The teenage orphan [Being edited]

21. Reunited

"Nolan?"

He looked at me oddly then realized. "Avalon, Avalon Briggs, it's really you?"

All the kids, Derek, and Zack looked at us. "Yeah, but can we get off the ground?" I asked him. "Oh yeah."

He got off of me and stuck his hand out. I grabbed it and he pulled me up. "I can't believe it's actually you." He said.

"Yeah, I know, this is weird. And I smell like fruit." I said laughing.

"I'll go get napkins." Jeremy said taking Thomas and Morgan with him. "At least it was your bathing suit and not an actual shirt." Nolan said.

"Yeah, haha. But seriously, this is like mind blowing. I can't believe you're actually here." I said.

"Well I could say the same to you, how come you're here? Like a vacation?" Nolan asked.

"Um, no actually, hey Nolan, why don't you come over and I'll speak with you at our house." I said. "Yours? You all? I never knew your parents adopted."

"Well, Nolan. It's not really like that." Mitch and Thomas came back with napkins. I cleaned myself up.

"Well yeah, let's head to your place now." He said. "Not to disrupt anything... But, are we all missing something here?" Derek asked.

"Oh right! Nolan, this is, Lily, Morgan, Jeremy, who's Morgan's, um, acquaintance? Logan, Mitch, Jack, Thomas, Eli, Derek, and Zack. Everyone this is Nolan." "But how do you guys know each other?" Morgan asked.

"Oh, this kid here, has been my best friend since we were like two freaking years old, and he moved away when we were like what? Ten? And left me with no one except for my family and the pet place I worked at. And we legit had no way to communicate because our parents were both antisocial parents. But yeah." I said.

"Let's all head home guys!" Everyone started to rush home, Zack and Derek just looked at Nolan and I.

I was walking with Nolan next to me. "Dude, I can't believe it's been like eight years." I said laughing.

"Yeah, you've grown up a lot." He said. "What does that mean?" I said smiling. "You've actually grown tits and an ass." He said laughing.

"Asshole." I said shoving him over. "I'm joking, Lony." He said smiling. "Oh my gosh, no one has called me Lony in such a long time." I said covering my face.

"Well yeah, because I was the only one who called you that." He said. "Oh yeah... Noly." I said smiling. "Dude I can't believe we , made matching nicknames, you can even tell how young we were when we were friends just from the names." He said laughing.

"We were so lame." I said laughing. "Well I could say one thing about you that hasn't changed." "And what's that?" I asked.

"You're personality, AND you're still lame." He said laughing. "WOW." I said laughing. He gave me this look.

"Dude why are you staring at me like you want to kill me?" I asked him. "Nah I'm not going to kill you, it's weird to see how much you've changed."

"Dude seriously, stop with my boobs." I said. "No I'm not talking about your tits, I'm talking about your face." He said.

I rolled my eyes. "Lony, by that I mean you've gotten more beautiful, I guess. I don't know how to put it in a non-weird way." He said laughing.

I smiled and said. "I know one thing that hasn't changed about you."

"And what's that?" He asked. "Your massive crush on me since we were eight." I said laughing. "Dude I did not like you." He said. "Those flowers and that huge stuffed animal tell me otherwise, you know I still have it, right?" I said smiling.

"And I still have that necklace with our names engraved on the back! I wore it on the night of my 18th birthday, and it's the only piece of jewelry I was able to sav-" I stopped in the middle of my sentence. "Never mind, but did you not notice me wearing it right now?" I said.

"Woah, I didn't notice that." He said smiling. "You know. It sucked how we couldn't stay connected." I said.

"I know right, it's so coincidental that you moved here and I live here. But I'm glad I could finally be reunited with you." He said swinging his arm around my shoulder.

A few more minutes left of talking and walking, we made it home.

"Damn, this is where you live?" He asked. "You haven't even seen my room." I rushed upstairs, threw my bag on my bed. "Damn, you're room's huge." "And look out the window. You could literally see the entire boardwalk." I said smiling.

"Sick." "Hey wanna go swim outside?"

He nodded and we went to the back yard. It was about 10:30, mostly everyone was asleep, and Nolan and I went into the hot tub. "Wait, so Lony. You live with all of them?" He asked. "What do your siblings and your parents think of that?"

I started to play music. "Nolan, it's more complicated than that." "Will you mind explaining?" He asked.

"So on my 18th birthday this year, my house went on fire. It killed both my parents and my siblings. The officers were only able to save some of my things. The officers couldn't find any orphanages to take an 18 year old in, in New York. So I had to fly here. Derek's mom took me in." I said.

Tears started to slowly run down my face and I whipped them away. Nolan scooted next to me and he hugged me. "And I was stupid enough to never shut up about your family. You know I'm always here for you, now that you live only a few minutes away." He pulled out if the hug and whipped my tears.

"It feels good to have you back, it feels like a sense, of home." I said while wrapping my arms around his waist. "You too Lony." He said while wrapping his arms around my neck.