Cherries and Sunrises (Steve)

Ugh...paparazzi.

I ordered them to scat unless they wanted the Mindcrack administration and angry parents involved. Some obliged, but some stayed. I'm sorry, but you know the rules. If you're not respecting my students, I won't muddle through any cordiality or pleasantries. Raising the volume on my device, I told them to leave again. If they describe me as rude in the next article, I won't feel bad about it. They disrespected my students' basic rights.

Look. Do with me what you want. Circulate those random creepshots and tell people that I'm on drugs or whatever, but don't do anything with my students. I can't have my students' lives ruined by some stupid people who don't know what boundaries are. Just in time, Mindcrack security arrived and began to clear the area. All but one person remained, a girl who looked like she was in high school.
          "This is Catalina Cortez and I'm with the Desert Tribune." Isn't that Mark's contrabass clarinetist? What's she doing with the Tribune? "Is it okay if I ask you and one student of yours from each grade a few questions?"
          "Who do you have in mind?" She showed me her list.

6th Grade: Nathalie Soulard 
7th Grade: Adrian Roth 
8th Grade: Alice Alder
9th Grade: Lisette LaCoste
10th Grade: Kenji Sugihara 
11th Grade: Hannah Engelhardt 
12th Grade: Kyle Escalona

Problem: Kyle and Hannah are in AP Alchemy and I don't think journalistic opportunities are valid reasons to leave the exam room. I alerted Catalina of this problem; she said she could wait because the school knows she's with the Tribune for education purposes. Those are looser policies than some colleges. I wrote passes for the students and alerted their teachers of the opportunity.

Rather than check on his scores after the interview, Kyle showed up for his after school practice with a bag of yellow cherries. His affinity for the fruit is one of the things I'll always remember about him. He practiced rudiments on a pad. After some sloppy paradiddles, he popped a cherry in his mouth and refined his technique. He's going to need a lot of cherries to perfect rudiments like that.

After Caitlin died, Kyle left little bags of cherries on my desk for days in a row. I didn't know what he meant by this gesture at the time, but I know now that he was trying to give me strength. Kyle often makes use of his odd abilities to make people happy. The taste of his fruits indicate the amount of effort he puts into them. The cherries came from genuine sympathy. At first, they were tart as lemon, but each bag grew sweeter with each passing day. The paradiddles came much more cleanly until Kyle knocked on my door.
         "I have more cherries for you." Kyle handed me a bag of the fruits, which were yellow with shadows of red. "Be sure to give some to your friends."
         "I will." Ranging from golden to crimson, each cherry was a sunrise and a sunset in one. I bit into one. The skin snapped under my teeth and its juices poured into my mouth. After a burst of initial tartness, my tongue bathed in pure sweetness. After moving the syrupy substance around in my mouth and extracting more and more of it as I chewed, the cherry slid down my throat.

Upon opening the door, I stepped out and saw the sky painted the same colors as the cherries Kyle gave me. The sun may never set on my grieving Caitlin, but it had risen on my love for Landon. Judging by the cherry pits I found in his trashcan, he probably holds some semblance of fondness for the fruit. He should taste the sunrise and the sunset in each golden, crimson orb along with me. It would only be fitting that another chapter of my journey begin with him.

(A/N: If you correctly guess the variety of cherry that Kyle handed to Steve, you get to give me a writing prompt!)