Summer break was approaching.

That was the main reason why we were all here now, Nolan, Ashley, Melissa, Derek, Cody, and I, hiking through the forest outside of school on a warm weekend evening.

Come next semester, we would finally be high school seniors. I still almost couldn't believe that we were already finishing this year as juniors. It felt like it was just yesterday when I was a sophomore and started hanging out with Nolan.

At Derek and Melissa's insistence that we had to do something to commemorate our last summer as juniors—namely, to hike through the forest as a last adventure of sorts—before we returned as seniors, Ashley finally agreed after twenty minutes of failed counterarguments on her part.

"We already did that two years ago," Ashley had protested earlier this morning, looking wary at Derek's suggestion.

We were sitting at our usual table in the dining hall for breakfast, crowded with fellow students. Surrounding chatter filled my ears even as I tried to pay attention to what my friends were saying.

It was the last weekend before summer break.

Somehow, Nolan had managed to crawl out of bed to join us for breakfast.

I suspected it was probably because we wouldn't be seeing each other until the next semester. When he got to the dining hall, he parked himself right beside me, rested his head on my shoulder, and proceeded to doze off.

"Exactly!" Melissa was exclaiming. "It was two years ago! And we didn't even spend that long in there, since an insect landed on Chelsea's leg, and she wouldn't stop freaking out until we left."

I scowled at her. "It was a large insect!"

I had a sneaking suspicion that Nolan was smiling at my indignation. I pulled back from him to see that I was right.

"Hey!"

"What?" he said, his eyes still half-closed as he grinned at me.

"What do you mean by 'what'? You're laughing at me!"

"I'm not laughing. I'm just smiling."

"It's the same thing!"

"No, it's—"

Clearing her throat, Ashley raised an eyebrow at Melissa. "Their flirting aside, I was freaking out about the insect too, you know. What makes you think this time will be any better?"

Aghast, I gaped at her. "We weren't flirting!"

Nolan took the opportunity to lie his head down on the table, bolstered by his forearms.

"Come on! We can get fresh air and get surrounded by nature!" Melissa waved her hands around in large gestures, nearly hitting Derek who was sitting beside her. "Today's our last day as juniors, you know. Don't you want to do something before we officially come back as seniors?"

Derek said, nodding at Melissa, "Tell us if you see any insects. We'll try to stand on the frontlines for you."

Ashley turned to me. "Chelsea, do you want to go?"

"I don't mind," I said, shrugging. "It'd probably be pretty fun if we all went, right?"

Going to the forest was basically the equivalent of going to the library for me now, considering how familiar I was with some parts of it. Not that I did the latter all that often, but still.

Ashley's jaw dropped as she brought a hand up to her chest. "Who are you, and what have you done with my best friend?"

I laughed. "Way to exaggerate. It's not like we haven't been there before. We'll all stick together, right?"

"But you hate insects!"

I blinked. "I mean, yeah, I guess ... but they're not as scary now."

After feeding Blue with them several times over the course of last year—in Nolan's presence, of course—I had kind of gotten used to their existence. I didn't desperately want them as a pet or anything, but I no longer had the kind of revulsion towards them that I used to have.

At this, Melissa applauded me. "You've finally seen the light, Chelsea! They're just insects!"

"What is this?" Ashley cried. "I can't believe this!"

"You're coming too, right?" Derek looked at Nolan. "We can go in the evening. As long as we don't go too far in and follow the common trail paths, I think we should be okay."

Nolan stifled a yawn. "Yeah, why not? I've gone there a lot of times, so I'm actually pretty familiar with it. I can help to make sure we don't get lost."

"Wow, you have?" Melissa leaned forward, her hazel eyes practically glinting with excitement. "We've only been there once!"

"Hey, speak for yourself," Derek said, slinging his arm around her neck and over her shoulders. "I've been there more than once, remember?"

She stuck her tongue out at him before asking Nolan, "Who did you go with? Don't tell me you went alone!"

"Yeah, I went alone," he said, leaning his side into me.

Everyone goggled at him.

"You went all by yourself in the evening?"

Nolan looked around the table, looking visibly surprised by everyone's reaction.

Smirking, I leaned over and whispered into his ear, "I guess my reaction back then wasn't so overkill after all, huh?"

He gave me a flat stare but didn't reply. Instead, he turned back to Melissa and shrugged.

"Yeah, I did."

They all started asking him questions about it, the quiet breakfast atmosphere over our table quickly changing into a rowdy one. Afterwards, we also invited Cody, who quickly agreed to come with us.

So here we were now, walking along a well-worn trail, listening to overlapping sounds of the various wildlife around us. Insects chirped and called from a nearby distance. Occasionally, I heard distant rustling sounds.

We'd left for the forest right as the sun was about done setting, so we made sure to keep strictly to the well-marked trails for better lighting and visibility.

"Everything looks so different when it's dark," Melissa commented.

Both she and Derek were each holding a flashlight, so by Nolan's request, they led the way ahead.

A twig cracked under my shoe as I stepped on it. The air I was inhaling tasted so clean and fresh. I could practically smell the leaves. I loved it.

"I can hear the insects," Ashley whispered, looking around slowly as if she thought an ambush was incoming.

Cody looked concerned for her. "Are you okay?"

She was practically coated in organic insect repellent, courtesy of my stash, so I was fairly sure she'd be okay. I had to smile at how much attention he was paying her, though.

I wasn't sure why they hadn't gotten together yet, but Cody and Ashley had grown a lot closer over the last year. Cody still spent most of his time with his own group of friends, but he was an honorary member of ours. When he wasn't with them, he was usually hanging out with us.

"Probably." Gulping, she grabbed onto his arm with her left hand. "I'll be okay."

I caught the way he halted in his steps for just a second before continuing to walk again.

"What are you smiling at?" Nolan asked me.

Oops.

I squeezed his hand, which had a firm but gentle hold on mine, and shook my head. "Just shipping."

He had opened his mouth to respond when Melissa whirled around to beam at Ashley, distracting all of us. "Come on, Ash! Smell that? That's delicious fresh air! Take a deep breath and feel better!"

"I am," she shot back. "I kind of have to breathe to live, you know?"

"Whoa! Did you see that?" Derek asked.

"What?" Melissa instantly snapped her head back to him. "See what?"

"I think I saw a rabbit," he said, craning his head forward. "It's gone now, though."

"Really?" I asked, joining him at his side and inevitably pulling Nolan along. "That's so cool."

Nolan lagged a little behind me, probably to avoid the field of light.

Whenever I came here with Nolan, I never had a flashlight on, so I didn't really notice exactly what animals were scurrying around while we were walking towards the clearing.

Coming to stand beside me, Ashley said, "Rabbits are so cute. My cousins have a pair."

"They are!" I nodded profusely. "They look so fluffy. Just looking at them puts me in a better mood."

"What about squirrels?" Nolan asked.

"They're cute too, but why the random question?" I asked.

"There's one up on that tree right now," Nolan said, pointing to a tall oak tree that was about seven feet away from us.

We all followed his gaze to one of its branches where I could make out a squirrel that was perched on all fours. Seeming to tense up at our attention, it faced us for a moment. Then it scurried across the branch and up into the tree, where it disappeared behind the leaves.

"Aw," Ashley said. "I love their little bushy tails."

"Adorable," Melissa said. "My mom likes growing tulips in our yard, so every spring we get squirrels coming in. I like seeing them. Nightmare for my mom, though."

"Why?" Cody asked.

"They keep digging them up for the bulbs," she said. "It drives my mom crazy how much they love them."

Ashley grinned. "Aw. That's kind of cute, though."

"It only sounds cute," Melissa said. "You should see how mad my mom looks when she comes out into the garden to find them uprooting her precious flowers."

I stifled a laugh at the mental image of a squirrel digging up tulips in a garden while Melissa's mom emerged from the house yelling at it.

We resumed walking down the trail, admiring the surrounding trees and green shrubs and occasionally pointing out interesting-looking plants.

We were taking a short break to drink water when Ashley abruptly nudged me. "Chels! I just saw another squirrel!"

"Huh? Where?" I looked all around.

"Over there," she said, pointing at a nearby tree. "You have to look up. It's pretty high up."

"I've always liked them," Derek said, his head raised towards it. "They look so alert."

"They are," Melissa said. "They're really smart, too. They know how to run away when they see my mom coming and to return once she's gone."

"I wonder if these animals know how cute they are," Ashley said. "They have to, right? I can't imagine being so cute and fluffy and not knowing it."

"I don't know," Cody said. "If you were born cute and fluffy, wouldn't it just be the standard? I'm not sure they're aware."

"Yeah, I agree," Derek said. "Even if they were cute, I don't think it'd matter to them."

Melissa shook her head, her brown high ponytail nearly whipping me in the face. "What a waste. They're adorable but they don't even know it!"

"They probably don't care," Nolan said, leaning against the large trunk of a nearby oak tree.

"I've always been curious what goes through their minds, though," Ashley said. "I wonder what their thoughts are like."

"Me too," Melissa said. "If I were an animal, I'd want to be a squirrel. They're so cute."

"Yeah, you'd make a good squirrel," Derek said, unscrewing his water bottle cap. "You're agile and energetic enough."

"What about you?" Melissa asked. "Which animal would you rather be, if you were one?"

He hummed. "Maybe a parrot? They're mischievous, right?"

Ashley stared at him. "Who describes themselves as mischievous?"

"I mean, I just did, so ..."

Laughter bubbled up my chest and spilled out of my lips. "At least you're self-aware."

"Squirrels are pretty mischievous too, you know," Derek said, ignoring the daggers Melissa was shooting at him. "So I'm not alone!"

"What would you rather be?" Ashley asked Cody.

"Giraffes are pretty cool," he said with a grin, running his hand through his straight brown hair. "They're so chill all the time."

"That's ... actually a really unexpected answer. But giraffes are cute too, for such a large animal, anyway."

"What would you want to be?" he asked.

"I'd want to be a cat. Cats always look like they're having fun," she said.

"Suddenly, everyone's talking about what animal they'd like to be," Nolan said, sliding his arm around my waist and pulling me towards him.

Resting my head on his shoulder, I inhaled the wonderful fragrance emitting from his hoodie. In the background, I could hear Melissa and Derek having a lazy conversation about the characteristics of various animals the other resembled.

"You smell so good." I let out a happy sigh.

"Thanks," he said. "So do you."

Beaming at him, I asked, "Hey, what about me? What animal do you think I could be?"

"Can't picture you as any," he said, releasing his hold on my waist and grasping my hand instead.

I pouted as he began walking and pulling me along. "Come on. Can't you just play along?"

"Alright, I'll play along," he said, leading me around the huge tree trunk. "You start first. What do you think I'd be?"

"Um," I said, temporarily caught off-guard by him turning the question back on me. "Let me think. Where are we going, by the way?"

"Nowhere too far," he said, stopping when we were standing behind the trunk.

It was big enough to hide the both of us and cover the sight of the others. I could still hear them chatting idly about animals.

Then Nolan tugged me closer to him, leaning down so that our faces were mere inches apart.

"Hey," I said, bemused but not displeased.

"Hey," he whispered, tucking a stray lock of my hair behind my ear.

The warm touch of his finger sent tingles down from my ear and right into my heart. His other hand, which was on the small of my back, felt warm and reassuring.

"So, why are we standing here?" I whispered back.

"Because I feel like it."

A soft snigger escaped from him when I just gave him the most deadpan expression I could deliver.

I rolled my eyes. "Really now?"

"Nah. I was just thinking that I'll miss you when summer break starts," he said, his eyes boring through mine. "Would be nice if this moment never ended."

Warmth spread from my chest to every part of my body, right down to my fingers and toes. "I'll miss you too."

"I'll miss you a lot. If I were an animal," he murmured into my ear, the brush of his breath sending a shiver down my back, "I'd be a tortoise, and you'd be my shell."

My heart began to pound hard against my ribcage—I loved the sound of his low voice. As he drew back enough for me to see his face again, I could only stare at him.

"You make it possible for me to poke my head out into the world and have a look around, because I know I have a safe place to retreat into. I can't imagine myself without you," he said.

My grin felt like it was stuck on my face. Nolan said romantic things every now and then, but this was the sweetest one I'd heard so far. I didn't know he felt this way about me, but I guess it made sense. After all, he was here now, hanging out with our friends, who were his friends now just as much as they were mine.

"I can't imagine myself without you too," I said.

"So, yeah, I can't picture you as any animal," he said. "To me, you are the shell to my tortoise."

He slowly lowered his head towards mine, causing my heart to thump even harder than it already was.

"Wait!" I heard Melissa say loudly. "Where's Chelsea?"

"And Nolan?" That was Derek's voice.

It looked the others had finally noticed that we weren't there.

"I really love you," I whispered.

"Me too. I know we're still young right now, but I want to love you for the rest of my life," he whispered back.

Delight rippled through my chest. Although I mostly never got that sensation of floating in his presence anymore, he still often managed to make my heart beat faster when we were together. I could never get sick of feeling this way around Nolan.

"Me too."

Although I didn't know what the future held for us, I hoped that, no matter what, we would still be together.

His face drew closer to mine, and I caught a hint of his minty breath that smelled mildly of apples.

"Chelsea?" Cody's voice rang clear in the area.

"Nolan?" I heard Ashley call out.

As I tuned out our friends' voices calling out our names—they could wait just a couple of seconds—Nolan closed his mouth over mine in the sweetest kiss I'd ever tasted.

END

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AN: wow. that's the final chapter! i'm sorry this came out so late, but i had a busy week and i couldn't get the ending right. thank you all so much for coming on Nolan's and Chelsea's journey. they've come a long way, and i honestly feel so fond of them. (but i suppose that's normal lol) i have a sequel novella planned for yastmt, but it won't be out so soon!

there's still the epilogue, though. stay tuned!

if you enjoyed reading You Are the Shell to My Tortoise, i would really appreciate it if you left me a comment or at least a vote! votes really give a boost to my story and it doesn't take much effort. i'm really thankful for all the love you've given my story, and the fact that it's sitting at 180k+ reads rn is thoroughly amazing. （●'∀｀）ノ♡

LOVE YOU GUYS! (ෆˊ͈ ु꒳ ूˋ͈ෆ)