Page 126 of Scarred King
“Are you ashamed of me?” I ask throatily.
He places his hand on mine, and suddenly twists it behind my back and sits me on his lap. “Ashamed?” he trails his finger down my cheek and screws up his eyes. “Try… in love, crazy… mad about my Duchess.” He grasps my head and kisses me again.
I turn to everyone else at the table. They stare at me, stunned.
“Ralph,” I laugh, “close your mouth. You never know what could get in there by mistake.” He looks at me in disgust and shuts his mouth right away. I stand up and hold onto Liam’s hand. “Come on, get up. You’re all coming with us.” I order them.
“Where to?” Ilan stands up immediately, looking amused.
“To the observatory.” I snuggle up to Liam. “Let’s see who can find some black holes.” I wink at him.
Ralph gets up. “I like holes. I don’t care what color they are.”
Tommy shrugs his shoulders indifferently. “I’m up for it.”
Only Mike scratches his head and gapes at us in bewilderment. “Wait, what? Why can’t I ever understand what you’re talking about?”
“You don’t have to,” I smile. “Your eyes will explain everything to you.”
We all walk toward the exit together and I stop and pull Liam’s hand. He turns his head toward me and smiles lovingly.
“My name’s Elena and I’m an addict,” I whisper to him.
“I love you, Elena. And I’ll never make you need to go to rehab.”
I jump on his back and we go outside to the street. A short, chubby guy takes a picture of us with his cellphone and I lean forward and kiss the most beautiful, exceptional scars I’ve ever seen in my life.
Epilogue
I smooth the gown over my black dress and sway on my feet, standing in a long line of students waiting to walk onstage and receive their diplomas.
Professor Sawyer approaches me with a pretty, young woman who smiles at me. “I couldn’t miss your graduation,” he smiles his bashful smile as he leans down and kisses my cheek. “I’d like you to meet Mia.” He moves aside and she puts her hand out. “She’s a professor in our Communications department.”
“Communications?” I ask, amazed.
“Nobody’s perfect!” he laughs, and she elbows him in the ribs.
“Perfect is boring,” I smirk. “Except for my thesis,” I add, waving a threatening finger at him. “That has to be perfect.”
“No worries, I’m sure it will be.” He gives me a big smile and the two of them make their way to the first-row seats.
I peek at the audience excitedly. I see my loved ones among all the excited parents and honored guests. There is my mom in a tailored suit, next to her is my man, with his tousled hair and green, cat-like eyes. Further down the row are Ralph, Tommy, Mike, Charlie, Ilan and some of the girls, who really made a great effort to dress conservatively today. Even Johanna came especially for me. My eyes lock on Liam’s and he winks and smiles at me.
“Elena Distal,” I hear them call me to the stage with my mother’s maiden name. I take my eyes off Liam’s loving gaze, stand up straight, and go up the stairs, shaking hands with my professors and stopping in front of the dean.
“Congratulations on graduating with honors, summa cum laude,” he says as he shakes my hand and hands me my diploma. I turn to the audience and hear thunderous applause. All my friends stand up, whistling and cheering. They point cameras at me, and I pull my fan out of my belt, snap it open and pose for the cameras proudly. I walk to the microphone. It’s time for my commencement speech. I unfold the paper in front of me knowing that I don’t really need it but drawing confidence out of it. I clear my throat and there's silence.
“Ladies and Gentlemen,” I turn my head towards the staff members onstage, “Dear guests,” I look at the audience, “and fellow graduates,” I smile as the crowd applauds enthusiastically, “I tried to think how to summarize three challenging and intensive years. Years of learning the basic laws of physics, that led us to magical, fascinating realms. And I've come to a conclusion that there’s nothing to summarize because this is just the beginning for us.” I look away from the pages in my hand and scan the audience. “We were taught everything that great and important people managed to discover long before we came along. And now we need to put that all aside and allow ourselves to discover great new things, to try and make significant difference in our world. And most importantly…” I pause for a moment and look at my man, “most importantly, we need to understand that there are many ways of looking at the world out there. We should realize that sometimes, stars are just shiny, pretty, white dots. We should realize that sometimes we can add energy to the world, especially if we decide to fill it with goodness. That we don’t always have to search for a logical explanation, because sometimes the most illogical things are the ones that will give us great passion for life.” Liam smiles his captivating smile at me, and I lay my hand on my heart. “Every way of looking at it, is a whole new world. And the collision between these worlds doesn’t have to be negative – it can actually ignite an explosion of love.”
I stick the sword barrette into my cap and throw it up in the air to the crowd’s applause.