Solangelo One Shots

The Tree House Club(p2)

Part two to last week's story!

Will's POV-2018

He sighed, nestling his head into his hand as quiet chatter filled the lunchroom, a hundred people having fifty different conversations. His friends were laughing, Cecil and Lou Ellen discussing their magic act for the talent show, Austin and Kayla fretting over their grades on the science test. Will sat alone in the middle of the crowd, watching snowflakes spiral down, frost collecting on the window and glazing it over. Out of boredom he found his eyes drifting around the cafeteria, at the other tiny conversations about the most menial things in the world. Long across the cafeteria was a familiar flop of black hair, a dark shirt with a head nestled in his hands. His gaze locked on to the boy and when he looked up he and Nico were making eye contact from across the cafeteria and Will felt the familiar bond between them, the one filled with pain and nostalgia and three years of avoiding each other in the  halls and staring sadly at each other's contacts in their phones, but never clicking the button to call.

"Will?" Will jumped, breaking the trance and he felt a pang in his heart as he saw the eye roll from across the cafeteria, and Nico turned back around, resting his head on his arms. "Did you hear the question?"

"What?" he asked. "Sorry, no."

"Are you okay?" Cecil frowned. "You seem out of it." Will sighed again, letting his eyes float back over to Nico, where he was once again staring lifelessly at his friends, paying no attention to Will.

"Yeah, sorry," he said with a tight smile, finally pulling the rest of his attention away from Nico and bringing it back to his friends. "Just lost in the past a little bit. What's up?"

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He shoved his textbooks into his bag as students rushed past him, plans formulated for the handful of free hours after school. Nico brushed past him, his head tilted towards the floor, his hands clutching his backpack straps. As he watched Nico walk away he opened his mouth, his brain screaming at him to say something, anything, but by the time he managed to push out a strangled Nico he was gone. 

He could see Nico a hundred feet in front of him during the walk home, the white earbuds snaking up past his thin winter jacket and blocking out the world around him, the boy walking behind him. The same pain he had been feeling for three years filled his heart, a stabbing sensation that made him want to curl up into a ball on the floor and cry until his body was dry. So when he reached the long driveway snaking to his house he walked past it, following the sidewalk until he turned into the forest, brushing past the long pine needles grabbing at his clothes until he reached the one place in the world that brought him solace.

He felt his eyes welling as he ran his hands over the crayon lettering scrawled on the walls, the words spiky in some places and loopy in others but despite the mess, the final e that had been left out of house, it was still their's. And despite the decade that had passed since it had been written, every time he looked at it there was still a fresh pain that he knew would linger in his heart for days to come. Empty mugs from their final meeting still lingered, apple cider stains ringing the rim as they collected dust. That had once been Will's favorite mug, the images of Spongebob characters faint after so many years of use. But now it brought back painful memories of secrets told and best friends betrayed so he kicked it to the side, watching it awkwardly roll across the floor until stopping with a soft thump next to the wall. Nico's mug still stood upright, the smile of Blue from Blue's Clues forever frozen on the mug. Even though part of her eye was rubbed off Will could still feel her gaze, strangely judgmental for a kid's cartoon character. He still wouldn't move it, though; if Nico wanted to deal with the ghosts from his own past, he could. But until then Will would leave the mug standing, a painful remnant of a friendship long gone.