In Chap­ter Twen­ty-Two of “If These Wings Could Fly,” the nar­ra­tor, Leighton, reflects on the sun­set as she trav­els to Liam’s house, not­ing Auburn’s beau­ty despite its flaws. The glow­ing red sun reminds her of a chaot­ic moment with her sis­ter Juniper using high­lighters on her copy of “The Bell Jar,” a con­trast of bright col­ors against dark words. As they arrive, Leighton’s moth­er ques­tions her sto­ry about need­ing a tutor, teas­ing her about the neces­si­ty of help in art class. This light-heart­ed ban­ter leads to Leighton show­ing her moth­er her lat­est still life project, which pro­vokes a laugh, and a ten­der moment occurs as she kiss­es her moth­er good­bye.

Upon enter­ing Liam’s home, Leighton is greet­ed warm­ly by his sis­ter Fiona, who express­es relief at Leighton’s vis­it, shield­ing her­self from Liam’s antics. Their friend­ly rap­port is estab­lished, light­ened by Fiona’s com­ments about Liam’s hob­bies and teas­ing. Mrs. McNa­ma­ra, Liam’s moth­er, enters, bring­ing warmth and warmth with her. She also shares her expe­ri­ences of teach­ing in a small, pre­dom­i­nant­ly white town, voic­ing her thoughts on the impor­tance of inclu­siv­i­ty in edu­ca­tion.

Liam soon arrives, exud­ing charm and an invit­ing pres­ence that leaves Leighton wish­ing this was a legit­i­mate date. They engage in ban­ter while choos­ing snacks, and Liam’s endear­ing nature starts to break down Leighton’s walls. Inside Liam’s room, they share a cre­ative space filled with art, graph­ic nov­els, and a glimpse into Liam’s aspi­ra­tions. Despite their play­ful exchanges, a deep­er dis­cus­sion about future aspi­ra­tions unfolds, reveal­ing their mutu­al fears and ambi­tions inter­twined with the chal­lenges of small-town life.

While work­ing on art, their close prox­im­i­ty becomes charged, prompt­ing flir­ty moments and reflec­tions. How­ev­er, as Fiona intrudes, the light­ness of the scene sharp­ens, high­light­ing their friend­ship. Even­tu­al­ly, they step out­side to part ways, where Liam express­es a desire to spend more time togeth­er beyond school. Despite Leighton’s instincts to focus on her respon­si­bil­i­ties, she finds her­self want­i­ng to embrace this thrilling snip­pet of teenage life and agrees to a bon­fire.

As Leighton returns home, she feels both exhil­a­rat­ed and guilty at the thought of mov­ing beyond her usu­al rou­tine, a bal­ance of excite­ment and famil­ial oblig­a­tions echo­ing in her mind as she nes­tles into bed. This chap­ter cap­tures themes of youth­ful explo­ration, fam­i­ly, and the del­i­cate tug-of-war between ambi­tion and enjoy­ment in life.

In Chap­ter Twen­ty-Two of “The Choco­late War,” Bri­an Cochran is con­sumed with anx­i­ety over the alarm­ing drop in sales for the choco­late sale fundrais­er, with yes­ter­day mark­ing the sharpest decline yet. His dread pri­mar­i­ly revolves around Broth­er Leon, the moody and unpre­dictable teacher who serves as a con­stant source of pres­sure for Bri­an, espe­cial­ly con­sid­er­ing Leon’s pre­vi­ous crit­i­cism of his work. The task of pre­sent­ing the sales totals looms over him like a dark cloud.

Despite Bri­an’s attempts to remain steady, he feels a surge of tri­umph in deliv­er­ing the bad news to Leon, who has been dis­mis­sive of him in the past. Leon arrives to hear the fig­ures, his pres­ence over­whelm­ing and intim­i­dat­ing. Bri­an informs him that the sales fig­ures have fall­en below the pre­vi­ous year’s totals, which sig­nif­i­cant­ly com­pli­cates their cur­rent quo­ta.

Leon’s sharp response—questioning Bri­an’s math­e­mat­i­cal skills—ignites Bri­an’s frus­tra­tion, but he sup­press­es any incli­na­tion to retal­i­ate. The tense atmos­phere thick­ens as Leon insists that Bri­an read off the sales fig­ures. Bri­an begins by list­ing the names of stu­dents who met or exceed­ed their quo­tas, ini­tial­ly enjoy­ing the con­trol over the pac­ing of his report. How­ev­er, as he pro­gress­es through the list, each drop in num­bers becomes increas­ing­ly uncom­fort­able, cul­mi­nat­ing in the rev­e­la­tion that one stu­dent, Renault, sold noth­ing at all.

Leon uses this moment to make an omi­nous claim about the over­all decline in sales, attribut­ing it to what he calls a “dis­ease” of apa­thy afflict­ing the stu­dents, sug­gest­ing Renault as the “car­ri­er” of this malaise. The chap­ter cap­tures Bri­an’s inter­nal tur­moil as he real­izes Leon’s intent to scape­goat Renault for the sales decline, lead­ing to a chill­ing rep­re­sen­ta­tion of pow­er dynam­ics and manip­u­la­tion with­in the school envi­ron­ment. The unset­tling atmos­phere and Leon’s fix­a­tion on Renault under­score the bur­geon­ing con­flict that has been seed­ed through­out the nar­ra­tive.