Authors Note: Here is a nice long chapter for you, in this chapter everything takes place at approximately the same time, but focuses on the separate characters. Thanks Spitfire303, I'll remember that next time :) thanks to everyone else that reviewed! Enjoy the chapter :)

After Graduation: Chapter 11

After a 1 hour car ride they finally arrived at the institute. It was a large white building. "This is it!" Lewis said as they walked through the entrance towards the reception. There they had to wait for a while as the receptionist was busy. They looked around taking it all in. They noticed they were probably among the youngest there, as this wasn't the place for new high school graduates. Most of the others there were in their mid twenties or older. They had been told Lewis's supervisor would be with them soon. As they waited they were joined by another pair, a girl and a boy who were around their age too. The girl was quite tall with straight blond hair that ended halfway down her back, and the boy was tall with longish light brown hair. Before they could say anything an older women approached the 4.

"Lewis McCartny, Elizabeth James?" the woman asked. Lewis and the other girl nodded in response. She shook their hands and introduced herself as Mary Owen, but that they should call her and that she would be their supervisor.

After a short conversation they found out that the two of them were the only ones attending the program at this particular Institute. She explained that she would first take them to their rooms to get settled in and then give them a little time to get to know each other, before doing a tour of the institute after lunch.

They headed over to a smaller building next to the institute. Inside there were several rooms that were for researchers to stay in while at the Institute. Those who worked there permanently of course had a home somewhere in Brisbane, but many just stayed for a couple of months, and weren't bothered to find a place of their own. Since Lewis and Elizabeth were part of a program, they would of course each get a room there too. Each room had a bed, a desk and chair and a wardrobe, as well as a nightstand and a few lamps. There was also a adjourning bathroom with a toilet, sink and shower. It was all pretty simple, but in good condition.

In the building there were about 10 of those rooms. There was also a large common area that included kitchen and seating area.

About half an hour later they were sitting in the common area, chatting away with Elizabeth, who told them to call her Lizzie, and her boyfriend Michael Johnson. They were both from Caboolture, a small town on the opposite side of Brisbane, about 45 minutes away, and she had gotten into the program through her high-school biology teacher who had recognized her talents, and had a contact at the institute who agreed with her. Michael was, like Cleo, there to help his significant other get settled in as he worked at the Caboolture Golf Club. They were just casually getting to know each other better when they realized they had to eat lunch or something before they were meeting at 1 o'clock for the tour. So the four of them headed out to eat.

Meanwhile, not so far away, at the University of Queensland, Emma and Asch were moving in her things into the dorm. They had arrived shortly before lunch as they didn't have the same tight schedule as Cleo and Lewis had, but they were meeting up with them for dinner, and then Ash would drive Cleo and himself back to the Gold Coast.

For the time being though, Emma was stressing over everything, and they had barley gotten there. First she was afraid there had been some mistake as she hadn't graduated like a normal student, then once he was checked in she was scared the room would be bad or something, and now she was stressing over getting everything organized. Ash knew Emma wasn't usually this bad, even though she could be a control freak sometimes, but he assumed it was because of the prospect of change and living on her own that maybe scared her a little.

They were just about the unpack a box of books when another girl came into the room. The girl was short with brown curly hair and glasses on her nose. She was wearing a pair of dark-wash jeans and a floral blouse. She stood there awkwardly looking at them, unsure what to say. Emma decided to make the first move.

"Hi, I'm Emma Gilbert. You must be roommate!" she said as she stood up and took the girls hand.

"I..uh..guess I am.. I'm Rosie Oberfield.." the girl said quietly. It was evident that she was a very shy girl.

"Nice to meet you Rosie, I hope you don't mind that i already chose a side, if it really bothers you we can change." In response Rosie shook her head as to say it was fine. "I'm going to go get my things" she said as she exited her room.

"Poor girl, she seems really shy" Ash casually mentioned after she left. "Yeah, hopefully she will open up more once i get to know her better, she seems sweet though", and then they returned to unpacking the books.

A while later Rosie returned to the room, struggling to pull a large suitcase behind her. Ash, being the gentleman that he is, rushed up to help her.

"Here, let me help you! Oh, and sorry i didn't introduce myself earlier, I'm Ash Dove, Emma's boyfriend", the girl was in minor shock by his actions, but thankful none the less.

"Dont you have anyone to help you?" Emma asked, wondering why such a petite girl was luging her things all by herself.

Rosie shook her head and explained that she was here by herself because she was originally from around Perth and no one was bothered to fly all the way across the country to help her move in. The couple felt bad for her, all alone, so far away from home, so they decided to to help her. They were almost done with Emma's stuff anyway.

In the mean time life went on back at Gold Coast as well. Will and Bella had finished packing up all her things and were heading over to her new home at the dormitories. Her parents weren't leaving for another few weeks, but with classes staring the following week it was time to settle in. The ground were filled with college kids moving in from all over the area.

After they had been to the registration office, they went looking for her dorm-room. It was quite easy to find as the campus wasn't that big. When they entered the room it was clear that her roommate had already moved in. One side of the room was already filled. The bed was already made and the desk was filled with books. There were also still a couple of boxes left on top of the bed. The girl however was nowhere to be seen. Bella and Will just went ahead and started to unpack her things on the other side. When they were done Will left, as his sister wanted something.

Now Bella was just sitting on her bed thinking about how her life was about to change once again. Suddenly a girl entered the room. She was quite tall and skinny with light brown straight hair till about her shoulders. She had green eyes and the biggest smile on her face. When the girl noticed Bella she went to her and introduced herself as Sandra Nelson. The girl was very energetic and exited. She told Bella she was from a small town outside Gold Coast, and that she was very happy she moved here because where she was from was very boring and dull, she was glad she could live in a larger city. Apparently she had just been out checking the extra curricular activities. Bella also introduced herself and the two spent some time talking.

"Hey, since you sort of know the area, do know a good place to go for smoothies or something? I would love to have one right now!" Sandra asked.

"I guess we could go to Rikki's. I have to be there in half an hour anyway." Bella answered as she glanced at her watch.

Fortunately the café was still fairly close, so it didn't take the pair too log to get there.

"Do you work here or something?" Samdra asked as they entered the café.

"Something like that, I sing here with the band a few times a week."

By this time they had reached the counter, where they were met by a redhead, Sophie. Even though Sophie had warmed up to Bella over summer, there was still some tension between them. The two girls acknowledged each other as they ordered, but nothing else was exchanged. Sandra however was oblivious to it all.

They were chatting about their courses and enjoying the smoothies as Nate came up to them.

"Bella! We need to start the performance as soon as possible, Zane threatened to fire us if we don't!"

That was when he noticed Sandra. "Well hello there!" He said to her as he tried to look sexy. Bella had to stifle a laugh.

"Nate, this is my new roommate Sandra, Sandra, this is one of my bandmates Nate"

When she was done, she got up to get ready for the performance, leaving Nate at the table staring at Sandra trying to flirt with her.

'Nate! We have to start!" His bandmates called him several times until two of them came and dragged him to the stage where they were already set up, to start the performance.

Sandra was quite impressed by Bella's and the band's talent, and could clearly see why Bella was going to study music.

After their performance the two headed bak to their dorm, as they had some introduction thing to attend that evening. But before they left, the talked a bit with Nate and the others, and Nate had been hitting on Sandra like crazy.

"Don't worry about Nate, he does that to a lot of girls, he thinks he is some kind of god!" Bella said as they left the café. "I think it was kind of cute " Sandra answered, and all Bella could do was to look at her like she was crazy.

Rikki felt awkward in her new outfit. Since her closet mainly consisted of jeans and teeshirts, Emma had taken her shopping the previous week to get more work appropriate clothes. Rikki was sort of nervous. She wasn't sure of what to expect, and she wondered what the people would be like. Sure, the woman who had interviewed her and given her the job seemed nice enough, but she was still nervous.

The business she was going to work for was a marketing business, where she would be doing assistant work. To start of with it would probably involve a lot of getting people coffee and following orders. That was going to be a challenge, as Rikki didn't particularly like people ordering her around.

Rikki entered the office building and went to the reception. Once she had introduced herself, the woman asked her to wait there. After a few minutes the same woman who had conducted her interview came. "Rikki! It is so nice to see you again, welcome. I will give you a tour of the place, and then I have to do work, so I will hand you over to my secretary who will tell you what to do. The tour only lasted for about 20 minutes. The office was quite small and she only received a brief introduction of all the other employees. Finally she was introduced to the secretary, a young woman who was a about 10 years older than Rikki herself. She was had dark brown long straight hair, and dark eyes. She introduced herself as Erica Gillings. She showed Rikki her desk, it was a small but personal area in one of the corners, on the desk there was a computer that she could use as well as 2 boxes for papers and a telephone. Erica explained that Rikki's job would be to answer the phone when she wasn't available and do some paperwork, as well as doing whatever the other employes would ask her, like picking things up an such.

Rikki felt that she could do that, she felt that this could turn out pretty good. She would just have to get through the first few days first. She sat down at her desk to start her day.