Swiped

"Tutoring"

^Caleb

Luke

"Dude, have you ever thought about getting a driver's license?," Caleb asked me. We were sitting in Caleb's car which sat idle on the road as the traffic light glowed red from a distance. I was supposed to be tutoring Caleb today, so he's driving us to his place after the last bell rang signalling the end of class.

I nodded half-heartedly. The truth was, I always held an apathetic attitude towards getting a licence. To me, a driving license is nothing more than a piece of plastic that says you're legally allowed to operate a dangerous heavy machinery on the road. But strangely enough, everyone my age is expected to get one. One can argue that setting 16 as the minimum driving age leaves something to be desired.

There are plenty of irresponsible 16 year olds as is proven by Youtube. Now, just to be clear, I am not opposed to learning how to drive, instead I couldn't fathom the rush to get behind the wheel like most of my peers. Besides, I prefer to use public transport or my own two feet to get where I needed to be. If the destination is too far away to walk or inaccessible, which is rarely the case, I normally ask my sister or parents to drive me there.

Perhaps it is the idea of liberty and freedom to travel that makes the prospect of driving so enticing. I looked over at Caleb who was staring out the front windshield with both index fingers tapping the wheel absentmindedly. He hum to the beat of 30 Minute Break that played through the stereo hooked up to his phone.

The dimming light from the sun bounced off his hair making it look a lighter shade of brown. He caught me staring and asked, "What?"

"Your hair is normally ebony. But the light makes it seem tawny," I articulated. Looking perplexed, Caleb muttered in response, "You are such a weirdo."

Smirking I turn to look out the window on my side. The sky darken rapidly. It looks like it was about to rain. Caleb changed gear suddenly and accelerated as the traffic lights went from red to green.

A while later, we pulled in to his driveway. Caleb lived a few blocks from me and Helen. Which meant that I could walk home later after tutoring. His house had the exact same layout as mine, which makes it easy finding my way around inside.

"My parents are still at work. And Jake has classes at Yale. So we've got the place to ourselves." Jake was his elder brother. He graduated four years ago and was accepted to study law at Yale university.

We dropped our bags in his room and went to the raid the kitchen for food. After a couple minutes of pillaging and no doubt, terrorising the groceries in the fridge, we amassed a booty of snacks consisting of a bowl of popcorn, some gummy worms, a pack of Coca-Cola, and a tin of chocolate cookies. Being the hungry teenage guys we are, the mass of food disappeared down our gullets in twenty minutes tops.

I'd like to say that we got down to work immediately. But I'm not in the habit of lying to myself. We made some more snacks and watched YouTube for about an hour. Then, we spent the remaining time playing Halo on his playstation.

"Dude, I think we need to get serious about this whole tutoring," Caleb told me after we completed a campaign. He sounded earnest.

I complete understood where his concern was coming from. Caleb's been having trouble keeping up with the rest of the class for Advanced Trig. Our Maths teacher had the brilliant idea to pair me up with Caleb and assign us study sessions. I didn't much minded it since we hang out all the time. Plus, getting extra credit doesn't hurt either.

"Switch the mode to legendary then," I suggested.

Caleb cackled. "Now you're talking!" He changed the mode to the most difficult setting and we jumped right back in.