“Mom?” I’m the first one to speak.
“Yes, Lovebug?” I can hear the mirth in her voice, and it makes my heart sing.
“I think your chicken pot pie is burned.”
Love is a battlefield
And I think I fucking died
(last entry)
Graduation Day.
The red cape and matching graduation cap make us look like a menstrual cycle. I shit you not, this thing is brutal. I don’t know who thought of the idea to match our capes to our football gear, but whoever they were, they need to lay off the crystal meth.
Kannon and Camilo trudge behind me in the long line on the stairway leading to the stage as our principal reads out our names.
“At least he shaved.” Cam laughs, elbowing Kannon and jerking his chin toward me. His leg is healing, and though he still has a faint limp, he is surprisingly cool about it. I say surprisingly, but really, if there’s one thing I learned this year, it’s that you rise up to the circumstances when they are presented to you. We are so much stronger than we think we are. But sometimes, we go through decades without having a reason to be tested. The thing about life is, it always hits us. No one leads a charmed life. Even the blond, gorgeous, picture-perfect, popular rich girl harbors secrets. Even the football captain. Even the rich mother of two who married her hot millionaire ex-student. The ballet prodigy. Everyone’s got a story, and we all have chapters we’d rather not read aloud.
“You look good, Penn.” Camilo slaps my shoulder.
“I don’t swing that way, Cam. Stop talking,” I grunt.
“Are Melody and Jaime here?” Kannon asks, snickering some more. What’s with those idiots? They act like it’s the first time they’ve met me, and I’m goddamn Taylor Swift. I adjust my stupid cap and let out a breath.
“Yeah, yeah. Bailey and Via, too.”
“Where are they?” Kannon asks.
“Somewhere in the crowd.” Hundreds of seats are in front of the stage in our football stadium—red plastic ones, of course—but I never bothered to check because Mel texted me earlier telling me that they’re going to grab a place in the back so we can slip out when it’s all over for dinner. The last thing I want is to go on a family dinner, but I promised to play nice with Via, and so far, I’ve succeeded.
“You haven’t even checked? That’s cold.” Camilo pretends to shudder, rubbing at his arms.
I turn around toward them sharply. “What’s with you assholes? If this is about Via or Bailey, no, you can’t hit on either of them. Bailey’s not even fifteen, you goddamn pervs.”
Kannon bursts into laughter that makes the girl behind him jam an elbow into his ribs while Camilo shakes his head on a smile, and says, “Just look for them in the crowd, you basic piece of shit.”
Reluctantly, my eyes swipe over the rows of seats. The principal calls the girl two people away from me. I don’t have time for this bullshit.
“Left, bro. Look left,” Kannon is losing patience. My eyes dart to the last row on the left side, and then a sharp sound of glass shatters in my ears, and it’s probably my heart.
Daria is there sandwiched between Melody and Jaime. She is wearing a purple dress that makes her look like some kind of…I don’t know, fairy or some shit. So pretty I can’t blink because I’m afraid she’s not even real. She is staring right back at me, throwing me a bone. A timid, unsure smile. I want my mouth to break into a shit-eating grin, but my brain has officially disconnected from the rest of my body, and I can’t function.
Function, Penn. Function. Don’t be that creep. Smile back.
She stands because she can, because she is in the last row, because this, I understand now, was planned, and she is holding a sign in her hand. A generic brown piece of cardboard with one word written on it in black Sharpie.
Talk?
I nod, feeling the smile finally spreading across my face, letting loose.
Yes. Fuck. Yes.
“Penn Scully,” Principal Howard yells for what seems to be the millionth time by the impatience in her voice. How long have I been standing here, ogling Daria?
“Penn Scully? One last chance to take your diploma. You’ll need it if you want to attend Notre Dame.” She sniffs, pushing her glasses up her nose. I stumble my way across the stage as people erupt in claps and whistles. My eyes are still on Daria. My eyes are always on Daria. Notre Dame, which I reluctantly agreed to after Jaime basically yelled at me that his daughter and I ain’t happening, might have to take the back seat again.
I’ll go wherever Daria goes. Even if it’s straight to hell.
I take my diploma, mumble my thank you, hug the principal, and dart off the stage toward them. Technically, I need to go back to my seat like the rest of the students to throw my hat in the air. But technically, I’ve also been alive this last semester although anyone who knows me also knows it not to be true.
I run across the narrow row between the seats, knowing all eyes are on me, even though I don’t have the greenest clue how she is going to respond when I stand in front of her.
She is still standing. Mel is in my way to her, and she doesn’t make a move to stand or anything. So I just stand there, watching Daria watching me, trying not to notice the way everyone around us is grinning. I’m out of breath even though my cardio is on point.
“You’re here.” Evidently, I am still intellectually subpar even in comparison to wildlife when she’s around.
She giggles into her palm, looking down at her feet. I can feel in the air that she has changed. I can feel in my gut that so have I. My eyes roam her face and body, trying to detect how else she is different. If she has a tan or a new tattoo or haircut or another fucking guy attached to her by the arm. But she just seems like good ole Daria.
“I’m here,” she says.
“Thank you.”
“I wouldn’t have missed it for the world. You know that, right?”
No, I don’t, and I’m trying to tell myself not to get my hopes up because they are slamming their little fists against the door of my brain’s basement, wanting to gush out. She’s just here to support me. Via’s ceremony is next week, and maybe she wants to be there for the All Saints event, too. But then why would I see her here, as a surprise, and not at home, where we’d just left a couple of hours ago?
She finally wants to talk. I have so much to say to her, I want to write it down in my phone so I don’t forget the big stuff. But we have this stupid restaurant thing to go to. Food is for pussies. There’s no way I can stomach anything right now that’s not Daria’s pussy juices. But I highly doubt her parents want to know that.
I turn to Melody and Jaime.
“Any chance we can have a rain check on that graduation dinner?”
“Not a chance in hell,” Jaime replies dryly, his eyes still on his phone screen as he composes an email, his long legs crossed. His cigar pants ride up, revealing funny, colorful socks.
“Fuck,” I say.
“Language,” Mel singsongs, flipping through a brochure she got at the gate but not really reading it.
I turn back to Daria and take her hand even though Mel is between us. Daria tilts her head to the stage, her eyes never leaving my face.