Fifteen | ✓

five

"This is so delicious, Sketch. I really can't remember the last time I had one of these."

"You mean a Popsicle?" Catherine laughed, raising a brow.

Christopher took another lick at his frozen treat before smiling. "Yeah whatever." His tongue was stained red from the raspberry flavouring.

It came as a surprise to Catherine that he hadn't had a Popsicle in a long time. Judging with his seemingly effervescent personality, she'd supposed he'd go hand in hand with fun things like that.

Popsicles were fun, right?

The concrete sidewalk was overhung by tall leaning trees, the streaming sunlight dappled by luscious green leaves.

It was June; it was summer. She'd never felt more free, more so to do with Christopher's recurring presence than the fact that school had let out last week, marking the end of sophomore year

As a butterfly fluttered past, she couldn't help the next words that fell from her mouth, "I really do love summer."

"Oh yeah? Why so?"

"It's the bestest season in the world."

"There are only four seasons, Sketch, and mind you, not all geographical zones have all four." Christopher paused. "And 'bestest' is not a word in the English language."

"Someone's feeling rather smartassy today," she muttered. "And bestest is an authorized word in my vocabulary."

Christopher laughed. "Smartassy isn't a word as well. Smartass in itself isn't technically a word too. There are many flaws in your lexicon."

Having nothing to comeback with, she settled with blowing a childish raspberry at him.

"Aside from your very interesting vocabulary," he continued, finishing off with his Popsicle, "you're yet to supply a fit answer as to why you love summer so much."

"Who doesn't love summer? It's great and warm and sunny, and the best part: no school!"

Christopher nodded his head as he listened attentively, tapping his dry Popsicle stick against his chin. "Elaborate."

She hummed tiredly, partly worn with his antics. "It signifies growth. Green. Life brought forth; happiness. Even Phineas and Ferb concur," she added, starting to sing the Summer song from the movie.

"Thank you for your unsolicited concert," his deadpan cut her off, although his eyes were smiling, "but I'm still not convinced that summer is the best season."

Catherine crossed her arms across her chest indignantly. "Oh? So what is the best season, Mr. Unconvincable."

"What is it with you and bad English today?" He let out a chuckle, not hesitating as he said, "Winter."

She crumpled her face in bemusement. "Winter? You prefer winter over summer? Winter with its frigid chains and only a two week break?"

"I at least supposed I had a right to my own opinions."

She backtracked, wanting to apologize but not feeling like, so instead she said, "Why?"

"Why I like the winter?" She nodded. "Well it's really cold, calm, quiet-"

"Boo! Sounds broody and depressing."

Catherine squirmed when Christopher shot her an irritated look; it was very off putting and she didn't know why he was uncharacteristically cranky that day.

"I'm sorry." This time, she voiced her apology aloud, afraid of his anger.

She had never seen Christopher angry before and wasn't about to invoke  it now.

He sighed, the embers in his brown eyes extinguished of their steady smolder. "I'm not mad at you; just a bit irked today."

She nodded, not bothering to interrogate him on the topic of his irkedness in order not to get him irkeder.

Christopher was right; the quality of her English was really falling putrid.

"Winter is like a pause button," he'd continued to speak as if there were no interruption. "All the other seasons have so much energy and joviality and sometimes the earth needs to take a rest from it all. So she freezes herself in a blanket of frost, recovering until her next awakening."

Catherine hummed in awe of his vast intelligence, either that or everything about him had become awesome to her.  "I never thought of it that way..." she mused, eager for him to continue.

And so he did: "The earth is not the only one recuperating during this time space; animals hibernate,  defying nature by pausing their bodies for numerous weeks on end-"

I wish I could sleep for numerous weeks on end.

"- until they awaken in the next season, when the play button is activated. Plants shed their leaves and become bald dark lifeless-like wood, the snow upon their dry branches resembling white frosting. They pause as well, recovering from the year's strain and stress. And the humans are not left out, even though most of us break the balance of nature and creep in and out of our homes in normality. But the other portion of the human race prefer to nest indoors smothered by a cocoon of blankets and hot chocolate and warm biscuits made by mothers-" at this he faltered. "Indoors also means solitude: a one on one time with yourself in which you gift yourself the opportunity to think and mull over the aspects of your life..." Christopher shook his head, his bangs flipping in the wind in a mesmerizing rhythm. "Y'know what? Forget it; I probably don't make any sense."

This saddened Catherine's heart, for she longed to hear the rest of the thoughts he'd knitted into the knowledgeable tangle that was his cerebrum, and also because he'd seemed to have lost a stroke of confidence, believing that his words had become useless and empty.

She wondered if someone had cut him off from speaking at some point in his life and shunned him, saying that he was talking nonsense; hurting him.

Her emotions must have displayed on her face, because Christopher had queried, "What's the matter? What are you thinking about?"

She did not know how to string her ideas into articulate statements to tactfully carry her opinions across like he had expressively done with so much ease, and a sting of failure pierced her while she simply shook her head and said, "I think you need another Popsicle."

He didn't argue.

As they backtracked towards the parked ice cream van down the two streets they'd previously walked through, Christopher had noticed her skipping across the sidewalk, as if evading something.

"What are you doing?" He asked, furrowing his eyebrows. "I hope you do know that this is cement and not molten lava."

She giggled (my, she hadn't giggled in a long time) whilst taking another jump over a tiny trench wedged in the concrete. "Step on a crack and you'll break your mother's back!" She sang, her movements now resembling a dance choreography.

"That's rubbish."

And she did not fail to note his continuous treading across the cracks after that, sometimes even taking jittery, awkward steps just to zero in on each and every one of them, she pondering if he held an inane vendetta against mothers, or just a deep misogyny for a particular one.