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It was May 22, the best Friday a senior at North Farrow High School could ever experience. It was the end of school until the fall semester of college, for those applicable. Every upperclassman stared at the minute hand as the time slowly counted down to 3:15. Every second felt like a minute, and every minute an hour. Students meandered from class to class, just to hear the sweet release of the bell and the final ride home for most students.

I stood in the doorway of my US history class, just waiting for the digital clock in the hallway to display the sacred time. Every individual fur on my back and arms tingled with anticipation.

"Stop crowding around the doorway," the teacher, Mrs. Macdonald, said.

When I turned to look at her as she said this, I gazed over a crowd of ten to fifteen students, just waiting. Out of the crowd, I picked out some familiar faces that I was going to remember for the rest of my life until I forget and be forced to look in an old yearbook or on social media.

I waved towards Usala, who sat at her desk, skimming the pages of her textbook with her head lying on the open palm of her hand. She waved back without so much a break from concentration. I think she was going to miss school judging by her long ears left limp on her slouched back.

I found Tazu talking to Mariette, the French-Canadian mouse who moved here a few years back. They had been dating for a few weeks now. Then, Mariette back-hand slapped Tazu across the face, knocking his spiked collar off of his neck onto the ground. He must have broken up with her. His pale white fur shone an almost visible pink handprint after she stormed off to probably gossip with Felicity.

Then my eyes rested on Redd, my best friend since elementary school. She stood next to me, and when I looked at her, she started beaming.

"So, Redd?" I spoke over the ambient noise.

"Yeah, Isaac?" Her broad wolf muzzle stuck out at me, and when I backed away, she chuckled.

"Sorry, dude," Redd continued. "I forgot about your personal space."

"It's fine. I'm just really nervous about what's gonna happen at the ceremony."

"Don't worry, Ike. Just get dressed up in your cap and gown, go up there when they call your name, get your diploma, and just walk off the stage."

"I know what to do. I'm just...worried something unexpected might happen."

"Like what happened with Grayson?"

"Yeah."

"Relax. He's not gonna do anything to you. I won't let him."

"Thanks, Redd. I at least feel a little bit better."

"Don't sweat it."

3:13.

"Hey, the bell's gonna ring any second now!" I exclaimed.

"I'll get Taz and Sala."

Redd squeezed through the crowd of upperclassmen into the empty void that was our last class ever. It seems like only yesterday that we watched a Civil War reenactment. I still remember what happened when the "soldiers" fired blank rounds as per their demonstration. Note to self: check area for ant nests.

I stared at the clock again, one foot in the hallway and the other in the classroom. Everyone started to push for freedom from this school.

Calm down, I thought. The ceremony is tonight, and I don't want to spend it in the hospital.

3:14.

"Here we go, guys," a student from behind me said.

"Yeah," I whispered, just loud enough so that I could hear it. "Here we go. The first moment of the rest of our lives."

I closed my eyes and waited for the bell to blare the signal to leave. I counted every individual second. I took very deep breaths, letting my chest rise and fall in sync with my counting. I prepped my legs by positioning them like a sprinter's. I had an unforgettable twelve years of schooling, and the next four would be extraordinary.

3:15.

The bell signaled the race as I quickly hid in the space between the doorway and the locker. Tazu came out first, still rubbing Mariette's mark on his face.

"Say anything," he told me, "and you won't like me. Nah, I'm just kidding. See you later, man."

"See ya later, Tazu!"

I speed-walked to my locker at the end of the Math Hall, forty feet away. I savored every deliberate step that I took. At my locker, my "locker-mates" were getting their respective belongings out, emptying the lockers as fast as the classrooms were emptied.

"So, Isaac," the goat kid nearest to my left said, "What are you gonna do after all this?"

"Well, Cody, I'm going to the University of Pittsburgh. When you see me again at the reunion 10 years later, you'll know me as the famous Isaac Prin, artist extraordinaire!"

"And you'll be sure to address me as Mr. Heartnet, right?"

"No, I'll still call you Cody."

"I know, but in a business setting..."

"Gotcha, Mr. Goatnet."

"Heh heh, I'll see you at the ceremony, okay?"

"Hell yeah, you'll see me!"

Cody left, and as I grabbed my binders and put them in my backpack, another senior came up behind me. I nearly jumped out of my skin when he spoke.

"So you still up for the party?" he said.

"What party?"

"The one Grayson's hosting after the ceremony."

I was surprised my veins didn't start popping out of my head at that moment.

"Raz..."

The salmon-colored cat backed away from me, sensing the tension in my voice.

"Oh, sorry, Isaac. I forgot about the, um, incident. I'll just see myself out."

"No, you don't have to do that. I overreacted, I'm sorry. It's just Grayson is a selfish jerk who deserves to get his head bashed in!"

"Isaac, calm down. Find your center. Breathe. Here, let me help you."

He put his left hand on my chest and his right on my back, lifting my chest up and down in tune to my breathing. I wanted to amuse him, seeing as how this might be the last time we'll see each other.

"Breathe in, breathe out. Get the bad thoughts out."

"I'm fine. You can stop touching me now."

He put his hands up to prove he was in no way making physical contact with any body part. My eyes scanned him, and he seemed much more casual than normal. It might have been the sunglasses he was wearing or the wide grin, but something unsettled me. I decided not to delve too deep into it and gave him my yearbook to sign. He took out a red marker from his pants pocket, which I guessed that he just so had to sign yearbooks last-minute.

"'Have a good summer'," he said as he wrote. "'Good luck, ya friendly foxcat.' Here you go."

"Thanks, Raz," I said. "I'll see you later, man."

"Yeah, I'll see you at the party."

"I'm invited?"

"Of course! It'll be awesome."

"Do you promise that Grayson won't try anything?"

"Sure. What are friends for?"

"Speaking of which, here they are."

Redd, Tazu, and Usala stood side by side walking almost in unison down the hall. Forty years ago, you wouldn't see a gray wolf, an arctic fox, and a rabbit even standing together like that without at least one person shoving them apart. But I think that if we were alive back then, we would have stayed together like the BLT we represented. (Tazu was the bacon, Usala was the lettuce, Redd was the tomato, and I was the bottom slice of bread, but I didn't mind because I was still fluffy.)

"Okay," Raz said. "See ya."

He walked off and disappeared into the crowd that was growing smaller by the minute.

"Hey, Isaac," Redd said.

"Hey, I have something amazing to tell you."

"What is it?" Tazu asked.

"There's this party after the graduation thing and we're all invited!"

"Oh, sweet!" Redd said.

"Nice," Tazu said.

Usala just stared at the end of the hall.

"Usala? Didn't you hear what I said?"

"Oh, I heard. In fact, I heard from someone else about this gathering. The host is none other than Grayson Rogers."

"I know."

Silence washed over us after I said this. A teacher came by asking us what we were doing standing in the middle of the hall. Redd apologized as we stepped outside to the courtyard next to the buses. It was only five more minutes, and the buses would leave without us.

"You knew?" Redd reminded me.

"Raz told me. He was the one who invited us there, and he swore Grayson would not hurt us."

Redd spoke up before I could say otherwise.

"Isaac, I know you think that this will take away all of those bad memories for just one night. I know that after this, you won't have to see him ever again. Maybe Grayson would like to fix this up. I don't know."

"And you do know what happened, right?" Tazu asked.

I took a deep breath, the recollection taking over my mind.

"I can never forget it, the faint blood stains on the courtyard and the rush of adrenaline. I mean, the insults I could deal with, but after that fight, I could never forgive him or myself."

"Did you know what would happen in that situation?" Usala said. "It took twenty-seven minutes to get you out of the restroom. We were genuinely frightened, Isaac. I did not even take the time to finish my sentence during that speech for English class."

"What 'Sala means," Tazu said, "is that we were worried about you! Don't get me wrong; I wouldn't care who was fighting what, but once you got involved, one of the only guys in this school that isn't a jock or a jerk, I would have pulled you out of there before the first punch."

"Grayson's a bully, I know that," I said, "but people can change. Maybe he regrets starting the fight, and he wants to start over."

The courtyard emptied out, and the buses were soon to leave. The only voices we heard were our own.

"I think we need to leave," Redd said. "Isaac, if you really think Grayson is trying to do well, then I won't stop you. In fact, I'll go with you after we get our diplomas."

"Thanks, guys," I said.

I wrapped each one of my friends in an embrace. Though Usala tensed up, all three returned the hug. I walked to my assigned bus, No. 27, and stepped on with the other kids named Parker to Richardson. (The last name organization was more efficient to them.) As I took my seat next to a taller, scrawnier weasel kid, I looked out the window to see Usala and Tazu stepping into the buses ahead of me, and Redd into one behind. I thought about all of us sitting, laughing at bad jokes in three hours' time. Everything was going to go smoothly and perfectly until we went to sleep tonight. I checked my watch: 3:25. The vibrations of the bus forced me to rest my head on the leather seat in front of me and sleep early, but I still felt the bus accelerate, turn, slow down, and completely stop. Thank you, first law of motion. However, the teacher in charge of this bus didn't want me to rest before my life changed forever.

"Can I have your attention, please?" Mr. Early requested.

The rest of the bus was either half-asleep or talking all the way to the back.

"May I have your attention, please?" he said more deliberately.

I managed to wake myself up before he shouted at the top of his lungs.

"If you don't listen right this minute, I'll hold all of you on this bus until you start sweating blood!"

The wolf's eyes glowed a special kind of red, and I sat straight in my seat, my backpack falling in between me and the weasel.

"Now, then. As you know, this is the last day of high school for all of you, and you'll either go into the military, business, or college. I know what some of you might be thinking, 'I don't know what I'm going to do.' Some friendly advice for those people: don't worry about what happens a year later, focus on what's happening now. But I do know some of you are immensely excited for college to start, and though you may be confused, you will discover some things about yourself that you never got the chance to do in any of your years in the Serato County School System, such as a love of music, a career in sports, or a simple liking to someone that blossoms into the most wonderful love you ever had in your life."

It almost seemed like he blushed as he took his seat when we approached the auditorium of Central Farrow High School.