Worth the Trouble ✓

04 | golden

THE MORNINGS ARE GETTING COLDER.

Waiting for the chartered coach to take me to the Carsonville Academy leaves me frozen to the bone. My breath mists into the air, and I shove my hands deeper into the pockets of my pressed trousers. In my right hand is a slip of paper I took a great deal of care to write, and I turn it over in my palm thoughtfully.

I had a revelation over Thanksgiving break. It was while Dad and I ate Thanksgiving dinner, a miniature meal of two turkey legs, mashed potato, green beans and tinned pumpkin soup. Holidays haven't been the same since Mom left.

Each year they get greyer and greyer, though I think that it's Dad fading rather than the joy of the season. Mom calls the landline. He picks up, and whatever she asks can apparently be answered with noncomittal grunts. Then Dad passes the phone to me, and I answer her questions about school, which classes I take, whether I do extracurriculars, if I get along with my peers. When I hang up, Dad and I share a quick burst of laughter.

Ever since I got old enough to make my own way around town, he's been spending a lot more time at the bar. He either orders in or makes dinner and leaves it in the oven to keep it warm. But he's gone from the time I arrive home from school till long after I fall asleep.

I can't blame him for drinking. He doesn't get mad or violent. Just sleepy. At least he stayed.

After a quiet Thanksgiving dinner and a quieter night, I messaged Suki. She'd already finished cleaning the dishes and taken her shower. The Yamatos have a functional dishwasher but refuse to use it, and everyone showers in the nighttime. She told me Thanksgiving is small at her place, too. Just her and her parents, since all her extended family lives in the Pacific Northwest.

I digress. My revelation was how amazing and bright and colourful holidays would be if she could come over to my house. And birthdays. And after school. And life, in general. Then I knew what I had to do. What I had to try to do, at least.

When the coach pulls up alongside the kerb, I sigh in relief. My extremities are going numb on this particularly cold morning. Suki is already in her usual spot, six rows back, on the right, window seat. She sits there every day.

I slide into the aisle seat and pull out the slip of paper. "Here," I whisper, sliding it onto the pages of her book of the week.

Until the bus gets to my stop, Suki reads to entertain herself. Any spare moment she has, she reads. Her choice of bookmarks is whatever she can get her hands on, because she refuses to spend her allowance on a proper bookmark. Currently, it's a movie ticket stub.

Suki picks up my note in her slender fingers. "What's this?"

"Just read it." Suki arches an inquisitive eyebrow at me, before she sighs and shakes her head. I see her dark, clever eyes skimming quickly over the handwritten words, so I hastily catch her wrist in my hand. "Aloud."

It's got to be read aloud.

After my Thanksgiving revelation, I spent a week thinking about how to ask her. I blew all my Dare Week money on our first two dates— 

I mean, hangouts. Not that I regret it.

But now I don't have any capacity for grand gestures. Nor did I want to simply ask over social media. Only a chump would do that when he didn't have to. Plus, I never saw her in school. I could hardly wait to tell Suki, let alone wait around for those sporadic moments when she appeared in the hallways like a mirage.

The note is my gesture, my scruffy handwriting immortalised in black ink. It reads like a series of brain teasers, the answers to which should be read aloud.