Preacher Man // ross lynch + driver era

112

Rocky gets out of the passenger seat and leaves the door open. "Hi babe," he says then kisses Liv. "Hayley, you can sit in the front." He points his hand out to the door.

I squeeze Ross's hand before stepping away from him. "Hi Rocky and Rydel. Happy you guys can be here," I tell them once I slide in.

"So happy to be here," Rydel says from the backseat.

Everyone gets into the car and Ross's hand immediately goes to squeeze my thigh once he begins driving. He's dressed in jeans and a nice shirt and he looks so good.

"Why this car?" I ask, glancing around at the nice interior.

He shrugs. "It was between this or a minivan so I decided this was the better fit," he smiles, his hand reaching out to gently press against the back of my head, but careful enough to not mess up my hair. "How are you feeling? Excited?"

I nod. "Excited. Nervous. Definitely a lot better knowing you're here though," I confess, feeling my levels of anxiety lower since seeing him.

As he rolls to a stop at the red light, he leans over and kisses me again. "You look so beautiful, by the way," he mumbles.

"It's green," Rydel says.

Ross laughs and continues the drive to the university. He walks me over to check in, my mind flashing back to when I brought him to his. "Proud of you. I'll see you after," he says, ghosting his hand down my arm as a way of affection.

I smile. "I'll probably text you if I'm bored," I say.

Mostly in reference to his graduation day, but I will definitely be bored too.

He picks up on it thankfully. "Perfect," he replies. "Have fun."

I walk over to the table and check-in, being told which direction to go. Graduation is a lot of waiting around and it is boring. So. So. Boring.

I made friends with the people on other side of me to just keep time rolling until they began their speeches so I can be more bored.

Out of respect, everyone became quiet and all eyes were on the chancellor as he spoke.

They finally began to call names. It's great to go within the first twenty students, but then I have maybe three hundred more to sit through. Thankfully my school isn't massive so it shouldn't be too long.

As I nervously stand up and begin the walk to the side of the stage, I just need to focus on my breathing and walking.

I'm fucking graduating.

"Hayley Atkins," the voice boomed through the speakers and my heart pounded with every step I made in order to reach the diploma and shake his hand.

Screams erupted from the crowd and I take the diploma and shake the mans hand. I glance over to the crowd as I make my way to the stairs and see all of my lovely friends standing up as they cheered me on.

"Yeah Hayley!" Ross yells and I have the biggest smile on my face as I finally get to the bottom of the stairs and they sit down before interrupting the next name.

I head to my seat and sit down, high-fiving the people next to me.

I watched the ceremony quietly, observing every new face I haven't seen. I feel my phone vibrate so I pull it out.

Max: I know we haven't talked because I'm too ashamed of my past actions. I didn't think it was fair for you (or myself) to try and act like everything was fine when I felt differently than you did about me. I know you're graduating today so congratulations. I heard you're moving to LA. Good luck on your future endeavors.