Not Enough Tomorrows

Congratulations, Noah Carter

By the time Noah got to school Monday morning, the news had already spread.

"Noah Carter!" Mr. Reynolds, his English teacher, called out as soon as he walked through the door. "There he is. Our International Excellence Scholarship winner!"

The classroom erupted into applause, a few kids whistling, someone clapping him on the back as he made his way to his seat. Noah managed a smile, ducking his head slightly.

"Thanks," he said. "It's not a big deal."

"Not a big deal?" Mr. Reynolds laughed. "Do you know how many students apply for this every year? You're the first from this school in a decade."

By lunch, half the school seemed to know. Teachers stopped him in the hallway to congratulate him. A group of juniors he barely knew asked if it was true he'd be studying overseas. Everyone wanted to talk about it except him.

Lena found him by his locker, practically vibrating with excitement.

"Noah!" She threw her arms around him before he could react. "You did it. You actually did it!"

"Yeah," he said, laughing despite himself as she pulled back, beaming.

"I am so proud of you. Like, insanely proud." She grabbed his arm, practically bouncing on her heels. "This is huge. This is everything you've worked for."

"It's a big opportunity," he said carefully.

"A big opportunity? Noah, this is the International Excellence Scholarship. Do you know what this means? You're going to study overseas. You're going to do everything you've always talked about."

He nodded, though something in his chest tightened at the way she said it—so easily, so certainly, like there was nothing complicated about any of it.

At home that evening, his mother cried when she hugged him.

"I am so proud of you," she said, holding his face in her hands. "Your father would be too."

"Thanks, Mom," Noah said, hugging her back.

"We need to celebrate. I'm calling the Brookses over for dinner."

"Mom, you don't have to—"

"Noah Carter, my son just won an international scholarship. We are absolutely celebrating."

Dinner that night was loud and warm, full of toasts and laughter, Lena's mother raising her glass so many times Lena eventually took it from her hand, laughing. Lena sat beside Noah the entire meal, practically glowing with pride, already talking about logistics.

"We'll figure out time zones," she said, scrolling through her phone. "I read that video calls work best in the mornings there, which would be like, evening here—"

"Lena—"

"And I'm already thinking about care packages. Do they even have peanut butter where you're going? Because if not, that's priority one—"

"Lena," Noah said again, quieter this time.

She looked up at him, still smiling. "What? I'm just planning ahead. We're going to stay in touch every single day. I already decided."

Noah opened his mouth, then closed it again. "Yeah," he said finally. "Every day."

He didn't say anything else for the rest of dinner.

***

That night, alone in his room, Noah sat at his desk and stared at the acceptance letter still open on his laptop screen. The scholarship logo sat proudly at the top, followed by paragraphs about tuition coverage, housing, program dates—an entire future laid out in black and white.

He read it twice. Then he quietly closed the laptop.

He couldn't picture it. Not really. Not in any way that made sense. Every time he tried to imagine himself overseas, in some unfamiliar city, surrounded by people who didn't know him, all he could think about was what he'd be leaving behind.

He opened a drawer instead and pulled out an old flash drive, plugging it into his laptop. A folder of videos loaded on the screen—years of birthdays, festivals, backyard summers, all labeled in his own crooked handwriting from when he was younger. *Lena's 10th Birthday. Lake Trip 2019. Halloween — Lena Fell In The Leaves (Funny).*

He clicked through them one by one, watching a version of themselves that felt impossibly far away already—six-year-old Lena missing her front teeth, laughing so hard she fell over. Twelve-year-old Lena teaching him how to skip stones, badly. Fifteen-year-old Lena, caught mid-laugh at some joke he didn't even remember making.

He watched until his eyes burned, until the room around him had gone completely dark except for the glow of the screen.

He thought about the acceptance letter. He thought about her voice at dinner, already planning around an absence she didn't fully understand yet.

He thought about a lifetime of promises. *I'll always find you. You'll never lose me.*

How was he supposed to keep any of them from another continent?

Noah opened the scholarship website again, the acceptance page still loaded from earlier. His eyes moved slowly down the page until he found it.

DECLINE OFFER.

His cursor hovered over the button, hand steady even as his heart wasn't.

He clicked it