When Amora Banks lands in Atlanta she expects to have the normal college experience. She has her girls, a love interest, and a set plan of how everything will go for the next four years. But, when she meets Derek Streeter, a mysterious college senio...
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"Amora Banks," the speaker said my name. I walked from behind the curtain and smiled, spotting my family and friends right off. I waved at them happily before shaking the line of hands. When I reached the last person there my diploma was, waiting for me.
"Congratulations," my dean said sincerely and handed my diploma. I turned and smiled at the camera before walking down the stairs and off the stage. I went back to my seat with the other graduates and stared in awe at my diploma. There it was finally in my hands. Four years of hard work had finally paid off. My phone buzzed signaling I had a text and I laughed when I saw it was from Derek saying, "They called your name can we leave now?" I shed a few tears watching my friends walk across the stage as well. All we'd been through since we got here seemed worth it. We were done. We were starting new lives in the real real world now.
"Look at my baby!" my mom spoke, waving a cut out of my face in the air. I laughed as I joined my family once the ceremony was over. I hugged everyone and tried not to cry even more than I already had. My dad and Adonis both embraced me, saying how proud they were of me but Derek was who I had been waiting to see.
"A & D company coming soon?" he asked. I jumped in his arms, holding him tightly. The past four years with him had been long and hard to say the least but we made it. We hit the milestone I had been waiting for. We were both done with college and the start of our lives together was now. "You did it baby girl. I'm proud as fuck," he said in my ear. I laughed at how he chose to show his pride. It was unique to Derek and I loved it.
I posed for a million photos. Group photos, photos of just me and someone else, photos with my friends, every type of photo you could think of. Everyone had shown up to see me, Jaiya, Devyn, and Mia walk across that stage. Kingston, Mario, Gelo, Damon, Lolo, even Bianca. Things had been kind of rocky with us after Rodney's passing but we were working on getting our friendship back to where it was. To this day no one knew what happened except me, Derek, Damon, and Gelo. We never even told King, who was the reason I suggested it in the first place. I tried not to think about everything that took place that night but some days it haunted me. I wanted today to be full of celebration though.
"So where are we going for dinner?" I asked, looking around at everyone. The girls were going with their families but I had my family and Derek's there to support me. We debated on a restaurant for the longest. "Chanel why are they like this?" I asked grabbing her out of Damon's arms.
"You always tryna turn my daughter against me," Damon mugged. Chanel loved her aunty Mora and Uncle Streeter which was the best feeling ever. She would come have sleepovers all the time, all her birthday parties had been thrown in our backyard so far, and since I got along with her mom, Tahani, so well, we'd take her out on weekends just for the fun of it. We'd been to every attraction they had in Atlanta.
"Derek can you call and make a reservation?" I asked once we picked a place. He pulled his phone out, about to call when someone started calling him instead. He excused himself which meant it was a business call. He looked like he was arguing with whoever it was so I handed Chanel back to Damon and went to see what the problem was.
