Spring

Chapter 25

Wednesday 27th April, Ash woke up to Olly's face staring down at her.
" Happy Birthday!" Olly told her giving her a hug.
" Thank you Olly." She smiled at him.
" Hurry up hurry up! The quicker you move the more time we have!!"
" Olly, we have school."
" B-But presents! I worked hard to find yours!"
" After-school buddy, Nana, Abuelo, Grandma and Grandpa are coming over along with mine and Charlie's friends, Sarah is bringing Henry and Nellie."
" Doggies!"
" Mhm. So go get changed for school."
" Ok!" Olly left her room allowing her to get changed. She sorted out her recently cut hair, she had it just above her shoulders with her iconic undercut, she had dyed it in a rainbow, not that her parents knew, Darcy had done it for her.
She headed downstairs to see the rest of her family already awake.
" Morning Ashley." Julio smiled to his daughter.
" Morning dad."
" Happy birthday baby." He hugged her and she replicated.
" Thank you."
" What time you planning on finishing today?" Jane asked.
" 4:30 ish, practice today."
" Okay hun, enjoy today." She told her, giving Ash her lunch box and a hug," Happy Birthday."
Ash smiled at her mum and left, Nick was going to pick Charlie up and she honestly preferred to take the bus, she could relax.

She got off the bus and as she headed into Truham she was bombarded by the rugby lads.
" ASHLEY!" Sai yelled as he jumped on her back. Christian, Otis, Harry and the others all came to her as well.
" Hey Sai."
" Happy birthday!" He told her, still holding on.
" Thank you now can you get off my back?"
" Sure thing." He said climbing off.
" Where's Charlie?" Harry asked.
" Coming with Nick. I took the bus, anyway see you at prac." She said walking away.
" Where you going?" Harry asked.
" To hide from Tao!" She called back walking into school. She headed to the bench where her and the others would meet in the morning after Harry had his conversations with the rugby guys. Ben was sat there typing on his phone, Elijah was sat next to him listening to music and Aled was opposite them reading. Ash sat next to Aled.
" This is very conversational." She spoke up gaining the 3's attention.
" Hi Ash." Ben smiled to her, " How are you doing?"
" I'm good, don't really want to be here today but I have to be."
" That sucks, but Happy Birthday."
" Happy Birthday!" Eli chimed in after and Aled gave a nod, this was how the pair normally communicated, they preferred to talk over text than in person, it meant no one could listen in to their conversations and they had some form of privacy. Plus he had stayed up 'til midnight to message her Happy Birthday since they had been talking about a book, Goodnight Mr Tom, they had both read it a while ago but Ash had re-read it and was encouraging Aled to do the same as they hadn't read it since Primary school.

" Are we walking back to your's?" Eli asked.
" No, Nick has his car and my dad said he would come pick us up, since we have practice and that today."
" Phew, I thought I would die, I have PE periods 5+6 today!"
" You are all good Eli."
They continued to sit and talk when the others eventually came and the conversation picked up more, Ash liked the simple conversations her, Ben, Aled and Eli had. There was no pressure to answer anything, they all knew they could not be assed in the morning and that. This was their favourite thing to do. Ever since Ben moved back to Truham because of the Higgs incident it was a morning ritual for them, especially as he didn't have Josh to help him. 

Ash, Ben, Tao and Eli headed to their form room, saying bye to the others. When they entered Meni wished Ash a Happy Birthday and she sat in her seat. Meni had this habit of embarrassing her students on their birthday by putting a banner on their desk and chair. Along with gathering some information about them, Ash was not looking forward to what that could be from Meni. She had told Meni a lot of the shit she did when she was younger during their weekly chats they had since she started. It was only supposed to be a check in but since they were around Maths lessons she took her sweet time to talk in them with Meni about nothing relevant to cause it to go longer so she missed maths. Although, Meni knew this trick now and it doesn't work on her anymore. Morning form consisted of notices and the whole room singing Ash happy birthday, causing her to put her head on the table. Maths went by like nothing, then science with Mr Farouk who said happy birthday to her on the way out, she was still confused to how she got into separate sciences. Everyone smothered her and Charlie at break. Music she had people playing happy birthday on the piano, Drama nothing happened, at lunch Ash took Eli to their spot hoping the others not to keep singing Happy Birthday whenever they saw her. It had been a while since the pair went off to their spot but they did like their alone time where Ash could help Eli with work, it also meant that he didn't have to run into his ass of a brother. English went by and before she knew it, it was the end of the day. She went and changed into her kit, as she stepped out the boys had made a tunnel for her to run through, so she did, rolling her eyes at them on the way. Singh laughed at them and once again they sang happy birthday to her, which ended with both Harry and Nick receiving a rugby ball to the face saying it was ' worth it'. They played some games and did drills like they normally would, Ash against Nick since she was competitive and he liked to wind her up, he was basically another brother to her.