Brute.

Nineteen

"Did you finish your biology project?" Hannah asked as I changed out my books in between classes.

"Yeah, I turned mine in this morning. Did you finish yours?"

"No, want to come over tonight and help me finish it?"

"Sure," I laughed, "what organ did you pick?"

"The heart. I did all the research, but I can't figure out what to do for a visual aid," Hannah explained.

"You haven't even started your visual aid? You could make a model that demonstrates the flow of blood through the heart," I suggested.

"How the heck am I going to do that?" Hannah laughed.

"I'll help you," I laughed, "I'll see you after calculus."

Hannah and I walked off in opposite directions to attend our classes. I think Jimmy and the boys are supposed to be coming home tonight, but I don't know for sure. I hope they come home tonight. Tomorrow is the last day before break. We'll have two weeks off and then come back, but what to do with two full weeks without school. Most kids love break, but without having a place to go for eight hours a day I'll be stuck at home. After the final bell rang, I met Hannah at our lockers before we left the school in my car.

"Are you going to play softball this year?" Hannah asked as I drove to her house.

"I haven't decided. I always liked playing, and when I started I even enjoyed it more than volleyball, but if I didn't get a volleyball scholarship there's no way I would get one for softball," I explained "and that makes playing kind of pointless."

"Playing because you enjoy it is not pointless," Hannah laughed, "you can play just for the love of the sport. Ya know, for fun"

"I guess," I laughed, "but I don't have fun."

"I know, you're boring," Hannah laughed, "doesn't mean you can't start."

"I always used to have fun while I was playing piano. It reminded me of my dad, but I don't have a piano to play and I haven't found something that gives me the same feeling as that," I explained as I parked my car in Hannah's driveway.

"Well you never will if you don't try to find something to give you that feeling, cap."

"I know, it's a viscous cycle of unchanging insanity," I laughed.

Hannah and I walked inside her house and into the living room. No one was home, so the house is ours to do what we want. We sat down on the couch and started watching The Office from the last episode Hannah had left off on, which was the oh so famous Scott's Tots episode. Hannah and I have watched The Office all the way through probably six times now, it's just such a good show.

"Is Chandler coming home tonight?" I asked.

"I don't know, why?"

"Just curious."

"Because if Chandler comes home then that means Jimmy did too?" Hannah asked with a smirk.

"Maybe," I laughed.

We watched a few episodes until we heard a car door shut. We turned the TV off and got to work on Hannah's human heart model. We don't want whoever that is to think we're doing anything before we finish homework.

"What are we going to use for blood?" Hannah asked as I sketched out a plan for the model on a piece of paper.

"If you want it to be accurate, we can use corn syrup and dye it red with food coloring. Or we can just dye water, but blood is closer to a consistency of corn syrup," I explained.