To Have Loved [BxB] Book I ✓

Chapter 46

a/n: Guess who's back from the void? Well, actually I wasn't in the void, I've just been super busy. I have a job and I'm doing school full time this semester, and then on top of all that I decided to get into a relationship, and he's great, I'm super into him, but there has been very little time for anything besides life. I just felt like you guys deserved some sort of explanation. I'll also probably add a song later, I couldn't find one tonight but I wanted to put this out. Anyways, I hope everyone's doing well and I hope you guys all enjoy the chapter! 

The last three days of the trip were spent in Plymouth, Massachusetts, and after all of the walking tours, stops at historical buildings, and nonstop lessons, everyone was exhausted.

On the last night of the trip, they were all given an opportunity to spend their time however they'd like for a few hours. Kayden, Elias, Grant, and Ezra were currently hanging out together in the hotel hot tub. Most of the others had already gone off to bed, including Brooks and Theo who both turned in early.

"I can't believe next year is our last year of high school," Kayden said. He thought about it a lot, but in some sense, it still didn't feel real. Maybe high school was the kind of thing that existed as its own sort of dimension. You couldn't imagine being outside of it until you were. It seemed so odd to think that it would all just end and he would go on to the next thing, a different phase of life.

"Well, I can't wait to get out of here," Ezra said. "In a year, we'll be going to Yale. Do you think they'll let us be roommates there too?" He asked with a glance at Grant.

"If we're not, we still won't be more than a short walk away from each other," Grant said with a small smile.

Kayden looked at Elias before his eyes fell to the water. A short walk away from each other. He tried so hard not to be bitter about the ease with which Ezra and Grant would stay in each other's lives after graduation. He didn't want to think about what would happen to him and Elias. He thought maybe he could convince Elias to go to Yale, or find a way to go to Cambridge, but considering Elias' family legacy, and his own mother's unwillingness to pay for anything she didn't choose, he wondered if he'd ever see Elias again after high school.

For so long, he'd looked forward to his senior year in all of its glory of privileges and bragging rights as well as just being able to be done with high school. It signaled the end of childhood, the beginning of a new chapter, and bursting forth into the real world. Now all of that seemed less exciting and more...scary. He didn't know that he wanted to be a part of the real world, not yet anyway. It seemed like such a shame, just as he was beginning to enjoy school, it was almost over. He felt like a lot of things went like that, though. There were things he wanted in life, and goals he wished to achieve, but he never did anything about it until it was too late, and he never appreciated anything until it was nearly gone.

"It looks like a nice night out there," Elias commented distantly, glancing out the large glass windows that covered the walls of the pool area.

"Astor, It's thirty fucking degrees, don't tell me you're considering going out," Grant murmured.

"I could do with a smoke," Elias said with a shrug, standing and running his fingers through his hair before he left the hot tub.

"Yeah, me too," Kayden said after a moment of consideration, hoisting himself backward out of the hot tub before he got up to grab his shirt.

"Addicts," Grant chuckled, glancing at Ezra. "You ready to head up?"

Ezra smiled with a nod. "Yeah, I'm tired anyway. It's been a long weekend."

Kayden glanced from the two boys walking out the door to Elias who was now wearing a shirt that clung to his still-damp skin as he searched around the chair he'd left his things on.