The sun glinted off the sea of navy-blue caps, shimmering like a restless tide over the heads of the graduating class of Westbrook High. Laughter and shrieks filled the air, some joyous, some nervous, and some already laced with tears. Dream Ambrose stood near the front of the crowd, tall and graceful, the edge of her lips lifted in a half-smile that didn't quite reach her eyes.
She was used to not blending in.
At 5'9", she stood a little above most of her classmates, her posture easy but striking. Her skin was a warm blend of chestnut and cream, like stained ivory dipped in sunset. And then there were her eyes. Those honey-blue eyes that turned heads, unsettled teachers, made boys stutter, and artists pause. They were piercing. Clear and deep, like the surface of some quiet lake that held more beneath it than anyone dared to imagine.
Today, those eyes were unusually still.
The principal's voice cracked over the old PA system, calling out names one by one. Families cheered. Phones flashed. Somewhere behind her, someone's grandma yelled, "That's my baby!" Dream smiled faintly, fingers curled around her rolled-up diploma. She had worked for this moment, painted it in her mind a hundred times. She'd imagined herself tossing her cap into the air and screaming at the top of her lungs, finally free.
But instead, her chest felt tight, as if wrapped in invisible string. Her stomach fluttered, not with excitement, but with dread.
She glanced over at the bleachers, scanning for her mother.
There she was. Maya Ambrose. Regal, as always, even in a simple beige dress and oversized sunglasses. Her thick afro was pinned in a high puff, and she stood with both hands over her mouth, like she was holding something back. Not tears. Not pride. Something heavier.
Then it happened.
"Dream!"
One word. Just her name. It floated through the warm summer air and cut through the noise like a scalpel.
Her mom's voice had cracked. A sound Dream had never heard before.
She froze. Her sneakers pressed into the warm turf, her fists still holding onto her cap like she wasn't ready to let it go.
Maya was now stepping down the bleachers, awkwardly. Hurriedly. Not like herself at all. She was waving now. Urgently.
"Dream, baby come here."
And that's when the world tilted.
Dream felt it before she knew it. A sudden hollowness opened inside her chest, deep and cold. The sky above, so blue just moments ago, seemed to bleach out, drained of color.
She began walking. Then jogging. The sea of graduates parted as she passed them, murmurs rising in her wake.
Her cap slipped from her fingers.
"Mum? What?"
Maya caught her in a hug. It was too tight, too desperate, as though she was trying to hold Dream together, physically keep her from breaking apart.
Maya didn't let go when she whispered it into her daughter's ear.
"He's gone, baby. Your dad... he didn't make it."
The sound that tore out of Dream didn't sound human.
It was somewhere between a gasp and a scream, guttural and raw. Her knees buckled beneath her, and she dropped to the ground right there in the middle of the field. The world around her dissolved into soundless static. Faces blurred. The blue sky above stretched endlessly, mockingly serene.
Students turned. Teachers began to hush the crowd. Someone asked if she fainted.
Dream didn't hear them.
She sobbed l,not quietly, not politely,but openly, like a child, like a wounded animal. Her hands trembled as they clawed at the hem of her gown, nails digging into fabric like she was trying to find something solid in a world that had just gone liquid.
Her dad was dead.
She hadn't even gotten to show him her final art piece, the one she painted of him smiling in his garden chair, surrounded by his beloved bonsai trees. She hadn't told him she got into art school. She hadn't heard his voice that morning because she told herself, "I'll call him after the ceremony." He'd always been her biggest fan. He called her his "walking masterpiece."
Now he was gone.
And the sky didn't care. And the sun kept shining. And people kept whispering, staring.
"Give her space," Maya barked at someone who came too close.
Dream curled into herself on the grass, hands covering her ears. She couldn't bear the weight of it. The truth of it.
The applause had died down. The air was different now. Stiff. Heavy with the kind of silence that only comes after a scream.
She didn't know how long she stayed like that. Ten minutes. Thirty. An hour. Her gown was stained at the knees. Her honey-blue eyes, now bloodshot, stared past everything.
When her mother helped her up, Dream's fingers were stiff and cold. Maya wrapped an arm around her and led her away, her heels clicking softly on the pavement as if trying not to disturb the ghost they carried with them.
The graduation ceremony went on.
But for Dream Ambrose, the world had already ended.