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A photo of the confetti falling at the Heated Rivalrave in Boston I talk about in my article \"The Need For Sunshine\"
A photo of the confetti falling at the Heated Rivalrave in Boston I talk about in my article \"The Need For Sunshine\"
Original photo by Neena DiIorio
U Mass Boston | Life

The Need For Sunshine

Neena DiIorio Student Contributor, University of Massachusetts - Boston
This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at U Mass Boston chapter and does not reflect the views of Her Campus.

There are cheers and tears all around as “I’ll Believe in Anything” by Wolf Parade blasts over the speakers and confetti falls over the crowd. I look next to me at my best friend with the biggest smile on my face. 

We had met the summer prior at our teaching fellowship, but she went back to her university in New York, and I started my semester up in Boston. We lost touch. We ended up reconnecting over winter break when our semesters died down for both of us and, coincidentally, the final episodes of Heated Rivalry were airing. I convinced her to watch, and we both quickly fell in love with the charming nature of this love story. Whether it was the dynamic of Connor Storrie and Hudson Williams in interviews or small character details that were pointed out by the masses on TikTok, this show struck something inside both of us. 

We both had difficult Fall semesters and found comfort in our mutual love for this cast and show. We would talk constantly about what happened to make our semesters so difficult and how much easier it was when she was in Boston for our fellowship. We would joke about her coming back up to Boston to visit, to recreate the club scene from Episode 4, and to go to a Heated Rivalry themed dance party happening in a few weeks. Then, my phone lit up with a notification: “are you serious about wanting me to come up to Boston?” and I got screenshots of our tickets to the dance party. Three weeks later, she is getting dropped off at my door with her bags to stay with me for the weekend, yelling, “I’m at the cottage!”

Leading up to the Heated Rivalrave, we revisited places from the summer and saw our friends from our fellowship who were in the city. We flashed back to our summer and relived the joys of it while looking forward to making new memories. Between the waffles from our brunch with friends to the cutting of shirts for our arts and crafts project for the dance party, we unlocked that sunshine we lost when the summer came to an end. We felt that same giddiness that we did when we would pull into the parking lot of our fellowship, ready for the day with our students. It healed us and brought back the sunshine.

The dance party was more than the blasting music, neon lights, and edits on the screen. It was a moment of pure joy for the two of us. This small weekend turned out to be a moment of belonging, knowing we could be the crazy fangirls we are at heart without feeling like we’re being judged. Most importantly, it reminded me that there is still a pocket of joy in our lives, no matter how hard our lives may get. We deserve sunshine no matter how dark it may seem.

Neena DiIorio

U Mass Boston '26

Neena DiIorio is a writer at the Her Campus UMass Boston Chapter. She is a fourth year undergraduate at the University of Massachusetts - Boston, with an English major and concentration in English Education and a Classics minor. Neena is also a part of the Accelerated Master’s program at UMass Boston, obtaining a Master’s in Secondary Education.

She currently works at the UMass Boston Writing Center as a writing consultant and the UMass Boston Tanimoto Math Tutoring Center as a math tutor and in-class facilitator.

In her free time, Neena loves to sit by the water and get lost in a book, especially fantasy and realistic fiction books. Her current favorite authors are Ali Hazelwood, Sarah J. Maas, and Bonnie Garmus. She is an avid adventurer and likes to explore the different places throughout Boston.