𝐎𝐧𝐞 𝐒𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐥𝐞 𝐓𝐡𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝 𝐎𝐟 𝐆𝐨𝐥𝐝 // (𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐫𝐚𝐝 𝐱 𝐑𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫)

Part 46

I spray Conrad in the face to wake him up, and he does.

I then go and spray Jere, but he doesn't.

"Jere could sleep through a tidal wave."

I chuckle and open the lid to poor the whole bottle on him.

He groans and looks up at me.

"Good morning, Eminem."

"It's almost five, I let you sleep longer, get up."

"Okay." He smiles.

The boys both follow me to the kitchen.

Jeremiah wraps his arms round me as we walk through, so I grab them and hoist him off of me.

"Mickey D's cheeseburgers?" He tries to grab one and I slap his hand.

"These are a crucial part of the reward system."

"How come Steven gets one?"

"Here's how it works, Conrad studies, he gets a burger."

"What about me?"

"Conrad studies, you get a burger."

He moans and sits down on a bean bag.

"A reward system, huh? What else do I get." Conrad slowly walks towards me.

"What else do you want?" I smirk. "Right, let's get to it, I have a practice test."
I hand it to him.

"Thank you, seriously, thank you."

He finishes the test after 20 minutes and sits back down.

"Okay, this one's easy, even I know this, where is the Golgi apparatus located?"

"Near the nucleus." We say in unison.

"Of course she knows that, she's smart as hell, and does a biology degree."

"Actually, she's in English literature." Conrad tells Jere.

I nod and throw two burgers over, Jeremiah drops his, Conrad does a perfect catch.

A few hours later I make Conrad and Jere do push ups.

"Why do I have to do this." Jeremiah asks.

"It's to boost your energy."

Jeremiah gives up after 20, Conrad makes it to 35.

We go back and forth between studying, eating and relaxing.

At 12am, everyone gets sleepy, so I play something to wake them all up.

I connect my speaker to my phone and blast 'Last Nite' By the Strokes.

"My Mom loved this song." Conrad's face lights up.

"Duh! Come on." I grab his hands and pull him up.

"Where?" He giggles.

"Dance breaks are essential for all-nighters."

"I don't dance."

"I don't care."

I start dancing around, and Steven and Jere join in, and it takes a minute, but Con starts too.

We all skip around and jump and sing, and Con and I link arms, going round in circles together.

After a few more hours, everyone goes to sleep, except me.

I check the time to see that it's 2:45, so I make my way outside, and see Conrad lying on a lounge chair.

I lay down next to him and take a deep breath in.

"Are you think about tomorrow."

"Yeah," He pauses. "Venus is still and even star."

That sentence shoots a small pain through my chest.

"It gives me, some kind of hope or something."

"You should feel optimistic."

"It's just hard knowing how much I fucked up. What if, they kick me out of Brown and they don't want me at Stanford."

"Then you'll figure it out, you always do, just in that scenario you wouldn't be doing it alone, like you always do." I laugh, slightly.

"Yeah."

"If you're lucky enough to get another chance, you will do everything you can not to fuck it up again."

We both know that I'm not speaking about Brown.

There is a moment of silence.

"Con, I need to tell you something, I, I really..." I look over to him to find him fast asleep, so I shut my eyes and fall asleep too.

~~

I head inside when I wake up, with a blanket over me and a pillow under my head, we all get changed and clear up the house one last time.

"You ready to go?" Jeremiah asks me.

"Nearly, we have one more thing left though."

Everyone makes their way to the little dock, for our family photo.

"Say cheese." My Mother yells.

"Cheese!" We all say back.

At the last second I look up, at the boy above me, and smile wider than I did before.

When it's done, we start walking to the cars.

I walk with my Mom, and when we get to the front yard, she hands me some coffees.

"I thought you guys could use some caffeine for your trip to Brown."

"Are you serious? I can go with them?"

"Of course, you should finish what you started, just...make the right choice."

"What do you mean?"

"You know what I mean, y/n." She smiles and hugs me. "I'll see you soon."

I run over to the boys and tell them that I'm coming with them, and Conrad says bye to my Mom,

Steven then has a talk with me.

"You did good, you don't give me many opportunities to say it so," We laugh. "Just trust your gut, is all I'm saying."

"Okay, thanks."

We all stand in a small circle.

"You know, since Belly's gone home, and y/n usually doesn't have to endure it."

"No, no!" I yell.

Steven and Jere grab my legs, and Conrad gets my arms, and they run to the pool.

"One," Steven starts.

"Two," Jeremiah shouts.

"Three!" Conrad yells as they throw me into the pool, everyone jumping in straight after me.

We play around in the pool for a while, enjoying these last moments of the beach house, it's different without Susannah, but it's still home.

Everyone makes their way to the cars and we wave goodbye to Steven and my Mom.

I hop in the front seat, Jeremiah goes into the front seat, and Con goes in the back.

The future is unclear, but it's still mine.

'I wouldn't know, what to do without you.'