We were cutting it close.

I'll be there I promise. Only ten minutes away, I texted Colin.

Luke was weaving in and out of traffic, not caring if he got into an accident in his most prized possession because he said a police escort to Colin's graduation would be even faster.

I'd insisted we hike down to the river bank to see the falls from below, and Luke relented after I kept pushing him, promising him we had enough time. I hadn't counted on the traffic.

I hopped into the back and pulled a dress out of my suitcase. My and Luke's eyes caught each other in the rearview mirror when I took my shirt off, and Luke reached up and turned it down like he hadn't just seen me naked less than twenty-four hours ago. I pulled the dress over my head, slipped my heels on, and settled back in the front seat.

Luke pulled up to the front of our high school with seven minutes to spare.

I got out of the car and turned around.

"I'll get your luggage to you tomorrow," Luke said, waving at me to go.

I hesitated. He hesitated. I turned slightly and turned back.

"Unless you want to meet me tonight," he added. "We'll be at Welliver's. That bar downtown."

I blinked. I wasn't going to that, but I could feel myself wanting to be wherever Luke was. Even if it was my high school reunion, and the last place in the world I wanted to be, I'd go there just to be with him.

"Thanks for everything," I choked out.

Luke nodded at me and smiled. "Now go, Bean. Before you miss it."

I took a deep breath, forcing myself to break eye contact, and turned around.

Do not look back, I said to myself as I pulled open the door and shut him out behind me. If I had, I would've cried.

I checked my phone. I had six minutes. I picked up my pace and turned down the senior hallway. I found my old blue locker and leaned back against it, taking in the empty corridor to the left and right.

I surprised myself when I realized I felt happy. Happy to have lived up to this moment because life is only a series a moments, and I could choose to live like it was always my last. I wouldn't relive my teenage years if I could, no matter the regrets, because they'd all brought me to the present point in time.

Memories came flooding back. Things I'd forgotten.

I looked to my right and remembered when Paige and I sat on that bench on the last day of school of sophomore year, writing in each other's yearbook. She was moving the next week, and I was convinced we wouldn't stay friends—that she would find cooler friends in L.A., that our communication would slowly dissipate. She totally did find cooler friends.

I turned around and tried the locker. It opened with a clink. It was completely empty and smelled like dirty metal. When it was mine, I had a picture of me and Paige from our last high school dance in tenth grade (we'd gone together) hung on the inside of the door and a white board for important school reminders below it—things like math quiz Tuesday and homework extra credit due next week for biology. The things I'd written there didn't matter at all anymore. At the time, they had seemed so important—like my life would be uprooted if I didn't get an A on the next assignment. And now I realized that shit didn't matter at all.

I looked to my left and remembered when Avery kicked my textbook in the hallway after I dropped it and she happened to be walking by. I had been so mad that I hadn't said anything, that I didn't stand up for myself, that I told her off later. But now I just laughed at how trivial it was.

Silly high school. Such distant memories that now seemed so far away. And if I'd told my high school self that I'd be standing in front of this locker five years into the future after going on a road trip with Lucas Finn, one in which we slept together and I'd developed maddening, unexplainable feelings for him, I would have laughed and laughed.

I made my way to the auditorium. I could hear the murmuring before I opened the wide double doors. I found Colin sitting on stage in his cap and gown before he saw me. I smiled as I watched him put his arm around the girl sitting next to him. She laughed at something he said and swatted his leg. I found the back of my dad's head and squeezed in front of the row of people sitting until I reached the empty seat meant for me.

"I'm sorry I'm late."

My dad sprang his head up from where he was reading the program. He looked older than the last time I saw him at Thanksgiving when he visited me in Boston. His short beard had splashes of gray and the lines in his forehead were a tad bit heavier.

He stood quickly and wrapped his arms around me. He smelled like home—old books and the hint of burnt metal that followed him from his job as a welder. "Reese," was all he could manage to get out. Always the strong silent type, he didn't want to cry.

"I missed you too, Dad."

He nodded against the side of my head and released me. Colin waved at me when I sat down. We beamed at each other, and he mouthed that he loved me.

He was older too. I wasn't sure how he could have grown so much buffer since the last time I saw him, but I suspected it had something to do with the girl sitting next to him, who also waved at us, or I was right about them turning my room into a gym.

Colin leaned down into her and said something in her ear before he kissed her on the top of her blonde head. She put her cap on and smiled up at him.

"That's a new development," I said to my dad.

He chuckled. "She's nice."

"And pretty," I added, inspecting her from head to toe. Her curls fell just below her shoulders, and she had on four-inch-high nude pumps. "Why didn't anyone tell me?"

"He didn't want you to pry." My dad rolled his eyes. "Teenagers."

"What's her name?"

"Emelia with an E."

I sat back and watched them before I realized I was watching like I was his mother. He was my brother, and I was supposed to be cool with his girlfriends—not inspect them like they were going to take my baby boy away from me. I switched to picking at the scab on my knee that I couldn't remember getting.

"Where have you been?" my dad mused, watching me like an actual parent.

I shrugged. "All of I-90."

"With?"

"Colin told you," I guessed.

"He talks to me," my dad said like he was cool. "And he just mentioned it. Don't you hate him?"

"Yeah, I did."

"Did?" my dad repeated and raised his eyebrows.

Principal Garcia stepped up to the podium in his navy suit and saved me just in time. "Good afternoon friends and family. We welcome all of you today to join us in this wondrous occasion."
Everyone clapped before he introduced the valedictorian. She stood and recited a version of a speech I'd heard hundreds of times about living life, appreciating the little things, making the most out of what we're given, and being happy. Why do we know all of these things, but it's so hard for us to actually practice them?

When she finished, Mr. Garcia took the podium again and began to read the names of the graduating class, starting with Colin Adler.

Colin rose in his maroon cap and gown and crossed the stage in ten large strides. I swore he had grown to at least six five since the last time I'd seen him.

He shook Mr. Turner's hand as he handed him his diploma and turned around and held it tight to his chest so I could take a thousand pictures. He beamed at me and my dad when he sat back in his seat as a high school graduate.

We did it!

Then I had to suffer through boredom for the next two hours, listening to one hundred and eight more names and a closing speech. But it was worth it to wrap my arms around Colin when he found us waiting in the foyer afterward.

"Hey, sis," he said warmly, picking me up off my feet.

I'd missed everything about him. His crooked smile, his boyish face. "I didn't miss you at all," I said, squeezing his neck tighter. He laughed and put me back on the ground. His graduation cap slid off his head, and he caught it behind his back.  "What is with the mullet though?" I added when I noticed his hair for the first time.

"Stupid boy trend," squeaked Emelia with an E, rolling her eyes from behind Colin.

I blinked at her. I blinked at her too many times. Not because she was dating my brother. Not because I was taking her in—though I noticed her petite frame, her freckles dotting her cheeks, and her toes tapping together like she was second guessing herself for speaking. But because of her choice of words.

Colin misinterpreted my silence. He pulled her into him with his arm around her back and introduced her. "The whole baseball team did it," he sigh-smiled. "Reese, this is my girlfriend Emelia."

I snapped out of it and smiled, bringing her into a hug. "It's so nice to meet you!"

I had a weird instinct to dig claws into her. This must be what parents feel like when their little baby is growing up too fast, and they have to meet their significant other. The protectiveness was hard to break. You don't want to see them ever have their heart broken, but at the same time, you want them to find everlasting love.

If it even exists.

Emelia squeezed me back. "I've heard so much about you."

Oh, God. And this must be what parents feel like when they realize all of the terrible things that have probably been said about them.

"Only good things, I hope," I said and cringed. I sounded like a mom. I caught Colin's eye, but he smiled lovingly at me.

"Only that you peed into a plastic bag once on the back of a tour bus on vacation, and he had to hold up a towel to block you," she remarked before her cheeks turned pink.

My dad laughed.

I narrowed my eyes at Colin. "You told her that?!"

He chuckled and shrugged. "It's a funny story, and Emelia was supposed to keep that to herself." He pinched her side.

"In my defense, there were no stops for another hour, and I was literally sweating from holding it for so long. And why am I still talking about me peeing?"

"No idea," Colin said with a smile.

"Mr. Adler," Emelia greeted my dad," it's good to see you."

My dad stepped up to hug her. "As always. See you Sunday for dinner?"

"I wouldn't miss it." She turned to me. "It was so nice to meet you, Reese," she said before she kissed Colin and whisked herself away to be with her own family.

"She goes to family dinners?" I looked between Colin and my dad.

My dad cracked a smirk. "Your brother's in love."

"Dad." Colin rolled his eyes. "Let's just go to dinner now."

At least I didn't get the eye roll.

—

Colin wanted lobster, so my dad had made reservations at a restaurant with real napkins, three forks, and a wine list longer than the taxes of every company I'd done that season combined.

I waited patiently—oh so patiently—the entire meal for Colin to bring up Emelia.

First they had to hear about every (appropriate) detail of my road trip. They asked way too many questions. They wanted to see all of the pictures.

And when I came to the events of earlier that day, Colin finally said, "Emelia and I went to Snoqualmie Falls a few weeks ago."

"How long have you two been a thing?" I asked as casually as I could.

Colin couldn't hide the affection on his face no matter how hard he tried. "Since prom. I did the whole promprosal thing."

I hadn't gotten any promposals, but Russ had asked me senior year if I felt like ever coming out of my hole, he'd take me. What a gentleman.

I'd heard about Luke's junior year. He'd completely covered Avery's front porch with bouquets of red roses and and waited on the steps with a huge sign until she came home. Avery couldn't stop talking about it—but then Luke broke up with her the next week.

Colin pulled me from my thoughts. "Dad helped me weld a huge metal 'PROM?' sign, and I wheeled it into her front yard once it got dark and lit a bunch of sparklers I stuck in the ground and knocked on her door."

I smiled.

"What?" he asked. "Is that lame?"

It wasn't. At all. I was smiling because he looked so happy, and it was such a cute idea. "Colin, that's amazingly perfect. Is she going to Washington State too?"

Colin shook his head. "No, Gonzaga."

"You're going to do long distance?" I asked, my smile faltering.

"It's only an hour away," he insisted. "Besides, we've heard it all before. If it doesn't work out then it doesn't work out, but it won't be because we didn't try."

I laughed under my breath.

Colin rolled his eyes at me. Ugh, I got the eye roll. "What?"

"Nothing. Just... we could all learn something from teenagers."

"Ain't that the truth," my dad remarked. "Present time!" My dad pulled out a box wrapped in shiny blue wrapping paper and handed it to Colin.

Colin couldn't hide his excitement. He tore into it and cried, "A new MacBook!" when he was able to read the box. "This is awesome, thank you!"

"You worked hard, you got a scholarship, you deserve it," my dad replied.

My dad must have worked an extra shift for that. Despite everything I did, my dad was still my hero. I think being a single parent has to be one of the hardest jobs in the world.

He turned to me. "And I know you're not graduating, but we got something for you too."

"What! Why?"

"Because you've sacrificed a lot, and when you told me about your plans this summer, I wanted to get you a gift."

He handed me a white envelope. It was warm from his pocket. I thumbed the flap hesitantly, trying to control my emotions, before I pulled out an airline gift card.

I fought back the tears.

"That should get you at least five or six flights hopefully," my dad said softly. "Colin pitched in too."

They both beamed at me, and the tears started to fall. I shook my head. "You shouldn't have done this."

It was way too much.

"Yes, we should have," Colin retorted. "You deserve to have an awesome summer."

"Thank you," I whispered and laughed. "Okay, okay, this dinner is getting way too emotional. Can we go home and curl up and watch a movie now?"

I wasn't sure I could take anymore crying.

Colin laughed. "Psh, I've got a party to go to."

"Right," I joked. "Of course, you do."