Candy Hearts | Watty's 2015

| 12 | Sunday, June 14

| 1 2 | Sunday, June 14

Arizona has never seen so much royal blue in her entire life.

The sun is blinding in her eyes, and reaching out, she grabs Crosley to position him before her, and he is just tall enough to block the light. "Thanks, man." Crosley grunts in response, eyes glued to the phone in his hand. Arizona rolls her own pair and turns to Romy, who is grinning so largely that Arizona nearly winces. Romy flicks her blonde fringe out of her eyes and blinks at Arizona.

"Dude. We're done with public education. Forever."

"Can't wait to get out of this hellhole," Gem mutters from beside Romy, just as Briana bounds up to her friends, Christine in tow.

"Congrats, you guys!" Briana yells and tugs everybody down to her height for a hug. Crosley sighs, shoves his phone back into his pocket, and obliges. "Christine's here."

"We can see that," Crosley raises his eyebrows, and Arizona slaps his bicep. He frowns at his arm before knocking it into Arizona's stomach, with a lot of force. "Oops."

"Fuckin' dick."

"Good to know, Zonie."

"What the fuck did you just call me?"

"You know exac-"

Arizona slams her foot down on Crosley's, and yelping a very high-pitched yelp, he scowls at her and grabs at his foot. Crosley growls and moves to stand next to Gem, away from Arizona, who only smirks.

"You guys seem excited," Christine says, fixing the red beret over her pin-straight black hair.

"Okay, Christine, now is not the time for your whole I'm-older-and-I-can-give-you-children-life-advice." Gem crosses her arms and Christine grins and raises her hands.

"It was a fair question."

"Don't mind Gem, she's just bitter over not getting into every single Ivy League school." Crosley rolls his eyes and Gem sticks her tongue out at the grinning boy.

"You can leave, Cros," says Arizona. "You know, hang out with some guys for the first time since first grade. Just a suggestion. You do know that we all think of you as 'one of the girls,' right?"

"Excuse you, I have friends that are boys."

"I'm sure you do," says Christine and Crosley makes a sound of protest.

"I've spoken to you about three times in my entire life, you have no right," he says to Christine, who giggles.

"Shut up, Crosley."

"Yes, please do."

"You're a loser, Cros."

♥ ♥ ♥

The actual ceremony, in and of itself, had been quite a long, boring process. Georgie Cortez, the valedictorian, had given her speech, at which Briana had teared up, much to her friends' amusement. ("Briana, are you crying?" "No, shut up, Christine." "Awww, Bri-ana." "I hate you.")

Now they stand in the plaza. The night has cooled down with a comfortable breeze and the pink skies are sufficiently sinking into dark blue ones, much like the robes hanging off of everybody's shoulders. Christine, appointed for the duty of picture-taking, rarely stands still, running around to get different angles and shots of the-holy shit-graduates.