(no subject)
Title: A True Gentleman (18/?)
Pairing: Dom/Billy
Rating: PG-NC17
Warnings: AU, angst, art geekery
Summary: Uni fic.
The morning sun tentatively warmed Harvard Yard-transformed from its usual peace with chairs, rippling banners, and thousands of people-through the arduous process of seating the entire university's faculty, alumni, graduating students with their families patiently (or perhaps impatiently) waiting. The grass was green and damp beneath their feet as each of the university's schools slowly marched in. Nearly two hours had already past just getting 32,000 people seated, and Dom had long since decided Pomp and Circumstance could go to hell.
He'd spent most of the morning before the ceremony trying to direct his parents' somewhere to park, since they'd adamantly ignored his repeated insistence that parking anywhere within a five mile radius of the school on Commencement Day would be a nightmare, they'd still insisted on taking the rental car. Elijah was much in the same boat with his own family. Their little trio was all split up anyhow, waiting in alphabetical formation on the outskirts of the Yard and waiting their turn to be guided in. Dom had yet to see Billy in this sea of black and red gowns.
He pulled out his phone as the Arts group was finally called to stand and begin slowly shuffling into place. One of the ushers guiding them where to go eyeballed him scathingly, since during rehearsal they'd been strongly reminded that mobiles were highly frowned upon at an ivy league school commencement (a rule clearly no student gave a fuck about, as most were texting or taking video). Are you here? he sent off to Billy's number. He hardly expected a reply, given that Billy's mobile was prepaid and every text cost him money.
But a minute later a reply chimed back, Am I where?
Standing around like a decorated ant.
Another two minutes passed as their procession inched forward, and it occurred to Dom that Billy was way ahead of him alphabetically and already in the Tercentenary Theater, with eyes watching. But then his phone chimed back, Hooded and tammed.
Dom grinned and sent back, sexy. He gripped his phone, smoothing his own black undergrad robes and adjusting his mortarboard, trying to picture Billy in his doctoral red garb. There really wasn't much sexy about caps and gowns, but the thought of Billy with the fancy traditional hood and a suit beneath pushed him through the long, boring march to his seat.
After the seating, speeches, and the long handing out of degrees slowly drew to a close with the disappearance of the timid sun, a rain began gently drizzling down as people cleared out of the Yard at a much faster pace than they came in. Dom had only caught a brief glance of Billy from seemingly half a mile away as he'd walked up to collect his degree with the rest of the school, the only part of this whole ordeal that had gone by far too quickly. Once again, he had to locate his parents, eat quickly at the luncheons to settle his growling stomach and then direct them to the building where the School of Fine Arts and Architecture's diploma ceremony would be held, for a second round of sitting on a hard chair for another hour or two before walking up to get fancy piece of paper.
The Piper Auditorium in Gund Hall was a considerably smaller venue than the massive affair of Morning Exercises, but Dom had spent plenty of time in this building for his Design and Photography courses, so it also felt much less formal. Once seated in his row in the middle of his class, he spotted Billy at one end of the front row with the two other doctoral candidates as the Art school faculty presented their department speeches and accolades. Even Prof Mort, up on stage in his own red robes and cowboy boots beneath couldn't manage not to look a bit bored.
"... and now, to address our graduating class is a published author in the field of Art History, with his Associate's degree from City of Glasgow College, his Bachelor's from Glasgow University, this morning the recipient of a Graduate degree awarded Summa Cum Laud, and very soon to be Doctor of Art History, your fellow student and graduate, Billy Boyd."
Dom's head had come up at the first mention of Glasgow, fastening his eyes to the back of Billy's head beneath his silly velvet tam o'shanter. The bastard hadn't said a thing about giving a speech to their class, had been pretty mum about anything relating to the ceremony, in fact. Hell, he hadn't even been at the rehearsal.
As Billy made his way up to the podium, Dom clapped perhaps a bit louder than the rest of the students around him, grinning to finally see him properly in the flesh, or rather the cherry red robes and draped hood.
"Hello," Billy voice rang in the microphone with feedback, and he leaned away from it with a wince. "Sorry. I'll try not to be so Scottish." A vague wave of laughter went through the crowd. "And thank you, Professor Candelwahl, for the... ehm, embellished intro. Makes me feel like the last twelve years or so of higher education were worth it."
The crowd laughed again as he unfolded the papers he'd brought. He smoothed both sheets out on the podium and cleared his throat, eyes wandering over the auditorium and left to right were families were seated. Dom grinned as he remembered how much Billy seemed to dislike addressing a class, and though the Art and Design school was quite small by comparison to giving a speech the full 32,000 strong outside, speaking to such an assembly as this might still be a bit daunting. Or perhaps he only hated it when certain students were doing their level best to disrupt and annoy him. Perhaps he didn't mind it so much if he secretly liked said students.
Among the quiet murmuring and the squeaking of chairs, Dom gave a very loud, exaggerated sneeze, losing his mortarboard in the process. He bent to retrieve it from between his shoes, hearing giggles around him as he reset it on his head with his patented shit-eating grin. He could hear Elijah's distinctive snickering from the back tiers, but the act had the affect he'd wanted: Billy had spotted him among the sea of nearly identical black robes and hats. He reshuffled his papers once again, narrowing his eyes, almost in a dare. Dom merely tamped his hat down and pulled his ears comically out of its edges, knowing full well how ridiculous it made him look. He widened his eyes, going for the look of complete innocence to listen with rapt attention. Billy cleared his throat again behind a smirk, dropping his eyes to his papers and began:
"Hundreds of years ago, students of art would study under the great masters of their craft. They sometimes left their homes as young as ten to spend much of their lives in the company of Michelangelo, Raphael, Caravaggio, da Vinci.
"Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci is one of my favorite artists who has ever lived. Maybe a few of yours as well, eh? A man who, in sixty-seven years of life, was not only painter, sculptor and an architect, but a mathematician, an inventor, a musician, a writer, an engineer... his knowledge and talents spanned nearly all of what we consider the Fine Arts, Mathematics, Medicine, Science and more.
"Arguably, Leonardo da Vinci accomplished more in his lifetime than most people could ever dream of. But it was his alleged dying words that have intrigued me the most." Billy raised a finger at the somewhat uncomfortable silence, "Not to be so morbid as to equate this occasion to the death of a master, but... more to what has come from his influence, since after all, each of us only has the time we're given to make our mark on the world.
"It's said that Leonardo died on a stormy night, at the chateau of his patron King Francois I, and in the presence of his two lifelong and most beloved students, Salaí and Francesco Melzi. That night the rain pounded down on France and all the rest of Europe." Billy shifted his eyes around the auditorium, briefly lighting again on Dom in the center. "I might be making this rainstorm up, but stick with me." The audience gave him another confused laugh as he continued, "I'm not making this part up, though. It is documented that Leonardo's final spoken words were, 'I have offended God and Mankind because my work did not achieve the quality it should have.'"
Billy gave a long pause to allow that statement to punch, looking out across the heads of the students. "There are various other translations of the quote from the Italian, of course, but hits you, doesn't it? It strikes at your heart to know a man who-to this day is on most top ten lists of the most influential human beings to have ever lived-wasn't satisfied with what he did. Some people might roll their eyes at that, say he was being facetious. And maybe he was," Billy shrugged as another titter of laughter went around the auditorium.
Then Billy shook his head with a smile. "I don't believe that. To me, this was a man who embraced what art truly is, at its simplest form. To influence. To affect. To challenge. And perhaps he didn't even realize his own influence on the world; how many of us do? It's difficult to see past your own self-criticisms and prejudices to realize that someone else might see a grand work of art, or an idea that might change everything." Billy's eyes held on Dom's for a moment, and his breath caught at what other implications could be meant in that statement, remembering the way Billy had looked at his own work, or how he'd looked at him on certain occasions.
"Remember that the measure of each artist's success is not necessarily by his or her own action, but the action itself is that of a raindrop in a still pond: it affects and influences everything around it. However dissatisfied Leonardo may have been, the droplets he made are still rippling, still affecting all of us, more than five hundred years later. What he and every other artist in the world and across history has done is to provide you all with new challenges to accept, new ideas to try, new raindrops to make new ripples. This is what shapes our future.
"From the years I have spent here among you, and hopefully taught a few of you about how art has arrived at our current era, I have watched you continue to make strides and lay down a new history. Now you graduate from a school that is renowned around the world, because you have worked and put forth years of your time and effort to hone your crafts and improve your knowledge to receive this degree. Whether you take photographs, or design buildings, or capture the soul of a person with a few strokes of your pen," Billy's eyes lit once again on Dom's face, making his heart give a funny wobble as he went on, "something occurs to me.... You are all the students of the grand masters. You are the up and coming da Vinci's of the world. And you will continue to influence, and to affect, and to challenge, because your hearts will always yearn, the way Leonardo's did, to do ever more. So, my fellow graduates of Harvard University, by all means... make it rain."
At Dom's first clap, the rest of the students and audience joined as well, a feeling of excitement rushing through the crowd. Billy looked mildly thrilled by it as he glanced around at students waving their hats, spotting Dom in the middle again and smiling before he shuffled back to his place.
Outside, the campus was dripping and chilly, but the drizzle had stopped. Dom spotted and jogged quickly across the grass to catch Billy, walking alone amongst family groups and grads taking photos and hugging, with his robe unzipped to the suit and tie beneath, tam o'shanter and degree folio tucked under one arm as he strode along with both his hands in his pockets.
"Bills!" he called, halting him so he could catch up, "Hey!"
"Hey," Billy responded, with an odd look on his face.
"Pretty speech," Dom offered, dropping his brow somewhat accusingly, "You didn't tell me about that."
Billy shrugged, scrubbing at his hair as a drop fell on him from the leaves above. "Wasn't a big deal. Viggo asked me to."
Dom shuffled closer, sliding Billy's tie lightly through his fingers. "And yet it rained."
Billy spontaneously smiled, looking about at the damp around them. "It did that, eh?" He pocketed his hands again as his eyes came back, flicking down and back up Dom's own dark suit beneath his black gown. The green campus reflected back in them, making them even more intense, and oddly sad. "Coincidence. I didn't even watch the weather report."
"I loved it," Dom murmured, tugging Billy's tie lightly, even as he heard his mother calling his name from behind. He gritted his teeth momentarily, muttering an explanation, "My parents."
Billy nodded, eyes shifting over Dom's shoulder, "I should go."
"Wait, just a second."
"Dom..."
"Dominic," his mum's voice was quiet close behind now, "Why do you still dart off like you're all of eight-years-old... Oh, hello. You're the Scottish lad that gave that wonderful speech, aren't you?"
Billy eyebrows collected nervously, nodding, "Aye, I suppose I was."
Dom turned to his parents, the cuffs of his father's suit trousers damp and his mother's heels splattered from the grass. "Mum, Dad, this is Billy."
"Billy, how lovely," his mother greeted as Billy shook her hand. "I don't think Dom's mentioned you before."
"Haven't known him that long," Billy lied with a shrug.
"A PhD," Dom's father noted as they also shook hands. "I imagine your family is very proud of you, young man."
"Ah, yeah," Billy scrubbed at the back of his hair awkwardly. "Not finished quite yet, though."
"I give him six months, tops," another very welcome voice joined them as Prof Mort strode up and gripped the pair of them by shoulders and gave them a good shake. "Billy's probably my hardest-working student. Dom-maybe the smartest."
"Smart-arsed, more like," Dom's dad said.
"That too," Viggo grinned, giving Dom a harder shake and offering his own hand. "Viggo Mortensen."
"Ah, Dom's advisor, the cowboy!" Austin exclaimed. "I've heard a lot about you!"
"Oh, we must have a picture, everyone scoot together," Dom's mother pulled her camera out of her purse.
"Erm, I'll just..." Billy started to step away, but Viggo pulled him firmly back.
"No, no, stand there together, that's it," she insisted on snapping several shots with Viggo smiling behind them.
"Let me ask you, Professor," Austin tugged Viggo aside after she was finished, "Your opinions regarding graduate schools in the states, especially in Architecture..."
BIlly was attempting to skitter off unnoticed again, but Dom caught him up around the trunk of the big oak, "Wait, Bills." He paused as he glanced back around at his dad, chewing Viggo's ear off. "Christ, he's relentless," he complained sourly, "I get to listen to that all night."
Billy did listen for a moment, as Viggo politely nodded and offered vague words that didn't lean one way or another. "How long are they in town for?" he asked.
"Just until tomorrow, thankfully. I've got to take them out for dinner later," Dom lamented, looking back at him imploringly, "Come with me."
Billy's eyes went wide, "No."
"Please?"
"Dom, no," he repeated, as if the idea was horrifying. "I can't."
"Please, Bills."
"I really can't, Dom," Billy insisted, "I've got work tonight, at Morton's."
Dom exhaled sadly, then lifted his eyes to meet Billy's at a sudden obvious idea, to which Billy quickly responded, "Don't you dare. We're probably booked out tonight anyhow."
Sliding his teeth over his bottom lip, Dom tried a sweet smile, dropping his fingers to Billy's wrist, hidden by their big sleeves, "I just want to see you. It's been ages."
A flash of Billy's teeth returned it as he whispered back, "It's been a week."
"More than a week since I really saw you," Dom swiftly replied, to which Billy shushed quietly but with an impish grin, flicking his eyes from his shoes to Dom's mum over his shoulder, taking photos of the buildings and people milling about.
"I'll see you at your party tomorrow night, remember?"
Dom lit up brightly, "You'll come?"
"I said I would, didn't I?" Billy nodded, smiling over Dom's shoulder again, "Your mum's taking pictures of us." Dom turned just as she snapped a shot and then picked her way through the wet grass over to them again. "'S where you got the photo-bug from, hmm?"
"Billy, why don't you and your parents come with us to dinner? " she asked, "It'd be no trouble at all."
"I'm afraid I can't, M'um," Billy gathered his eyebrows apologetically. "I've work tonight."
"Oh, but aren't you spending time with your family?"
"They obviously aren't here, Mum," Dom said flatly. He'd had quite enough of his parents' assumptions after this morning.
"Don't be sassy, Dominic," she shot back. "I certainly don't mean to pry, I only assumed-"
"No worries," Billy shifted his feet. "'S not a big deal. I've got to go anyway."
"Well, congratulations, anyway. It was a wonderful speech," she offered politely, touching his arm.
Billy muttered his thanks and turned, prompting Dom to point his mum at the banners decorating the façade of Widener to distract her while he trotted off to catch Billy up again.
"Hey," he paused, trying to read that odd look on Billy's face. "Sorry about that. Are you okay?"
"Yeah," Billy shook his head, contradicting with his answer as he paused, looking about at other grads with their families. "This is all just... a bit weird, you know?"
Dom nodded, moving closer instinctively as Billy shook his head again. "Feels like a hundred years since I did this last, and that time..." he stopped, looking at his shoes and shrugged, but Dom understood. That time, it was likely that at least his sister and his gran had been there to see it, and the lack was sinking hard in now.
He cast about, trying to find something to make it feel better, "I saw you get your PhD today. And I put you through hell to get it, eh?"
Billy breathed a laugh, waving the folio in the air between them. "You did that."
"DR. BOYD," bellowed Orlando from nearby, with Elijah trailing behind as he ran up to them, "Give me this thing, here-" he grabbed Billy's tam and tugged it down to his eyebrows onto his his own head, ridiculously with the tassel dangling in front of his nose as he shoved his own mortarboard haphazardly onto Billy's head. "We fucking graduated, man!"
"Yeah, bitches!" Elijah roared, hands punching in the air, and Orlando looped two long arms around both Dom's and Billy's necks. Their exuberance seemed to perk Billy up, even as Orlando planted a big wet kiss on his cheek, getting a dark look from Dom and returning with a sly grin. "Aw, my bad, you two lovebirds were having a moment, yeah? Here," He removed himself from between them, knocking their heads together with his arms still encircling them, "Commence with kissy-wissies."
"Dude," Elijah shushed with giggles, standing a bit apart from them and glanced around. Dom could hear his mum's camera snapping away.
"Relax, Lij," Orli grabbed him by the collar and knuckled his head, "If your dad sees you gaying it up he can deal, because you just GRADUATED FROM HARVARD! I can't wait to celebrate! Billy, are you coming to the party?"
"Yeah, I'll come," Billy replied, looking at Dom again. Grinning, Dom put a hand around his neck and squeezed, leaning close to drop his voice under his mates' raucousness, "Better?"
"Yeah," Billy took to deep breath, biting his lip. "Still got to go, though. Have to catch a bus."
"Right," Dom remembered with a sigh of his own, with a last squeeze to his neck, he tugged him close to press a chaste kiss to his mouth. "See you at the party, then."
Billy exhaled, a flush crawling over his cheeks at Dom's overt affection. "See you."
He watched him stride away, returning to his parents' as Orlando and Elijah had got roped into photos with Viggo and Dom's mother.
"Come on, Dom, let's have proper photos with your friends," she encouraged.
Orlando piped up, "He's too busy mooning over his boyfriend."
Dom's mum gasped, looking after Billy, and then back at her son, "That lovely young man is your boyfriend, Dominic, why on earth didn't you say so?"
Dom grabbed Orlando in a headlock, pretending to strangle him from behind. He caught Viggo arching an all-knowing eyebrow at him, hiding his blush in his mate's shoulder as Billy disappeared in a flash of bright robes around the corner of Widener.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Pairing: Dom/Billy
Rating: PG-NC17
Warnings: AU, angst, art geekery
Summary: Uni fic.
The morning sun tentatively warmed Harvard Yard-transformed from its usual peace with chairs, rippling banners, and thousands of people-through the arduous process of seating the entire university's faculty, alumni, graduating students with their families patiently (or perhaps impatiently) waiting. The grass was green and damp beneath their feet as each of the university's schools slowly marched in. Nearly two hours had already past just getting 32,000 people seated, and Dom had long since decided Pomp and Circumstance could go to hell.
He'd spent most of the morning before the ceremony trying to direct his parents' somewhere to park, since they'd adamantly ignored his repeated insistence that parking anywhere within a five mile radius of the school on Commencement Day would be a nightmare, they'd still insisted on taking the rental car. Elijah was much in the same boat with his own family. Their little trio was all split up anyhow, waiting in alphabetical formation on the outskirts of the Yard and waiting their turn to be guided in. Dom had yet to see Billy in this sea of black and red gowns.
He pulled out his phone as the Arts group was finally called to stand and begin slowly shuffling into place. One of the ushers guiding them where to go eyeballed him scathingly, since during rehearsal they'd been strongly reminded that mobiles were highly frowned upon at an ivy league school commencement (a rule clearly no student gave a fuck about, as most were texting or taking video). Are you here? he sent off to Billy's number. He hardly expected a reply, given that Billy's mobile was prepaid and every text cost him money.
But a minute later a reply chimed back, Am I where?
Standing around like a decorated ant.
Another two minutes passed as their procession inched forward, and it occurred to Dom that Billy was way ahead of him alphabetically and already in the Tercentenary Theater, with eyes watching. But then his phone chimed back, Hooded and tammed.
Dom grinned and sent back, sexy. He gripped his phone, smoothing his own black undergrad robes and adjusting his mortarboard, trying to picture Billy in his doctoral red garb. There really wasn't much sexy about caps and gowns, but the thought of Billy with the fancy traditional hood and a suit beneath pushed him through the long, boring march to his seat.
After the seating, speeches, and the long handing out of degrees slowly drew to a close with the disappearance of the timid sun, a rain began gently drizzling down as people cleared out of the Yard at a much faster pace than they came in. Dom had only caught a brief glance of Billy from seemingly half a mile away as he'd walked up to collect his degree with the rest of the school, the only part of this whole ordeal that had gone by far too quickly. Once again, he had to locate his parents, eat quickly at the luncheons to settle his growling stomach and then direct them to the building where the School of Fine Arts and Architecture's diploma ceremony would be held, for a second round of sitting on a hard chair for another hour or two before walking up to get fancy piece of paper.
The Piper Auditorium in Gund Hall was a considerably smaller venue than the massive affair of Morning Exercises, but Dom had spent plenty of time in this building for his Design and Photography courses, so it also felt much less formal. Once seated in his row in the middle of his class, he spotted Billy at one end of the front row with the two other doctoral candidates as the Art school faculty presented their department speeches and accolades. Even Prof Mort, up on stage in his own red robes and cowboy boots beneath couldn't manage not to look a bit bored.
"... and now, to address our graduating class is a published author in the field of Art History, with his Associate's degree from City of Glasgow College, his Bachelor's from Glasgow University, this morning the recipient of a Graduate degree awarded Summa Cum Laud, and very soon to be Doctor of Art History, your fellow student and graduate, Billy Boyd."
Dom's head had come up at the first mention of Glasgow, fastening his eyes to the back of Billy's head beneath his silly velvet tam o'shanter. The bastard hadn't said a thing about giving a speech to their class, had been pretty mum about anything relating to the ceremony, in fact. Hell, he hadn't even been at the rehearsal.
As Billy made his way up to the podium, Dom clapped perhaps a bit louder than the rest of the students around him, grinning to finally see him properly in the flesh, or rather the cherry red robes and draped hood.
"Hello," Billy voice rang in the microphone with feedback, and he leaned away from it with a wince. "Sorry. I'll try not to be so Scottish." A vague wave of laughter went through the crowd. "And thank you, Professor Candelwahl, for the... ehm, embellished intro. Makes me feel like the last twelve years or so of higher education were worth it."
The crowd laughed again as he unfolded the papers he'd brought. He smoothed both sheets out on the podium and cleared his throat, eyes wandering over the auditorium and left to right were families were seated. Dom grinned as he remembered how much Billy seemed to dislike addressing a class, and though the Art and Design school was quite small by comparison to giving a speech the full 32,000 strong outside, speaking to such an assembly as this might still be a bit daunting. Or perhaps he only hated it when certain students were doing their level best to disrupt and annoy him. Perhaps he didn't mind it so much if he secretly liked said students.
Among the quiet murmuring and the squeaking of chairs, Dom gave a very loud, exaggerated sneeze, losing his mortarboard in the process. He bent to retrieve it from between his shoes, hearing giggles around him as he reset it on his head with his patented shit-eating grin. He could hear Elijah's distinctive snickering from the back tiers, but the act had the affect he'd wanted: Billy had spotted him among the sea of nearly identical black robes and hats. He reshuffled his papers once again, narrowing his eyes, almost in a dare. Dom merely tamped his hat down and pulled his ears comically out of its edges, knowing full well how ridiculous it made him look. He widened his eyes, going for the look of complete innocence to listen with rapt attention. Billy cleared his throat again behind a smirk, dropping his eyes to his papers and began:
"Hundreds of years ago, students of art would study under the great masters of their craft. They sometimes left their homes as young as ten to spend much of their lives in the company of Michelangelo, Raphael, Caravaggio, da Vinci.
"Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci is one of my favorite artists who has ever lived. Maybe a few of yours as well, eh? A man who, in sixty-seven years of life, was not only painter, sculptor and an architect, but a mathematician, an inventor, a musician, a writer, an engineer... his knowledge and talents spanned nearly all of what we consider the Fine Arts, Mathematics, Medicine, Science and more.
"Arguably, Leonardo da Vinci accomplished more in his lifetime than most people could ever dream of. But it was his alleged dying words that have intrigued me the most." Billy raised a finger at the somewhat uncomfortable silence, "Not to be so morbid as to equate this occasion to the death of a master, but... more to what has come from his influence, since after all, each of us only has the time we're given to make our mark on the world.
"It's said that Leonardo died on a stormy night, at the chateau of his patron King Francois I, and in the presence of his two lifelong and most beloved students, Salaí and Francesco Melzi. That night the rain pounded down on France and all the rest of Europe." Billy shifted his eyes around the auditorium, briefly lighting again on Dom in the center. "I might be making this rainstorm up, but stick with me." The audience gave him another confused laugh as he continued, "I'm not making this part up, though. It is documented that Leonardo's final spoken words were, 'I have offended God and Mankind because my work did not achieve the quality it should have.'"
Billy gave a long pause to allow that statement to punch, looking out across the heads of the students. "There are various other translations of the quote from the Italian, of course, but hits you, doesn't it? It strikes at your heart to know a man who-to this day is on most top ten lists of the most influential human beings to have ever lived-wasn't satisfied with what he did. Some people might roll their eyes at that, say he was being facetious. And maybe he was," Billy shrugged as another titter of laughter went around the auditorium.
Then Billy shook his head with a smile. "I don't believe that. To me, this was a man who embraced what art truly is, at its simplest form. To influence. To affect. To challenge. And perhaps he didn't even realize his own influence on the world; how many of us do? It's difficult to see past your own self-criticisms and prejudices to realize that someone else might see a grand work of art, or an idea that might change everything." Billy's eyes held on Dom's for a moment, and his breath caught at what other implications could be meant in that statement, remembering the way Billy had looked at his own work, or how he'd looked at him on certain occasions.
"Remember that the measure of each artist's success is not necessarily by his or her own action, but the action itself is that of a raindrop in a still pond: it affects and influences everything around it. However dissatisfied Leonardo may have been, the droplets he made are still rippling, still affecting all of us, more than five hundred years later. What he and every other artist in the world and across history has done is to provide you all with new challenges to accept, new ideas to try, new raindrops to make new ripples. This is what shapes our future.
"From the years I have spent here among you, and hopefully taught a few of you about how art has arrived at our current era, I have watched you continue to make strides and lay down a new history. Now you graduate from a school that is renowned around the world, because you have worked and put forth years of your time and effort to hone your crafts and improve your knowledge to receive this degree. Whether you take photographs, or design buildings, or capture the soul of a person with a few strokes of your pen," Billy's eyes lit once again on Dom's face, making his heart give a funny wobble as he went on, "something occurs to me.... You are all the students of the grand masters. You are the up and coming da Vinci's of the world. And you will continue to influence, and to affect, and to challenge, because your hearts will always yearn, the way Leonardo's did, to do ever more. So, my fellow graduates of Harvard University, by all means... make it rain."
At Dom's first clap, the rest of the students and audience joined as well, a feeling of excitement rushing through the crowd. Billy looked mildly thrilled by it as he glanced around at students waving their hats, spotting Dom in the middle again and smiling before he shuffled back to his place.
Outside, the campus was dripping and chilly, but the drizzle had stopped. Dom spotted and jogged quickly across the grass to catch Billy, walking alone amongst family groups and grads taking photos and hugging, with his robe unzipped to the suit and tie beneath, tam o'shanter and degree folio tucked under one arm as he strode along with both his hands in his pockets.
"Bills!" he called, halting him so he could catch up, "Hey!"
"Hey," Billy responded, with an odd look on his face.
"Pretty speech," Dom offered, dropping his brow somewhat accusingly, "You didn't tell me about that."
Billy shrugged, scrubbing at his hair as a drop fell on him from the leaves above. "Wasn't a big deal. Viggo asked me to."
Dom shuffled closer, sliding Billy's tie lightly through his fingers. "And yet it rained."
Billy spontaneously smiled, looking about at the damp around them. "It did that, eh?" He pocketed his hands again as his eyes came back, flicking down and back up Dom's own dark suit beneath his black gown. The green campus reflected back in them, making them even more intense, and oddly sad. "Coincidence. I didn't even watch the weather report."
"I loved it," Dom murmured, tugging Billy's tie lightly, even as he heard his mother calling his name from behind. He gritted his teeth momentarily, muttering an explanation, "My parents."
Billy nodded, eyes shifting over Dom's shoulder, "I should go."
"Wait, just a second."
"Dom..."
"Dominic," his mum's voice was quiet close behind now, "Why do you still dart off like you're all of eight-years-old... Oh, hello. You're the Scottish lad that gave that wonderful speech, aren't you?"
Billy eyebrows collected nervously, nodding, "Aye, I suppose I was."
Dom turned to his parents, the cuffs of his father's suit trousers damp and his mother's heels splattered from the grass. "Mum, Dad, this is Billy."
"Billy, how lovely," his mother greeted as Billy shook her hand. "I don't think Dom's mentioned you before."
"Haven't known him that long," Billy lied with a shrug.
"A PhD," Dom's father noted as they also shook hands. "I imagine your family is very proud of you, young man."
"Ah, yeah," Billy scrubbed at the back of his hair awkwardly. "Not finished quite yet, though."
"I give him six months, tops," another very welcome voice joined them as Prof Mort strode up and gripped the pair of them by shoulders and gave them a good shake. "Billy's probably my hardest-working student. Dom-maybe the smartest."
"Smart-arsed, more like," Dom's dad said.
"That too," Viggo grinned, giving Dom a harder shake and offering his own hand. "Viggo Mortensen."
"Ah, Dom's advisor, the cowboy!" Austin exclaimed. "I've heard a lot about you!"
"Oh, we must have a picture, everyone scoot together," Dom's mother pulled her camera out of her purse.
"Erm, I'll just..." Billy started to step away, but Viggo pulled him firmly back.
"No, no, stand there together, that's it," she insisted on snapping several shots with Viggo smiling behind them.
"Let me ask you, Professor," Austin tugged Viggo aside after she was finished, "Your opinions regarding graduate schools in the states, especially in Architecture..."
BIlly was attempting to skitter off unnoticed again, but Dom caught him up around the trunk of the big oak, "Wait, Bills." He paused as he glanced back around at his dad, chewing Viggo's ear off. "Christ, he's relentless," he complained sourly, "I get to listen to that all night."
Billy did listen for a moment, as Viggo politely nodded and offered vague words that didn't lean one way or another. "How long are they in town for?" he asked.
"Just until tomorrow, thankfully. I've got to take them out for dinner later," Dom lamented, looking back at him imploringly, "Come with me."
Billy's eyes went wide, "No."
"Please?"
"Dom, no," he repeated, as if the idea was horrifying. "I can't."
"Please, Bills."
"I really can't, Dom," Billy insisted, "I've got work tonight, at Morton's."
Dom exhaled sadly, then lifted his eyes to meet Billy's at a sudden obvious idea, to which Billy quickly responded, "Don't you dare. We're probably booked out tonight anyhow."
Sliding his teeth over his bottom lip, Dom tried a sweet smile, dropping his fingers to Billy's wrist, hidden by their big sleeves, "I just want to see you. It's been ages."
A flash of Billy's teeth returned it as he whispered back, "It's been a week."
"More than a week since I really saw you," Dom swiftly replied, to which Billy shushed quietly but with an impish grin, flicking his eyes from his shoes to Dom's mum over his shoulder, taking photos of the buildings and people milling about.
"I'll see you at your party tomorrow night, remember?"
Dom lit up brightly, "You'll come?"
"I said I would, didn't I?" Billy nodded, smiling over Dom's shoulder again, "Your mum's taking pictures of us." Dom turned just as she snapped a shot and then picked her way through the wet grass over to them again. "'S where you got the photo-bug from, hmm?"
"Billy, why don't you and your parents come with us to dinner? " she asked, "It'd be no trouble at all."
"I'm afraid I can't, M'um," Billy gathered his eyebrows apologetically. "I've work tonight."
"Oh, but aren't you spending time with your family?"
"They obviously aren't here, Mum," Dom said flatly. He'd had quite enough of his parents' assumptions after this morning.
"Don't be sassy, Dominic," she shot back. "I certainly don't mean to pry, I only assumed-"
"No worries," Billy shifted his feet. "'S not a big deal. I've got to go anyway."
"Well, congratulations, anyway. It was a wonderful speech," she offered politely, touching his arm.
Billy muttered his thanks and turned, prompting Dom to point his mum at the banners decorating the façade of Widener to distract her while he trotted off to catch Billy up again.
"Hey," he paused, trying to read that odd look on Billy's face. "Sorry about that. Are you okay?"
"Yeah," Billy shook his head, contradicting with his answer as he paused, looking about at other grads with their families. "This is all just... a bit weird, you know?"
Dom nodded, moving closer instinctively as Billy shook his head again. "Feels like a hundred years since I did this last, and that time..." he stopped, looking at his shoes and shrugged, but Dom understood. That time, it was likely that at least his sister and his gran had been there to see it, and the lack was sinking hard in now.
He cast about, trying to find something to make it feel better, "I saw you get your PhD today. And I put you through hell to get it, eh?"
Billy breathed a laugh, waving the folio in the air between them. "You did that."
"DR. BOYD," bellowed Orlando from nearby, with Elijah trailing behind as he ran up to them, "Give me this thing, here-" he grabbed Billy's tam and tugged it down to his eyebrows onto his his own head, ridiculously with the tassel dangling in front of his nose as he shoved his own mortarboard haphazardly onto Billy's head. "We fucking graduated, man!"
"Yeah, bitches!" Elijah roared, hands punching in the air, and Orlando looped two long arms around both Dom's and Billy's necks. Their exuberance seemed to perk Billy up, even as Orlando planted a big wet kiss on his cheek, getting a dark look from Dom and returning with a sly grin. "Aw, my bad, you two lovebirds were having a moment, yeah? Here," He removed himself from between them, knocking their heads together with his arms still encircling them, "Commence with kissy-wissies."
"Dude," Elijah shushed with giggles, standing a bit apart from them and glanced around. Dom could hear his mum's camera snapping away.
"Relax, Lij," Orli grabbed him by the collar and knuckled his head, "If your dad sees you gaying it up he can deal, because you just GRADUATED FROM HARVARD! I can't wait to celebrate! Billy, are you coming to the party?"
"Yeah, I'll come," Billy replied, looking at Dom again. Grinning, Dom put a hand around his neck and squeezed, leaning close to drop his voice under his mates' raucousness, "Better?"
"Yeah," Billy took to deep breath, biting his lip. "Still got to go, though. Have to catch a bus."
"Right," Dom remembered with a sigh of his own, with a last squeeze to his neck, he tugged him close to press a chaste kiss to his mouth. "See you at the party, then."
Billy exhaled, a flush crawling over his cheeks at Dom's overt affection. "See you."
He watched him stride away, returning to his parents' as Orlando and Elijah had got roped into photos with Viggo and Dom's mother.
"Come on, Dom, let's have proper photos with your friends," she encouraged.
Orlando piped up, "He's too busy mooning over his boyfriend."
Dom's mum gasped, looking after Billy, and then back at her son, "That lovely young man is your boyfriend, Dominic, why on earth didn't you say so?"
Dom grabbed Orlando in a headlock, pretending to strangle him from behind. He caught Viggo arching an all-knowing eyebrow at him, hiding his blush in his mate's shoulder as Billy disappeared in a flash of bright robes around the corner of Widener.
CHAPTER NINETEEN