Not Like Before

Chapter 24

Mature language

Y'all. I didn't realize I had the coaches name as Coach Smith, I did that because it's generic but then I realized NEGAN SMITH was a gym coach before the apocalypse.

I might use that I might not lol
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Third Person POV

It was currently 2:46 am on a Sunday night, and Chandler was wide awake. His mom had moved out the day before and with all the chaos surrounding his personal life, he'd unintentionally let 7 homework assignments and 1 project pile up.

He figured since he couldn't ever sleep anyways, now would be a perfect time to knock those assignments out.

He was on the third one when he got an unexpected text.

Laura W: hey u up?

Chandler was confused, not that she was up so late, that was pretty normal in high school. But why would she text him of all people? He picked up his phone.

Chandler R: yeah, why?

Laura W: just wondering, what are you doing?

Chandler R: homework. You?

Laura W: tossing and turning. Can I call you?

Chandler didn't have time to respond before his phone was ringing. He was confused but he answered nonetheless.

"Hey. Wanna talk?" She asked. Chandler could feel his heart rate speed up a bit but tried to ignore it and act cool.

"Sure I guess." He said and sighed, putting on his best careless attitude. He was good at it by now.

"My lip hurts like a bitch." Laura says and Chandler chuckles quietly.

"Yeah you'll get that after a fight. You're really lucky no teachers saw you. But then again I'm starting to think they really don't give a shit about their 'zero tolerance' fighting rule." Chandler says as he puts Laura on speaker and sets his phone next to him.

He continues his assignment and Laura sighs in the background.

"I know. I'm just glad I got to hit her to be honest. Not to sound crazy but it felt amazing and at the time I didn't even care if she won the fight. It—it wasn't even about winning, I just wanted to hit her." She explains. Chandler nods, and then remembers Laura can't see him.

"I know the feeling. But I also have issues so you should maybe talk to someone who doesn't if you're looking for advice." He mumbles.

"I'm not looking for advice, I'd do it again in a heartbeat." Laura says quietly.

They fall into a comfortable silence for a few minutes, Chandler doing his assignment, and Laura trying not to fall asleep, as she finally felt tired.

"Hey uh...can I ask you something? A-and you can obviously say no...it's probably weird..." Laura started awkwardly.

Chandler yawned and looked at the time, it was already 3:32 am.

"Yeah sure, what is it?" He asked and closed his laptop.

"Would you mind if...would you mind if we stayed on the phone to sleep? I know that sounds weird I just feel like I'd actually be able to sleep if I felt like someone was here. If not it's completely fine I can just call Ava—" She started but Chandler cut her off.

"No no I get it. You need my strong, manly presence to feel safe. It's totally cool, lots of girls want to sleep with me." He jokes and plugs up his phone next to his bed.