Stopping Time

Chapter thirteen

It was Wednesday after school and Evan thought it would be a good idea to have a study session. Only problem was neither Connor or Evan understood anything in the textbook and Connor wasn't even paying attention.

    They were at Connor's house–because Evan kept saying that he should be to his house at least once–and no one else was home. Zoe had jazz band, Ms. Murphy was out running errands, and Mr. Murphy was still at work.

    Evan had been rereading the same paragraph for ten minutes, trying to make sense of it. He slammed it shut in frustration and fell back onto the couch.

    Connor was on the floor, staring at a sheet of paper that had practice problems. None of them were solved. Either he didn't get them or he didn't want to do them, Evan wasn't sure.

    Connor crumpled up the paper. "Remind me again why we're doing this?" he asked, tossing the paper onto the couch. "It's stupid."

    "I know," Evan agreed. "What do you want to do?"

"I don't know," Connor said. "Anything but this. We have a foosball table in the basement if you want?"

"Really?" Evan sat up. "Come on!"

Evan pulled Connor up. Connor lead him to the basement. "I haven't been down here in forever," he said.

    Evan ran over to the foosball table. "Jared and I used to play this all the time," he said. "I would beat him every time, so I'd watch out."

    "I call black," Connor said.

    "Of course you do," Evan joked. "What should we play to?"

    "First to ten wins?" Connor suggested.

    "You're on."

They've played eight games. Evan won most of them. Connor won two.

    "Aha!" Evan exclaimed as the ball went into Connor's goal. His hands shot up in victory. "I win!"

    "You weren't lying when you said you were good," Connor said, putting his hands in his pockets.

    "Wanna go again?" Evan asked.

    "I think nine games is good for now," Connor replied. "Let's get something to drink."

    Evan followed Connor up the old creaking steps.

    Evan sniffed, smelling someone cooking. "Who's home?"

    "Probably Cynthia," Connor said. The two entered the kitchen and sure enough Cynthia was cooking.

    She turned around at the sound of voices. "Oh! Connor, who's this?"

    "Evan," Connor said. "He's my uh my friend."

    "You've never mentioned him before," Cynthia said. "But I'm glad you've made a friend. I was just making dinner, would you like to stay?"

    "I-I don't want to i-intrude-"

    "Oh nonsense, you wouldn't be intruding." Cynthia laughed. It sounded forced. "Connor never has anyone over so it would be nice if you did."

    "O-oh. . ." Evan picked at his fingers. "O-ok then."

Awkward. That's the only way to describe dinner.

    Barely anyone spoke. It was mostly questions and then a short answer that lead to silence until someone asked another question.

"So Evan," Cynthia said. Evan looked up from his lap. "How long have you and Connor known each other?"

"O-oh uh, w-we met a-at the b-beginning o-of the y-year," Evan said.