Oceanspray

Chapter Eight

A/N: Second to last chapter! Guys, are you ready to cry? I sobbed so hard when I wrote this chapter. My roommate must have thought I was insane 'cause I just kept grabbing tissues. I almost couldn't finish this story because this chapter legit broke my heart. </3

I hope you all like it though! I promise, once this story is done, I'll have another short story posted that just full of fluff. Just tough it out. c:

Chapter song: Summertime Record as arranged by Yuki Yukki. I felt like the flow of this song really fit this chapter. Besides, it's a beautiful arrangement that I just had to share with you. :3

Chapter Eight

Neros

It was his last day here. After his small crying session last night, I knew that this was going to be a lot harder than I thought it would be. Every tear that fell from his beautiful blue eyes hurt more than any attack that could ever be inflicted upon me. I didn’t want to see him cry anymore. I didn’t want to see him cry ever.

“When I go home, I’ll probably have some university letters,” he mused.

We were currently sitting in the shallow waves of our little cove. My tail was flicking water back and forth, and Adrian was dragging his fingers through the water. I almost wanted to smile to myself when I convinced Adrian to leave his shirt on one of the rocks closer to the palm trees. All of his milky skin bared for my eyes only.

“What is a university anyways? You keep mentioning it.” I tilted my head slightly, staring at him.

“It’s a school that you go to after high school. It’s for higher education.” He sighed and dug his fingers through the soft sand. “Here, humans go to school to learn rather than learning from elders like you probably do.” I nodded at his assumption. “We go to pre-school when we’re little, maybe four or five. Then we enter grade school when we’re five or six. Grade school is for six years; kindergarten, first grade, second grade, yadda yadda yadda until fifth grade. Then middle school for three years. Then high school, which is four years. I’m currently in my last year of high school.”

“What is school like?”

He laughed without amusement, and the sound was so empty and so uncaring that it sent chills through me.

“It’s the worst place I could ever imagine. I hate that we have to learn the same material year after year, barely going deeper into the subject at hand. We sit in classes for six hours of our day and spend another three or four doing all of the required homework. It wastes so much time. On top of that, half the teachers that are being paid to make sure we understand the material do little to actually teach us anything.”

“That sounds terrible.”

“I hate it.”

“Yet you want to continue?”

He nodded. “I don’t have a problem with learning. I love it in fact, but it’s the matter that I have to learn the exact same facts and concepts over and over again that I hate.”

“I’m confused.”

He smiled at me, features relaxed more than I’ve ever seen. “It’s a little difficult to explain. I love learning, but I hate the institution that we have to learn from.”

I nodded, understanding a bit more. “But when you learn the same thing over and over again, you can always understand more to the idea than you did before.”

“I haven’t had that happen yet.”

“You’re so pessimistic,” I teased. “It happens. I have read the story of my people countless time, and every time, I approach it from another angle until I create my own ideas of it.”