Back To Where We Started

A/N This is the Prologue of the Chapter the beginning of the Bonrad Fanfic since My Bonrad oneshots was going Viral I figured to make a fanfic of my favorite ship 

Let me know what you guys think 

It had been four years

 Four summers since Conrad had seen her last

Four years since she was the girl with braces and glasses 

It was  still awkward, still growing into herself  and four years since he had walked away from the beach house and the life that used to feel so simple

That was before everything changed

Before his dad's betrayal

Before the pressure of being the "perfect son" drove him to quit football, to give up everything he had worked for just to take care of his family

 Before he found out that his mom's cancer was more serious than anyone had let on, that she'd been hiding it from his brother, Jeremiah 

He didn't even know his mom was suffering with it and neither did his younger brother Jere 

 Before the guilt of seeing his mom try to recover from chemo while his dad, the man he had once looked up to, had the nerve to cheat on her with his secretary 

The same woman his dad had introduced them to years ago, the woman who was still one of his mom's "friends." 

He couldn't look at her the same way anymore

 Every time he saw her, it was like a knife to his chest

 His dad had done the worst thing imaginable, and Conrad hated him for it

That was all before Belly came back into his life

Belly 

He had spent most of his teenage years not seeing her for who she truly was  a crush he'd buried under layers of distractions

Back then, she was just Steven's little sister, the girl who tagged along on all their adventures

 Sure, she was cute in her own way, but she wasn't the girl who could break his heart

 Not the girl who could make him feel anything beyond a passing, fleeting attraction

 But now?

Now she was standing on the beach, grown up and looking like someone he had no right to look at the way he was

 His chest tightened, the familiar ache in his heart he had been trying to ignore for years resurfacing

Conrad was in a bad place

 He wasn't the same guy he used to be, the one who could laugh and joke with Jeremiah, the one who could chase after a football on the field with passion

 Now, all of that seemed so far away

 The boy he was back then was buried under the weight of his family's secrets, under the bitterness he carried toward his dad, under the uncertainty of his future

And now, here she was Belly

 The girl who had crushed on him for years 

The girl who had always been right there, always around, always watching him like he was someone special

But back then, he had never been able to see her that way

Not until the summer when he was seventeen

That summer, when everything shifted, when they had kissed like it meant something, when everything between them had felt electric and then he had pushed her away, just like he always did

 He couldn't afford to care Not with everything going on with his family, not with the mess that was his life

But now?

Now she was different

 Grown up, confident, and standing in front of him, looking like the last thing he needed in a world that was falling apart

She was the one person he had tried to forget, tried to block out, because deep down, he knew what it meant to care about her. He had always known

"Conrad," Belly called, her voice pulling him out of his head

He looked at her, feeling like he was seeing her for the first time

 She wasn't the awkward girl he remembered

 The braces were gone

The glasses were gone

She had grown into herself, into the kind of woman who could make his heart race even when he didn't want it to

"Belly," he said, his voice quieter than he expected

She had always been Steven's little sister to him, but now... now, it was something else

 She wasn't just a memory of a summer kiss, not anymore

 She was here, in front of him, real, with eyes that seemed to hold questions that he wasn't sure he was ready to answer

There was an awkward silence that stretched between them. He could feel the weight of everything 

The years, the distance, the way he'd pushed her out of his life the moment things started to feel too complicated

He'd never let himself deal with it then

But now?

Now, everything he had been running from was standing in front of him

"Wow," she said, breaking the silence "You look... different. Older, I guess."

He forced a smile, though it didn't reach his eyes "Yeah, well... college changes you."

The truth was, everything had changed

 He'd changed

 And so had she.

"I... didn't expect to see you again," she continued, her voice soft but carrying the weight of all the unspoken words between them "I didn't think you'd still be here."

Conrad shifted, feeling the tightness in his chest "Yeah, well, things change. I'm... here."

"I know," Belly said, her gaze softening as she took a step closer

"I just... I didn't expect it to be like this, after all this time

 I thought... maybe you'd have moved on Gone somewhere far away."

He wanted to tell her he hadn't moved on, that everything still felt like a mess  that no matter how far he tried to run, nothing would ever let him escape

But instead, he just shook his head "Yeah, well, I've been kind of stuck Haven't really been going anywhere."

She nodded slowly, like she understood, and it hit him then

 He wasn't the only one who was stuck

She was, too

 Even though it had been years, even though she had grown into someone completely different, there was something about her that still pulled at him

The way she looked at him, like she saw through him, like she knew exactly what he was trying to hide

"Maybe we're both stuck," Belly said, her voice barely above a whisper "Stuck in the past, stuck in everything that happened."

The words hit him harder than he expected. It was true

They were both stuck. Stuck in memories

Stuck in regrets

 Stuck in everything that had come between them

And now, with her standing there in front of him, everything that had been buried for so long threatened to rise to the surface

Maybe, just maybe, this was the summer they couldn't ignore it anymore

The End Of Prologue