Chapter 8 -H Is for Headway
(Make Headway – progress, go forward)
Charlie was making headway. He found the boxes in the attic, and the next step was to look for the yearbook.
Charlie went up to the attic, right on top of his craftsman and below the roof. It was hot and dusty as predicted, and though the sun was slowly setting, the light coming through the semi circle glass window enabled him to see without switching on the lights.
He saw an old bed, dismantled and leaning against one side of the attic. Stacks of boxes lay by the side walls, and in the middle was a big pile of something covered by heavy plastic. The heavy plastic was covered in a thin film of dust. He thought it was probably some junk to be carted off. He must make a point to help his dad get rid of it.
But he looked carefully. He lifted up the heavy plastic taking care as not to get the dust in his face. He could see that there were some Christmas decorations for some of the tinsel were sticking out of the box as if it was packed in a hurry.
He remembered that it was last year no, no, early this year and in the middle of January his dad reminded him that the Christmas tree needed to be taken down and all the decorations packed away and he appreciated some help.
But one thing let to another and he had forgotten all about it even though the tree was no longer in the hall, he still didn't realized that he was supposed to help his dad.
He felt bad then and later it was OK for he took his dad and Don of course to a very nice dinner in one their favorite restaurants.
He went round and pulled up the other end of the heavy plastic and was surprised at the other things he found. There were some plastics pails, a new shovel, a big bundle of plastic sheets wrapped in another plastic bag, and some new pots. He was puzzled as to why the attic became the storeroom for gardening stuff. He pulled back the plastic and covered it up again and went back to his original task, looking for the yearbook.
He went round the side where the boxes were. There were many boxes but all in one row stacked neatly, one on top of the other. He counted twenty of them, some stacked in threes and some in fours. They were in standard size boxes. He was surprised.
He read some of the labels written neatly by his mother. Some were torn because it was torn off the original boxes and reposted onto the standard boxes. The rest of the labels on the boxes were written by his father.
Dad must have repacked everything so that the boxes could be stacked evenly and neatly in a row on top of each box.
He wondered when he did that. It must have been some months back as the dust had already gathered on the top of the boxes.
These standard sized boxes must have been purchased from a courier company.
Only courier companies have these standard sized boxes.
He remembered there were only about five large ones; now due to the size of the box, five became twenty .
Boy oh boy, he will have fun searching for the yearbook. He could procrastinate and do it the next day, but he'd rather do it now.
Who knows when he will be this curious again? If those questions were not answered, he might never know.
His father had placed the boxes that held his books and things all on one side, and on the other side, there were about five boxes holding Don's things.
He wanted to know what was inside the boxes. He had many books. It would be fun now to look back at all the books he accumulated in his early years. Some he bought while he was away in Princeton, but mostly they were his study books. He tore the tape off one of the boxes and when he did dust flew round, he quickly backed off.
But, he pondered to himself as he started to get the vacuum cleaner, it would be even more fun to look in the boxes of Don's stuff.
Charlie switched on the lights, plugged in the vacuum and started vacuuming the dust off the boxes.
'Oh might as well, vacuum the room,' he thought to himself and started the job of vacuuming the attic room. He started of with the boxes by running the vacuum brush over the top and sides. He did it quickly so there wouldn't be dust flying around.
He did the floor, but when he came to the pile in the middle of the room, he gave up. He unplugged the vacuum cleaner and got the long extension cord rolled up neatly. He had to make two rounds, so he took the vacuum cleaner back down to the storeroom.
He was curious as to what was in Don's box, rather than his own. He opened Don's box first and pulled out the books. There were a few fiction books, mostly detective stories and some school books on History and Geography. Boy, Don must have loved History and Geography.
He saw his Grade books, thin ones and he was tempted to open it, but he did not. After all, this was Don's box. He knew he would get an earful if Don knew he opened his box.
He got lucky when he opened the first box. He saw the old bat, ah… was this the one that mom and dad bought for him? It was really well worn. This was the bat that Don didn't get but got him the book on Math. He took it out of the box and put it aside.
He checked further inside, no yearbook, and he opened another and another and finally found their school yearbook. Getting what he wanted, he closed the box back carefully.
He decided to take two boxes of his down to the garage without opening them. He stuffed the bat and the yearbook into one box after opening it and took it down carefully. Leaving it in the garage, he went back for another box.
He immediately took the yearbook out and started running through it.
"Charlie."
He was engrossed in the book, and he did not answer his dad.
"Charlie!"
"Coming," he called out and put the yearbook back into the box and went out.
tbc