Disclaimer: Friends does not belong to me in the slightest.
A/N: Thank you for the reviews and those of you who have kept feeding me back compliments and criticisms. All are greatly appreciated (the little 'break/brake' mix-up from the last chapter has been fixed, heh). I always thought that the way I was developing Emma, she'd bea pretty good driver :) By the way, another story of mine called TOW the Birthday Video takes place in between this chapter and the next.
Two more installments after this. I might write an epilogue so I can introduced Grandma!Rachel, but who knows.
XXX
"Oh my God, how many more people before Emma's name is called and we can get outta here?" Sean whined quietly on a breezy spring late afternoon from his seat between his father and younger sister.
Jen, who had been staring at her older sister with rapt attention, glared at her fourteen-year-old brother. "Shut up, you're being rude," she admonished, her voice just as low as his.
Sean made a face at his twelve-year-old sibling as Rachel leaned across from Jen's other side and whispered, with a smidge of threatening thrown in, "She's coming up, just be patient." She sat back, but not before sharing a small smile with her husband.
She could hardly believe where they were: Emma's graduation from high school. The eighteen-year-old had already given her well-organized and inspirational class president speech prior to the distribution of diplomas, along with their guest speaker, the valedictorian, and the salutatorian. All that was left now was getting through the two hundred and ninety-four names of all the graduating students of the senior class and the parting speech by the principal.
Tears formed in Rachel's eyes as she recalled the day so long ago when her little girl had excitedly escorted her by hand down an elementary school hallway towards the preschool class on the first day of school. Flashes of the beginning of every new school year went past in Rachel's mind, some hazier than others. Images of Emma primping for her school dance, first date, and most recently, her senior prom. Times as far back as the first time she sat up, crawled, stood, and walked on her own, way back when they were still living in apartment nineteen in the city and it had seemed Rachel and Ross would never get their acts together and have a future.
How far we've come, Rachel thought wryly to herself as she stole a glance of Ross, who she could tell was mentally counting on his program the names left before their daughter's was called.
Rachel set her eyes back on the stage of the outdoor theater they were at where all of the graduations of the high schools in this area took place. Normally, the place would be holding concerts and other shows, but today, it had been decked out with balloons, streamers, and banners in the school colors.
Emma was waiting by the stairs that led up onto the stage, joking around with the girl standing in line behind her that Rachel vaguely recognized from a party her daughter had thrown the month before. She seemed lost in a sea of red robes and hats, Columbus High School's colors ironically being the same as Lincoln High (Ross, Rachel, and Monica's alma mater). Her light-brown hair, now displaying a golden tint thanks to the highlights she'd pleaded for at the beginning of the year, glinted in the waning sunlight. Rachel couldn't tear her eyes away from her graduate, mentally taking a picture of the way she stood, how her hair was nicely straightened, her face the picture of excitement and nervousness rolled into one.
If Rachel were being completely honest with herself, she'd admit that she was afraid there would never again be another moment like this, where she would be able to observe her daughter in such obvious delight. She knew it was a stupid thing to fear, but with college looming just three months away, a part of Rachel felt she was never going to see Emma again.
The eldest Geller child had kept up her marks throughout high school, and in the end earned her well-deserved placement as seventh in the class. She'd excelled at science, a natural talent that had obviously come from her father, and had even lent her piano-playing skills to the music department. Emma had decided during her sophomore year quite suddenly that she'd like to become a psychologist, and had spent much of the rest of her high school career working towards a good school that would help her reach her goal. Four of the six colleges she had applied to had accepted, and three had even offered scholarships.
In the end, Emma had chosen Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, a school she'd always liked immensely. Upon hearing this decision, Rachel's mind had quickly jumped to the fact that North Carolina was quite a ways south of New York. Ross had congratulated their daughter and supported her one-hundred percent, though later after Emma had left to tell her news to her boyfriend, he had admitted that a part of him had hoped she'd decide to attend New York University, where he was head of the paleontology department.
Rachel knew life wasn't fair like that, however. She'd known the second Emma had told her that she'd been accepted to Duke that that was what she was going to end up choosing. Call it mother's instinct.
"Doug Gebb," the principal announced, and the boy ahead of Emma walked proudly up the steps to the podium, received his diploma holder from the woman giving them out (the real ones were coming after the ceremony), shook the principal's hand, moved the tassel atop his hat, and walked off the stage amidst applause.
"Emma Geller," the principal said with a smile, and at her name Ross directed his hand-held camcorder eagerly and began recording the moment. Jen was sitting up high in her seat, snapping pictures like a madwoman. Rachel felt a few tears trickle down her cheeks as her oldest daughter held her head high as she received her diploma, shook hands with the principal, and moved her tassel with a grin towards the crowd before following Doug Gebb down the stairs.
Rachel let out a long stream of breath as Ross put the small camcorder back into it's case. They smiled at each other over Sean and Jen's heads, both of whom were still cheering for their sister. Rachel saw a few tears in her husband's eyes, and knew he was just as proud of their daughter as she was.
The rest of the names fell into the background as Rachel tried to locate Emma's head amongst the crowd of kids already having received their diplomas from the stage. The only name that registered was Thomas Kane, Emma's boyfriend, whom Rachel actually had become very fond of over the time he and her daughter had begun dating seven months ago. Ross snapped a shot of him up on stage, as per request of Emma, who had asked her father beforehand to get at least one shot of Tom for her.
As the ceremony came to a close nearly an hour later, Rachel let out a long sigh of something like relief while the graduates screamed and laughed and cheered and tossed their hats into the air, catching them when gravity pulled them back down. So this was it. Twelve years of grade school, plus three years before that in preschool and kindergarten, and this was what it culminated to.
Rachel could not have been prouder.
After locating Emma and congratulating her repeatedly, the family took a few pictures together.
"Okay, uh, Sean and Jenny, stand on either side of Emma," Ross instructed as families and friends shouted and whooped around them in the parking lot of the concert center. "Emma, hold up your diploma. All right. Okay, Rachel, get in it with them. Yeah. Oh, that's gonna be one for my desk!" he exclaimed with a grin.
"Right next to your 'Dinosaurs Were Dads Too' coffee mug?" Emma asked, tongue-in-cheek. Rachel stifled a laugh.
"Just one more; a group one," Ross said, ignoring his daughter's jab at his office paraphernalia. "Hey, Tom, do you mind taking a picture for us?"
Tom grinned, running a hand through his short red hair. "Yeah, sure," he agreed.
The Geller family stood together, and Rachel wrapped an arm around Emma's shoulders and squeezed lightly right before Tom took the picture. He handed the camera back to Ross, and after a few more shots, Emma promised to be home as soon as she could to join her post-graduation party with family and friends, and was off to capture a few moments with her fellow graduates.
Rachel, Ross, Sean, and Jen all made their way through the maze of the parking lot, reaching their car with some difficulty because of the amount of people milling around. They got in and inched their way towards the exit.
"That was the longest thing I've ever sat through in my entire life," Sean declared wearily, throwing his head back against the headrest. "And that includes that one field trip to the wax museum where they lectured us on the different ways to use wax for like, five hours. At least next time it'll be my graduation."
"I liked Emma's speech," Jen decided. "I really liked that one thing she said about life being like chapters, and that graduation was just the end of another chapter, but also the beginning of the next."
"I hope Darwin is okay," Sean said randomly with a worrisome tone he only seemed to adapt when something was wrong with the family dog. They'd had the beagle for over two years. "He's still limping."
"Seany," Jen groaned, "his broken leg has been fine for a month, you're making the limping thing up. What time do you think Emma is gonna come home?"
"I don't know," Rachel sighed, her thoughts elsewhere.
Ross smiled softly and glanced at his wife, sensing her funky mood. "She did it," he said quietly as Jen and Sean argued good-naturedly in the back.
"Yeah, she did," Rachel agreed, her voice choked.
They made their way home, back to the group of people waiting to celebrate this momentous occasion with Emma: Monica, Chandler, Erica and Jack, Phoebe, Mike and Christopher, Jack and Judy, Sandra- even Joey and his wife Alex had flown out from California for the event. It meant so much to Rachel (and Ross, too, she knew) that their friends and family had all insisted on being at their home when Emma returned.
Rachel looked out the window at the passing sights: the trees thriving, the flowers blooming, the weather perfect as the sun kept descending behind the horizon.
And so there it was. Emma's final year as a true resident of Westchester, New York before heading off to North Carolina was nearing it's close. All she had left was three more months of goofing off with her friends, spending time with her boyfriend, enjoying her family's company, buying the things she'd need while at college, and packing up her belongings.
A graduate. Eighteen years old. Going off to Duke. Starting her new life, far away from her family in New York.
The thoughts brought tears to Rachel's eyes, because it suddenly hit her, like a bolt of lightning, that her little girl…
…Was no longer a little girl.
XXX