(Pov Jason)

  ?Jason had never cared much for history. He knew it mattered — people always said it did — but that didn’t make it interesting. However, he did try to pay attention. Normally.

  On the whiteboard, Mr. Hawthorne had written various dates related to the Vietnam War. However, few of these were reflected in Jason's notebook as he drew doodles in the margins. He had tried to follow along, but that attempt had failed miserably.

  “Jason”

  Jason let out a slight breath as his mind kept working over the issues his family seemed to be having, if the conversation he walked in on that morning was anything to go by. He had been thinking about getting a job, but frankly, helping on the farm took up so much time, he didn't know if he could.

  “Earth to Jason”

  College wasn't for him, he had neither the grades nor the motivation. Still, he did want to help his sister get her wish, at least if he could. The thought of her not pursuing it and even the fact that she didn't want to tell their parents yet gave him an aching feeling in his chest.

  “Jason. Hello, anyone home?”

  Jason startled slightly at the blur of a hand passing in front of his face. Looking up, he saw a pair of deep green eyes, set in a round, kindly face, with the entire assembly framed by brown curtain bangs.

  Chloe had a slight frown as she looked at him. “Deep in thought, or did you just get too little sleep?”

  Jason pinched the bridge of his nose. He tried to assume a tone that sounded carefree. “It's nothing important. What can I do for yah Chloe?” His lips curled into a slight smile.

  Chloe's frown became ever so slightly more pronounced as she held his gaze. After a few seconds, she let out a sigh. “I don't believe that, but you do you Jason. You also didn't hear a word Mr. Hawthorne said, did you?"

  Jason's gaze fluttered around the room, trying to look at anything else, and he noticed that the classroom was empty and the whiteboard had been cleaned. Despite his best efforts not to, Jason cringed. “No, I guess I didn't. What did he say? Anything important?"

  At that, Chloe scoffed, her frown disappearing nearly instantly. “I would say everything the teachers say regarding our school work is important.” Jason's right eyebrow lifted slightly as he waited for her to continue. “But to answer your question, yes, he did. He was talking about our groups and topics for the assignment. Anyway, we got paired up. And I wanted to ask if you… maybe wanted to come over on Sunday to start working on it. Or we could, like, meet at the library if you would rather do.. that?”

  “Yeah, we could do that. I think the library is closed on Sunday for some maintenance stuff, or at least I heard my mom talk about it. So let's say your place then. By the way, what's the topic?” His head tilted slightly to the right as he looked up at Chloe.

  Chloe's face seemed to glow slightly, a dash of pink appearing on her cheeks. “My place it is then. Should we say we start at one o'clock?”

  “yeah one works great.”

  “Great, then let's do… that. To answer your other question, he said we should focus on Nixon and Johnson's policies and the domestic situations that led to them here in the US. Also, the foreign situations that lead to them, of course.” Chloe looked at the clock before raising an eyebrow. “We should go, English starts in like 5 minutes.”

  “Oh shit, yeah, we should go.” Chloe glared at him for a second as Jason shoved his things into his backpack.

  As they left the classroom and walked towards the English classroom, Chloe seemed to have an extra bit of pep in her step. Though Jason couldn't figure out why.

  The sun was lower in the sky a few hours later in the school parking lot. Jason was waiting for his sister. She was late, again.

  Casting a glance towards the school entrance, and seeing only the empty concrete stairs and the doorways, as desolate as they had been 5 minutes ago. Jason turned his attention back to the cracked Ephone 4.

  There were some jobs he could take on that he thought he could do. At least for a while, until his parents needed more help on the farm.

  Glancing up, Jason saw Mr. Hawthorne approach, looking apologetic.

  “Hey Jason, I was wondering if you could come back in and help me clean up after choir practice. They all left before I could stop them. You don't have to, of course, but it would be a great help.” Mr. Hawthorne offered him an apologetic smile.

  “Yeah, happy to help, Mr. Hawthorne. Just gotta send a message to my sister to tell her to wait by the exit.” He said while tapping on his phone.

  Jason sighed slightly as he entered the classroom that the choir had used for practice. The light in the back corner of the room blinked, and there were stains in the linoleum that he was sure were there when his cousin was in freshman year. Benches were stacked to make stands for the choir.

  “I would only really need help with the benches, they are a little heavy. especially for a man of my age.” Mr. Hawthorne's laugh at his own comment was warm and seemed to fill the room in a way that one wouldn`t expect from the small man.

  “Well, I can at least lift things, Mr. Hawthorne. I know I am good at that.” Jason walked up to the first of the benches. He had learned years ago not to lift with his back, so he bent down in the middle of the bench and lifted. The thing was heavy, though he was used to lifting heavier things; he just couldn't do it a lot. He carried the thing back to its place along the wall of the classroom.

  Looking back, Jason frowned slightly as he saw the remaining benches. “Mr. Hawthorne, is it a problem if I drag the rest of the benches at least most of the way?”

  Looking back from where he was cleaning the whiteboard, Mr. Hawthorne nodded and said, “No, at least I wouldn't say so. If the marks are bad enough, maybe the county will see fit to finally increase our budget.” Mr. Hawthorne wiggled his rather bushy eyebrows. “No need to be too careful.”

  “Copy that, sir.”

  After a few minutes, Mr. Hawthorne asked. “So Jason, I hope it's ok I placed you with Chloe for the assignment. You two seem to get along, so I thought it would be fine, especially after that debacle with Sam last year. I figured it was best to avoid that again, especially as you guys are only two and a half months from graduation.”

  Jason cringed at the mention of Sam. “Yeah, it's probably for the best. Chloe's good… She's great to work with.”

  At that, Mr. Hawthorne seemed to glance at him with an eyebrow slightly raised, though Jason couldn't for the life of him figure out why.

  Having set back the last of the benches, Jason looked at the clock over the door. Frowning slightly at the time. He said goodbye to Mr. Hawthorne and started walking back out of the school towards the car.

  Jason let out a low moan as he shoveled another forkful of spaghetti into his mouth. He had always loved his mother's spaghetti, and had he not known his maternal grandparents, he would have suspected she was secretly Italian.

  From the other side of the table, he heard his sister, who was in vivid animated conversation with his mother. It was something or other about a classmate; he had been talking to his grandpa, so he didn't catch the start of the conversation.

  “So, anyway, that's when Mrs. Stevens had to ask Thomas to leave. He like objected to being thrown out, saying he was pheromonemaxing, and that we were just a bunch of normies.”

  Jason couldn't stop himself; he started coughing and laughing. A small piece of spaghetti flew out of Jason's nose, landing, luckily, next to his plate instead of on it.

  A deep, warm laughter filled the room. Turning to his left, Jason saw his grandfather nearly double over, laughing his ass off.

  Jason felt his cheeks heat up, though his grandfather's laughter was infectious, and Jason could help but snicker. The rest of the family looked at them like they were insane. The confusion written on his father's face made Jason's snicker turn into full-on laughter.

  Gathering his courage, he said, “Hey dad, other than you know the everyday basics. Will we have much work around the farm for the next few weeks?”

  “Well, there are some problems with the tractor, but that should work itself out. It's not something we can fix, though, so gotta wait for the repair guy to get here. I was gonna get started on the fixes to the barn closer to the Jacksons’ fields. Why are you asking? You got any plans?” His father looked at him with a raised eyebrow.

  Jason noticed his chest tighten slightly. “I was thinking about getting a part-time job, not a lot, just every Saturday or something the like. It wouldn't interfere with my chores or the farm work much.”

  His father glanced at his mother, seeming to have a quiet, if quick, conversation. Taking a breath, he looked back at Jason. “Well, of course you can, buddy. You are 18, even if for only a few weeks, so it is your choice. I would pay you for the farm work if I could, but I ain't got the budget for that. I do hope you keep helping on the farm, though. But we do have a little downtime, unfortunately.”

  Jason let out a breath he didn't know he had been holding. “Yeah, of course dad. I wasn't planning on working every day, so I will help wherever I can. I also would like to start paying a little rent on that income if you'd let me. Also, do you know of anyone who's hiring?"

  “I can ask around, there is the old hydropower station. But the loggers always need someone, as might the people building the new ski resort. I will check around and get back to ya.”

  Jason felt a small smile pull at the corner of his lips. “Thanks dad.”

  It had taken his father less than 3 hours to get back to Jason about a potential job. Apparently, old Jannet , the old lady no one in town remembered the full name of nor the age of, needed an extra server on Saturdays. She had been willing to give him a chance at an interview.

  Jason had no idea what he was feeling; he couldn't help but smile, and yet he felt as if a pit was forming in his stomach. Every time he thought about the coming Thursday and the interview he had that evening, it felt like both dread and excitement tried to consume him. He knew he should temper his expectations, yet he remained completely unable to.

  Jason only knew one thing: nothing could go wrong on Thursday.