so this is a sequel to my claire/owen high school au because these two still own my life. i still don't know how to write smut, and i still have no idea how football works. bear with me. realized that i never posted it on here, so for future purposes it might be fun to also look at my ao3 account (i'm sharoncarters there as well) for more. enjoy!

Her graduation speech is bullshit. That's how the summer before college starts for Claire: standing up in front of three hundred classmates and their families, spouting lies about their futures. "Don't let anyone tell you what you can and cannot be," she says, and everyone claps. It's nice, in a way, to know that everyone likes her speech and that she's not going to get in trouble for whatever she says, but it's all fake. She's never meant anything less in her entire life, but at this point she's over it.

What she really wants to say is, high school sucked. It was some of the worst years of her life, even though she did have Zara and Karen (and Owen, towards the end) to help her through it. And sure, she had some good times, but mostly she's just glad it's over. And so she says her speech in somewhat of a hurry, sits through all the boring stuff like the everyone's names being read and the pictures, and then it's over.

She grins through a few pictures with her "friends" that she'll probably never see again, hugs each one of her family members, then goes to find Zara and Owen. She finds them with Lowery in the back of Zara's car, their diplomas abandoned in a haphazard pile, and smiles.

Over the last few months of school, after she started dating Owen, they had formed a weird but functional friendship. They were all such completely different people, but it worked. (She doesn't even want to talk about the reactions of her classmates after she and Owen got together. Half of them didn't care, and she was grateful for that half, and the other half was equally amazed and confused. Zara nearly walked into a door the first time she saw Claire kiss her boyfriend on the cheek, and that about sums it up.)

Zara makes funny quips and teases the boys mercilessly, Owen and Claire flirt and gross everyone out, and Lowery is… surprisingly funny. He has a weird obsession with Jurassic Park, and he and Owen bond over their love of that, which the girls never fail to poke fun of. Claire likes it, though, having friends other than Zara. Not that she doesn't like Zara, or anything, but it's nice talking to people with such different opinions than theirs.

They all look up as Claire approaches, Owen scooting over to make room for her to sit.

"We're going to the sink hole later," Zara starts off, not bothering with pleasantries. They're familiar enough with each other to not care about stuff like that. Owen, instead, kisses her on the head and whispers "Hey, congratulations", even though he knows how she feels about the whole valedictorian thing. (Which is uncomfortable and sort of sad, because she doesn't really think it'll get her anywhere.)

"Zara wants to get wasted, as per usual," Lowery adds, even though that had been pretty obvious to her already. She laughs, anyway, because she's sort of on a high from finally being free and having literally no summer work to stress about.

Her best friend just rolls her eyes and doesn't respond, turning to Claire again. "Don't worry, I'll totally convince your mom to let you go. She can't say no to me."

"No," Owen pipes up, "but her dad can."

"Oh, stuff it, quarterback. No one asked you."

Claire's parents find her with her friends a few minutes later, and Zara really lays it on thick. Her persuasion skills aren't a joke, which Claire knows firsthand, considering she's been on the receiving end of them for the better part of their friendship.

"Heeeeeey, Mrs. Dearing," she greets Claire's mother, stretching out the word and smiling in a way that would unnerve any person that looked at her. "So, about Claire's plans for tonight…"

Her mom ends up saying yes, obviously, convincing her husband that Claire needs as much time with her friends as possible before college. Their graduation dinner is postponed to the following night, and Claire is equally astounded and not surprised at all.

The sink hole, as the kids in Claire's town have dubbed it, is one of many attempted (and then abandoned) public works projects that their city government had put into place, only to realize halfway through the process that they didn't have the money for it in the first place. The hole was supposed to be a second public pool, because the original one they have in town is notorious for being broken into after hours by drunk teenagers, and had obscene graffiti all over the brick walls that made up the buildings around the pool.

The town had found enough volunteers to paint over the graffiti the first time, but after the fourth time it was vandalized everyone had given up. People still go to the town pool, but it's mostly middle schoolers and the swim team, now, since the older kids have gone elsewhere.

Claire carefully climbs down the ladder someone had put into place along one side of the pit, her friends following her down. It looks great, actually, having undergone major improvements since the last time she'd been there. Which was, incidentally, the first and last "high school party" she'd ever been to, until now. It had been some type of bonfire, she remembers that, although not the reason behind it. As though high schoolers really needed a reason to party.

Someone, most likely Zara, had found a way to string up some fairy lights that lit up the entire space, along with putting random chairs around in addition to the logs that were already there.

"Looks nice," she tells Zara after they settle in around a fire someone had started before they got there. Her friend beams at her, already on her way to being drunk. Claire has a rule about drinking, the rule being that she doesn't do it. Ever. Karen had dated her fair share of drunken idiots, and there was a drinking problem issue that ran in her family, so she knew what it did to people and didn't want it to happen to her. It was also a control thing; she just didn't like not having control of her own body. She didn't like to get in the way of other people's fun, though, preferring instead to laugh silently at her friends' antics.

Lowery, in particular, was extremely funny when he was drunk, spouting off random facts about video games, or dinosaurs, or whatever he was researching at the moment.

After a few rounds of truth or dare and never have I ever, she's leaning tiredly against Owen's arm, snuggled in his varsity jacket, ready to go home but not wanting to spoil everyone else's fun. Plus, she was their ride, anyway, she didn't want to leave them stranded at the bottom of a pit in the middle of town.

Owen wasn't getting drunk, either, and when she'd asked him why a few minutes into the party, he'd simply said, "I don't want to waste any more time with you," which had made her blush furiously and kiss him, to the chagrin of everyone around them.

She knows what he's referring to, though, remembering the night of the first party she'd been to at the sink hole, sophomore year. Zara had persuaded her to go, obviously, 'cause she was into some football player or other at the time, someone of no importance to her now. Claire had spent the party huddled in a corner, praying that too many people wouldn't recognize her, considering the ridiculous outfit that Zara had forced her into.

It was a black, formfitting dress, but in Claire's opinion, "dress" was a serious misnomer. The thing sat on her more like a slightly-longer-than-usual top, and the fact that she had no leggings on underneath it made her ridiculously uncomfortable. She'd snuck on a lengthy sweater, though, (which at least covered up her arms and chest) after Zara had wandered away. Claire had insisted; she hated being a stick in the mud, even though that was exactly what she was, and the whole ensemble made her feel like a weird-looking witch than a girl trying to have fun at a party. Not that she was succeeding in any capacity.

Owen was there, drunk, or just very, very tipsy, loudly joking around with the rest of his team. Claire had sneered, disgusted by his very presence (and with herself for not realizing that he would be there). She'd spent most of the time in her corner, silently judging him, and secretly wishing that he'd come over so that she could yell at him, not that it would be a fair fight.

She got bored of standing around eventually, and decided to wander over to the table of snacks. She'd skipped dinner to come to this stupid thing, and she was getting hungry. She'd tugged down her dress approximately a hundred times as she made her way over, and then twice more while she was picking at the sandwiches and crackers.

Hoping to spot Zara somewhere in the crowd, Claire turned around, abandoning her food, and immediately bumped into someone's (much taller and very muscular) chest, which was very typical of her life. She felt a pair of warm hands, obviously male, gentle on her shoulders, and squirmed away, looking up.

"Sorry," she'd muttered, but immediately regretted it, because said male was Owen Grady. "Actually, never mind. Not sorry."

Instead of getting angry, though, he'd chuckled, slow and warm, clearly drunk. "Don't worry about it… Claire?" He seemed genuinely surprised when he realized who she was, which made her scowl in response. She was dressed up, yes, but it wasn't like she looked that bad every day, either.

He stood there for what seemed like hours looking at her, eyes slightly wide, mouth hanging open, and she wanted to slam it shut. "You look…" he'd started to say, but never finished, because Zara had bounded over and decided that she needed to go home, immediately, and grabbed Claire's arm to drag her away. Claire left Owen there, still slack jawed, and had thought about what he said for weeks afterward.

He never brought it up, though, which lead her to believe that he had forgotten all about it because of the state he was in, and she could never bring herself to go to another party because of it.

It was different now, though. She's happy. She's dating him. And she has friends, plural. And high school is finally, finally over.

"Owen," Claire whines, shifting her hips impatiently. She feels him chuckle against her thigh, which is so rude and completely not helping the situation. She's not a very patient person during sex, she's learned this summer. Owen, on the other hand, is infuriatingly patient. He likes to "make up for missed time", which is great, sure, but also extremely frustrating. Especially when she's so so so close and he's teasing her.

"Easy," he breathes, and she feels it throughout her entire body.

"Yeah, for you," she snaps, and can feel his grin against her clit, which is a really weird and yet oddly satisfying place to feel a grin.

Finally, finally, he licks a stripe up her center, and she falls apart, just like that. She's also very easy to please, which is why she lets him get away with all the teasing. He beams up at her from between her legs, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, smug and way too proud of himself. She wants to smack him. (In a nice way, of course.) Instead, she tugs at his hair to get him to lay on the bed next to her.

"Hey," he says, which makes the corner of her mouth turn up, in what Zara has patented as her "Owen smile".

"Hey," she grins back, giddy and satisfied.

"I like you like this."

"What, tired?" He laughs and she presses her lips together to stop smiling so damn much.

"I don't know. Happy. Not yelling at me."

"What time is it?" Deflect, like always. Good job, Claire. She doesn't know what to say when he gets like this; she's just generally bad at emotions. And she doesn't really understand why he's so obsessed with eating her out, either. She's oddly embarrassed about it. The firs time he'd asked if he could, she was so shocked that she almost fell off of his bed. The idea of it was nice, but the actual logistics seemed so… icky. She didn't know why he'd even want to. Even now she feels sort of guilty, even though he always offers and seems excited when she says yes.

He groans at her question, elbowing her in the side. "You had to ruin it." He rolls over to look at his alarm clock, and sighs. "Four-fifty."

She's been at his house almost every day, apart from when she hung out with Zara (who had been taking extra classes at the community college before college started for real), or when they all hung out as a group.

Her and Owen have basically spent the entire first half of the summer fooling around, but they've done it with a time limit. His parents work until five-thirty every day, so she comes over at around twelve, which gives them a good five good hours to do whatever they want. She likes to stop at around five, just in case his parents get home early, because she does not need the embarrassment of getting caught, especially not by her boyfriend's parents. She doesn't think she'll ever let him touch her again if that happens.

"We should get dressed," she says, and he groans again, running his hand down the one thigh he can reach while lying next to her.

"Five more minutes." It's so cute how eager he is, but she shakes her head anyway, slapping his hand away.

"You know I'll just be here again tomorrow, right?" she says with a laugh, and he covers his face with his arm.

"You know I can never get enough of you, right?" he parrots back at her, which makes her chest bloom with warmth. Idiot. He always says things like this, which make it impossible for her to concentrate or think about anything else. So she ends up straddling his lap and kissing him senseless for way longer than five minutes, until his five-fifteen alarm rings. At that point she frantically starts getting dressed, tugging up her shorts and pulling her bra back on.

It's disgustingly hot, and her skin is covered in sweat and she knows there's no way that his parents won't know what they've been doing, and she panics a little.

"Have I mentioned today how gorgeous you look?" he asks her, pulling on a t-shirt that does not help her mind focus on looking presentable for his parents.

"Mmm, multiple times."

"Well, you do. You look incredible." He tries to slip his arms around her waist, but she jumps away from him, dashing into the bathroom to comb her hair and splash water anywhere she can reach. She looks like an honest mess, and she wishes that her hair were long enough to pull into a ponytail, but it's not. So she tries to clean herself up as best as she can until she hears the front door open, and cringes.

It's always weird for her to be around his parents, especially now that they're dating. She'd put him through so much in high school, and he'd probably told them all about how much of a bitch she was to him before. She never likes to stay for dinner, either, sneaking away before they get home from work, but today he'd distracted her with his stupid abs and by buttering her up, and now she's stuck.

Claire debates jumping out of his window as she walks back to his room, where he had gotten his laptop out and was scrolling through his Netflix. She'd already gotten him to watch most of The Office in the time that school had ended, which she was extremely proud of, but now they were on the last season and she didn't really feel like crying at the moment, so.

"Is there any way I can get out of here without your mom seeing me?" she asks him, bouncing a little as she falls on the bed.

"Nope," he answers her, not really looking too sorry about it. She huffs in response. "Come on, babe, just stay for dinner once. It won't kill you."

The food itself might not kill her, but the embarrassment of having to talk to adults might. She's still trying to figure a way out of it, nestled against Owen's side as they watched Andy make an ass of himself, when his mother pokes her head through the door, giving them a warm smile.

"Hi, honey," Owen grunts in response, "hi, Claire. You staying for dinner?"

"Um," she stiffens, looking up at Owen. He rubs her arm reassuringly. "If it's no trouble."

"Of course not, dear. We're always happy to have you. And maybe afterwards I can show you some old pictures of Owen playing football when he was just starting out." He instantly jumps up at that, pausing the show.

"Mom."

She just smiles again, winks at Claire, and leaves the room.

"I actually love her," Claire says with a laugh, tugging him back down to the bed. "I don't know what I was even worried about." Owen just makes a face at her, cheeks slightly flushed.

Claire reflects on dinner as she drives home, a soft smile on her face. It was fine; great, even. She'd been worried that Owen's parents would hate her for what she put him through, but they were nothing but kind to her. Blue had jumped around underneath the table, always excited to see her, and Claire'd fed her some scraps of meatloaf, which made the small dog extremely excited and a hundred times more friendly than she already was. His parents didn't ask much about college, either, which was slowly creeping up on them, and she didn't really want to think about it.

It was kind of a sore subject for her, which Owen had probably told his parents so that they didn't upset her; it was sweet of him. She didn't get into many colleges that she had applied to, not that she expected to anyway. She'd applied to a lot of ivy leagues, and even though her grades were good, her SATs weren't. She'd tried extremely hard, but tests just weren't her forte. Still, she maintains that an 1830 isn't even bad, and she's proud of herself regardless. Claire can learn to like a state school. She can. Plus, the lowered tuition is for the best, anyway, considering Karen still had a ton of loans to pay off. Claire knew she couldn't be selfish.

Her heart is beating way too fast, because just thinking about college gives her anxiety, so she resolves to not think about it as she pulls her car into the driveway and unlocks her front door. Of course, like always, the universe continues to hate her.

"Hi honey," her mom greets her as she walks into the living room. "Your college sent a packing list email, and the move-in dates and things for when school starts." Oh, lovely. Just great. As if she needed to be reminded that in a month she has to leave behind her friends and boyfriend, and go live with a stranger. Her school is far enough that she can't live at home, but close enough that her parents can pick her up if she needs them to. The problem is, Owen got a football scholarship to a school states away, Zara's going to a fancy art school in New York, and Lowery got into MI freaking T, the asshole. And Claire is stuck is stupid Ohio all by herself.

"We need to go shopping soon," her mom continues, and Claire wills herself not to cry. It'll be great. She can do this. Maybe if she says it enough times she'll start to believe it.

"Yeah, mom, sure. I'm gonna go to bed."

Her mom and Karen take her shopping the next weekend, and it's… well. An adventure, to say the least. They're both so excited for her, but all Claire really wants to do is lock herself up in Owen's room and pretend like college doesn't exist.

"What about this one?" Karen suggests, picking up a pillow with a cartoonish velociraptor on it. She can't help but laugh a little when she sees it.

"Yeah, that's cute." Their shopping cart is literally full to the brim with stuff, from a lamp to new sheets to so many notebooks that she doesn't even know what she's going to use all of them for. She starts to stress a little about how much this is all going to cost, but her mom doesn't seem to mind. Which, instead of making her feel better, just makes her feel worse. Not only is Claire leaving her, she's using up all of her money, too.

"What's wrong, Claire?" she asks her after, while they're eating appetizers in the Chili's across from the mall (which, by the way, never fails to make her laugh, because she always thinks of that one Pam line from the Dundies). Claire shrugs, dipping a chip in some guacamole and popping it in her mouth. She doesn't want to talk about it; but, then again, she doesn't ever want to talk about anything college related.

"She's worried that we're spending too much money," Karen answers instead, which makes Claire choke a little on her chip.

"Ka-ren," she snaps at her sister, who just shrugs and keeps eating.

"Oh, honey. Your father and I always work things out, you know that, right?" Another shrug. "Don't you worry about a thing. All you have to think about is how great your first semester is going to be, okay?"

"Yeah, okay." She gives her mom a weak smile, still not feeling to great about it. But there's nothing she can really do.

Owen starts school a week later than her, so he drives up with her and her family to drop her off. It's a three hour drive, but he told her he didn't mind, as long as they got to spend time together.

She doesn't know how much "spending time" they really get in, though, between her silent panicking and internal screaming for the whole ride.

Halfway through the drive she loses her breakfast at a rest stop while Karen holds her hair back, Owen waiting anxiously near the door. She's never been this worried about anything before, not even her first day of high school. She still couldn't comprehend the fact that she was just leaving. With almost no time to prepare herself for it.

She'd written pros and cons lists and had calculated distances and cried more times than she could count, but she still wasn't ready.

"I'm not going," she tells Owen after they get back in the car. "They can't make me. I won't even unpack my stuff after they leave, I'll just take it and fake my own death. Meet me in Costa Rica in a week."

He gives her a sweet smile that reads "the hell you will", and gives her a side hug. "You'll be fine."

"We must have completely different definitions of the word 'fine'."

Her mom cries. Karen rolls her eyes, but gives her a hug anyway and tells her not to get too plastered. Her dad gives her an extremely tight hug, and tells her goodbye in the gruffest voice imaginable, probably to keep himself from crying. She wants to cry, too, not that it would help anything. After she's partially unpacked and her bed is made, there's no reason for them to stay.

They leave her and Owen alone in the room to say their goodbyes, which is extremely generous of them. Her roommate hasn't gotten there yet; it'll be nice to have a tiny bit more privacy for a while, at least.

She just stands there.

"Owen—" he must sense what she's going to say, because he shakes his head and pulls her into a hug. She buries her head into his chest, and the tears that she's been holding back escape. She knows that she's being dramatic, and she knows that she'll see him again during winter break. She knows these things. But after finally being with him, especially after realizing how much she's been missing out on, it's hard to let him go.

She loves him and she's so completely proud of him and his accomplishments, especially his athletic scholarship. But it's just hard. And she doesn't want to be that girl, you know? The "my boyfriend goes to a different school", "ha, that's a funny story it reminds me of that one time my boyfriend…", boyfriend-visiting-just-so-we-can-have-sex girl. She's never experienced it firsthand, but Karen has told her stories, and she just doesn't want that to be her life.

Plus, her and Owen have only been going out a few months. She knows that he's fine with the whole long distance thing, but she doesn't know how practical it actually is. Maybe time away from her will make him realize that she's just not worth all the trouble. It makes her head hurt just thinking about it.

"Don't even think about it, okay?" he says quietly, kissing the top of her head in that way of his. "We've talked about this."

"I know, okay? I know. But you're saying this now. What if you meet some other girl and—"

"Claire. There are other girls, and then there's you. And it's only ever going to be you for me, alright?"

"I love you," she sighs, and he pulls back and holds her by the arms. She blinks, realizing that neither one of them have ever said it before.

"Well, shit." That makes her laugh for the first time that day, and his smile is blinding. "I had a whole speech and everything, and you had to go and ruin it."

"So you feel the same way?" She's suddenly nervous, even though she knows she really shouldn't be.

"Do I feel—you're ridiculous. C'mere." He hugs her again, and they stand there like that for what feels like hours. "I have loved you for a long time, Claire Dearing, and I don't plan on stopping anytime soon."

She doesn't want to let him leave, but her family's waiting in the car, and Karen sends her an impatient text, so she has to.

Her roommate isn't nice, but she's not mean either. They don't actually… talk enough for Claire to form any opinion of her. The first day she got there she dropped off her stuff and immediately left, not even bothering to stay for introductions, which were so painful that Claire literally thought she was going to die. "What did you do over the summer?" "What do you like to do?" Blah, blah. As if public speaking isn't bad enough, the resident advisor made them all talk about themselves, which was her least favorite thing to do, ever. What was she supposed to say? "I boned my boyfriend, who used to be my worst enemy, and I watched a lot of TV on the internet." Fun stuff.

Despite missing all that, her roommate, Sammi, is still basically the most popular girl on the floor (and in the entire dorm). Claire can't have a single day without ten girls (and even more guys) barging into their room looking for her, and it's even worse on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays. (Three days of partying. It's ridiculous. When do these people get their work done? Or sleep?) It's gotten to the point where Claire doesn't even bother locking the door anymore, because she has to constantly get up and open it. She considers making a "Sammi's not here" sign to put up whenever the girl leaves, but figures that that's too passive aggressive.

Sammi goes out a lot, which Claire doesn't do for obvious reasons, re: drinking and boyfriend having. Not that she'd ever do something to betray Owen's trust, but there are a lot of sleazy guys here, and she doesn't even want to begin to deal with them.

She also likes to lend everyone her clothes and give out alcohol and cigarettes (oh yeah, she smokes too, isn't that peachy?) to anyone she can. Whatever. Claire doesn't want to buy any friends, and if they don't want to make an effort, she's just fine being on her own. The girls in her dorm are fine, nicer than her roommate, but she just can't seem to form friendships with any of them as quickly as they have with each other, and after the first month everyone is paired up and she's too late.

She tries to make conversation, she really does, but everyone has already learned everything they need to know about each other, and all they talk about are the parties they go to and the classes they have together. Which is fine for them, but she's stuck reading her books and watching her TV shows all alone. Plus, she tested out of most of the general classes (except for math, ew) so she doesn't have anything in common with the rest of the people on her floor.

She's starting on her dinner when Sammi walks in with her usual gang of followers (er, "friends"). She feels like she's always either eating or crying whenever Sam sees her, and can't even begin to imagine what kind of impression of mental health she's made. All the girls smile and say hi to her, and then completely ignore her for the rest of the night. Nice attempt, guys, thanks, she wants to sneer, but knows that that's completely bitter and it's her fault that she has no friends.

Claire does have one friend, though: her RA. Which is pretty pathetic, yeah, but whatever. He's a cool guy. His name is Max, he's a senior, and his boyfriend makes the best white chocolate cookies that she's ever eaten in her entire life. (They don't help with the whole freshman fifteen thing, they way she stuffs them in her face, but whatever. She can have exceptions.) Max hosts weekly movie nights in his room that she's finally worked up the nerve to start going to, considering her room is right next to his.

It's not horrible, really, just nothing at all like she'd expected and not particularly fun. But whatever. She's there to learn, not to make friends.

Claire's always considered herself a decently smart person, even though she has to study a lot more than other people to achieve grades that are up to her personal standards.

But for some reason, her stupid econ class is just not clicking for her. No matter how hard she studies, no matter how many times she goes over the stupid practice problems, she still manages to get them all wrong.

There's a quiz in her class every week on the current reading, and she's managed to fail almost every single one. The first time it happened she'd cried for an hour and then called Owen on Skype. It was a Friday night, and her roommate had gone to another girl's room to get ready to party, so at least she had some privacy.

"Hey, babe," he answers, looking so unbelievably gorgeous and disheveled that she squeezes her thighs together, just a little. She realizes with a pang how much she misses him, how long it's been since they've seen or touched one another.

She hears a few shouts in the background of the video, understanding that he's probably on his way to a party with his friends, too. Leave it to her to be the only one pathetic enough to be crying on a Friday night.

"How are you?" she asks, hoping that that puffiness in her face had at least gone down a bit. He's oddly perceptive about things like that.

"I'm great!" he shouts, and she hears a couple other people "whoo!"ing in the background. She gives him a shaky smile. "I'm so stoked for the game tomorrow, it's gonna be great. The team is awesome, I really think we'll win. How are you, though? You okay?"

"Yeah, yeah," she lies, not wanting to ruin his good mood. "Just wanted to see you."

"You have to see me play sometime, babe. It's… there's nothing like it." His face is lit up like a Christmas tree, and he just looks so happy that she can't bare to tell him. Why should she ruin his fun time just because she's miserable? She's been so selfish for so long that she wants to just give him…this. This one time to be happy just because, and not because she's not yelling at him for once or because she let him put his hands under her shirt. He deserves to be happy on his own.

"It sounds amazing," she smiles at him, trying to make herself feel better. "I really hope I get to someday."

"Claire, I'm sorry, I gotta go," he says, as some guy punches his shoulder. "Love you."

"Love—" she starts to say back, but he's already hung up. Okay, then.

She tries not to cry herself to sleep later.

She wants to tear out her hair in frustration studying for this stupid class, and she has so much work to do and three papers to write all due next week, so she calls Zara halfway through a mental breakdown. Which helps, a bit.

"You're Claire freaking Dearing," Zara tells her, like this is brand new information. "You're a million times smarter than everyone at that stupid school, and you know it. So suck it up and get back to studying."

Claire sighs, running her hands through her hair. It had grown out a little, down to her shoulders now, because the last time she'd gotten it cut had been in the middle of July. She stares at Sammi's collection of bottles on her shelf and rolls her eyes, and decides to do exactly what Zara says.

"You're right. I love you, you know?"

"Yeah, yeah," Zara laughs. "I have to go destroy this design midterm, but I'll talk to you later."

"Bye."

She gathers up her stuff, grabs a bottle of water from the fridge, and makes her way downstairs to the study room. No one else is in it, which isn't the least bit surprising, but it's all the better for her anyway.

After an hour or so of studying her mind starts to wander, and she's so ridiculously bored that she needs to take a break. She ends up scrolling through her Facebook feed, which shows how desperate she really is, because she never goes on Facebook. Her heart skips a beat when she sees the picture.

Owen, looking absolutely plastered, grinning at the camera, and some girl. A really pretty girl, with blonde hair down to her waist and a dress that Claire herself would never be caught wearing, tight and sparkly and… ugh. She feels sick.

Fifteen minutes later she's five months deep into hate-stalking the blonde girl's — Candice's — Facebook page, and she feels even worse than she did when she saw the picture. She's literally perfect. Claire can't even bring herself to hate the girl, because she's the kind of person that has three thousand friends and makes time to post on all of their pages for their birthdays, and she uses smiley face emoticons too much.

Claire herself had deleted about fifty percent of her friends list when she graduated from high school, literally as she was waiting for her name to be called to get her diploma. She was down to less than a hundred now. Logically, she knows that she shouldn't be worried. On the other hand, she'd predicted that something like this was bound to happen the minute Owen had left her dorm room.

It's not a nice feeling, so she buries it and goes back to studying.

It rains the day of her first final; she tries not to take it as an omen.

Claire starts ignoring his calls. It's not intentional; she's busy with the last of her finals studying and work (because there's no way that she's leaving herself and her family with that much debt) and she just doesn't have time to be on Skype for hours at a time when she's so completely overwhelmed.

They still text every day, so it's fine, really. They'll both be home for winter break, so they'll see each other then, and she even put in the effort to watch all of his football games on Youtube, even though she still has no clue how football works. She knows his jersey number, though, so she just watches him. There's something oddly enrapturing about watching him play; she can tell that he really loves it. He's so talented.

She wishes she had something like it. Something that she's good at, that she can call her own. Everyone's always telling her how smart she is, but she's pretty sure she failed her stupid econ final, and didn't do so hot on her final assignments for the rest of her classes because she was so busy studying for that one. She just feels… stuck. While Zara is off creating amazing art and Lowery is coding and Owen is being a pro freaking athlete, she's sitting in her pajamas ninety percent of the time and crying into a bag of potato chips.

It sucks.

Her phone lights up again: Owen on Skype. She hits ignore.

She gets a text.

Owen, 8:15 PM, what gives?

She doesn't answer it.

Owen doesn't come with her parents to pick her up for winter break. She helps her dad carry a bag of her biggest sweaters and coats into the car, and listens to Taylor Swift the entire three hour ride home.

So, it turns out that Claire didn't do as horribly as she thought. She ends her first semester of college with straight A's except for econ, which she gets a B+ in. It's not great, but considering how hard she struggled, it wasn't bad either. She's home alone, her family having gone out for some event at her parents' job, which she had politely declined. She's checking her grades after they've finally been posted online. She has to give her professors some credit, though, considering how many people had been in each of her classes. They had to grade all of that work within a week.

It's snowing outside, but just barely. Claire decides to make herself some hot chocolate, wandering into the kitchen and humming a song she'd been listening to earlier. She's just finished pouring the milk in her mug when she hears the doorbell ring.

She pokes her head outside without even checking to see who it is first. And there's Owen, gorgeous and tan as ever, even in the winter. His hair's longer than the last time that she'd seen it, and his hands are shoved in his coat pockets. Her heart is beating fast, and suddenly it's like she's in high school all over again and her worst enemy is at the door.

Except it's not, because he's her boyfriend and she's been ignoring him and she feels so guilty and stupid and petty, now that she's seeing him face to face again.

She steps aside to let him in.

He shakes some snowflakes on the carpet as he takes his coat off, while she locks the door. It's so quiet. She doesn't know what to say. And then her stupid mouth decides to take over for her.

"Who's Candice?" He looks up at her, eyes wide. Fuck. She didn't mean it like that. Since when was she this girl? The jealous girl? The insecure girl?

"So that's it, huh?" he says, instead of answering her. She looks down at the floor. "I thought I'd done something to piss you off again, like I used to back then." Her chest hurts. "Do you know how fucking… shit. I was so scared, Claire. I thought I was hallucinating. We had those few months of summer and it was like all of my dreams come true and then you started getting all closed off again, and I just — I thought it was a cosmic joke. Like the universe was laughing at me."

"I'm sorry," Claire blurts, shuffling her feet, unable to stay still, not knowing what else to say. "I'm so sorry, I don't know what I was thinking and I—"

"If you want to break up, just say it," he snaps, and he looks so hurt and all she wants to do is wrap her arms around him and never let go. "It'll kill me, but I'll get over it. But just tell me. Because I can't wait anymore and I need to know because I had you and now I don't know if I do and—"

She launches herself into his arms. It's a rare moment for her, articulating her feelings first, but she doesn't care. She's so fucking stupid. As if he would ever cheat on her.

He lets out a desperate sound against her mouth, one hand coming up to grasp the back of her head, pulling her tighter to him.

"Owen, I'm so sorry," she gasps, pulling away from him, and he shakes his head, goes in for more. "Mmm, just let," she can't get words out, because he's kissing her neck and it feels so so good and his hands are slipping under her t-shirt and she doesn't want him to stop. But she needs him to understand.

"Okay," he breathes, pulling away, looking as if it physically pains him to do so. "I can control myself."

She gives him a wry grin. "Can you?"

"Actually, no. Just one more." He leans in for another kiss, and she acquiesces, letting him tug on her bottom lip before he pulls away again. "Okay, now I'm good."

"Okay." She sighs, not knowing how to start. "Okay. I… um. The more I thought about it, the more it just… didn't make sense, you know? You and me." He opens his mouth to protest, but she cuts him off. "Just let me finish. You're so… talented. And nice. And funny. And hot. And you have so many friends. I'm just not like that. I'm boring and I like organizing things and I've never worked out a day in my life, unless you count that one time that I walked the mile to McDonalds because I was really craving a McChicken." He snorts at that, which makes her stop for a second and smile at him. She really, really, loves him. Like, a lot. "And I just saw that picture and I thought, 'There's no way that he really likes me. Because he can have girls like that, and why would he want me, then?'" She finishes her speech with a shrug.

"Claire…" he's shaking his head, and he steps closer to her again, cupping her face in his hand, which she leans into. It's warm and callused and she missed it so, so much. "Just because you haven't figured out what to do with your life doesn't mean you're a loser, or whatever you think it does. And I could never stop wanting you. And, by the way, Candice is my friend. Who is a lesbian," he pauses to let the word sink in, and she sags against him a little in relief, "and we were just having a fun night. I told you before, there are no other girls. Just you."

"Have I mentioned that I love you?" she asks, and raises up on tip-toe to kiss him again. She leans in towards his ear, "Or that my parents aren't home?"

He groans. "We can't fix all of our problems with sex, you know."

"Already fixed," she quips. "Besides, it couldn't hurt."

"Not going to argue with that foolproof logic." She squeals when he lifts her up, wrapping her legs around him. He carries them to her room.

They spend the rest of the day making up for lost time.

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