✸ ANYONE ELSE
chapter eighteen ━━ the last dinner

JULIE ALWAYS FELT ambivalent at the end of the summer. She absolutely adored spending time in the beach house, but at the same time, she also looked forward to starting school again.

Not this year, though.

She didn't want to move on with her life after this summer. She wanted it to last forever. She wanted to freeze time.

Laurel, Isabel and Steven were leaving later that day and her family were leaving the day after.

She didn't want them to leave. She didn't want to go home and actually deal with this.

Everything was so easy to ignore in the summer. You can just pretend that all your problems don't exist. You can pretend your life is perfect.

When you then come home and you are faced with reality once again, everything comes crashing down upon you.

That was her least favourite part of the summer.

"Are you done packing?" Jeremiah opened the door to her room and peaked inside.

"Uh," She smiled innocently at him. "No?"

He laughed, and stepped into her room. "Need help?"

"Thank you," She smiled thankfully, and he grinned at her.

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THE LAST DINNER before they all went home was always weird.

They knew it was going to be a long time until they were seeing each other again, but still, they tried to keep up the good mood. The last dinner needed to be just as good as all the other ones.

Julie was sat between Steven and Jeremiah like usual, and Steven was holding her hand under the table.

They weren't hiding anything, as their family probably already had caught up with their antics, but it was still weird for them to be together in front the rest of their family's.

"Are you looking forward to starting school again?" Laurel smiled at the teens as she took another bite of food.

"Not really," Steven laughed. "I don't really have high expectations for college."

Conrad quickly agreed with him, and Jeremiah chimed in, saying he couldn't wait to finish senior year, but the two girls disagreed.

"I'm really excited for this year," Belly smiled widely. "Junior year is gonna be amazing."

Julie agreed, telling her to look forward to it.

"I'm just gonna enjoy my last time in high school." She leaned slightly back in her chair,. "I'm actually pretty excited,"

The boys sent them doubting looks, but the mothers smiled softly at the two girls.

"We're really gonna miss you," Susannah voiced all of their thoughts as she took Laurel's hand into her own, giving it a soft squeeze.

The rest of them nodded slightly in agreement and Laurel smiled sadly.

"We can meet up over the winter," she looked around at them. "It doesn't have to be goodbye until next summer."

"It's still gonna be weird not seeing you guys everyday." Steven squeezed Julie's hand under the table and caught Conrad's eyes from across the table. He smiled softly at the two, and the younger boy smiled back.

"It's not goodbye forever. Just for a long time."

✸ edited ✸