How To Stay Afloat (BxB)

Chapter 181: A few years later

Surprise.

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It's been three and a half years since I finished highschool. A lot changed. For example no one tried to commit suicide or murder someone. No one overdosed. The good kind of change.

Some things stayed the same. I still kinda don't feel like an adult if I'm being honest.

I remember when I was seventeen, eighteen and looked at other people that were twenty-two and thought they were mature. Well, except for people like Dylan. He seemed mature when I first met him, but he kinda then started behaving childishly.

That being said, I'm also still very childish and a good amount of time I still feel kinda lost and not sure what my purpose in life or what my goals are. I blinked when school was over and now I'm here.

I finished my bachelor's a few months ago and started my master’s degree. That's one thing I'm sure about, deciding to start studying software development was a good idea. I'm now doing my master in game design and I'm working ten hours a week at some indie game startup and couldn't be happier about that. But I'm honestly a tiny bit burned out and have been slacking off at uni a bit.

I'm still in therapy. Well, I stopped at some point, but then Austin convinced me to start again in a tearfilled conversation a year ago. Still good old Alan.

I still sometimes struggle with the things that happened with Noah. Yes, it's been years and I should be over it by now, but I'm really not. Well, I am over everything like ninety percent of the time, but then suddenly I'm not.

Christmas time kinda triggers me everytime because it just reminds me of what happened back then with Noah. Obviously the other things he did were as bad, but what happened there in my own home at christmas fucked me up a thousand times more than all the crazy stuff he did afterwards. Like, shouldn't the almost being killed part be much worse than a little rape? Alan's voice in my head right now is scolding me for judging my own feelings.

It's okay to still not feel alright.

That being said, Austin and I both avoid christmas decorations and traditions and basically ignore the whole thing. Well, we do celebrate with our families, but that's about it.

Speaking of Austin. He's been doing great. Honestly, he's just perfect. Well, still kinda depressed and hella depressed for like a week or two at a time. But he's handling it well.

Austin did pass his math finals, not in september like planned, but then in october. He worked at some nursing home for nine months instead of military service and he loved it. No idea how that can be a nice job, but somehow he smiled every time he came home from his work. I think he just really likes helping people.

But then he decided not to follow this path because he'd need to study and the pay would be shit. So now he works as a tattoo apprentice at a really cool studio. He's incredibly talented and I'm in awe whenever he shows me his work.

We got a couple's tattoo a few months ago. It's one of my two small tattoos. One for Austin and the other one I have is for Jared. Because- well, just because I wanted a reminder of our friendship.

Austin on the other hand has a whole collection now. Since he hardly pays for it he got one after the other, also tattooing himself quite a lot. It's like an addiction. Every other week he comes home with a new tattoo somewhere. If there's no customers at the shop because someone canceled last minute or was done earlier, the people working there tattoo each other. That happens a good amount of time.

Now that I mentioned addiction, I could talk about my own demon. Well, it's been okay. I haven't done hard drugs since back then at school. I did occasionally do a bit of speed or mdma while I was out because I really like clubbing, but I always feel overwhelmed and drugs really do help me relax. But it never escalated like it did back then. I did it for the right reasons, for fun. I waited long enough until I knew I had my tendencies under control.