Eli graduated from Bangor High School the following June, one year late. He’d missed most of his senior year in the hospital and rehab, and the school let him finish with summer classes and a tutor that Kurt’s uncle paid for.
The graduation was held at the Cross Insurance Center downtown, a big arena by the river. Eli walked across the stage without his cane, slowly and carefully, with a slight limp he’ll probably carry the rest of his life.
When the principal read his name, “Elijah Daniel Thibodeau,” three rows in the stands went crazy.
Bernadette was there in her church dress, crying into a handkerchief. I was there with Hector’s old camera. Kurt was there in a polo shirt with his stopwatch app finally turned off. Thomas Ouellette came, and so did Linda Morrissette, Theresa Boucher, the ICU charge nurse, and the plow driver from Hermon who found Eli in the ditch, a big man named Gary Labbe who hugged Bernadette so hard he lifted her off the ground.
And Joanne Pelletier was there, sitting right next to Bernadette, where family sits.
After the ceremony, out in the parking lot in the June sunshine, Eli came over to us in his blue cap and gown with his diploma in one hand.
He handed Joanne something with the other.
It was a small Mug & Muffin cup with a lid. I’d made it myself at six that morning and given it to him at the window, because he’d asked me to.
“Small vanilla latte,” he said. “Four eighty-five.”
Joanne took it with both hands and laughed through her tears.
“You paid for this one too, didn’t you?”
“I did,” Eli said. “But this time I’m handing it to you myself.”
Joanne set the cup down on the hood of her Corolla and hugged him. She held on to that boy in the middle of the parking lot for a long time, the way only a mother can hold on to someone.
I took a picture. It’s taped up beside my window at the Mug & Muffin now, right next to the birthday photo of the skinny kid in the gray hoodie squinting at a candle.
Sophia Rivers is an experienced News Content Editor with a sharp eye for detail and a passion for delivering accurate and engaging news stories. At TheArchivists, she specializes in curating, editing, and presenting news content that informs and resonates with a global audience.
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