Chapter Fourteen

 “So Katie, how have you been in the couple weeks that I haven’t seen you?” Mike asked as he shoved a piece of pizza into his mouth.  I just bit the end off of a french fry.

        “I’ve been good.  Book ten, finally.  After that I’ll have to find something else to play, but I’m not sure that I’ll have trouble playing anything else.”  I couldn’t help bragging a little bit.  It was Mike.

        “Yeah?  What about school?  How you doing?”

        I gulped.  “Well, I’m getting good grades in most of my classes. . . .”

        “But you’re failing math.”

        “How’d you guess?”

        “That expression on your face that clearly said, ‘If Brad finds out he’ll kill me.’  And just so you know, I wasn’t planning on telling him.  But I am going to tutor you now.”

        I spit out my milk.  “Excuse me?”

        “You heard me.”  He leaned forward.  “I.  Am.  Tutoring.  You.  In.  Math.  And you can’t get out of it, either.”  Leaning back at again, he smiled at me smugly.

        I glared at him.  “No.  Absolutely not.”

        He threw his hands up in the air.  “Why not?  I’m here in town still, and my college courses aren’t all that hard.  I did harder stuff in high school.  So why is it bothering you?”

        “I’m just . . . not comfortable accepting favors.  Then it feels like I’ll owe you something.  And I already owe you for letting me stay at your place during breaks and stuff,” I pointed out.

        He swallowed his latest mouthful and burped.  The smell of tomato sauce and cheese spread over my face.  “Sorry,” he apologized.  “Besides, I owe it to your brother.  Taking care of you is the least I can do.  And if anyone owes me anything, I’ll make Brad pay for it.  Happy?”

        I sighed and looked at the bright yellow ceiling that gave me a headache.  “No, but you aren’t going to stop, are you?”

        He smiled.  “Wasn’t planning on it, no.”

        “Fine, we’ll meet at the pubic library after school.  And don’t get all mafia on me.  If you do I have a right to dump cranberry juice over your head.”

        He held his hand out to me.  “Agreed.  Mafia Mike equals Cranberried Mike.”

        I laughed and shook his head, and to my dismay my cell phone rang.  Answering it, I said, “Hello?”

        “Katie?  Thank goodness.  Is Mike there?  I have some news for both of you,” said his mom, Molly.

        “What is it?”  I set the phone down on the table and put it on speakerphone so we could both hear it at the same time without getting uncomfortably close.  Mike looked at me quizzically but didn’t say anything.

        Molly inhaled deeply and said in one huge glob of words, “Henry, my father, is in the wheelchair.  His arthritis is now so bad that his legs won’t work right.”  Mike and I both froze at the same time, and it would have been comical had the situation not been so serious.  Molly continued, “He’ll be in the hospital for a few days, because the doctors want to make sure that there’s nothing too serious with him, but we’re afraid that he’ll be in a wheelchair for the rest of his life.”

        I glanced at Mike, but his face was a blank mask.  I told Molly, “We’ll have to call you back, kay?”

        “Okay.”  I could almost hear her chewing on her lip, but we said our good-byes and hung up.

        Five minutes later and Mike still hadn’t said anything.  I nibbled on the rest of our friends and stood up, saying, “My lunch will end soon.  We have to go.”  Still not talking, he stood up and we left the restaurant so that we could breathe without smelling deep fried salt.

        When we caught up with Kayla at the front of the school I shot her a look that I hope screamed “Don’t say anything.”  If it didn’t, it worked anyway because she kept her mouth clamped shut.

        The rest of the school day was solemn enough.  At least no one decided to try to cheer me up.  That’s always a bonus.  The bad part is that I barely finished any of my homework, so I would have to do most of it when Dad was gone.  And I had to write an essay.  That was five pages long.

        “Come on, it can’t be that hard.”  Three hours after the horrible phone call, Kayla was standing by my locker watching me stuff all of my books in the backpack.

        “Do you want to do my essay for me?  I’m sure it’ll be all so easy, considering you were in Honors English last year while I’m in regular English 10,” I smiled.

        Kayla laughed.  “That would be cheating!  Besides, this is good for you.  So stop whining and get to work.”  I glared at her and shook my head as I zipped my backpack up.  Lifting it, I grunted.  It had to be about sixty pounds.

        “If you want I can help you with Science.”

        I snorted.  “Biology is easy.  I could do half of it in my sleep.  The other half I just read the book and the notes Mr. Mobery gave us.”

        “I sometimes wonder if you just fake being dumb.”

        “I don’t fake being dumb in Math.  I’m surprised they didn’t send me to Informal Geometry.  I know that they should have,” I said, holding my breath as we walked past the Home Ec class.  Their cake was burning.

        “I know they should have put you there, but they didn’t, so just be thankful for that.  Then you’ll be able to get into a better college.”

        Pushing the door open to leave the school, I laughed.  “Not with my GPA.”

        “Whatever.  I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?”

        “Bye Kayla.”

        We parted ways, thankfully on my part.  I didn’t want to have her hovering over me all the time like she had taken a habit of doing.  However, I still felt bad that I was happy to leave my best friend standing on the front steps of the school.  Still, I did leave her there.

        Only to be picked up by someone else.

        “Katie, can you please come home with me?” Mike asked, walking up to me.  All of the girls nearby who didn’t have a boyfriend glared daggers at us.  I didn’t care.

        “Sure, but only if you carry a few of my books.”  I turned around and started to try to unzip the backpack so he could take my geometry book out or something like that, but he just took the entire bag off my shoulders.

        “This is heavy for you,” he commented as he easily swung it over one shoulder.  I laughed.  “What?” he asked.

        “Just how strong are you?”

        “Katie, I was on the football team for a year.  I had to have been strong,” he pointed out, also laughing.

        We talked on like this until we reached his house, where he fell silent.  I could guess why.

        Entering his house, we saw Molly sitting on the couch, looking at old pictures of her dad.  I set my backpack to the side and plopped down next to her so I could see as well.  Henry used to be tall.  Wow.

        Mike sat down on her other side, and when she looked at him and started crying I suddenly felt like I shouldn’t be there, yet I wasn’t allowed to leave.  So I just sat there, trying not to stare and failing epically.

        After a few minutes they finally remembered that I was there and Molly said, “Well, I suppose I’d better leave you two to your homework.  I’ll see you later.”  Mike and I took that as we were banished from the room, so we stood up and took our books up to his room.

        “Okay, on to Math.  What is the formula for the area of a circle?” he asked. I groaned.