Stress Relief

4: Friends

School felt like it dragged on for way longer than eight hours. He could barely concentrate on what the teachers were saying thanks to his mind being occupied going over all the reasons he hated Braden and his asshole self for spamming his dms. It continued over all of his classes at least once and so, next thing he knew, he had six assignments he was doing after school on the bleachers. It was times like these he wished "post breakup grief" or whatever he was going through was something the faculty could put on his 504 plan.

Putting his earbuds in he pressed play on a playlist and started working. It felt like hours had past when he finally got through the first few slides of his lab notes, but eventually as he came to the review for an upcoming quiz, he scratched at his chin, stuck. "I doubt "mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell"'s gonna help me on this one." he grumbled to himself. Lack of sleep weighing down on his body like a weighted blanket. Having said that it probably wasn't a good idea to try and study now while he could feel the pull of unconsciousness tugging at his eyelids.

A snort pierced through his headphones and he turned to see Chase in his gear, leaning against the bleachers. Pulling them out he smiled at him. "Sorry," He smiled apologetically, "I tried calling your name but you couldn't hear me."

"All good." Just then he realized that none of the others have arrived yet, "I see you're here earlier than usual. You ditch your girlfriend?"

"Actually she ditched me, technically, so I didn't have to get yelled at." Chase chuckled and came around, sitting to his right, "You look like you have your hands full."

Elijah sighed, looking at the screen of his laptop that he was pretty sure was giving him a migraine. "You have no idea." Chase leaned over to take a peak, humming as he likely tried to answer a few in his head.

Despite having someone looking over his shoulder, he kept working. Eventually he found the answer to the question he was stuck on, and submitted the guided notes. Halfway done. "You can do all that stuff at home you know."

While that was true for anyone else, Elijah shook his head. "No, can't focus as well. I always get distracted by my phone."

"Just put it away." Elijah gave him a look and he put his hands up. "Hey I'm just trying to help. Yknow, "out of sight out of mind"."

Every time his dad told him that, it just pissed him off, but for some reason the idea didn't sound as bad coming from Chase. "Fine. This is giving me a headache anyway." He shut his laptop and put it up, stuffing the paper he had out into a journal and packing up. "You might want to let my dad know your here, unless you don't need help with homework?"

"Crap I knew I forgot something!" He bolted and Elijah smiled as he left. A few minutes later a collection of footsteps came from the school.

"I'm telling you dude, I'm getting a date for hoco! I already have one in mind." Carson's confidence rang out as the boys with him chuckled.

"Sure you are." Matt came around the bleachers and his head turned automatically, having gotten used to Elijah always being there. He gave him a nod. "Sup, you finish working on whatever you were doing?" Carson was at his left, an offended smile on his face as he too greeted him,

"For the most part." He sighed. "I'm taking a break for now."

"I gotcha." Anthony came out behind him, then Alex. "You two go get the ball and some cones." Anthony rolled his eyes, and Alex just gave him a thumbs up. Watching them walk away out of curiosity, he saw Alex whisper something to Anthony that earned him a smack on the arm and for the boy to walk faster. "Did you run into Chase by the way?"