AT LAST, I COULD BREATHE | billy hargrove

so arcades are fun.

chapter song: Need Me - Eminem (ft. P!nk)

so arcades are fun.

"So what you're saying is sine x is gonna go here instead of here because...?" I trailed, pointing at the equation written down on the math paper.

"Because if you put it over there, then tangent wouldn't equal zero," the blonde girl across from me, Erica, replied.

My mouth dropped a bit at my own stupidity and I mentally facepalmed, "Ohhhhhh. I actually get it now, thanks! What's next?"

"Uh," Erica paused, looking at her notes, "Wow, uhm, you're actually done. All caught up." My face lit up in the joy that I was finally finished learning everything I missed because of the gap in the curriculum from my last school to Hawkins. "Wow, I didn't think we were done," she muttered to herself, looking puzzled down at everything we'd finished.

"Not to be completely and totally full of myself, but I learn very quickly—faster than the average person, actually."

She nodded, eyebrows up. "Despite my expression, I'm actually not surprised, I've just never seen that before."

"First time for everything, I guess," I replied nonchalantly, packing up my things neatly. A few kids around six years old zoomed past our booth at the arcade and ran around the corner to Pac-Man. "I'm surprised you suggested here to finish studying."

"Oh, yeah, this wouldn't be my first choice with all of the noise and stuff," she paused to let me hear all of the chatting going on. "But it's within walking distance of my house and I didn't want to trouble you for another ride. Besides, you have an incredible amount of focus and I knew we'd get our work done anyways."

I nodded, slightly agreeing with her. "Don't hesitate to ask for rides, Erica, I'd like to think we're friends."

Her big, green eyes, peered over her framed glasses and her mouth hung open a little. "We are?"

"Yeah," I answered, "Of course we are. You're cool."

She blushed a bit and grinned at me. The blonde began to stand up and I did the same, signaling to each other that we were ready to leave.

"If you need any help on anything, just let me know, Bo," She said cheerily, happy with my deduction of our friendship.

"You, too, Erica," I winked. "And are you sure you don't want a ride?"

She nodded profusely, "Yeah, I'm like three houses down from here, I think I can make it on my own."

"Be careful, it's late." She nodded and thanked me, leaving the arcade swiftly. I couldn't see the front entrance, but I heard the bell ring as soon as she left, and again two seconds later again, meaning someone entered. I didn't think anything of it and just browsed around the arcade, looking at the games I used to waste my money playing for no reason. I was actually quite awful—garbage, to be more precise—at video games and I always got frustrated when I lost, so they clearly weren't a pastime that I spent too much time on. And then I passed a game that I completely forgot about, but had a lot of fun playing despite my inept nature.

DIG DUG.

There was a girl playing it a few feet away with shockingly orange hair with an incredibly focused look in her eye and a scowl on her face. She couldn't have been more than a few years younger than me—my guess was either 7th or 8th grade—but she was around my height, maybe a bit taller.

"Max!" I heard a quite familiar voice command from behind me. Before I turned to give him a dirty look, I saw the red-haired girl's head shift over and she let out a sigh of defeat. "I told you I'd be here at 8 sharp, let's go!!"