Date Me, Bryson Keller(3)

I take the stairs two at a time. My house has a no-shoe policy, so my socked feet slip on the hardwood floors, and I only save myself from falling by gripping the kitchen island.

“One day you’re going to end up breaking something,” Mom warns. She’s seated at the island, reading the newspaper on her iPad. Mom is dressed and ready for the day. Her bottle-blond hair is pulled back in a ponytail. There’s a stack of Dad’s pancakes on her plate, and my stomach growls at the sight.

“You better eat something quick, boytjie,” Dad says. He’s still got his South African accent despite having lived in the United States for almost two decades now. My mom is White, and my dad is mixed race. When I was younger, I didn’t understand the stares that they got—the stares that I got—but now I do. People have an idea of what love should be, and my parents loving each other doesn’t fit into everyone’s perfect vision. Dad has always said that racists are sad people trying to make the rest of the world just as sad. Their hatred is something we should pity them for because it keeps them from living full lives.

    My phone buzzes. I pull it from my pocket and open the three musketeers group chat with Donny and Priya. After finishing the Dumas book last summer, I convinced them to watch the movie with me. The whole “All for one and one for all” motto was so extra that it seemed perfectly made for us.

I scroll past the memes that Donny shared last night and find the text telling me that he’s here.

“No time,” I say as I head to the cabinet where Mom keeps the breakfast bars. She makes sure we always have some on hand because most mornings I tend to run late. I rip open the wrapper and take a big bite.

“He got the oversleeping from you, dear,” Mom says to Dad.

“Well, I have an excuse. My body hasn’t adapted to this time zone.”

“It’s been twenty years. I think that excuse is over.”

Mom and Dad met when she was doing volunteer work with a church in South Africa. It just so happened that Dad attended that same church. They fell in love, and the rest, as they say, is history.

“Bye!” I call as I race from the kitchen. I stop at the door to put on my school shoes, grab my messenger bag from the hook, and gobble down the rest of the breakfast bar.

    “Have a great day,” Dad calls.

“Love you,” Mom adds.

“You too,” I say, my mouth still slightly full. I exit the house and walk toward the sports car that a teenager has no business owning. I climb into the back seat. Donny is driving and Priya is in the front seat.

“Donny, when you’re at Caltech, please invent an alarm that will actually wake me up,” I say by way of greeting.

Donny and Priya have both already been accepted into their first-choice colleges. In a few months’ time, Donny will be off to Pasadena and Priya to UCLA. I’m currently waiting to hear back from Tisch. Every time I think about my dream being on the line, I feel sick. Any day now I will hear if I made the cut.

It’s sad to think that these morning routines will be coming to an end soon. Donny and I met freshman year, and we’ve been best friends ever since. Priya adopted us several days later, insisting that without her, Donny and I would be lost little sheep. We’d never admit it to her, but she was probably right.

“There is a way,” Priya says. “It’s called willpower.”

“You sound just like Yazz.”

“The Force is strong in that one,” Priya says.

“Priya made us watch Star Wars again.” Donny catches my eye in the rearview mirror. “You should have come with.”

“Nah, you guys need your date nights,” I say.

    “If a theater is showing any of the Star Wars movies, then it is a given that I must attend,” Priya says. “It’s a family tradition. My dad literally made sure it was the first movie I could ever remember watching. My father is nothing if not dedicated.”

“Does your mom still want him to get rid of his figurine collection?” I ask.

Priya snorts. “I think that will only be possible if he dies. There are three things my father loves more than anything in this world: his family, his job, and his Star Wars collection.”

“My dad’s the same with Manchester United,” I say. “Just this weekend he woke up at three a.m. to watch them get thrashed by Chelsea.”

“I wish my dad had a hobby,” Donny says. “Then he wouldn’t be nagging me about my grades all the time. He wants me to be better at math.”

“Impossible,” I say. “Until you, I didn’t even know someone could get such a high math grade.”

Donny laughs. “Math skills and bad family names are Duckworth traditions.” He twists to look at me when we stop at a red light. “Did you do the homework?” he asks. “I struggled on the last two equations.”

“Please, Donald. Let’s not ruin Kai’s morning by asking him about math.” My suckage at math is a longtime running joke among my friends, as is the legendary test on which I got one equation right and no more—that’s a success if you ask me.

Priya is allowed to call him Donald, but no one, absolutely no one, is allowed to use his full name: Donald Duckworth IV. I kid you not, the family name has been passed down from one generation to the next like some prized heirloom. Spoiler alert: it’s not.