Chapter Forty Eight
“Willow’s parents are going to be guests of the county for at least twelve months. My niece is way behind in her school work. I was hoping you might consider tutoring her.
“I believe Willow should enter the same grade that Tray’s currently enrolled in. That should make her feel more comfortable about the situation. She’s never been inside an actual school or seated in a classroom to my knowledge.
“I would be willing to pay you an hourly wage – the same rate as Tray, in fact. Willow is a very fast learner. Three weeks should be plenty of time to familiarize her with the course work,” Celeste commented.
“I’d be happy to do it, but why didn’t you ask Tray?” I inquired.
“He is busy with Rave in the garage – holiday tune ups and the like – besides, Tray told me about your intellectual abilities. I understand that he would have failed his English class without your assistance,” she stated.
“My brother did utilize my assistance in English. But his declaration of complete failure is a gypsy stretch of epic proportions. In fact, I had only provided him with assistance because he hates researching anything.
“But, I’d love to earn some holiday gift money. So, yes…and, I’d be happy to help,” I told her.
I would tutor Willow every day for a few hours until she was up to speed. When we sat down at the table for her first session I asked her how she learned information.
“Umm, like everyone else I guess,” she answered me and looked at me as if I had thoroughly confused her.
“I’m sorry, let me rephrase that. I meant do you learn through talking, reading or hands on stuff?” I inquired.
“I suppose through talking. I do enough of it, at least,” she replied and then giggled.
We worked on English first. I spoke the lessons out loud and then asked her to repeat what she had heard. Willow could recite everything I stated, word for word. She had some seriously extraordinary skills in the listening department. She was caught up with Tray’s class in less than two weeks because of those abilities. I wished that she could teach me her skill but sadly, I knew my faulty memory would make that an impossible feat to accomplish.
“So you knew Tray back when you were kids,” I asked Willow during a break one afternoon and snickered.
I couldn’t imagine my brother ever being little.
“Yeah, we would meet up occasionally. Our families would cross paths for a few days, and then one or the other would move on. The first time we met was at a state fair. I didn’t realize we were engaged in a game of hide and seek – massive terror style. I was walking through the dark midway. I thought I was alone because it had been closed for hours. Your brother was hiding underneath a ride, waiting to pounce. He jumped outta the shadows and scared the beejeezus outta me.
“Well, he thought it was hilarious and I didn’t. So I refused to tell him my name when he tried to introduce himself to me. My refusal certainly didn’t stop him from pestering me to tell him. By the time my family was ready to move on, he still hadn’t discovered what to call me. So Tray decided to just name me Arkansas since that’s what state we were in at the time.
“My family left that state fair first and we found a carnival to follow around. It just so happens that your family caught up with us a few weeks later in Atlanta. I saw Tray wandering around, talking to the carnies. As luck would have it, he didn’t see me. So I decided that night to get a little payback and hid behind this enormous clown statue with a crazy mirror in its tummy. I waited for him to check out the fun house after hours, because I knew he couldn’t resist it.
“Although I knew his name, I decided that it didn’t count. It wasn’t part of our game, so I wasn’t about to call him Tray – not by a long shot. He was standing in front of the mirror, making faces at himself when I jumped out from behind it and shouted, ‘Hi Georgia – nice to see you again…’ He almost fell over backwards, it was hilarious. It didn’t take him long to recover and then, he complained about the name I’d given him.
“His complaints fell on deaf ears. You see, he was the one who invented the name game, so I singlehandedly decided that I would get to make up all the rules. I told him whoever saw the other person first got the new state name. Your family left that carnival since mine had been there first. A month later we were – um, how should I put it – kindly asked us to leave the place we were working. We happened across your family again, this time in New Jersey. I’m one-hundred percent positive that Tray saw me first, but he patiently waited until I ‘found’ him. Seems he preferred to be known as Jersey instead of Georgia – go figure??
“Our lives sort of continued on that path. We’d meet up at various locations from time to time. The name game continued as always. We also made up another one over the course of the years.
“The new game we invented was like a personal treasure hunt we designed for each other. We would leave cryptic messages for each other everywhere we went. They were always in different places. So every time we went somewhere new, we’d both search through every square inch to find the hidden messages.
“Then, one day you appeared on the scene with your brother. You were the tiniest thing I’d ever laid my eyes on when Tray carried you over to meet me. He named me Texas because he saw me first. When I announced that I was gonna call you lil’ Texas he said ‘you can call her Carolina Blue since she was born in the Tarheel state’ – a.k.a. the fine state we’re sitting in. You couldn’t have been more than a month or two old when we had that conversation. When’s your birthday?” she asked me.
“February 15th…” I replied, enthralled with her story.
I never knew I was born in North Carolina.
“You woulda been about two months old because it was around April before we saw each other that year. Eventually, he learned my real name, but the game plays on. I’ll admit I was shocked when I saw him again. He was always big for his age, but he’s the size of a small giant now,” she stated and smiled with a look of longing in her eyes.
I wondered if she missed her family. I planned to ask her a few thousand more questions, but Tray picked that moment to step inside. Her full attention was immediately redirected and our conversation was over – at least for the time being.
I told Celeste that I needed to stop tutoring Willow. Otherwise, she would start ahead of the class.
Before Tray and I left that evening, she handed us each a white envelope. I sniffed it like it was a delicious meal – ahhhh…my first, earned paycheck.
“Hey, don’t get used to that kiddo. You’re not gonna be working – gotta give you that childhood, remember?” he stated with a bitter edge to his voice.
I remembered our conversation about his only regret in life and my heart tore a little. I reached over and hugged him. I love my brother.
“You are definitely the breadwinner and I’m having a fantastic childhood,” I announced happily.
He kissed me on the top of the head before I slid back into my seat. I was having a wonderful life and my brother was the reason why…
“You know, Tray, I love you. You’re the best big brother anyone could ever have…” I said quietly and felt a lump form in my throat.
“I love you right back, Little Girl,” my brother smiled and turned up the radio for me to listen to.
Ember Rising Light (Book One) Page 52
