Picture Us

Chapter 18: Multi POV

POV: Tam

The next weeks was a hurricane of emotions, their results and graduation were fast approaching. This was the end of college, Tam realised with a skip of his heartbeat. Now, he had to go find a real job in the real world, with real people who probably sucked. Tam continued to worry about Linh, and they visited her together every few days, but their togetherness became a sense of reassurance.

Through weeks of officially being boyfriends, they'd both put off date planning until after all their piled-up stress had passed. Tam wouldn't tell Keefe, but he ached to go out somewhere, without all stress of exams and the noise that came with college. All he wanted was to go to a nice cafe with Keefe, and chatter endlessly about... something. But, as their schedules had it, there was no way to fit it in with everything going on.

The morning in their dorm had been filled with anxiety as the hours counted down until their final grades were released. They were standing at their kitchen counter, Keefe's eyes drifted to Tam, his nerves twisted into an uneasy expression. Tam didn't even notice Keefe watching him; he was too busy worrying about if he was going to fail. In between his own injuries and Linh's current condition, it didn't leave much time for studying.

Keefe crept up behind him and rested a hand softly onto his shoulder, Tam jumped slightly.

"Hey Tammy... wanna go out after graduation?" He asked.

Keefe watched Tam's troubled expression melt into a wide smile as he snapped out of his worried state. Tam grinned a wide, goofy grin. He spun around to face Keefe.

"Finally, we've been procrastinating that for way too long." he paused for a moment. "I was starting to wonder whether you were going to chicken out." he teased.

Keefe wrapped his arms around Tam, furrowing his brow. "You know you could've asked me too, right?"

"Oh yeah...I forgot about that." he laughed, hugging Keefe back.

After a few moments of silence, they both loosened their embrace.

"I'm so nervous for the scores to be released today." Tam breathed. It was the first time he'd voiced his fears, and it felt freeing. With a healthy dose of even more nervous.

"Yeah, I can tell, you've been looking like you're about to crap yourself all day." he joked, a smirk appearing onto his face. Tam lightly punched Keefe in annoyance,

"Shut up, I know you're nervous too."

POV: Keefe

They sat on the edge of Tam's bed, Keefe leant on Tam's shoulder, resting his open laptop beside him. He tapped his leg nervously as they watched the clock tick down until their release time. 3:58pm, 2 minutes left.

Tam breathed shakily "I don't know how I'm supposed to react, what if I get a shit grade?"

Keefe chuckled "Even if you do, I won't judge, I mean you had just got out of hospital." he pecked Tam's cheek, holding onto Tam's hand as reassurance.

As the clock showed 4:00, a notification dinged on both their laptops. They both clicked onto it.

Keefe felt a wave of relief as he read 91% in bold writing. With uncertainty he twisted his head towards Tam, who was already looking at him. His mouth lay agape, completely unreadable, Keefe peered at his laptop screen. 85%, he felt an overwhelming happiness rush over him, probably much more than Tam was feeling at the moment.

"We did it Tammy boy." he sighed, smiling. "We are officially finished with everything!"

Tam rolled his eyes, but he was smiling more than Keefe. "Finally, I'm so relieved, I thought I was gonna fail it completely."