its never too late

Holden ran another anti-virus on the laptop. He was sure it was ready to be used, but he needed one more quick scan to be sure.

He'd found the laptop in the dumpster behind the grocery store. Practically, good as new, but it wasn't a touch screen. Originally on the laptop, there were only some old TV shows of WILL AND GRACE that evidently someone downloaded illegally, which resulted in an infestation of all sorts of malware and other bad stuff.

He'd worked on it diligently all week long. It kept his mind off things. Like graduation. He didn't want a party. He didn't want anything, actually.

Honestly, he thought Prom was much more than he ever hoped for. Irma was the last person Holden ever expected to go with.

He smiled now, thinking of the first time he met Irma. It was third grade and she didn't know how to read. The teachers were pretty much going to leave her for Special Education, only the teacher and school counselor couldn't track down her parents for a meeting. She was at least getting some help in remedial reading, and the teacher decided to stick him with her group since he could out read everyone and usually helped out with first graders.

Yeah, they always kept him busy back then so he'd stay out of trouble. Of course, Irma was so tiny and in the saddest clothes, over-sized T-shirts and thin leggings that barely covered her ankles. Her hair in a pixie, but she could throw the meanest punch and she bit people, too.

Well, he didn't know personally, but he'd seen her on the playground. Anyway, she told them reading with boring. She didn't need to know how to read.

So he'd decided to try not to make it boring for her. They did some word games, putting blends with endings. Still, she wasn't impressed. And then she put  SH with the word IT.

"Are you kidding me!" She was so excited. She even let the word slip, but covered her hands over her mouth hoping no one heard. It was the start of something. He showed her another favorite bad word. It wasn't long until she was making sentences. Before long she was reading to him instead of him reading to her. She didn't have to go to RESOURCE, after all.

And now he had a laptop for her so she could study for her GED.