"I need to learn how to read," Aden barged into her inn room without warning. This had become quite normal throughout the past few months.
"I thought you said reading was a waste of time?" Sonja smirked from behind her book as her friend flopped onto the bed along side her.
"Yeah, yeah. I was wrong, I get it. Just teach me how to read." He buried his face in the pillows ashamedly.
Aden's illiteracy hadn't proved to be a problem ever before. He never received an education as a child, as his family was of lower class. Of course, because his only duty on the old Fenith was mainly helping others using his Earthmate abilities when he wasn't messing around with his swords, there was never a need for him to learn to read or write. However, after crash landing two hundred years in the future, culture began to revolve around scripts and books more than they had before.
But Aden had it easy.
With a literate girl trapped in his mind for over a year, Sonja was able to do all the reading for him. And now... well. She was back in her own body, and he was on his own without a clue how to read or write. It had only been a week since their separation, and Aden had already given up.
"Alright, fine. I'll teach you," Sonja uncrossed her legs and put her books down, "but it's going to be hard work! You can't learn to read or write overnight."
Aden peeled his face away from the bed to look her straight in the eye, " That's fine. I don't care. I literally can't do shit anymore all because I can't read."
"That makes sense. I offered to teach you multiple times as a child, you know!" Sonja teased her friend, stepping to the bureaux to switch books, "It would have been a lot easier to learn then."
"Reading wasn't relevant then..." He mumbled back, scowling as he propped himself up at the end of the bed.
Sonja gave a heaving sigh as she seated herself on her bed. Teaching someone like Aden to read was going to be a lot of work, but if he wanted to learn, she was happy to oblige.
"So the first thing you should know-"
"Wait, we're starting now?" Aden frowned at the book that had been placed in his lap.
"Yes? I thought you were excited-" The boy cut her off again.
"Oh, no way! It's nine o clock at night! I'll start tomorrow." Aden got up from the cushioned bed and made his way to the door.
"Aren't you pushy tonight?" Sonja rolled her eyes at her friend, a sense of snark in her voice.
"Yeah, yeah. I'll be back tomorrow, I guess." This boy was trouble.
WEEK ONE: ADEN KNOWS NOTHING.
"A," Sonja enunciated the first letter of the alphabet.
"...A," Aden repeated.
"Good - B."
"B."
This had been going on for quite sometime now, and it finally seemed like Sonja's student was getting the hang of the alphabet. Aden was still having a bit of trouble with some of the sounds, but he knew the alphabet and the vowels precisely.
"Now E. Remember how special E is?" Sonja pointed to the matching letter on the page of a weapon magazine.
"Yup. It's a vowel, and if you put it at the end of a word the all the vowels become long vowels... right?" Aden faltered slightly, but maintained confidence.
"Perfect!" She grinned and reached across the table to pat her friend's head.
As usual, the boy responded negatively and swatted her hand away, "Would you cut that out!?"
WEEK TWO: ADEN DOESN'T UNDERSTAND SPELLING.
"Th-roh-uh-guh...?" Aden always stumbled on this particular combination of letters.
"Through." Sonja corrected, "The O-U-G-H makes the sound OO."
Aden paused to roll his eyes at the book he had been reading, "Why the hell...? English is stupid..." He concluded.
"Well, YOU chose to learn late! It's your own fault." She pointed to a similar word, 'rough', "Read this."
He gave the letters a good look before replying with confidence, "Roo."
"Rough."
"Are you-!? You're kidding me!"
"Unfortunately, no."
"But you just said that the O-U-G-H make the OO sounds!" Aden had had enough of irregular spelling at this point.
"It makes that sound for that word! In this case it makes the uhf sound," Sonja fought back laughter and pointed to yet another word with similar spelling.
Aden was careful before answering at that point. He knew what she was up to. His new word was spelled T. He knew that the T and the H went together to make one sound, but now in addition to the difficult O-U-G-H, there was a T as well. As far as he knew, the word was either thoot or thuft, neither of which he knew to be real words.
"Thuft? Like theft?" He guessed without thinking again.
This time Sonja did laugh, "Thought."
"Are you fucking kidding me!?" Aden just exploded, "What the hell is with all of this weird spelling? Why wouldn't they spell it T-H-O-T? That makes way more sense!"
Sonja just bit her tongue to keep from laughing anymore. She knew that he would have trouble with these words, and couldn't wait to bring them up. The girl loved to push her friend's buttons.
"You're just making fun of me now, aren't you?" Of course, Aden could see right through her motives, and he was right.
WEEK THREE: ADEN CAN WRITE POORLY
A... D... E... N.
A... D... E... N.
A... D... E... N.
His handwriting was sloppy and all over the place, but he was getting it. Sonja had noted how he chose to write with his right hand, and occasionally his left as well. Although he mostly used his right hand, his handwriting looked the same with either hand. She assumed it must have had something to do with the fact that the boy wielded dual blades, and therefore used both arms in combat.
"Hey, is this right?" Aden displayed the sheet of paper he had repeatedly written his name on.
"Yes, that's perfect. Good job!" Sonja beamed.
"Okay, okay. Cut the praise, I just wanted to know if I was doing it right!" Aden put the paper back on the table and prepared to write more, "How do you spell your name?"
"S-O-N-J-A."
"With a J?" Aden looked back up to his friend, "what about an I?"
"Sometimes the name is spelled with an I, but mine is spelled with a J," Sonja wrote a J in the air with her finger.
"That's stupid..." He muttered and continued to scratch out more letters on the paper.
S... O... N... J... A.
S... O... N... J... A.
S... O... N... J... A.
WEEK FOUR: ADEN HAS INSISTED ON BEING INDEPENDENT.
"What does this say?" Aden pointed to a rather large word in the weaponry magazine he'd picked up.
Sonja leaned over his sitting spot by the foot of her bed, "That says zweihander.It's German, but we use the name here too."
"Oh, I know what those are! Thanks," satisfied, he slumped back over his magazine and continued to sound out the words.
But he didn't stay that way for long. Alas the sun had set, and it was just about time Aden headed home to eat. He closed his magazine, and stretched a bit before getting up.
"I'm headed out now, I guess," Aden scratched his head and tucked his magazine under his coat.
"Alright. Will I see you tomorrow?" Sonja raised her vision from her own book.
"If I'm not busy. Oh yeah..." Aden pulled a slip of paper from his pocket and handed it to his friend, "This is for you."
Without another word, he was out the door. Curious about Aden's odd gift, Sonja opened the folded paper to reveal a poorly written note.
Dear Sonja,
I figyered I shud write you a thank you note. So thank you for teeching me how to read. I like to read with you. Now I can read my cook books properly insted of just gessing what the picshers mean. I also want you to no that I love you!
A lot, I think.