Chapter Text
"I'm ready!"
Vi propped open Powder's door and peeked inside. In the late afternoon, she stood in awe at the site and felt herself getting a little emotional. Here stood her baby sister in a graduation gown zipped open in the front to reveal a short black dress with ripped tights, and her cap decorated with blue and pink splatters on top. She, of course, was wearing dark eyeshadow and her hair was in her iconic long braids.
"Wow, look at you." Vi exclaimed. She crossed her arms and smiled at her sister, who wasn't a baby anymore. But of course, that wasn't going to stop her from calling Powder that. "You're all grown up."
"Ugh, you're getting all mushy on me again." Powder scoffed, teasingly brushing off her sister's pride for her. Vi chuckled and shifted her weight onto one foot. She definitely had her fair share of emotions these last few weeks. God, she's gonna ruin her tough girl image from being a total sap.
"I get a pass today, my baby sister is graduating." Vi said, placing a hand on her hip. Powder huffed out a laugh before turning to her mirror to touch up her makeup. As much as Powder was making it seem like this wasn't a big deal, she knew she was excited.
Scared of what was to come, but excited.
Vi grabbed her phone and opened the camera app, snapping a photo of Powder while she was distracted, knowing this may be the only chance she gets to take a sappy photo before the ceremony. Powder turned when she heard the faint camera shot sound from her phone.
"Whoa, hey! No flash photography!" She shouted, reaching for the phone. Vi laughed and held the phone up out of reach.
"You goober, it's a big day! I gotta get pictures!"
Powder gave up shortly after, sighing out of defeat and leaning back down to her mirror, fixing up the last bit of her makeup. Vi smiled and reached for her keys.
"Alright, Pow. Let's roll."
The ceremony wasn't for another hour and a half, but the school requested the student show early to practice walking and making sure everyone was in the correct spot for calling names up on the stage, etc.
The drive to the auditorium was short. The college the ceremony was being hosted at was actually much closer than the high school itself. After dropping Powder off, she waved a quick goodbye and watched her scurry off into the building. Parents were not allowed in quite yet, so Vi had some time to kill until the doors opened.
Her mind wandered to a different topic, specifically a welcomingly distracting topic of the other woman she was currently waiting for to show. She couldn't help the slight blush that appeared on her cheeks and the shy smile that she couldn't suppress at the thought of their conversation last week. It almost didn't feel real.
Caitlyn. Ms. Kiramman from classroom 306, was her girlfriend.
It felt very high school to be giddy about the word girlfriend, but she supposed it was an extra sappy week for her. After the hard feelings she went through this year, she deserved to be a little sappy.
Caitlyn told her she was coming to the ceremony, and Vi couldn't help peeking up from her phone to look for her so frequently. The small crowd of parents standing outside and talking showed no familiar faces. Most teachers didn't come to the graduation anyways since a lot of them didn't teach senior courses, so there really weren't many familiar faces here.
Vi sat on the bench and passed the time on her phone until a faint sound of clicking heels slowly became louder, pulling her attention from her phone and causing her to sit up a little straighter.
She was smitten, that was for damn sure.
Caitlyn was wearing a plain, navy blue dress that cut off at the knees with short sleeves, and a pair of black heels that had straps around the ankles. It was a casual and yet slightly formal look that was perfectly appropriate for something like this. She looked cute.
But that went without saying.
"Hey," Vi stood from her spot on the bench, shoving her hands in her pockets. Caitlyn waved as she approached. She reached for Vi's cheek and pulled her into a chaste kiss as a greeting and Vi felt her ears burning at such a public display of affection. It was amazing how easily this woman could make her feel like she was on cloud nine.
Caitlyn smiled and glanced away, her demeanor timid. She cleared her throat into her fist before looking back at the shorter woman.
"Have you been waiting long?" She asked.
"Nah, not too long. We had to get here early because I guess they have to…practice walking?" Vi answered, scratching the back of her neck.
"Weird. How long until we get to go inside?"
"Uh, the ceremony starts in an hour, so hopefully soon?"
Caitlyn hummed back in response, the silence comfortable between them as they enjoyed the summer sun.
"Did you get any pictures of Powder before she went in?"
Vi laughed and pulled her phone back out.
"Heh, yeah I got a candid shot of her touching up her makeup. She doesn't like me asking her to pose for pictures 'cause she says it's weird for me to be all 'parent-y', but I gotta capture those moments, ya know?"
Caitlyn nodded, her smile warm and endearing. "For sure."
The two passed the time sharing photos and basking in the sun, letting the lull of comfortable silences in between topics settle. Vi didn't know what was appropriate for public interactions. It's not like some of these parents didn't know who they were, meeting them at least once or twice from parent-teacher conferences. She guessed it didn't matter and was more an issue in front of students, but it was still something that made Vi hesitant within eyesight of other parents.
That anxiety went away however, everytime she looked back at that captivating tooth-gapped smile and sparkling blue eyes. This whole school year felt so much longer than nine months, and Vi couldn't believe how ridiculously long it took for the two of them to come around. The more she stared, the more she wished she could've done this sooner.
A click from the front double doors of the stadium interrupted Vi's trance, causing the two to turn their heads to see one of the staff administrators holding out a box for tickets. and waving for people to form a line. Once the two gave their tickets and found a seat, Vi took in the site and sighed.
It wasn't that long ago she graduated in this same building, and couldn't help getting a little choked up that now she was going to watch her sister walk across that stage. She saw her little sister sitting in the seats in the middle of the floor in front of the stage, facing away and chatting with her friends sitting beside her.
When Powder turned to look at the incoming amount of parents, she looked around until she spotted Vi in her seat and waved obnoxiously over her head with an iconically mischievous smile across her face. Vi chuckled and waved back. When Powder turned back to her friends, Vi let out a sigh and started to pick at her nails, keeping her hands busy while she tried not to appear all mushy so publicly. She was trying hard to work on the "not acting like Powder's parent" thing, but it was hard to let that go. Especially as someone who essentially was like her parent for so long. It's emotional.
Vi felt a gentle hand lay over her own hands to stop the fidgeting, and looked up to see Caitlyn looking at her with a comforting smile that sent butterflies to Vi's stomach. Vi smiled back and intertwined her fingers with Caitlyn's, their clasped hands resting on top of Vi's thigh.
It felt silly how sheepish she felt about something so small like hand holding. Constantly comparing the feeling to being like a kid again, but it was true. But Vi didn't mind. They were good feelings and she was proud of herself for letting herself feel those things.
The feedback of the microphone and dimming of the lights shifted their attention to the stage, the sound of a robed Principal Mel's heels clicking across the stage floor. As the woman approached, she cleared her throat away from the mic before fixing her posture.
"Hello everyone, thank you all so much for coming to the graduation for the Class of 2018!"
The crowd of parents, teachers and students all clapped and cheered, including some well expected loud whoops and fist pumping from Vi. As the cheering died down, Mel smiled before returning to her speech.
"I am so very proud of every single one of you for making it this far. I can't wait to see where you guys take flight in your journey of adulthood. Every one of you should be proud of yourselves for making it to where you are right now."
Mel continued with her speech, giving special thanks to members of student council, to the orchestra for making an appearance, to staff who put in efforts to help students reach success. While Vi had heard all the same recycled speech before, it felt different this time. Maybe she was giving these Pilties too much credit, or maybe the amount of emotions from today she was feeling was warping her perspective. But it was all good feelings.
After wrapping up her speech, along with a few teachers and students that came to the mic to give their own, finally after what felt like an hour, they started calling students one by one to the stage. Vi watched as Powder's row walked up to the side of the stage to wait for them to be called up. Seeing the familiar long blue braids standing out against the darkness of the curtains in the background, Vi held her breath in anticipation.
"Powder Lane." Principal Mel called, holding out a case for her diploma. Powder comically held up two hands giving a rock on sign and sticking out her tongue to the crowd as she walked across. Vi stood and whooped as loud as she could over the crowd of polite claps.
"Yeah! Go Pow!!" She shouted while clapping obnoxiously loud. Caitlyn chuckled and clapped along with Vi, clapping one hand on her arm while the other held her phone camera. Not quite as loud as Vi but just as excited. Powder accepted her diploma and shook Principal Mel's hand a bit aggressively for the taller woman's liking, but was endeared nonetheless.
Powder was unapologetically herself, and Vi couldn't be happier about seeing it on that stage.
Powder and Mel quickly had a photo snapped by a staff member before she was guided off the stage to skip back to her row.
After the last student was called, Principle Mel instructed the students to move their tassel from one side to the other, and congratulated the class of 2018 before every student cheered and threw their caps into the air.
As Vi clapped and whistled loudly along with the crowd, she had an overwhelmingly warm fuzzy feeling in her chest. She was so happy to see her sister walk across that stage and see her throw that hat up in the air with the rest of her graduating class. Proud to see her sister make it to the end. She would go through every hardship all over again if it meant being able to see Powder successfully make it to graduation this happy.
She was content.
Vi waited outside with Caitlyn shortly after the ceremony ended, waiting for Powder to come outside with the rest of the graduating class. She had her camera app open on her phone ready to swarm Powder with a photoshoot of her with her diploma.
Spotting a familiar mop of hair under a flat blue and pink splattered hat, Vi waved high up across the crowd to catch Powder's attention. Powder spotted Vi and smiled so big before running over into a tight hug from her older sister.
"Holy shit, Pow! You did it! Officially a Piltover graduate!" Vi exclaimed, hugging her even tighter. She felt Powder chuckle into her shoulder as she hugged tight before pulling back into a confident stance.
"You're damn right I did! And they say being a genius is hard." Powder joked, comically blowing her nails.
Seeing her sister so confident in her abilities gave a relieving sense of reassurance that Powder was growing up. She was gonna be okay out there.
College plans hadn't even been figured out yet for Powder. Vi knew it wasn't a good time to bring that up, but she couldn't help thinking about it in the back of her mind about where Powder was going to be next. She was proud of Powder for making it to the end. They would figure it out. They always did.
Vi chuckled, shoving her hands back in her pockets. "I had no doubts, Powder. High school was hell but you're tough. Give yourself some more credit."
Powder's smug look softened into something more sincere, and glanced to the side. Her demeanor came off timid, like she was hesitant on something she'd been wanting to say. She was quiet for a moment and pulled her cap off her head before straightening herself back up.
"Well then I'm proud of you too."
Vi raised a brow. "What do you mean? Today's about you, Pow. Don't worry about me."
"You went through hell, too! High school is hard, and you just went through it again as an adult." She emphasized, waving her hands around. Vi glanced to the side at Caitlyn who was patiently observing and nodding in agreement silently, not wanting to ruin this moment.
"I guess you could say that," The shorter, pink-haired woman chuckled, hesitantly. "But this is a job, I don't know if it's the same—"
"—Plus when you graduated from here, no one was here to tell you how proud they were that you made it. How proud they were of how far you got on your own while taking care of others at the same time. Taking care of me. N' I was a little shit!" Powder explained, jokingly at the end but her words still determined. Powder chuckled lightly at her own joke before taking in a breath to finish.
"I'm still your sister too. You deserve to hear it. Even if it's a little late."
Vi stood stunned, looking down at her slightly shorter sister and fighting the urge to tear up. She couldn't think of a time she had really heard someone say something like that to her in a long time. Not since Vander. \
She let out a timid laugh to cover the sound of a sniffle and put a hand on her shoulder. She smiled before looking away and ruffling Powder's hair.
"God, when did you go soft Pow Pow?" Vi said, chuckling through her voice crack. Powder crouched and pulled Vi's hand off her head and smoothed down her hair.
"Don't get used to it, today's a big day. Tomorrow I'll go back to calling you a meathead and continue to convince you to let me turn all your shirts into crop tops."
"Never gonna happen." Vi smiled, her chest warm.
After a shared moment, Vi looked around and noticed all the parents taking photos, reminding Vi of her earlier mission before Powder ran out.
"Alright kiddo, we gotta snap some pictures. This is not negotiable." Vi stated, grabbing Powder's hat from her hands to place it on her head. Powder scoffed out a laugh and nodded, not even putting up a fight about it this time. Vi unlocked her phone and turned to Caitlyn who stood quietly.
"Could you take our picture?" Vi asked, her eyes soft.
"Of course! Go, pose with Powder I got this." Caitlyn said, holding up the phone camera. Vi ran back to Powder near the wall of the building and pulled her sister in close to pose for their photo. Powder threw up a rock-on sign and her usual obnoxious grin while Vi gave an equally wide smile. A few more silly poses for photos and Powder chuckled before pulling out her own phone to open up her front facing camera.
"I gotta get my own pictures, scoot in the shot!" Powder exclaimed, holding her phone up horizontally. Vi crouched slightly and smiled into the camera, holding up two fingers behind Powder's head. Snapping a couple shots, she posed for one more before noticing in the camera, Powder's eyes glancing to the side towards Caitlyn who stood aside to keep appropriate and supportive distance, smiling endearingly at the two of them. Vi started to worry for a moment if Powder was going to say something passive.
But she didn't.
Powder rolled her eyes and pushed down her smile the best she could, attempting to hide any softness, only for Vi to notice her failing to do so.
"Ms. K!" Powder shouted, turning her head. Vi turned towards Caitlyn, watching carefully. Caitlyn's eyes widened as her attention was caught.
"Come get in the picture!" Powder said, waving her free hand over. Caitlyn looked side to side before smiling and rushing over.
"You sure?" Caitlyn asked, as her fast paced walk slowed.
"Ugh, Get in here." Powder grunted, pulling Caitlyn by the arm to stand behind in between her and Vi. Caitlyn bent down to get into the shot next to the shorter two and smiled for the picture, her hand resting on Vi's shoulder. Powder snapped the shot, giving her iconic big toothed smile and saved it to her gallery before closing the app.
Another reason for Vi to feel all fuzzy inside. Her sister pulling Caitlyn in for a picture!? This day just keeps getting wilder. Seeing Powder accept Caitlyn being a part of Vi's life made it so much harder to fight tears than even before.
Vi clasped her hands together and straightened her posture from where she stood, attempting to snap herself out of her teary stsnce. "Alright, now that we're done being a bunch of saps, what's next? Did you wanna go out to eat? Or…"
Powder glanced away, her hand reaching behind her neck. "Actually, I was gonna ask if it would be okay if I went with Ekko and Lux to go out to eat tonight. I know you want to celebrate but I only have a little bit of time left with them before Ekko leaves for his internship and—"
"Powder, it's totally fine with me. I understand. Go hang out with your friends!" Vi answered, her face soft. "Do you want me to wait up for you?"
"No, no. I'll be fine, and probably won't be back until late. Besides, now you can go take out ya new girlfriend." Powder teased, drawing out the last word in her sentence dramatically.
Vi felt heat rising to her cheeks, not expecting Powder to tease her about this so publicly. "Pow—"
"You'll thank me later! Have fun!" Powder shouted and waved as she turned and quickly made her way across the parking lot towards Ekko's car.
"Be safe!" Vi shouted, keeping her eyes on her chaotic sister as she ran across the lot, not looking both ways of course. Vi let out a tense sigh and waited until Powder got in the car before turning back to Caitlyn.
Caitlyn crouched slightly to eye level with Vi, looking into her eyes and placing a gentle hand on her shoulder. "You okay?" She asked, softly.
Of course Caitlyn would be so gentle and caring, it was only her nature. Vi couldn't help feeling so many feelings at once just at these small gestures. She felt the tension leave her shoulders as she gazed back into those blue eyes.
"Yeah! Yeah, I'll be fine. Just, a lot today." Vi brushed off, leaning into the touch. Caitlyn smiled softly before leaning in to place a quick kiss on her lips, her hand sliding up to the side of her neck that sent tingles down her spine. God she'll never get tired of this woman making her feel like that.
Caitlyn backed away and straightened back up once again, smiling down at the shorter woman lovingly.
"Okay, darling." Caitlyn responded. "Where do you wanna go now?"
Vi shrugged, shoving her hands back into her pockets. "I don't know. It's been a long day. I'm not sure what sounds good right now."
"If you want, we could order some takeout and just relax at home." Caitlyn suggested. Vi grinned at the idea and nodded.
"Yeah, that sounds nice." Vi said, her voice much less tense than before. "Sorry that I'm not quite up for something more exciting."
"What? No, Vi don't say that. I value your time, and I love just sitting and relaxing with you. Don't even worry." Caitlyn replied, frantically reassuring she didn't need something extravagant planned. The taller woman reached and grasped Vi's hand gently, rubbing her thumb over her knuckles.
"Besides, we have plenty of time to do whatever we want together. If there's something fun you want to do, we can always do that some other time too. We have the whole summer."
Vi's eyes perked at the reminder. That's right! They had the whole summer to do whatever they wanted. Go on actual dates, spend nights together, do all the things Vi wanted to do with Caitlyn for the entire school year. Had all this time to say everything she wanted to say to this woman who changed her life. Working in a high school really did throw her back into that silly teenager logic and excitement of having the whole summer to themselves, but she didn't mind. It was true.
They had the whole summer.
"Yeah, you're right. We have time."