The end of this year was entirely different for James. Last year, he’d known his father would be waiting for him at that train station. Last year, he’d had some sort of family to go back to. James was never really the sort of person to look like he was very interested in family. But when life goes and yanks something like that away from you, the stark relief of what you had is very apparent. And that’s what James had been dealing with ever since November. With no security to go back to, perhaps that’s why he clung to his friends these past few months. Jude, who was really better than James thought he deserved, let him stay with his family during Christmas and kept him company during the worst days; Bastien, who’d dragged him home during the Spring Break, got him out of that godforsaken castle; Luca, who was always good for an ear or just a quiet smoke with – they had so much in common, those two; Ophelia, who was oddly motherly and yet more stable than James knew he was capable of.
And then there was Katherine. It was she that had the most intriguing relationship with him. Even he didn’t know exactly what was going on with them anymore. This year, they’d ended up closer than he’d ever expected and yet they spent much of their time together arguing. Maybe it was just that they were both too outspoken and opinionated for their own good. They simply clashed. There were times over the year where they’d both been furious with each other. He’d even intentionally set out to make her jealous, to make her hurt a little, and then played it off as nothing. Yeah. Some friend he was.
And yet… here they were. Still sitting together, after everything they’d put each other through in the past few months. It was her last train ride this year, something he was almost painfully aware of. Even he knew that she was only kidding, but he really did have to wonder sometimes. What had he been thinking, having most of his friends a year ahead of him? Perhaps he was just a glutton for punishment, or had grown up a little too fast to really get along with most of his own classmates. After all, the two or three mates he had in his own year were nearly as jaded and cynical as he was. But in the end, it didn’t change anything. It was still their last year, and he was still stuck behind them.
“Oh, I don’t know,” James started, the smallest of smirks playing at the corner of his lips. “I reckon you’re right. I’ll just sob until they let me see you lot again.” He snorted laughter, rolling his eyes. “Seriously though? There are always owls and journals. And… I don’t know, do you know how to use a telephone?” The corners of his lips pushed upward a bit more, teasing her just for the hell of it. This was the easy part. This bit of banter, he was good at it. He could do this. So long as he kept telling himself that “goodbye” this time around really wasn’t as final as it seemed in his head. Magical London was a small world. Or at least that’s what he was telling himself.