Follow lifelong best friends Rae, Joel, Mackie, Aaron, Sarah, and Miles as they navigate their late high school and college years, growing together and separately, standing together through the good and the bad, and navigating love and heartbreak.
The series begins with Rae and Aaron’s epic will-they-or-won’t-they best friends to lovers romance.
Friends Like This
I’m not sure it’s a good idea to fall for your best friend.
No one told me that junior year is when everything would get complicated. At the heart of the complexities? My best friend, Aaron freaking Cooper—more specifically, my relationship with him. Whether I should have a relationship with him that’s more than friendship. Whether I already do.
Everyone else in our lives seems to think there’s something between Aaron and me—that we’re denying it and lying to ourselves—even my boyfriend and his girlfriend.
No matter what we tell them or our friends, it doesn’t change what they see.
But as the lines start to blur between friendship and more, I find myself thinking that everyone else might be right.
Then again, maybe it doesn’t matter. Because I’m not sure it’s a good idea to fall for your best friend. But I’m not sure it’s a choice, either. Which leaves me wondering if Aaron and I have ever been just friends, or if we’ve always been something more. And if we are, is it finally time to risk everything and do something about it?
I have no idea.
And that’s the problem.
Falling Like This
I’m in love with my best friend. And I think he’s in love with me.
It’s been a week since I kissed Rae after the State Championship game. And we haven’t said a word about it.
Tonight is the first big party of the summer, and I’m going to steal her away, kiss the hell out of her, make her mine.
At least that’s the plan. Until everything comes crashing down.
What happens at the party changes everything for both of us.
Now I’m broken physically, and Rae is broken emotionally. She’s hiding behind fake smiles and the walls she’s so good at putting up—walls I’m determined to tear down. But she makes it clear that won’t be easy.
After a summer from hell, the school year begins with everything up in the air. When we’re forced to face our feelings for each other, will we finally give in? Is she ready for this? Can we find our way to each other after everything that’s happened? Or will we fall apart before we even get started?
Broken Like This
After all of this I still want him. And I hate us both for that.
I promised her forever.
But I’m not sure I can keep that promise. At least, not the way I’m supposed to.
I’ll always want forever with her, but not like this.
I’m broken. Falling apart. And I’m taking it all out on her.
I’m too much of a mess for this, and she deserves more than that. More than the way I’ve been. More than me.
I don’t want to do this without her, but I don’t know how to do it with her. There’s so much I have to figure out about myself and my future, and I have to do that on my own.
I have to let her go.
She might hate me, but it’s best for both of us.
I just have to hope by the time I figure things out and am ready for us again, she’ll still want me—want us.
I have to trust that she won’t give up on us, and we can still have the forever we were always meant to have.
Love Like This
“You better mean it.”
“Oh, I do.”
Finally.
We had feelings for each other and denied it. We fell for each other and we messed it up.
We’ve grown and changed, but through it all—even the hardest moments—we never gave up on each other. We never gave up on us.
Now I know we never will.
After everything, we have our chance to get it right.
I have no doubt it will be hard. It’ll push our limits and test our love. We both have plenty more learning and growing to do.
But this time, we’re in it together, and no matter what, we’re going to keep building our life together, stronger every day.
This is just the beginning, and I love knowing that wherever the road leads us, his hand will be wrapped around mine for the entire journey.
Because it’s always been us, and it always will be.
Married Like This
A Friends Like This Bonus Novella
I’m in this with you, Ace.
Forever.
“I’m gonna marry you someday.”
It’s been eleven years since he carved our initials under the slide and said those words. Since then we’ve walked through all the ups and downs of our lives together—even when we weren’t a couple. Through the hardest moments, we made it. Sometimes we were battered and bruised, but we did it.
All that was just the beginning.
We’re about to start our life together as husband and wife, and I can’t wait to see what twists and turns come next on the roller coaster of our lives. As long as I’ve got his hand in mine, I know we can make it through together.
Rae Cooper sounds like a good name. I could picture myself being Rae Cooper one day.One day is now. And I can’t wait to marry the love of my life.
Together Like This
You’re what I want.
The only thing I don’t have.
Bethany Monaco Smith 