Page 66 of Motivating Mira
Thirteen
Mira
I stood on the stairs, waiting for my name to be called. Master Derek was on stage along with Professor Holland who was handing out diplomas. Nerves danced in my belly despite the heaviness in my chest as I looked out over the crowd watching us.
There was a possibility of me collapsing and ruining everything. Even though I felt okay right then, I didn’t know how I’d feel up there when I was given my diploma and held it for the crowd to see. Because there was no family out there for me. My mom was gone. I had officially graduated before she passed away peacefully with me at her side, but she missed the ceremony by two months.
It was okay though. We’d done a little fake graduation ceremony with Master Derek and Professor Stahlbaum at the care home. We’d even had cake and a glass of champagne. So here today. This was for them. For the professors and Master Derek, who’d helped me get here, who’d needed me to do this, so I’d have no regrets later.
And there were no real regrets.I’d made peace with my mama. And she told me that Wes had been right. That my feeling of being judged and not good enough was never her intention. That I was the best thing that had ever happened to her, and she considered raising and caring for me a privilege—her greatest gift. And if she’d seen what she’d been doing to me, she would never have done it. Because all that shit, the making sure I could take care of myself, pushing me to stand on my own two feet, it was more about her than it was about me. It was her way of dealing with her losing me, feeling like she’d accomplished the one thing in her life that mattered, raising me.
“Mira Wilcox.”
I swiped away a tear that slipped out and walked up onto the stage, smiling as wide as I could because my mom may not be in the audience today, but I knew damn well she was watching me from somewhere.
“Congratulations, graduate,” Master Derek said, smiling down at me.
“Thank you, Sir.”
“I’m most proud of you, Mira. Congratulations.”
“Thank you, Professor Holland.”
Turning to the audience, I held my leather book open, showing off my degree. The crowd where my fellow students and friends sat went wild and I grinned through my tears and stared at the rest of the families out there, pretending mine was out there too. And that’s when I saw two people I didn’t expect. And both made my stomach drop.
My grandmother. A woman I’d talked to for the first time ever a few months ago after I ran out of Master Derek’s office. A woman I’d never expected to see again.
And Doctor Wesley Lake. I’d thought he’d left. I’d heard he was going back home to Canada.
Someone handed me a mimosa an hour later after all the speeches were done and the crowd had broken, everyone finding their people.
“Drink up, Mira. It’ll take the edge off.”
I glanced to the person who put the glass in my hand and smiled. “Thanks, Clee.”
“You look like you’re ready to collapse. Are you okay? I can totally blow off dinner with my folks. I’d actually like to get them out of here before they accidentally hear or see something they shouldn’t. Do you want to go back to the apartment?”
I had one of those now. On the Ranch. And I shared it with my bestie Cleo.
“You know they’re not going to see or hear anything they shouldn’t. Master Derek and the staff took every precaution. No one, absolutely no one, is going to wander into the Dungeon and be scarred for life.” I chuckled but it sounded off even to me.
Maybe I’d imagined seeing both my grandmother and Wes. After all I’d been standing here for over twenty minutes, and no one had approached me. And it was a hard day. Maybe not the hardest, but hard, nonetheless. I had worked my backside off to get here, so my mom could see me in the cap and gown, and she didn’t get to be here.
“I think I want to be alone. I might go back to the apartment and paint. I always feel better when I paint.”
“You sure?”
“I am.”
“Look at Silas,” Cleo said pointing at our friend who’d just introduced his Domme to his mother,and his mother and hisDomme, to his new girlfriend. He looked terrified and yet still madly in love. It was adorable.
“Mira?”
I jumped at the hand that tapped my shoulder. When I turned, it was my grandmother standing there. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed that out of the two people I’d seen in the crowd, that it was this one who found me and not the other.
“Hi,” I said somehow managing to sound both affronted and nervous at the same time.
“I know you’re probably surprised to see me since the last time you saw me was when you banged on my door and ripped me a new one.”
