1000 Paper Cranes

Chapter 29 - 390

"What's on the agenda, today?" Robin asked as she climbed into my car. Her black hair caught the sunlight in ribbons of blinding white. The light loved her. It was like the light lived in her. And around her. She perpetually glowed. A perpetual bright spark in everything.

"I'm getting a haircut. My parents finally agreed to it." I was more excited than I imagined I would be. We had accomplished all of the easiest to complete cranes; we had knocked out all the low-hanging fruit. Now I was fulfilling the wishes that I had never expected. The things I hadn't expected Mom and Dad to allow, or to actually be physically able to complete.

We were completing two cranes that day.

#21 – Adopt a pet

#4 – Get a Mohawk

Instead of telling her what we were doing, I just handed her two folded cranes. Her eyes lit up as bright as the sun itself. She had only gotten to open one other of my cranes. She was appropriately respectful of the occasion.

"You're getting a Mohawk?" She giggled, not teasingly. "You? Jordan Johnson? With a Mohawk? Do you have a concussion or a fever or something?"

She jokingly felt my forehead. I blushed, embarrassedly.

"Maybe I should have made smarter cranes."

"I think you'll look great. But you literally look great in everything." She kissed my cheek playfully.

"I thought you never lied." I laughed, taking her chin in my hand and tilting her face to kiss her.

"You're adopting a pet? What kind?" She sounded even more excited. I knew that Robin, like me, had never had a pet before. But she'd always wanted one. "Your parents are actually letting you? Even though we're moving away for college soon?"

I shrugged. Surprisingly, my parents had approved. I didn't know what had gotten into them, but since my community service weekend, they had been a lot more lenient on me than they had been. Joanna thought they were slacking up on me so I would stop rebelling. Not that I had rebelled. But that was, apparently, how they'd seen it.

"It'll have to move with me," I explained. "My parents are helping me apply to live off-campus."

I thought about how nice it would be to move to Rhode Island with my girlfriend and my cat. There was something romantic about that. There was something so completely Jack Kerouac about that. There was absolutely nothing Jack Kerouac about that. But it was still the biggest adventure I could imagine taking.

"Do Joanna and Jonathan know that you're shaving your head today? Or is that going to be a surprise?" She giggled until her cheeks turned rosy. She was imagining me with a Mohawk. To be honest, I had been imagining me with a Mohawk for days. Since my dad gave me permission to get it, I'd caught myself staring at myself in the mirror, imagining what it would look like.

"They're meeting us there. Joanna insisted I use the girl who cuts my hair. She's who cut it earlier this year that made me look so good." It was weird to hear myself admitting that I had looked good. But I had looked good. As good as I could have looked, at least.

"I love that this is a social experience." Robin laughed a genuine laugh. "I can remember a time, Johnson, that you would not have wanted anybody around for a such a big event in your life.

It was true. Had I really come that far in six months? Could people change that much in six months? Or was I only pretending? Maybe I was acting. Or maybe acting out these cranes was making me the person I was always supposed to be.

"I'm growing up, I guess." I shrugged one shoulder as I drove, the road stretching out before me.

"Just don't outgrow me, okay?" She smiled that disarming smile, the one that distracts me while I'm driving. The one that could start wars or bring peace.