Not a Love Story

Fifty-Four // Graduation

Oliver Greene

Graduation was just a few weeks away and everyone was cramming to get through the last round of exams before we were finally free.

I'm happy to say Ben is not in danger of failing bio, he's actually on track to get an A if he does well on the final. All of us were sitting at lunch, Ben at my side as I was hunched over my calculus textbook, furiously reading over integrations.

"Ol?" Ben asked, nudging my arm. I looked up at him, seeing the others were all animatedly engaged in conversations. "You okay?" he asked, his eyebrows knitted together.

"A little stressed." I admitted, letting out a sigh. Ben reached over and put the scrap paper I'd been using as a bookmark on the page I was on before shutting it.

"Why don't you eat? You still have another week until your calc midterm, right?" he asked. I slowly nodded. "Okay. So how about you look at calc after you eat?" he suggested. I nodded again, watching as he slid the book to his side so I couldn't reach it. I reached for my lunch and pulled out my sandwich, leaning into Ben's side as I listened in on Mia and Jack's argument over which Marvel movie is the best.

- - - -

Finals are finally over.

Graduation is tomorrow.

Mia, Jack, Alex, Emily and I all sat in Alex's basement, the floor covered in craft supplies as we decorated our caps. Mia's had a giant 'M' on hers in the University of Minnesota font and color. Emily was working on an intricate quote written in fancy lettering with the Marquette logo at the bottom of her cap. Jack was mostly messing around, complaining that he didn't know what to put on his cap and Alex had a printout of the Wisconsin 'W' plastered on top of his and was leaning back, watching a distressed Mia fight with Jack over the hot glue gun.

"You're not putting anything else on yours, Alex?" Emily asked, looking at the piece of paper he'd hot glued to his cap.

"Don't see why it needs to be extravagant." Alex responded, shrugging. I laughed and shook my head as I continued cutting out the Michigan 'M' out of yellow paper.

"Also not all of us are artistic geniuses like you, Emily." Jack teased, watching as she glued another rhinestone to her cap. She just smiled and continued working.

"I don't know what to do." Jack groaned again.

"Just slap the Iowa 'I' on it and call it a day." Alex suggested. Jack groaned again and reached for a piece of yellow paper.

I glued the last bit of the 'M' onto my cap and looked down at it. It looked pretty good if I said so myself.

"That looks great, Oliver." Mia said, smiling at me.

"Thanks." I said. "Can you guys believe tomorrow is the graduation?" I asked.

"It all seems really surreal." Emily said. Everyone agreed, nodding.

"We need to make sure we get pictures together, so no leaving until we do!" Mia insisted, making each of us promise before we went upstairs to get pizza her mom had just brought home.

- - - -

"I can't believe my baby is graduating." my mom said, snapping another picture of me.

"Maybe save the pictures for after the ceremony, mom." I laughed. She nodded and wiped a tear from her eye, David looking over at her and pressing a kiss to her temple in an attempt to calm her down. I smiled at the gesture, happy to see my mom so happy.

"Let's get a move on, I don't want to stand for 3 hours." Henry said as he bolted down the stairs.

"Alright, yes good idea. Let's get going." my mom agreed, ushering us all into the car. I sat next to Henry, my leg bouncing up and down as I looked out the window, the school coming into view.