IF OWEN HAD THE guts to be a smart ass again, he’d have said that Parkinson is three minutes late. But his Ma gave birth to a son with sense and it is common sense not to poke someone reluctant to tutor you in the first place.

For September, the temperature is cooler than it needs to be, the sun warm on the hand he has slung out of his car. A used 2015 black Toyota RAV4 which Laurel says has the personality of a dementia patient. Of which he named the car Demi as a nod to Laurel’s description but better personality than appearance. 

From head to toe, someone could mistakenly guess that Parkinson is going in the school instead of out because of how neat his uniform still is: hardly any crease can be found unlike Owen who look as if he had taken a beaten. 

The bike Parkinson rides on is as immaculate as his whole appearance, not a scratch can be found.

“Hey.” He smiles but Parkinson barely reacts to the greeting. “What’re you waiting for? Put your bike in the back and hop in.”

Getting down from his bike, Parkinson the rear door, glance inside and slams it shut. Turning around halfway, Owen glimpse at the discarded items of forgotten sweater and a hanger, one of Finnigan’s lost cleats, a broken cat carrier, a few packed nylon of beer cans his friends had left over the summer and other miscellaneous things but nothing that can’t be moved to one side.

“Just sweep it over and get inside.”

“No thank you. I have my bike.”

“Okay. We can keep it—”

“No.”

Hearing the finality in that word, Owen twists around to face Parkinson. His face is pinched in the sun and he has hopped on his bike once again.

Rough start. “Whose house are we going?”

“The library or yours. Choose whichever.”

“All the more reason to get in. You don’t know my house.”

“I can follow you.”

Owen pause, in case he heard wrong. “You’ll follow a car with a bicycle?”

“Yes. If I can’t keep up, I’ll stop and I’ll never tutor you. Simple as that.”

“You really don’t want to tutor me, huh?”

“I should tell you that your two hours starts now. We can stand here and keep talking.” He shrugs as if to say no skin off my back.

“The drive is included?”

“He has ears. Praise the Lord.”

Owen isn’t enjoying the sarcasm but makes the conscious decision not to prolong their conversation. Putting the car in ignition, he tells Parkinson to, “Follow me closely. And try to keep up.” 

He toss out carelessly but is fed those words when Parkinson easily keeps up with him. Yes, the boy looks like a sort of puffer fish exerting himself (a look Owen doesn’t want to find cute) but he is fast and Owen feels sort of foolish. 

By the time he parks and gets out, Parkinson has padlocked his bike to the railing leading up to the house and is doing a very good job of pretending not to breathe heavily. 

He glance over at his Ma’s bakery—the Four Luck—thinking of maybe buying a smoothie for Parkinson but the decision is made for him when the boy taps his foot impatiently.

“My house is upstairs.” He says, following Parkinson power walking up and enters without the awkwardness of a first time visitor. He guess Parkinson is used to going to houses for tutoring. 

“Well, this is me.” He gestures at the house: at the large, patterned carpet and wallpaper that used to be fashionable but is now outdated and fusty.

The three sofas—two singles and one three seater—with little cream skirts to hide their legs and the small coffee wooden table with the ever present problem of shaky legs, decades old stains and spills with a vinegar scent that has never really gone away.

From the doorway, one can see the beginnings of the kitchen and the whole view of the three steps leading up to the rooms and once you bypass the welcome home mat, to the right is the dining table crammed into the corner and a door leading to the back balcony and roof.

There is another door—a sliding door by the kitchen leading to the side balcony but that door has been jammed for about six years it doesn’t open anymore. 

Parkinson doesn’t even acknowledge Owen has spoken. Just takes off his shoes and zips to the dining table, makes himself at home and starts bringing out his books. 

Owen used to feel self-conscious at how small his house is but got over it when he became grateful at how hard their parents works to provide. Being ungrateful about having a roof over his head is an insult to his parents and his grandparents who had helped buy this house in the early seventies.

“Did you go to the wrong house?”

“What? No.”

“Then stop standing as if you’re in the wrong house and come in.”

Owen chuckles, shaking his head. “It’s only you who’ll invite me to my own house.”

The house is quiet. He can tell because Cotton Candy, his beloved cat didn’t greet him home the way she does. That’ll mean his sister isn’t at home. No one but he and Parkinson are. That shouldn’t excite him as much as it does. Taking a sit, Owen dumps his books on the table but quickly arranges it into a tidy pile like Parkinson’s. He doesn’t want to look like a slob.

“Which subjects are you failing the most at?”

“World History. Literature. Chem.” 

“And the ones you fail at?”

“Pre-calc. Physics. Social studies.”

Parkinson purse his lips. “Basically everything.”

“No. I pass…” He pause and amends his statement. “I sufficiently pass English, biology. Music and,” he grins, “P.E.”

“Sufficiently pass?”

“Yeah. I get C’s.”

Parkinson narrows his eyes. “A C is a sufficient pass to you?”

“Yes. It’s a passing grade.”

“A C?”

Parkinson finds that hard to believe. What did Ms. Sterling say to make Parkinson think Owen is dumb? “Yes.”

“A B minus is a passing grade. A C is failure.”

Oh. Owen gets it now. “That’s because you’re a genius. The rest of us are okay with—”

“Being mediocre?”

“With passing.” He corrects. “We can’t all get A’s.”

“Any B’s?”

“Arts. Biology. On good days, English.”

“Any A’s?”

“P.E.”

“Apart From P.E.”

“Hmm… Not really.”

“What we’ll start with is tackle the four you’re mostly failing at for a month. One per week. Give me a book.”

Owen blindly reaches for the book at the top and hands it over. Parkinson flips it open, scans it once and returns it. 

“You have a neat handwriting but terrible note taking skills.”

“I do?” First time Owen’s hearing this. He takes the book and opens it but doesn’t see the terrible note taking skills. He writes what’s on the board.

“Do you have a memory jotter?”

“A what?”

“A pad for memorization.” At his confusion, Parkinson slides out a small green notebook from the pile, rectangular in shape and ridiculously shiny and flips to a page.

“It’s as the name suggests. You jot things you need to memorize. Things that’ll make your school book look clustered if you write it down.”

If Owen has a neat handwriting, Parkinson has a fabulous handwriting, as if printed. It’s small but legible, even spaced and highlighted.

“You jot down difficult things and memorize them every day. As you can see, I have just about little of every subject.” 

Parkinson quickly leaf through the pages that Owen will have to take his word for it.

“Read them every day, anytime. When you’re brushing, walking, about to go to bed, whenever you can.”

That does sound like solid advice. “Do you have a spare?”

“No. And don’t do it yet. Let’s try after a week. World history. Let’s begin.”