Reasons To Live✔

07

Josh
4:17PM
I'll be over in 20 minutes.

I throw my phone down to the side and rush down the stairs to my parents watching TV. When they hear my elephant-like footsteps they turn around, watching me.

"I'm having a friend over to study. Is that okay?" I ask, moving further into the front room to look between them both.

They glance over at each other before looking back at me.

"Who?"

"His name is Josh. It's just studying, he has a girlfirend," I mumble back, leaning against the railing.

"Sure. Do you want me to make any food? Is he eating here? Should I go out and buy cookies? Or milk? Do you-" My mum says, standing up as she paces towards the kitchen.

"-mum it's fine, if we get hungry we'll go out and find something. Don't worry about us." I laugh, walking back upstairs to clean my small bedroom. I pick up the clothes my mums been pestering me to clean and throw them into the washing basket.

My heart starts speeding up as I watch the clock tick and for the first time in a while that repetitive sound is all I can hear. For 20 minutes whilst I'm sat waiting until-

"El! Your friend is here!" My dad shouts from downstairs. I stand up, my vision shaking slightly as I rapidly race down the stairs.

Josh is stood there. His hair is falling over his eyes, he waves awkwardly at me. I smile back and he waddles towards me, my parents smiling in the background.

"Elyse, come here for a moment," my dad says, my heart stops for a second. I look over to Josh and point to my bedroom, he nods and walks off.

Hesitantly, I walk towards my dad. His serious face quickly is taken over by a bright smile.

"What is it?" I ask.

"We're so proud of you!" He laughs, his arms around me suddenly.

"What. What for?"

"Making a friend! We thought It'd never happen!" He continues to laugh, my mum now hiding her smile.

"Well that's rude." I mutter, my lips creeping with a smile. "But we're barely friends, it's complicated." I continue, my eyes moving to the floor.

"He's coming over to study!"

"Let me go study then!" I say, my dad rolls his eyes before nodding. I turn away on my heel and head up the stairs.

"Be good!" My mum shouts. I wave her off, pushing open my bedroom door open and closing it behind me.

I look over at Josh who's got very comfortable very quickly as he's lying down on my bed. I can't help but smile as I sit on my chair.

"Let's study then," I smile, turning around to look at my cluttered desk.

"Or we could just chill?" He laughs. I turn to face him. "But you're right, we have to study or we'll fail. What should we study?" He continues, his eyes rolling.

"Physics?"

He nods and walks over to the chair next to me, sitting himself down comfortably next to me. He flicks through my text book until stopping on a page. I look over him to see a bunch of numbers, I really don't see anything more than that.

"So this is-" he starts, his fingers dragging along the shapes around the numbers. Then suddenly his text tone echoes around the room. He reaches over, picking his phone up. I glance over for a second and see 3 missed calls from 'Soph' and 7 texts.

He let's out a soft sigh before turning his phone over and looking back down at the textbook.

"You're not gonna respond?" I ask, searching through my pencil case.

I look over at him, the pen tapping against the white desk. He glances back at me, he shrugs. "We're studying," he smiles. I smile back, our eyes moving back down to the thick textbook.

"Do you understand it?" He questions, taking the pen off me and making some notes.

"Not at all," I mumble, embarrassed. Science has never been something I'm good at.

"That's okay, I'll teach you," he slides a piece of paper over to me, handing me the pencil.

We spend the next 4 hours going over science stuff. I feel more confident in the subject after we're done. He leans back in the chair and let's out a heavy sigh. I laugh and spin my chair to face him.

"Thanks for that, it really helped."

"I'm glad, pass me my phone," he nods towards his phone. I turn my body and pass him the phone, noticing the Polaroid photo of him and Sophie in the phone case.

He turns the screen on, another heavy sigh.

"Everything okay?" I wonder, my eye brows raised.

"14 missed calls and 36 texts," he mumbles, his face showing utter defeat.
"I guess I'm in trouble with Soph." He forces a laugh, I force a smile.

"You hungry?" I ask, trying to change the subject. He eagerly looks up at me and nods. "You wanna go get some food then?" I continue to ask.

"Yeah, lead the way." He stands up from my chair. I pick up my bag and together we head down the stairs.

"We're gonna get some food." I shout to my parents in the front room.

"Stay safe!" My dad shouts back.

"It was a pleasure meeting you both," Josh smiles, standing in the doorway. How polite.

"You too," my dad laughs.

I walk to the front door, sliding my shoes on and walking outside. The wind hits my face for the first time in hours and I finally relax. I hear the door close.

I spin around to him and he's smiling brightly too.

"So where do you-" I start to be interrupted. He places his finger against my lip and squishes my cheeks together.

"Silence!" He laughs.

I nod.

"Number seven: studying and feeling great afterwards."

--

Dedication: thewriterr7 you've been so supportive of me and it means the world to me, you're so kind and amazing! Thankyou so much for taking the time to interact with me and just be an awesome person. I also get so much joy from reading your book and so excited for updates. I cannot even begin to explain how talented you are~ ♡