The Boy Across Enemy Lines

Epilogue.

After that day of the magical peace treaties everything changed. Our parents accepted Dante and I’s relationship and everything went smoothly. We even had family gatherings together.

“Here we go.” Mom said placing the salad on the table.

“This looks great honey.” My dad said before kissing her cheek.

“Yes Ashely, this looks amazing.” Mrs. D’Angelo said smiling at her.

“And I bet it tastes even better than it looks.” Mr. D’Angelo said.

“Well, be the judge of that your self. Dig in.” My mom replied sitting down. Everyone dug into the food.

“So Alicia, have you decided what school you’re going to be going to?” Mr. D’Angelo asked looking over at me.

“Well, I’ve applied for a couple different schools. Stanford, NYU, Yale, some other state colleges, but I haven’t settled on one yet.” I said simply.

“Well, I’m sure you’re going to do great wherever you go.” Mrs. D’Angelo said smiling.

“Thank you.” I replied happily. Our mom entered into chatter about some movie. While our dads talked about sports. It was normal. Everything was normal. And I liked that. I looked over at Dante and smiled up at him.

“This is perfect.” He whispered looking down at me.

“As it should be.” I replied before he kissed my cheek and began eating his food.

Soon enough graduation rolled around. The end of our high school career had finally come. I wasn’t sure if I was ready to leave it all behind I mean, it’s been such an amazing four years of my life. But everything goof must come to an end. And now I was off to do bigger and better things. To start a life somewhere else to make the most out of my life. And of course our Valedictorian, Cece, would be giving the speech.

“And now seniors of this wonderful school. It’s time to go out and explore. It’s time to go out and try new things. Make mistakes. Fix them. And make a life for yourself. Don’t let anyone tell you what you can or cant do. Don’t let anyone let you feel less of yourself. Because you are stuck with yourself for the rest of your life. You can either be the best person you can be or live with the consequences. Go become an Art major. Go become a physicist. Go out and save the world. Do whatever you want because this is you’re life. Yours and no one can take that away from you. This right here is not the end. This is only the beginning. Now you have the whole world at your fingertips. Grab it and don’t let go. It’s been a privilege to spend the past four years of my life with you guys. Now it’s time for us to separate and go down different paths that are all going to lead to the same place. Success. Thank you.” Cece finished before walking off the stage. We all clapped while the principal came up.

“Now, we are going to be handing out the diplomas.” He said. He started with the roll call and one by one every senior of this school walked across the stage and got their diploma.

“By the power invested in me by the state of California. You are now high school graduate. You may now move your tassels.” The principal said. And we did. And everyone cheered or looked down at their diploma. Their certificate of high school completion. And that’s a lot more than what people think it is. It’s a lot more than just grades. In these four years you go through a lot more than completing assignments and acing tests. You go through friendships. You go through heartbreaks. You go through drama and lies and betrayal. You go through shit load of stress. You go through parties and late nights and hiding the fact that you’re drunk beyond your wits from you’re parents. You go through arguments and tears. You go through laughs and smiles. You go through a lot to get to this point. And no certificate can nearly compare or even remotely represent the things that you’ve gone through during the course of these past four years. Nothing. But that’s all we get. We get a diploma and we walk across this stage and we move our tassel. And we allow ourselves to believe that these simple things can symbolize the memories of these past four years, because that’s all we get.