Ana POV

I wake up 10 minutes before the alarm clock is supposed to go off the next morning, and instead of getting out of bed and get started, I'm spending these few minutes staring at Elliot as he sleeps. Mrs. Clayton was right about one thing, he really is handsome! No matter how much he protests it, I am lucky that I found him that early morning in Seattle, and even more lucky that he seems to like me as much as I like him.

"Stop staring, it's creepy," Elliot says but keeping his eyes closed. How does he do that?!

"But you're so handsome," I giggle.

"Well, you're right about that Banana," he says suddenly jumping on top of me, trapping me between him and the mattress.

"Elliot!" I squeal.

He quickly quiets my protests by pressing his lips to mine. I gasp, which he takes advantage of, introducing his tongue into my mouth. I quickly get over my shock and kiss him back, our tongues swirling around one another. Our kiss is slow and passionate, making my stomach erupt in butterflies.

"You were saying, baby?" he mocks me, knowing he has completely muddled my thoughts with his kiss. I have no chance of gathering myself or my thoughts as he proceeds to kiss, nibble and suck down my neck, so I just moan at the feelings he awakes in me.

We are interrupted by a knock on my bedroom door.

"Ana! I'm leaving now, I'll see you at the school," Kate yells through the door.

"Okay, good luck with the speech!" I holler.

"Thank you!" She yells before we hear the front door slam shut.

"She seriously has the worst timing," Elliot grumbles dropping his head in the crook of my neck.

"We have to start getting up anyways, I have to start getting ready. We have to be at the school in just under two hours," I giggle, wiggling out from under him and go to the bathroom to shower. I hear Elliot mumble something into the pillow, but I have no idea what he is saying, so I just continue into the bathroom.

Coming out of the steamy bathroom, I see Elliot sitting on the bed with two plates with breakfast on them. Or buttered burnt toast.

"Breakfast in bed for the graduate," he smiles.

"You made that for me?" I whisper, feeling very overwhelmed suddenly. I don't remember the last time someone made food for me, tears well up in my eyes at his thoughtfulness.

"Yeah, I know it isn't much and a little burnt..."

"It's perfect! I don't remember the last time someone did something like this for me, even cooked for me," I interrupt, going over to the bed, giving him a kiss to show just how thankful I am.

"Damn, I should burn toast more often!" he says, making me laugh.

We quickly eat our breakfast before Elliot goes to shower and I start on my hair and makeup. I am curling my hair when Elliot comes out of the bathroom, only wearing some boxers and drying his blonde curls with a towel. I can't stop staring at him, no one should be allowed to be this perfect. Elliot notices me staring at him but merely puts on a smug smile. Usually, I would look away and be embarrassed that I got caught staring but seriously, what does he expect? He can't come out of the bathroom looking like that and not expect to be ogled.

"See something you like, baby?"

"Yep," I say straight out, knowing I wouldn't be able to appear nonchalant right now.

I finish my hair and makeup, and then we quickly get dressed and take off towards the school in Elliot's truck as he complains Wanda is too small.

We meet up with dad just outside the school, I'm so happy he's here to see me, he's always been my number one fan.

"Hi Annie, how are you feeling?" Dad asks me as gives me a hug and a kiss on the forehead.

"Hi dad, a little nervous but mostly excited,"

"Hi Elliot, good to see you again," dad says, reaching his hand out to shakes Elliot's.

"Hi Ray, good to see you too," Elliot says, shaking dad's hand.

We stand around talking for a bit before I have to excuse myself as I need to go in. Dad and Elliot go off together to find some seats together.

I go to the back amongst a sea of graduates dressed in cap and gown just like myself, I decide to try and search for Kate before we have to walk in. I don't manage to find Kate. However, I do find my friend, Maddie who studied English Lit just like me. We've stuck together through the four years as well but have otherwise been in different social circles, plus she and Kate have never been able to get along with one another.

"Maddie!" I say, trying to get her attention but without getting the attention from everyone else as well.

"Ana, oh I'm so glad I found you," she says, walking towards me, we give each other a big as we haven't seen each other since our last exam.

"Me too. I've missed you! Everything has been about exams the last month or two," I smile.

"Ugh, don't I know it, but we did it! We are actually graduating!" she squeals, getting the attention from a few people standing close to us.

"I know, it's so hard to believe,"

"You're still moving to Seattle with Katherine, right?" she asks.

"Yeah, we are moving all our things this Saturday, why?"

"Well, I've been offered a teaching position at Lakeside High School in Seattle teaching their freshman and sophomore English class, so I'm moving to Seattle in a few weeks! I just have to find an apartment,"

"Oh my God, are you serious? That is so amazing," I tell her excitedly.

"I know, right?!"

We are interrupted as we all have to line up to start the walk in, I just pray I won't trip over my own feet and fall o my face. Once we are all seated, the dean and other people, including Kate and Elliot's brother Christian, enter the stage and take their seats. The ceremony passes by in a blur, Kate's speech is fantastic, and she gets a standing ovation. Christian's speech really good as well, but leaves with a great feeling of sadness too. He's gone hungry at some point, and I'm sure it was before he was adopted by the Greys, which means it was with his birth mother, who might be my maternal aunt. I realize how lucky I am to have Ray and from such a young age, my mother never really showed any motherly instincts, it was always Ray who was taking care of me, ever since I can remember. When the ceremony is over, I hurry outside to find my dad and Elliot, thankfully I see them almost immediately, my dad looks conflicted at first but quickly puts on a smile. He sweeps me up into one of his signature bear hugs as he tells me congratulations and how proud he is of me. The second he puts me down, I'm in Elliot's arms as he swings me around, congratulating me before giving me a quick kiss as he sets me down.

"Thank you so much, I can't believe it's over," I tell them happily.

"You did great, sweetheart! I couldn't be prouder of you than I already am," my dad says, being unusually emotional.

"Thank you so much, dad," I say with tears once again welling up in my eyes.

We are interrupted by Maddie who crashes into my side screaming 'we did it!', and I quickly hug her back.

"Hi Maddie, congratulations," dad says kindly. He's met Maddie a few times when he's visited me at school, and I know he secretly likes her a lot better than he does Kate, even if he won't tell me that.

"Hi Ray, it's good to see you again, and thank you," she says, quickly going from to hugging Ray.

"Maddie, this is my boyfriend, Elliot. Elliot, this is Maddie. Maddie took English Lit just like me," I say introducing the two of them. Maddie practically gives herself whiplash at the word 'boyfriend,' but quickly gathers herself.

"Hi Maddie, nice to meet you," Elliot says reaching his hand out and putting on his panty-dropping smile.

"Hello Elliot, nice to meet you too. I hope you're taking good care of my girl here," Maddie says, shaking Elliot's hand, looking completely unaffected by Elliot's smile, which is a first as far as I know.

"I promise to take great care of her; otherwise I'm sure Ray here will have my head," Elliot laughs.

"Damn right about that," Dad says, making all of us laugh. Maddie has to take off, she is going out with her parents and twin brother, but we promise to meet up once she moves to Seattle.

I tried to look for Kate as I wanted to congratulate her, but one of her journalism buddies told me she had already left with her family. Christian stopped by quickly and congratulated me again and that we'd see each other again on Sunday before he took off with his bodyguard/driver/right-hand man.

"Your brother was welcome to join us for dinner," dad says to Elliot as we are standing by dad's car.

"He probably has some work to do back in Seattle and with his chopper, he'll be back in Seattle in an hour," Elliot says.

"his chopper? Your brother has his own helicopter?" dad asks looking utterly gobsmacked.

"Yeah, one of his many toys,"

"Dad, Elliot and I will meet you at the restaurant, we should get going, or we'll miss our reservation," I say, wanting to stop the questions about Christian. Elliot and I still have to talk about the possible connection between Christian's birth mother and my own, something I'm sure we both want to postpone as long as possible.

"Okay, I'll meet you kids in front of Bancorp Tower, and then we'll head up together," dad says and gets into his car. Elliot and I walk hand in hand over to his truck, to take off for the Portland City Grill. Dad had apparently invited Elliot to join us as they were sitting waiting for the ceremony to begin. Elliot opens my door and helps me into the car before walking around and getting into the driver's seat. As we're driving to downtown Portland, I decided to bring up the look on my father's face when I first found them after the ceremony.

"Did something happen between the time I left you two to line up and then came out after the ceremony?"

"Why do you think something happened?" Elliot asks evasively, squirming slightly in his seat.

"Well, when I first found you guys after the ceremony, my dad looked... Conflicted," I tell him.

"Shit," he mumbles, not expecting me to hear, but I do none the less.

"Explain, Elliot!"

"We ran into José right after the ceremony. He came up to Ray apologizing profusely about what happened to you, but then when he saw the blank look on Ray's face, he ran like hell realizing he just busted himself to your dad,"

"Crap... Did you tell my dad what happened?" I ask, not sure what answer I prefer.

"Not anything specific, just that there was an incident on Monday night, but that he should talk to you about it. I didn't think you'd be very happy with me telling him everything,"

"Ugh, he is going to be pissed that I didn't tell him right away," I moan, dropping my head into my hands.

"It'll be fine, Ana. I promise," Elliot says, taking my left hand in his right and stroking my knuckles with his thumb.

Dad is already waiting for us outside of the restaurant, so we head straight up to the restaurant and get escorted to our table.

"So Annie, how does it feel to have graduated?" dad asks after we have ordered our drinks and food. Both men ordered a steak while I ordered stuffed chicken.

"It still feels a little surreal, but I can't wait until I start at SIP," I say excitedly.

"I really am proud of you, and remember my offer still stands,"

My dad had offered to get me my own apartment, so I wouldn't have to live with someone, but when he first brought it up, Kate and I were fine, so I said 'no thanks.' But if things continue the way they're going, I might just consider it.

We do a little small talk as we eat, my dad doesn't bring up José at all, but I know it's coming when I least expect it.

We are halfway through our dessert when it happens.

"So Annie, when were you going to tell me that something went down between you and José?"

"Uhm... I was going to wait until after graduation," I mumble, squirming a little in my seat.

"It's after graduation, now what happened?" he asks determined to get every detail out of me. I know he is angry, that I kept something from him, and he's going to be even angrier when he finds out what happened.

"As you know, we all went out on Monday night, I was drunk like most other people, but José was wasted. At the end of the night, Elliot went out to get us a taxi, but I had to pee, so promised to meet him outside. As I came out of the bathroom, José cornered and grabbed my arm, keeping me trapped against a wall. Apparently, he was in love with me and wasn't too happy about me being with Elliot. He kept trying to kiss me, but I kept turning my face away and tried to push him off, but he was too strong. Thankfully Elliot came looking for me because I was taking so long, he got José off of m, even gave him a few punches," I finish a few tears have escaped as I told what happened, but Elliot was quick to wipe them away. My dad reached for my hands from across the table, he had tears in his eyes, something I've never seen before.

"I'm so sorry, Annie! I wish you would've told me right away, but I guess I can also understand why you didn't. Please tell me, that you reported him," he begs me. I know he and José Sr. are still close friends, and I hope this won't affect their friendship.

"No, I just wanted to forget it ever happened. It's not like anything actually managed to happen other than a few bruises," I mumble. Elliot is clenching his hands; clearly, he'd be more than okay with pressing charges against José.

"I'm not going to lie, I wish you would have pressed charges even if it is José, but I also know how you are; you're old enough to make a decision like this, and I'll respect that. Or at least try," he says, but I can tell he's not happy about it.

"Thanks, dad," I say, giving his hand a squeeze. Dad pays the check despite Elliot trying to convince him to let him pay it since he crashed our family dinner. The only response he got out of my dad, was 'you're family now too', this made me tear up again for like the hundredth time today, and it completely stunned Elliot, which gave dad the window of opportunity to grab the check and pay it.

As we say goodbye outside in the parking lot, I promise dad to call him as soon as we've moved everything into the new apartment on Saturday. Dad and Elliot are whispering to each other, but it's too low for me to hear no matter how hard I try.

Elliot and I head back to the apartment, Kate is staying the night with her parents and then bringing her brother, Ethan with her tomorrow.

"Thank you for letting me tell him what happened, and just being there for me," I tell Elliot as we are laying in bed.

"Of course, baby. I'm here for you, any way you'll let me," he says kissing my cheek.

This day has been long and exhausting, and it's finally caught up with me, my eyes can barely stay open. Just as I'm falling asleep, I hear the words the 'I love you,' but I'm too far gone to respond.