Exhale

0.1

"Okay, see you soon then!" I practically screamed into my phone, while packing the rest of my school books into my bag.

"See you at school!" My best friend Ashton said over the over line of the phone call.

With that we both hung up.

I grabbed a banana off the bench and walked out the front door if my family's apartment.

Just as I was about to close the door, mum shouted out my name.

"Helena!"

"Yes mum?" I sighed as I walked back inside the apartment.

"I've made some calls and you have to be at Pisto's Pizza right after school. They might have a job lined up for you" my mum ordered.

"Okay thanks" I sighed and closed the door.

My mum was trying to get me motivated again. I kinda lost all motivation towards anything but school right after my older brother died. It's been about 5 months and me and my mum still seem to be miserable, mostly my mum though.

I walked down the empty floor of my apartment and reached the elevator.

The elevator doors opened and I saw a smiling Ashton standing there.

"Ash?" I spoke, entering the elevator.

"That's me" he giggled.

"I thought you were at your dads and you wouldn't see me till school?" I said confused. I pressed the button to go down to the last floor.

"Yeah, well i told my dad to drop me off at mums before school because I haven't seen you in ages." He said seriously.

"It's only been four weeks Ashton" I laughed.

"That's ages. Why haven't you been coming to school? Are you bad again?" He said almost in a whisper.

"Really ash, I'm fine. I just had a few off weeks. I'm better now see? In fact, I have a potential job tonight" I said enthusiastically.

"Where at?" Ashton asked as we started walking to school. It's usually takes around 15 minutes to walk from my apartment to school.

"Pisto's Pizza!" I cheered, walking next to Ashton. Our walking in sync.

"Pfft. Lame!" Ashton joked.

"At least I might have a job ash you lazy ass!"

"Oh please, I could get a job if I wanted" he laughed.

"Rightio ash."

"Hey looks there's Michael!" Ashton stated, pointing to the bright green haired boy waking on the other side of the road with his earphones in.

"Michael!" I yelled.

"He has his earphones in you goof! C'mon!" Ashton said as he grabbed my wrist and dragged me across to Michael on the other side of the road.

"Oh hey guys!" Michael greeted as he took out his earphones.

Ashton and I mumbled out hellos.

"Helena, here have you been! It's been like forever since I've seen you" Michael whined.

"Yeah, I was just chilling at home" I sighed.

"I would have popped around but I didn't know whether you were like, yenno-"

"Bad again?" I interrupted.

He just swollewed.

"Well, I'm fine now, that's all the matters right?" I said, causing the awkward tension between us to fade.

Michael just wrapped his arms around me from the side.