*1 year and 3 months later*
I close my eyes for a second, feeling the warmth of the sun on my face and the soft cooling breeze gently brushing my hair back. My eyes flutter open when a familiar hand comes up to the back of my neck, massaging me. I turn my head to the side to look into his eyes which seem to be holding the same warmth as the sun.
"You good baby?" He asks.
"Yeah, I'm just relaxing and enjoying the sun, " I say, smiling at the boy next to me.
"Hey, guys!" Alice yells once they arrive.
"Hey, sorry we're late, " Sydney says, walking side by side with Alice.
"It's fine, we're still waiting for people, so you're not the last, " Elise says, placing a salad bowl on the table.
"Yeah, we're still waiting for the rest of the boys to come, " Jacob says as he flips the meat on the grill.
We decided to have a nice barbecue in the backyard of Elise's parent's house since summer is ending soon. It's always nice hanging out with everyone, especially when there's no tension in the air and everyone is on good terms with each other.
"How are you guys?" Sydney asks, whilst hugging me.
"We're good, how are you?" I say, wrapping my arms around her.
"Good, good just a bit tired from moving heavy boxes all day yesterday, " she says, pulling away to hug the rest.
Sydney and Alice are in the process of moving into a new bigger apartment together. Their relationship has been getting stronger as time goes by and we're all very happy for them.
Speaking of being happy for people, Elise seems to have found someone for her. She's been dating a guy named Oliver for four months now. He's definitely Elise's type, tall, brown hair and most importantly, has green eyes. We just met him today, so I can't form an opinion on him yet, but he seems like a nice, genuine, funny guy and he makes Elise smile so, so far so good.
"Do you want any help?" I ask Elise, as she carries the plates out.
"Yeah, can you get the glasses?" She asks.
"Yeah, of course, " I say, standing up and whisking myself towards the kitchen.
"Oh, hey Amanda, " I say, seeing her grabbing the cutlery.
"Hey, Chloe, here to help?"
"Yeah, " I say, opening the cabinet and grabbing as many glasses as I can hold in my hand.
Amanda is Jacob's girlfriend. She's a really sweet, bubbly girl and she brings Jacob's sweet side out more. They haven't been together for that long only a couple of months, but they seem happy.
My friendship with Jacob never really recovered from what went done last year. We never manage to go back to being as close as we used to be, but we still are friends and talk a bit whenever we're all hanging out together like today.
"Hope you guys haven't started eating without us, " Frankie shouts at us once he walks in with his girlfriend on his side.
Oh, wow, she's pretty!
"Hi, everyone, " she says, waving at us.
"Hey, nice to meet you, I'm Chloe, " I say, shaking her hand after greeting Frankie.
"Nice to meet you too! I was so excited to meet you after hearing a lot of good things about you, " she says, smiling really wide.
"What's your name by the way?" I ask.
"Oh, I'm Katie, " she says.
"Well, I can tell we'll get along great, " I say, walking her back to the table where everyone else is sitting.
"I hope so, " she says, sounding a bit nervous.
I haven't heard a lot about Frankie and his girlfriend, but they look good together and she seems like an angel. The only thing I heard recently is that they were having a few problems, but I guess they solve them out or at least that's what it seems.
"Hey man, " Frankie hugs Ian as the rest of the girls greet Katie.
"Where is Eddie?" Ian asks him.
"He'll be here soon."
"Good because the food is ready!" Elise yells, bringing in the last dishes out as I go back in to bring the rest of the glasses out.
We are a big group today since everyone brought their significant others if they had one. We went from being a group of 5-8 people to 12.
"Hope there's food left for us!" Felix yells at us coming in with Eddie.
"Plenty, " I say.
"You're lucky we haven't started eating, " Jacob says, hugging Felix and shaking Eddie's hand.
"As if you would've started eating without us, " Eddie says, taking a sit down next to Ian once he greeted everyone else.
I'm happy that Felix and Eddie worked through their problems and stayed together. They had a rough start to their relationship, and they even took a break once for several months, but now they're back together stronger than ever before it seems. I do hope they'll stay together for years to come because, despite everything, they're good for each other.
"Great, now that everyone is finally here, let's dive into this deliciously looking food please, " Elise says.
"Yeah, but first I think a toast is in order, " Felix says, raising his glass.
"To us and our friendships," Sydney says after all of us raised our glasses.
"To us and to love, " Elise adds.
"Cheers!" Everyone yells.
"Now we can eat people!" Felix yells, making us laugh.
"So, what's everyone's plans for when they graduate?" Amanda asks.
"I don't know actually, " Alice says.
"Yeah, me neither, " Jacob says.
"Me third! I'm too focused on just graduating, " Elise says.
"I'm planning on doing a master's, " I say, taking a sip of my water.
"I'm just going to find a job, no more uni for me, " Ian says, resting his hand over my chair momentarily before going back to eating.
"I'm doing a master's as well, " Eddie says, leaning back on his chair and looking at me to fist bump.
"Oh, God no! No more assignments for me, that shit is too stressful, " Frankie says before taking a big bite of his food.
"Any plans with your partners?" Elise asks with eyes wide full of curiosity.
"I and Katie are looking into moving together by the end of this year hopefully or else next year for sure, " Frankie says.
"Well, we're already living together so nothing is going to change for us, " Sydney says, looking at Alice that nods in confirmation.
"We are also looking for a place to live together. We don't plan on moving in together though until next year or the year after that, but we just wanted to have an idea of how much it would cost us, " I say, trying to explain mine and Ian's plan.
"We don't have any plans, for now, we're kind of just taking things as they come, " Felix says, looking at Eddie that's smiling at him.
"Any advance future plans for you two?" Eddie asks, looking at me and Ian with a raised eyebrow and side smile.
"I don't know what you're talking about, " Ian says, shaking his head with a huge smile on his face.
"I think you know exactly what I'm talking about, " Eddie says, winking at us.
I laugh and hide my face in my hands unable to keep the smile off my face.
"Oh, now I want to know!" Elise yells, looking at us two with furrowed eyebrows.
"It's nothing really, we just talked about you know, marriage and children and what we thought and wanted, " Ian says, placing his hand on my thigh.
"Omg!" Elise screams.
"Why are you screaming girl?" Alice asks her.
"How much more excited are you going to be when I tell you that we're getting married or stuff like that?" I ask her.
"Oh, I'll be just as excited as I am now, " she says, smiling.
"Neither of those two things are happening anytime soon. We both want to be financially stable first and have a place of our own before taking any bigger steps in our relationship, " Ian says and I place my hand on top of his on my thigh.
"But you will at some point, so it's still exciting, " Elise says.
"Do you know how many kids you want?" Katie asks us.
"Not yet we just know that we want kids, " I say.
I turn to look at Ian as the conversation carries on to something else. He's already staring at me with his warm chocolate eyes that have a golden shine in them under the blazing sun. He tucks my hair behind my ear, carefully trying not to push off my ear cuff and lean closer to me so his lips are brushing against my ear.
"I'm so in love with you, " he whispers.
"I'm so in love with you, Ian," I say as he places a kiss on my neck before pulling away.
I'm so happy that I found the one for me at such a young age. I watch how his eyes smile when he laughs and how his head tilts a bit back.
I'm so lucky to have him.
A/N
Tomorrow, the Let me love you train will reach its destination!
I hope you enjoyed this chapter and stay tuned tomorrow for the epilogue!
Feel free to comment & vote ❤️
I hope you have a lovely Sunday! Xx
All the love - M ❤️