j a k e
"I actually forgot how much I hate school," I mutter underneath my breath as I open my locker. Grayson snickers as I continue, "I hate it. With a passion." I shove my notebook in his face, showing off the scribbled down words. "Who the hell gives this much homework?"
"Mr. Johnson can suck my dick," Grayson reads off the page with squinted eyes.
I turn the notebook towards me. "Oh, wrong page. Ryder wrote that."
"Doesn't surprise me," Grayson laughs loudly. I stuff the notebook and my textbook in my locker and promptly close it loudly to express my anger. Grayson just rolls his eyes and threads an arm lazily around my shoulders. "Let's go, buddy. You have your money?"
"Don't call me buddy," I groan, "But yeah."
We meet Ryder, Reese and Connor outside of the building. Even though it's only just nearing the end of September, the cool weather is unforgiving. I shiver in my t-shirt and force Grayson out of his sweatshirt since he already has a jacket.
"I want pizza," Ryder announces as we begin to walk away from the building. "If we go now we can beat the lunch line."
"We get pizza every day because of you," Reese retorts. "What about Chinese? No one ever goes there so there won't be a line."
"There's a reason no one goes there," Grayson points out. "It's sketchy as hell. What about sushi?"
"Look, guys," Ryder interrupts loudly. "We can argue about this all we want. But at the end we're going to get pizza."
That just led us to more arguing, but eventually, we end up sitting in the pizzeria by the school, sharing an extra large cheese pizza. (Reese wanted pepperoni, but then Connor started saying something about him turning vegetarian, and things just went downhill from there.)
"I broke up with my girlfriend," Grayson suddenly announces in between chews.
Ryder's eyebrows furrow. "Who...?"
"Moh," Grayson says. Ryder's confused expression doesn't change, so Grayson turns to me. "The girl I was making out on your couch with?"
"Yeah, I remember her," I snort. "Never liked her."
Grayson rolls his eyes, "You spoke two words to her."
I shrug, leaning back in my seat and pointing accusingly at Grayson with my pizza. "I knew it wouldn't work out."
"No you didn't."
"Girls," Reese chides.
We stop arguing, both with sighs. I continue eating my pizza, studying Grayson. He doesn't seem too upset- Grayson never really is. There's only one girl who Grayson has ever really been honestly emotionally invested in, which is Kayla. We still talk to her now and again, but after she broke Grayson's heart, it's just hard to look at her the same. The good news, though, is that now they've been talking to each other more and more lately, so maybe something good may come out of Grayson's break up with Moh.
I look out the window from the booth we're sitting in. I'm squished against Connor and Ryder, but they don't even seem to notice. I don't mind; I just laugh and watch the sun high up in the sky, allowing myself a small smile. For the first couple of years of high school, lunch with my friends was the only thing I had looked forward to. After the clinic when I didn't go back to school, I had missed out on spending time with them, along with any chance at making other friends. I guess I'm kind of grateful to be back. Although school is the biggest pain of the ass ever, I can't help but find myself smiling every time I wake up to a spam of messages from Grayson every morning, or laugh when the daily argument begins about where we will go to eat, which always leads us to the pizzeria.
