handle [discontinued]

Spring

Spring: Getting To Know Him

❀ "I haven't had a real friend since the 8th grade."

"I can change that."

friday, 7:14pm, home

I was in my room, completing the little homework I had left. It was a simple French worksheet and a few pages in the math textbook that I had to complete.

These teachers are just giving us little bits of work before the year ends.

It was mid-April now, and there was really only a month left of school. So the teachers took the time to give us finals and homework, even after the state tests had been completed. I'll be a senior next year, and then I'll be going to college.

Well, might be.

Nano's college fund is more important than mine. But maybe I'll go to a community college. Mom just wants us both to go to college.

Mom. Oh God, Mom. We thought it was just the common cold, until she started coughing up blood. Mom's a huge asthmatic, and I'm surprised that she didn't pass out when she went running today. She must've taken her inhaler. But 3 months? That's it? That's all the time me and Nano have left with her?

That's all the time she has left?

We need more time.

She needs more time.

I stared at my unfinished homework. Well it was finished; I just needed to check it. I looked at the problems and stared at them blankly. All of these problems are solvable, but they were just math problems. They can be solved. They have answers. But my mother doesn't have an answer. She has an unsolvable problem.

Tears welled up in my eyes. I fought them until they fell. I just let them run down. There was no denying it now. I cried harder as I tried denying it over and over again.

Mom's not dying.

Mom doesn't have 3 months. She has many more than that.

Mom is okay.

She's fine.

Mom is okay.

Mom is okay.

Mom is okay.

"Drew?"

My head popped up from my tear-stained math homework. Mom was calling me. She knocked on my door softly, peeking through the crack of my slightly ajar door. I looked up at her and she looked at me. She looked normal, but I knew that she was just as sad as I was.

"Come on, let's go watch a movie." She wiped the tears off my cheeks and away from my eyes. I rose off my wooden chair, not turning off my lamp as I walked out of the room. I held Mom's waist as we walked side by side down the hall to the living room.

Mom got the remote and turned the TV on to Netflix. She scrolled through the queue as I got a blanket for the both of us. Mom clicked on The Breakfast Club and I silently cheered. Mom smiled at me and pulled me close to her. My back was facing her as I draped the cover over our feet.

I thought to myself as Allison, also the the Loner sat by herself in the back of the classroom. A World Alone by Lorde played in my head. I never went to school for a Saturday detention, but just every day at school, I was a loner. And I'm okay with that. I had no friends by choice. 99% of the people at my school were so conceited and uptight. I really just couldn't with everyone at school.