Problem Children

Chapter Five

George was sitting with Malcolm and Angus in the basement. The two eleven and thirteen year old boys each had a guitar practicing some chords taught the other day. "Good, good. Now hold your fingers like I showed you."

"I can't wait till I get my own guitar," Angus said. "This one's too big for me."

"Aw, you guys will grow," George said. His brothers looked up at him. Neither one had grown very much over the years and the future didn't look promising. "Maybe."

Malcolm sighed and looked at his watch. "Oh shit, Ang! We gotta get to school!" They set their guitars down and raced upstairs for their uniforms. They and Hannah, now went to junior high. It was 1966, December right before Christmas/summer break.

Hannah waited outside their house. They were late yet again. Malcolm ran outside with Angus following behind. "You're late."

"We know," Malcolm answered breathlessly.

"Did you get it, did you get it?" Angus asked. Hannah pulled a note out of her backpack. She wrote a love note for him to give to Susan Lockhart, his all time crush. "Aha!"

"Remember the deal..."

"Right." Angus pulled two Snickers bars out of his bag.

"Thank you."

"You know, Ang, you could just ask Susan out yourself instead of a lousy note," Malcolm said.

"Lousy?" Hannah asked spitting out Snickers.

"You know what I mean."

"Because this note is anonymous. Susan can't say no if she doesn't know who sent it."

"But she can't say yes either," Hannah said. Angus kicked a rock.

"Oh, what do you know about girls?" he mumbled.

"More than either of you." She kicked the rock as well. "My guess is she throws the note away. Why didn't you write it yourself?"

"'Cause you're the best writer I know." Angus smiled at Hannah. "And my handwriting is shit."

"Just give her flowers or something, Ang, just tell her in person," Malcolm said.

"Ha, fat chance." The three kids played a soccer game with the rock the rest of the way to the school.

The first thing Angus did was slip the note in Susan's locker then headed to his class. He and Hannah were in year seven while Malcolm was in year nine. He and Johnny were still friends, and Angus still didn't like him. Said he was a 'daft sod'. He especially wasn't fond of him during lunch later that day.

Malcolm and Angus were in the cafeteria going on and on about their upcoming New Year's party. "So who's all coming?" Malcolm asked.

"Hannah of course, then all the cute girls of our years. And our friends."

"What about Susan?"

"Didn't you hear me say 'cute girls'?"

"How you've changed, Angus."

"Huh?"

"You used to think girls were gross." Malcolm twirled his plastic fork and Angus watched it.

"That's before they cleaned up."

"So Johnny was right?"

"Yep. That shrimp was right." Malcolm laughed then turned around.

"Ang, look."

"Speak of the devil..."

Hannah sat with a group of year seven girls. Some were squeaking about the party, others were squeaking about boys. Some were just plain squeaking. "Isn't he the cutest thing?"