. I gazed over at him to find him staring out at the sunset just as I was.

It didn't take much time to realize, but for a mere seconds it hit me that this is now my life. Luke and I are grown up and we're starting our real lives. We don't live at home anymore and we have a jobs, maybe not full time and real hard working jobs, but soon that's how it'll be. It was crazy how fast time seemed to go by.

"Hey Luke?" I spoke softly. He turned his head to me and focused his attention on me. "What are we supposed to do after college?" I let my chin rest in my hand, looking up at him through my eyelashes.

"Can I tell you what you're technically supposed to do or what I want to happen after college?" He questioned back, giving my a lazy smile.

"What you want." I said as I now took an interest in what Luke wanted for his future.

"Well, I actually want to not think about that." He chuckled, looking back ahead of him. "I just want take things as they are now. I can worry about later in a couple years." He answered. I sat back up in my chair and kicked my feet up on the short railing we had. "What about you?" He asked.

"I don't know." I sighed. "I want a lot of things for my future. Nothing big and extraordinary though." I explained. He stood up from his chair, catching my eye.

"I know what you mean." He stated. He held out his hand as he usually did to get me come with him. I grabbed it without hesitation and followed him as he walked to his car. He laced our fingers together as we lightly swung our hands back and forth.

He led me to the driver's side as he began digging in his pocket with his free hand for his keys. He dropped my hand shortly after and searched for them in his other pocket which he successfully found.

I was now resting against his door while I sat on my hands as swaying gently side to side. He stepped closer to me, leaving a few inches between our bodies. I caught his eye and I began to feel my heart speed up as he reached over to the side, sticking the key in his door and unlocking it. I swallowed down the butterflies in my stomach as he stood up straight once again.

He flicked between my eyes and my lips then wrapped his arm around my waist and removed the remaining space between us, resting his hand on the small of my back. My hands went from behind me to the top of his shoulders from the sudden closure of space and I could feel my cheeks flushing. The side of his mouth tugged into a smile for a second then released back to the flat line they were in before.

He leaned into me, something I hadn't experienced from the first time we kissed since he took me by surprise. His lips pressed against mine softly and my arms moved around his neck, pulling him closer to me as he began to kiss me a little harder than before. I couldn't help but smile during it, which I felt him do the same back. I took the opportunity and pulled back from him just enough to get a few words out.

"Your family is probably waiting." I said in a hushed tone. He brought his forehead down to mine and put his other hand that wasn't around my waist on his car.

"I think they can wait a little longer." He mumbled, showing off a smirk. He kissed me once again, just as he had before, yet he pulled back this time since it was beginning to get deeper than he had initiated it.

He took his hand off his car and I dropped my arms from around his neck, finding his hand that slipped from my waist and interlocking our fingers. I sighed deeply, looking down at our hands.

"I'll see you Wednesday night." He told me, referring to our nights we shared before Thanksgiving. For the past 5 years, we've taken turns staying the night at each other's houses. This year he came over to mine and there was no doubt about seeing him that day.

"Wednesday night." I repeated. He let go of my hand and opened his door, finally sitting inside. I took a step back from it as he started it up. He looked at me through his window, giving me a light smile, but even from here I could tell how bright his eyes had been. I gave him a small wave and watched as he pulled out, leaving me standing by myself in my driveway.

I looked down at the ground, smiling like an idiot to myself. I brought a finger up to my lips, running over them softly as I couldn't shake off the feeling of Luke's lips on mine.

I don't exactly know what Luke wanted after college, but I do know what I wanted. And what I wanted was Luke. I'd been blinded by the title of 'best friend' that I failed to see what I was missing out on. And perhaps I never fell in love with Ellis because I had fallen in love with Luke.