Shawn stared out the window all the way back to the apartment. He was drained. He and Cory had sat through a lecture from Mr. Matthew's about respecting other people's houses, and not taking advantage of strangers. It had been long and boring and at the end of it, Cory had been sent to his room, grounded.
Shawn was expecting the same thing to happen to him, so he was surprised that when he and Jon walked into the apartment, Jon ordered him over to the couch instead.
Shawn silently did as he was told, and looked up at Jon expectantly, waiting for more lecture. Jon had kept very quiet at the Matthew's and Shawn suspected he had more to say.
Jon paced silently in front of the teen and then turned to look at him.
"I don't know wether to be furious, or impressed." he said honestly.
Shawn smiled weakly. "My instinct says to go with 'impressed'" he tried.
Jon sighed. "You still did the wrong thing." he said.
"I'm sorry." Shawn says quickly.
Jon frowns at him then. "Are you?"
Shawn slowly shook his head.
Jon sighed again.
"But only because it was a good plan, and it worked Jon! You should have seen the money we made, it was awesome!"
Jon shut his eyes, rubbing his forehead.
"At the expense of someone else's house."
"But nothing bad happened." Shawn argued.
"But it could have!"
Jon's voice was raised now.
"What if someone had accidentally burnt Mr. Feeny's house down? What if someone had stolen something?"
Shawn wasn't going to mention that someone nearly had.
Jon let out a long breath. "Okay. This is what I'm going to do. You're grounded, that's a given. But it's up to you how long for."
Shawn frowned. "What, like I choose?"
Jon shook his head. "No. You complete your assignment for Feeny. You work your butt off on it, like I know you can. You put everything you've learnt about running a business in it, and you make it good"
Shawn was still confused. "But what does that have to do with me being grounded?"
Jon smirks a little then. "Easy. You get an A on the assignment and you're only grounded for a week. You get anything less than an A- and you're grounded for two."
Shawn's eyes got comically wide and Jon had to bite his lip to stop himself from laughing.
"Jonnnnnn!" Shawn whined, sounding all of three.
Jon shrugged. "It's up to you how long this lasts."
"Either way, I'm grounded." Shawn grumbled.
Jon gave him a pointed look. "Did you not expect to be?"
It was Shawn's turn to sigh then. He did know he would be in trouble with Jon, just like he knew he would be getting some detentions off of Feeny.
"No."
"Well, that's settled then, go to bed."
Shawn rolled his eyes at that, but he got up and did as he was told.
Jon smiled at his retreating ward. Maybe he was getting better at this parenting thing.
The next day at school Shawn and Cory compared their punishments.
"I'm grounded for two weeks, I'm on dish duty for three, and I have to help Feeny with his weeding." Cory said. "What did Turner give you?"
Shawn hesitated for a second. Jon's grounding didn't sound so bad now that he was hearing what Cory had dealt to him.
"Uh, he said that if I get an A on my assignment, he'd only ground me for a week." he said.
Cory looked surprised. "What if you don't get an A?"
Shawn sighed. "Then it's two weeks."
Cory nodded. "Well, you still did better than me."
Shawn grimaced. He felt a little bad about that, it had been his idea after all.
He said as much to Cory.
"Ah. No, don't even worry about it. It just shows me again, how much cooler Turner is than my parents. Do you think he would take me in too?"
Shawn grinned. "I think he'd rather drive his motorcycle off a cliff" he joked.
Cory shrugged, but he grinned. "It was worth a try."
For the next three nights Jon noticed Shawn putting a lot of work into his assignment. Straight after school he would be working on it, and then he wouldn't stop until Jon would remind him he had to be up early, and send him to bed.
On the Thursday, Jon was getting ready for his next class when Shawn came basically running into the room.
"Jon, look!"
Jon peered down at the graded assignment as a huge grin filled his face. Shawn had got an A.
"Way to go, kid. I knew you could do it!"
Jon hold out his hand for the teen to clasp, but instead, Shawn went in for a hug. It was very brief, but it caught Jon off guard. He recovered quickly and slapped the boy on the back affectionately, marvelling at how far the kid had come.
Shawn looked a bit nervous then.
"Does that mean...?" He trailed off, but Jon knew what he was asking.
"Yes." he said with a smile. "You're free as of Monday."
Shawn's face split into a huge grin. "Thanks, man."
Jon shook his head. "Thank yourself. You put in the hard work, you earned the reprieve."
Shawn hurried off then, to tell Cory the food news and Jon went back to his prep, shaking his head.
"I was wrong, you know." Came a voice from the door. Jon didn't have to turn around to know that it was Mr. Feeny.
"Oh?"
"You appear to be the best thing that has happened to that boy."
Jon raised his eyebrows at that. George had been decidedly against Jon taking Shawn in at first, worried that it would cross the line between teacher and friend. Something that Jon was confused about, because, to him, it seemed like George crossed that lone regularly.
"I never thought I would see the day that Shawn Hunter would put enough effort into an assignment to earn an A."
Jon smiled, his pride evident. "He really does have a mind for business, he's smarter than he thinks."
"I have no doubt."
George walked over to Jon then, and held out his hand.
Jon frowned as he saw a wad of cash in it.
"What's that?"
"This is the money that Shawn made with his business idea. I told him he could have it back when he got into college. I want you to hold onto it for me and give it to him when the time comes."
Jon's eyes widened a little. "You really think he can get in?"
George nodded. "He's come along way Jonathan. You should be very proud."
Jon shook his head. "It's all him, George."
George smiled then. "Well, I think that you've taught each other."
He left the room then, leaving Jon with his thoughts.
Taking in a teenager was not easy. They definitely had their ups and downs and got on each other's nerves... a lot. But hearing George say those words, and seeing the improvement in Shawn, it all felt very, very worth it.