One Last Summer (Dylan O'Brien Fanfic)

21st June, 2014

It was the day before Alex’s funeral and Dylan was nowhere close to being mentally and emotionally ready to say goodbye to the best thing that happened to him. He was supposed to be finished writing the speech for the funeral two days ago and he still hadn’t started anything yet because he still refused to believe she was really gone. It was almost a week since the accident and he was still trying to comprehend what really happened that afternoon they were on their way back to the cabin. It was all still a blur to him and it all happened so fast; one minute he was thinking about how perfect she looked with his sweater on and her hair falling in semi wet curls on her shoulders and the next he was waking up in a hospital room and his father was looking at him with the most pitiful look he’d ever seen on another human being.

He had a week to continue to beat himself up about how he treated Alex for the latter part of their senior year. Since they became friends they had been planning for their senior year. They were both planning on making it the best year ever and somewhere along the way, it just got messed up because Dylan lost sight of what was so important. He was an outcast for so long that when he finally got the slightest bit of attention; he was willing to do anything to keep that attention, even if it meant betraying and ignore the single most important person on his life. Looking back at it now Dylan hated himself for what he did to Alex and the only thing that gave him some sort of peace of mind was the fact that he was finally able to apologize and at least she died knowing the the truth; he was in love with her.

He was sitting at his desk with a blank page in front of him. He was surrounded by crumpled paper signifying all his failed attempts in getting his emotions from inside him, onto the paper. Nothing he wrote seemed good enough. Nothing he wrote seemed decent enough. Nothing he wrote seemed appropriate for a funeral. He didn’t think anyone even deserved to know how he really felt about Alex because they were his feelings and they were all he really had left of Alex.

Twelve years worth of feelings and memories that Dylan was not ready to let go of. He felt if he wrote that ‘speech’; the memories of Alex and all he felt for her would inevitably come out and that was the last thing he wanted to happen. He wanted to hold on to every single bit of her left and he did not want to share with anyone what only he and Alexis shared. Dylan knew that there would be people at her funeral that probably didn’t know her name till she died. He knew that people from their school would be there. The very same people that used to shun them and make fun of them for the majority of their school life. The very same people who encouraged him to ignore her for the last part of senior year, the very same people who couldn’t care less about her when she was alive. They would all be there and they all would be crying like if they even gave a shit about Alex when she was alive; like if they even cared about the fact that she was obsessed with the weirdest things, like if they cared that she only wore one pair of converse because she was worried her other pairs would get too worn, like they cared that she always put herself first.

None of them cared when she was alive; they had eighteen years to show her they cared and Dylan was pissed at the thought of them feeling like they had the right to mourn the girl they didn’t even know. The memories were his and no one was allowed any of it because no one deserved it. Call him selfish but that was the way he was feeling and he knew he deserved every bit of her he could hold onto.

It was 11:37 PM and he was still sitting at his desk staring at the blank page trying to decide what he wanted to say about the girl who basically saved his life. What was there to say to the girl who was singlehandedly the only reason he wasn’t a loner or a social outcast? What could he say about the girl who still managed to fall in love with him even though she was probably the only one who actually knew how much of a miserable asshole he could be when things didn’t go his way. She was the one who knew how moody, weird and passionate he could get and she still found a way to love him because of all his quirks. What could you say to or about the person who did that? How could you even say goodbye to that person?