A Lonely Graduation

The school days went by pretty quickly. It was weird suddenly not having Nova, but the circumstances surrounding her existence were pretty weird to begin with. Being reunited with an old friend who was supposed to be dead wasn't something that I ever expected to happen, but it did. And then without him, the day of our graduation approached. I always hoped we'd graduate together, but that's not how things turned out. We're far apart now, but we're still friends. Distance doesn't mean anything.

"You nervous?" asked Rose.

"Y-yeah." I said, "I never made it this far in my past life."

"And now you'll be able to get even further, won't you?" replied Rose.

"Yeah." I responded, "I'm glad."

"But still," said Rose, "I never expected all of that stuff to happen."

"I didn't either." I said.

Our conversation went on for a bit longer and then our graduation ceremony started. In my past life, I worried about whether or not I'd make it here with Oswin, but now I can't worry about that. As long as I've got Rose with me, I'll definitely be fine. Probably. I think. Clara, along with both of my parents came to my graduation. It's weird to think that whether I was Gabe or Nova, those two would have come to my graduation anyways. I really had lived a weird life up to this point.

***

"We're almost done." said Mary.

"Yeah, I know." I responded.

"Are you sad?" asked Mary.

"No." I answered, "Why do you ask?"

"It's just... Gabe's not with us anymore." said Mary.

"All that matters is that she's okay now." I said, "I don't mind if her old self is gone."

"It doesn't bother you?"

"Gabe is Nova and Nova is Gabe. Why would it?"

"You've changed."

"You really think so?"

So the day of our graduation came. All this time, I had expected to make it here with Gabe, but that ended up becoming impossible. Now, the two of us were separated by different worlds. Even so, I wasn't sad. I was just happy to know that my best friend wasn't gone for good, even if the circumstances were very bizarre. The graduation ceremony took a while but I managed to live through it.

I couldn't believe I actually managed to finish high school. After that, well, I'm not sure what I'm doing. No matter what I'll be doing in the future, it's going to feel weird not going to school like that anymore. But that's the thing. Time goes by and we all get older. As we go forward, we have to put things behind us. It's sad to see things go, but that's just the way things are. Sometimes you don't even realize how important something was to you until its gone.

The summer went by pretty quickly. Instead of going to college, I ended up just going straight into work. I didn't really have anything specific in mind, but I just ended up working at a few different stores as the days went by. I saw less of Mary as well, but she still contacted me whenever she could. Even if I spent most of my time alone, my summer was actually pretty decent. I was no longer feeling sad about anything.

***

I spent a lot of my summer with Rose. After we finished high school, we quickly became adventurers. Basically, what we do is go into dungeons and fight monsters. Then we take materials we get from the monsters and sell them. We can also collect and sell plants. It's a lot of work, but it's been fun. Every now and then, I would wonder what Oswin was up to. I considered sending him a letter or something, but I just couldn't get myself to do it.

The days went by pretty quickly and before we knew it, it was winter. I looked outside my bedroom window and saw the snow falling. Just looking at it made me think of Oswin. Back when I was Gabe, I never really went outside in the snow because of my poor health. Outside my window, Oswin would make this massive structures out of snow. They always looked so cool.

I had to wonder how he was spending his winter? Did he find something to do after high school? Was he enjoying his life? I hoped that wherever he was, that he was fine. After thinking for a bit, I ran outside to meet up with Rose since we had work to do.