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“Makes sense.” It didn’t. I had no idea where to start, but that was why she was here. To help.
“Good, because I saw that test score you got last week, and I’ve spoken to Professor Hessler about it. We agreed he would strike that score off your record if you could produce a higher quality piece of content based on how you would market the Covey U football team.”
“You did what?” I swallowed down the nervous feeling in my stomach. It felt wrong, but I also couldn’t believe she’d somehow wrangled this for me.
“I spoke to Professor Hessler and told him that you’re my newest client and that unfortunately I was too busy to take you on any sooner, otherwise you would have gotten a better mark.”
“But-”
She raised her hand. “Don’t worry. It’s not cheating to ask for make ups. Lots of students do them, especially when something stressful has happened to them. I’d qualify being the number one prospect on the football team as pretty stressful.”
“But you did that for me?” She nodded. “But you hate me.”
She tilted her head, sighing. “I don’t hate you.” Then, pursing her lips, she pushed them from side to side before cursing herself. “I’m sorry. I know I give off that vibe, but I promise I don’t hate you. I don’t know you well enough to hate you. I just have an issue with all athletes. It’s not personal to you. Well, it’s definitely not personal to you, actually. You’re doing me a huge favor and I appreciate it.”
I rubbed the back of my neck before easing the words out. “Yeah, I guess I owe you one after thinking you just wanted to date me.” She pinched her lips, ignoring me. “I had no idea being tutored by you would be so in depth.”
“Like you, I take my work seriously. Now that you’re one of my clients, your wins are my wins.” She smiled, and for a split second, I almost felt like I’d broken through that hard exterior. Had we become friends? Allies, at the least? Her eyes skated across my face, and she shifted her shoulders. “Right,” she huffed out, dropping her gaze to the open book, and refusing to give me eye contact after. “Now, if you want to be able to write a good report, you’ll need to implement the learnings from Chapter three.” She pointed her perfectly manicured nail to the book, and I let out a low chuckle. “Have you read the chapter?”
“Yeah, uh, about that.” How was I supposed to tell her this? She was here to help me, I knew that, but it still felt odd to be anything but perfect.
She didn’t let me finish because she was already glaring at me. “Tanner. I can pull all the strings I have, but this isn’t going to work if you don’t put the effort in.”
“I’m trying, believe me. It’s just,” I closed my eyes and huffed out a breath. It was now or never. “I have difficulties reading.”
There. I said it. The one thing I’d never said out loud, because it made me feel pathetic. I was a twenty-year-old college student, and yet, sometimes it felt like I had the reading ability of a three-year-old.
“I’m not the fastest reader, I know that.” I continued because the silence felt deafening. “But I work my ass off even if half of the stuff on the pages doesn’t make sense.” I hesitated for a minute and then admitted it. “I’m dyslexic. I’ve known that since High School and have been trying to work with it since.”
“They didn’t have any help in your school?”
“They gave me extra time in my exams and a few colored plastic reading sheets to help, but they didn’t have much support besides that. But the longer I’ve been attending here, the more I’ve realized that my teachers may have also been a little more than generous with my grades.”
As embarrassed as I felt right now, she didn’t flinch. There was no mocking in her expression. She just shut the textbook in front of me and made sure I was looking at her before she said anything else. “Okay. It’s good to know that you’re dyslexic. I’ve worked with a lot of dyslexic students before, and I think I’ll be able to help you create better habits that will make it easier for you to remember content from your classes. There are also resources at the student centre that are catered to your needs as well.”
“Good to know.”
“Not just good to know. I urge you to take advantage of these resources because they have techniques to make things easier. You don’t need to suffer alone.” She shuffled through a few of the papers at her side. “You know what? I don’t think it’s on your student record.”
“It’s not. I didn’t put it in.”
“Because you didn’t want them to help you with it?” I shrugged sheepishly and stilled when she dropped her hand to my knee. “Okay, well, let’s get one thing clear. Dyslexia is not something to be ashamed of. It doesn’t mean you’re stupid or any less deserving of performing well in classes. In fact, it’s probably the reason you’re so good at football. Dyslexia is a gift, and we just need to harness it. That involves learning to work smarter, not harder, and taking advantage of all the resources available to you.” I nodded and kept my gaze on my book because I was starting to realize how much I hated her eyes piercing into me.
“Good thinking,” I said, because I had no idea how else to respond.
“So the first quick win I have is Alexa.”
My brows crossed. “Alexa?”
“Alexa, on your phone. You can download almost any book and she’ll read the contents for you. You can pause and slow her voice down if needed, too. So, you can learn it at your own pace.”
“Okay.”
“And I’ll make sure to take that into account when I write notes for our next session. Until then, I’m going to talk through Chapter Three because I read it just before you got here. I want you to listen and ask me questions. If you don’t, I’ll assume you aren’t listening, and that will go as a strike against you for future sessions.”
She was trying to be menacing, but I wasn’t sure if she’d forgotten that her hand was still peacefully resting on my thigh. I wasn’t about to point it out, because I kind of liked it.
“Sounds good,” I said with an uneasy edge.
