What Was Missing

Chapter 11 - Scarlett

Song: Fallen Star - The Neghiborhood

"Me gusta hablar con mis amigos en las tardes."

"Again."

"Me gusta hablar con mis amigos en las tardes." Alex repeats while having a pencil in between his teeth.

He looks so silly. I'm trying so hard not to laugh because if I do, he'll figure me out.

I've been making him do all sorts of weird things during tutoring and I'm happy to say he's been doing them all without complaint. I actually made him do jumping jacks while repeating the vocab just last week. The confused look he gave me when I told him to do them was hilarious but he did the jumping jacks anyway. I think he knows it's his punishment for how he treated me and that's why he isn't fighting me on it. Told you his torture wouldn't be anything extreme.

It's been two whole weeks since we started and it been almost nonstop tutoring. We also made time to complete our English project which we will be presenting tomorrow. We have everything ready so that's one less thing to worry about.

"Alright enough. Put the pencil away and let's move on to the next lesson." I order and he does as I say. Good boy.

"Ok now let's go over the vocab. I'll tell you the English word and you have to tell me the word in Spanish, ok?" He nods and I start with the list.

"To dance."

"Bailar." He says confidently.

"Good." I praise. We've been going over this vocab a lot so he should know most of the words.

"To paint."

"Pintar."

"To sing."

"Cantar."

"To ride." I ask.

He stays quiet and he has a look on his face like he's thinking really hard on the answer but I know he doesn't have a clue.

"Correr?"

"Nope, that's wrong. Now give me 10." I order but once again that confused expression makes its way back to his face.

"But- I don't have any cash on me." He nervously replies.

"What? No! Not 10 dollars Alex, 10 push-ups!" I nearly yell as I facepalm myself.

"O-oh!" He exclaims and quickly scrambles to the ground to do the push-ups. I swear, he can be so dumb for a nerd sometimes.

I watch as he does each push-up but something isn't right. He isn't struggling like I thought he would. If anything it looks like they're the easiest thing he's ever done.

He stands once he's done and I stare at him with narrowed eyes.

"Those push-ups seemed way too easy." I say looking up at him.

"D-did they?" He cluelessly asks as he fidgets around.

"Are you hiding some muscles underneath all those baggy clothes or something?" I try joking. He stays quiet. "Are you?" I question again with more seriousness.

"I-I-"

"Alex, could you come down here and help me for a moment." We hear Emma call from downstairs.

"Coming!" He answers and quickly scurries out the room. Saved by the bell.

I decide to sit and wait on his bed.

Alex has gotten a lot better at remembering the vocab we get assigned in class. He still has trouble forming sentences though but we're making some progress. I've also been enjoying the silly torture I have going on.