Congratulations, Laurence Beveridge

III

At the end of the school day, Laurence and Drew met up at the gates as usual and began their walk back to their home, sharing Drew's earphones, listening to none other than Weezer because 'it was Drew's earphones they were sharing, therefore Drew got to choose the songs they listen to'.

The two talked about nothing that important on their twenty minute walk until they were almost home, and then the subject Drew had recently wanted to avoid had somehow come up; "Me and Barrone? What do you mean, man?"

"Dude." Laurence raised his voice in exasperation as he looked at Drew's somehow clueless expression, "Seriously? I've seen the way you look at him; there's got to be something going on, surely." Laurence actually sounded surprised which made Drew wonder more about this subject, the only subject on his mind recently.

Drew didn't say anything for the rest of the walk, silently telling his taller friend that there was something more to this matter, and the fact that Drew didn't talk to him for the rest of the night only made Laurence's suspicions grow.

-

Laurence couldn't sleep that night; his short friend's unspoken confession still on his mind, and as he tossed and turned, he decided he had to get them together if Barrone felt the same way, of which there was no doubts. He decided to try and sleep until he heard a fair bit of movement from Drew's bed.

"Laur?" he pretended to be asleep when the sound of the blonde's voice reached his ears.

Drew sighed and got out of bed, walking to their bedroom door and leaving for a few minutes before returning with a glass of water. He picked up his notebook from the small table that sat comfortably next to the now vacant bed and sat down on the floor, pulling his pillow from on top of the mattress and placing it behind him, leaning against the wall facing Laurence's bed.

"I know you're awake, jerk." Drew said once he'd pulled a pen from seemingly nowhere in Laurence's line of sight.

The black haired boy sighed faintly before speaking, "Sorry.. Can't you sleep either?"

"I, uh, I-" Drew opened his notebook, "Night terror," he said quietly, embarrassed that his best friend would tease him.

"Want to talk about it?"  Laurence offered, emerging from his bed to sit in front of the smaller boy.

"I- No, thanks. I'll be okay, I think." Drew let out a shaky breath and began to write the details of his bad dream.

"You sure?" Laurence checked once more, earning an honest nod in response. "Okay," he said, fully aware of what Drew was writing; he was, after all, the one who got him to write his bad dreams in the start.

Drew had had night terrors since he was brought to the orphanage, and they were mostly about his parents in the beginning, so when he was paired with Laurence as roomies, he confided in his taller friend for comfort most nights.

After around eight months of practically non-stop nightmares Laurence had been adopted by a young couple who were told they could never have children, so when Laurence was packing to leave, he gave his friend one of his precious notebooks so Drew could get the bad thoughts out of his head without revealing his weakness to anybody else. Drew agreed to his friend's idea and promised to write them all in their, not forgetting any details no matter how much they scared him nor how embarrassing they were. Just six weeks later, and much to Drew's surprise, Laurence had returned to the orphanage because the couple that had adopted him had some form of miracle in conceiving their own baby. As sad as Laurence was to have no family again, he was glad to see his best friend, and had since had to give another two notebooks to his older yet more fragile friend.