Reality Check

Thirty-Five Degrees

A/N- *SHAKES BC I FINALLY GOT THIS DONE*

Hello everyone!! This starts the first epilogue chapter (yes, there will be a few more), and writing it actually took me so much longer than expected. Genuinely started summer thinking I'd finish my whole fic by the end of it, but this summer turned out to be super super busy, so I haven't had as much time to write regularly.

Also I think a part of it too is that this fic is vv close to ending, so I've probably been procrastinating a bit more on writing as fast as I usually do LOL

To give some context, the epilogue begins two months after the latest chapter (so its April now instead of February)

Thank you so much for reading, and hope you enjoy!

This Is The Life (by Two Door Cinema Club)

"And we're starting new, try to make a change. It's one more thing to do . . ."

___

The beeping of an alarm jolted Owen's attention to his bedside table, where his phone was laying face-down, untouched for the most part of the last hour. Although he'd been expecting it, the sound nearly made him jump out of his skin. Practically lunging for it, he hit the button to turn the alarm off and climbed out of bed, where he'd been pouring over comics and halfheartedly scratching on math homework his mom assigned him. Not that he'd really been focusing on either— he'd been too excited for what tonight brought.

By now, Owen had had plenty of experience sneaking out. Most (if not all) of it had been going to the library in the middle of the night to jump into books, or going to the book club at Bethany's school, back when he'd been grounded a few months ago. The only difference now was that his mom actually knew about his sneaking out for this particular mission, and approved it. And how couldn't she approve it? It was for a great cause!

And that wasn't to say he hadn't been punished for running away the second time with Bethany and Kiel, where he'd spent a week in the fictional world, fighting evil and saving worlds. Owen would've thought that after all his heroic deeds, his mom would simply be too proud of him to ground him. And of course, he'd mostly been wrong. While she was proud — extremely proud — her concern for Owen's well-being outweighed it, so she gave him a punishment anyway. Not only because he'd run away, but also because he'd risked his life more than once in the past week. Definitely not the thing a mother wanted to hear.

Thankfully, his punishment wasn't as bad as the one before. The only thing it involved was working extra hours at the library, sometimes taking his mom's shifts in the morning when she needed a hand. And when he wasn't doing that, he was working on schoolwork or hanging out with his friends, who often visited him while he was working. Not a bad punishment, in Owen's mind. After a month, his punishment had lifted, so now he was back to working the way he was used to— just a few hours in the afternoons and nights. And he could leave the house whenever he wanted, which was already an added bonus.

It was like things were back to normal. Except it was a different normal.

A better normal.

The real world still brimmed with boredom, but it wasn't like that was new. Life was boring when you lived in the real world. There was nothing magical or extraordinary about it. No dragons, no superheroes, not even flying cars. It'd bothered Owen for so long, that there'd never been anything cool about his world. But things had changed. Because Owen's perspective had changed. Magic and adventures and everything fictional wasn't all that made life exciting. It was incredibly exciting, sure, but it wasn't all he'd needed. Most of all, he'd just needed friends. And finally, he had them.