Knockout by Tracey Ward Page B

would change. We wouldn’t see Kellen nearly as often as we had before, which had been practically every weekend. He didn’t have the pull of a girlfriend begging him to make the long drive and now he had the threat of facing an ex if he showed. It wasn’t enticing, no matter how much he loved us.
    It was in the start of that third month, right at the beginning of August when I was missing my friend something fierce, that I got a letter. I recognized the return address immediately.
    It was from Kellen.
    When I tore it open, a smile already forming on my face, I couldn’t wait to see what it said. Then my heart plummeted. I frowned at the paper and groaned in annoyance.
    He had written the damn thing entirely in French.
    “Are you serious?”
    I picked up my phone and immediately texted him.
    You wrote me in French?!
    His reply, though short, was immediate and to the point.
    Qui.
    Ass!
    Qui.
    It’s summer! I’m not interested in doing homework.
    Learning never takes a vacation. It’s an ongoing process.
    Thanks, Yoda.
    I think you mean ‘Merci, Yoda’.
    You’re the worst.
    Qui.
    “Ugh!” I groaned, tossing my phone aside and sitting down with the letter.
    It was hopeless. I had to go get my French book out of my closet to translate it and I still made a mess of it, only gathering the gist. It wasn’t until I was halfway through that I realized I could type it into a translator online and get a perfect English copy immediately. But as I sat there with his slanted, sharp handwriting in front of me working on the puzzle of deciphering his message about school, boxing and his life in general, I didn’t want to cheat. I wanted to earn the answers the way he intended. I worried I’d miss something if I did it the easy way. I also worried he’d know and that would be the end of my letters.
    So I worked on it diligently for over an hour. It wasn’t a long letter, but it felt like a novel when I finally finished it. There was nothing profound in it. Nothing to remember years later, but it was nice to hear from him. To feel connected to him again, as though we were sitting in front of the silent TV side by side working through it together. It bridged the three month, six hour gap between us until I was smiling and feeling better than I had in weeks.
    It sounds like you’re eating a shocking amount of Lucky Charms, I texted him.
    Well I am Irish.
    Congrats on the win in your last bout.
    Do you know how amazing it is that you know it's called a bout?
    I've gone to almost every one you've had for years!
    Still though. Amazing.
    Well I am that.
    Agreed.
    My phone fell silent in my hand after that. I didn't know what else to say and he wasn't talking either. It had been nice, though. Between the letter and this quick back and forth with him. It was more than I'd had in months. When I slipped my phone into my pocket and headed for my room, I was smiling.
    I wrote Kellen a letter the next day. In French. It nearly killed me but it wasn't even a week before I got a response. We went on through the summer like that, mailing each other back and forth. Laney found a letter once, one telling me he'd gone on a date with a girl but that it'd been a disaster because she was too much like Laney. She saw her name and freaked out, asking what he'd said about her. I told her he said he missed us all, even her. Yeah, I lied to my sister ‘cause I just didn't need the drama from her right then. I was going through dating woes of my own.
    "Devon's been banging Trisha. Like on the regular," Sam told me one night on the phone.
    I stared at the ceiling trying not to care, but part of me did. I still liked him. He was a nice guy and what happened with us, before my sister and Kellen burst in, had been incredible. It was something I would have liked a repeat performance of, maybe even something a little more X rated, but that show had pulled up stakes and moved on. Apparently now it was the Trisha Show five days a friggin' week.
    "Lucky her," I