Don closed his eyes and tried to attempt to block a sneeze. It didn't work and he sneeze yet again. He was up in the attic of his brother's home looking at some long forogotten boxes, most of which belonged to him and had been there before he had left for Quantico and the FBI.
At Alan's insistence, he had come over to look at the boxes and either take them with him to his apartment or to get rid of them. As he was pulling out yet another box, a small file box in the corner caught his eyes. It was labeled, "Charlie E. -English Portfolio." Don grinned. His little brother had and still was a notoriously horrible speller and had hated english with a passion in high school-mostly because it kept him away from math.
Temptation overcame Don and he reached for the box and opened it. He sat on the floor and began looking through his brother's english assignments. Most were in the B and C range, which drew another chuckle from Don. On some the teacher had gone so far as to have written "More English-less Math please!"
As Don continued to comb through his brother's assignments a paper at the very back caught his eyes. The title on the page was Idol. At it was marked with a large "A" by the teacher. Don smiled. All the sophomore english students had been required to write about something that they idolized. Don had written about baseball. He chuckled to himself, telling himself that Charlie had probably written about math. He noted that the assignment wasn't very long, about half a page and quickly scanned through it. At the end he was blinking moisture from his eyes.
Charlie's Idol paper read as follows:
My idol is a wonderful person. She understands me and I can always count on her. Sometimes I feel like she is the only one that gets me and she had made lots of sacrifices for me. She has always encouraged me to do my best and she loves to watch me when I do my math. She makes my world a little brighter each day with her laugh or when she gives me a hug. She is my mother, my friend, my idol. She and my dad and my big brother mean everything to me. I could live without math only if I absolutely had to...but my mom I could never live without.
Don smiled softly as he put the english box away, except for the Idol paper. That Don tucked away in his pocket to take home with him, Charlie would never know it was gone, and even if he did realize it, Don knew Charlie wouldn't ask him to give it back.