Safe | ZACK FOSTER [ 𝐁𝐎𝐎𝐊 𝟐 ]

Chapter XII - NO LONGER ILLITERATE [ILLITERATE? PT. 2]

You entered your room, rummaging between the cabinets and dropped belongings.
There must be the notepad somewhere...

You opened a plastic bag, your gun, and Zack's notepad and pencil lying below. You took your gun and placed it gently in the holster on your hip.

You took both the notepad and pencil and opened it. There are more than enough pages in here.

You walked back out, searching for Zack, who was on the couch, his arms crossed, one of his hands tapping his arm showing his impatience.

"I found them," you said, showing in your right hand the old notepad. "Then let's get to it," Zack said eagerly.

The two of you sat on the floor. You'd brought an additional pencil so that the two of you could write at the same time.

You ripped two pages from the notebook, handing one to Zack. "Don't crumple it," you said. He nodded, as he held the pencil with his fist.

"First, don't hold the pencil like that. You aren't holding a ball or your scythe," you cleared up. You accommodated his fingers to hold the pencil properly with a firm grip.

"There," you said. "It's like this?" Zack asked.
"There isn't really a correct way to hold a pencil, but the way I showed you is an easy way to hold it so you can write quickly and effectively," you replied.

"Huh, is that so," Zack muttered, looking at his hand that gripped the pencil firmly.
"Now. What would you like to learn to write? Your name, months of the years, days of the week, greetings?" you asked.

"How do I write kill?" Zack said curiously, looking at you.
...Why am I even surprised..?

You took your pencil and drew down a straight line. Zack observed, doing the same. You then drew two diagonal lines, one pointing to the top right direction, and one pointing down and right.
Zack did so, struggling a little, but managing. You then paused, moving your pencil a bit right to the symbol you'd just drawn. You drew a small dot, and then another line down, Zack following and doing the exact same.
Finally, you drew two long lines down, Zack finalizing and doing so.

"So what does this say?" he said.
"Kill," you replied. "The first symbol is a [ k ]. In [ kill ], it's pronounced [kay]. The second letter is [ i ]. It is pronounced [aye]. The last letters are two [ l ]s. They are pronounced as if there was only one, [ ell ]."

It took a few minutes, Zack muttering to himself the syllables and then the word as a whole. He then looked at what he'd written.
"...Kill," he whispered.

A smile formed on his lips as he read it over again. "Kill...Kill! Kill, right?" he repeated. "Yeah," you said, smiling to yourself.
He's so cute, repeating a word over and over once he finds he can read it...

"Now, let's actually do something that'll make things easier for both you and me," you said, gaining back Zack's attention.
"Yeah?" he said.

"We're gonna learn the alphabet, because that way it'll be easier for you to write anything and for me to tell you how you're writing things and your progress," you said.

"The alphabet? What the fuck is that?" Zack said, confused. You sighed, a wry smile on your lips. "Just let me show you, alright?" you said.

"This better not take long," Zack muttered.

You let out a dry, nervous laugh as you scratched the back of your neck.
"No promises."

╔══ ≪ °❈° ≫ ══╗
✧𝐸𝒱𝐸𝒩𝒯𝒰𝒜𝐿𝐿𝒴✧
╚══ ≪ °❈° ≫ ══╝

The sunlight had already faded, the sky a lavender shade with a tint of an orange hue fading to a mild yellow.

"Come on, Zack, you're at the last letter, and you've been trying to write it for five minutes now," you said exasperated.
Who knew it'd take this man hours just to write lowercase letters? Not to mention he hadn't done all of the uppercase letters too.

Though he did put in effort, you did see that. He was genuinely trying to do it correctly, and for that, you were thankful.

"Shut your mouth, I've never done this shit before! And why's it so curved yet straight?!" Zack said, annoyed.
"For fuck's sake, Zack, it's literally the first letter of your name!" you replied.

Zack grumbled, muttering curses as he finally finished, the capital and lowercase [ Z ] written down on the lined paper.

He let out a heavy sigh, as he dropped the pencil. "Holy shit this is exhausting...!" he said.
"This is only day one, Zack. We're going to have to continue working with this," you said.

"You've got to be fucking kidding me," Zack replied.
"You signed up for this, you told me you wanted to do this," you said.

"That's 'cause I didn't think this would be so tedious!" Zack said, looking at you with gritted teeth.

"Yeah, well, we're going to take a break for the rest of the day. You've done more than enough for today," you stated, standing up and stretching, a yawn escaping your lips.

"It'll only get worse from here on when I start teaching you math," you murmured.
Zack sighed sharply, as he stood up, taking the notepad and pencil, taking the papers with him to your room.

Zack locked the room upon entering, looking at the back of his paper. You were perceptive, but not enough to notice what Zack had noted down in the back of his lined paper.

╔══ ❀•°❀°•❀ ══╗
             [ Y / N ]
╚══ ❀•°❀°•❀ ══╝

 𝐘𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐧𝐚𝐦𝐞.

Over. And over. And over.
Heavy, dark circles were drawn around it, the messy scribbles of your name everywhere.
And followed by each repetition of your name were the very delicately written words "is mine."

A lovesick smile found its way to Zack's expression, his heterochromatic hues with a buried glint that could only be described as obsession and insanity.

He sighed, looking at the palm that held the paper. He clenched his fist, crumpling the paper as he headed toward the trashcan and throwing it away.

His eyes narrowed, looking back at the paper that lay at the bottom of the metallic object. He huffed as if ignoring and pushing away a thought that had made itself present in his mind.

"𝐍𝐨. 𝐍𝐨𝐭 𝐲𝐞𝐭."