Friends,Enemies & Falling In Love

Just Breathe

Chapter 2- Just Breathe

*Ashers Pov*

I woke up and she was still asleep on FaceTime, her cute little nose scrunching up in her sleep. I stretch out and yawn, trying to be quiet enough to not wake her. I lie there a second just so I could take in her beauty, how is she still so perfect even when asleep. She was beautiful before she went away for the summer, so just when I thought she couldn’t get even more prettier she surprises me yet again. I dragged myself out of bed, careful again not to wake her. I had a quick shower and brushed my teeth, walking back into my bedroom with a towel wrapped around my waist.

I picked out a black Nike T-shirt and some ripped blue skinny jeans and airforce 1s. Once dressed I returned to my position on my bed and glanced at my phone. I saw a gorgeous smile look back at me, her eyes half open in a sleep haze.

“Good morning sunshine” i jest, my voice still husky. Her eyes open in shock and she instantly blushes, I could help but chuckle. Everything she does just makes me smile, pretty sure she could tear out my heart and stamp on it and I’d still think she was gods gift.

“Morning Satan” she grinned. She’s been calling me satan for years, just because my mum let slip that she wanted to call me Lucifer. The girl just won’t let me live it down.

“Alright, I’ll leave you to get dressed and I’ll see you outside in a hour” I smiled at her. She nodded her head and waved goodbye before hanging up the call. The moment she was gone it was like all my happiness left, I just sat there wishing her face would reappear. I grabbed my car keys off the bedroom dresser, me and Callum are the only drivers in our group so we do school pick ups and drop offs. I rush downstairs, give my mom a kiss good morning.

“Morning Mum, where’s dad” I sit at the table and reach forward for a piece of toast taking a bite out of it.

“Had to be in early sweetheart, big case” my mum replied in her brisk polite way, which normally means she’s just as mad as I am about him bailing on another breakfast. I rarely see dad anymore, he’s always at work and when he’s home he’s in his office. He barely even acknowledges my existence. I roll my eyes and carry on eating.

“Remember to be home for 5 as I need the car okay” she reminds me, I give her a nod as I stuff the rest of my piece of toast in my mouth and stand up. I retrieve my bag from the hallway and shout goodbye to mum before I leave. First stop was at Myles and Lexapedia’s house.

As I pull up, Lexi and Myles were in a heated game of rock, paper scissors. I stop right next to them as Lexi’s rock defeats Myles scissors. She starts jumping around triumphantly, pumping her fists in the air and being extra just to annoy Myles that little bit more. He groans and climbs into the backseat as Lexi slides in next to me, a grin still plastered over that pretty face. I turn myself in my seat to face Myles.

“Lose again? Seriously Myles!” I tease him and he flips me off.

I turn to Lexi, “you must be able to read his mind with your twin powers”. She breaks out giggling then reaches for the radio. I hate anyone picking the music when I’m driving, but with Lexi I allow it.

“Why do you let her pick the music” groaned Myles from the back. I shrug and pull off. She stops on a Fall Out Boy song and is humming along to herself while Myles catches up with his maths homework. I stop outside our local park and Dylan climbs in, he too laughs at Myles for losing again.

“Don’t worry about Kayla and Callum, he gave her a lift today” he chuckles. It’s so obvious Callum and Kayla like each other they just won’t give in no matter how much we tease them. I start the journey to school, a song comes on that we all know and it turns into carpool karaoke. I keep my eyes on the road, listening to Lexi sing along. She has a beautiful singing voice but she wouldn’t think so.

We arrive at school just before the bell rings, all of us race to class, splitting up. Me and Myles run to maths while Lexi and Dylan go opposite to English . We take our usual seats at the back of the class when Willow and Ella appears in front of us, it takes all my will power to not groan. Willow was what you call the s**t if the school, there wasn’t a boy she hasn’t been with and I was not going to add myself to that list.

“Myles your home” Ella smiles, pulling him away into there own conversation. So there goes my scapegoat.

“Ash” grins Willow. I honestly feel like throwing up.

“Willow” i mutter, opening up my book and trying to get a hard start on the work displayed on the whiteboard.

“Are you trying out for football this term?” She asks flirtatiously, placing a hand on my shoulder. I shrug her of gently and watch a scowl form on her face, making me 10x happier.

“Yeah I am” I tried to sound as blunt as I could, indicating that I want this conversation over.

“Yay! I’m cheer captain so we are gonna see a lot of each other” she winks and then goes to the front to take her seat. Ella follows shortly after, and Myles looks deflated when she leaves. I decide not to press him on the matter and leave him to it. The teacher appears at some point and just tell us to do what’s on the board, of which I had pretty much completed the majority of it. Once I finished the last question we still had 10 minutes left of class, I fold my arms in my desk and place my head on them. Letting my mind drift else where, it automatically thinks about Lexi. I wonder what book she’s reading, I wonder if she’s got that adorable smile on her face she has when she’s so immersed in a book. I know for a fact english is her favourite lesson. My eyes turn to Myles who’s lost in thought staring at Ella. I wonder what he would say if he knew how I felt about his sister, he would definitely hate me and there is no chance he would ever let me be around her again let alone date her. I sigh, my heart aching for the fact I care for a girl who is out of bounds. The last couple of minutes drag of class, worsening my mood. When the bell rings I take no time in packing away my things and dragging Myles out of there. I do not want to be cornered by Willow again.

The one good thing is we all have science together, we all crowd around our usual table and complain about how boring our first class was. Lexi had a smile on her face so I could tell she enjoyed her lesson, the only person I will ever meet that loves school as much as this girl. We take our seats and the teacher hands out our paired project assignment. I close my eyes and pray that she has paired me and Lexi together, I’m eager to spend some more time just us after the incident in the treehouse. Seeing her that upset broke my heart, I had to stop myself from kissing her that night. I feel a piece of paper drop in front of me and I pry my eyes open and to my surprise see ‘Asher & Alexa’ written across the top. I look up to her and she too is also grinning.

“We’re gonna ace this Lexapedia” I reach across the table for a high five that she reaches forward to gently smack my hand.

“That’s not fair why do you get the human dictionary and I’m paired with Dylan” Kayla mutters, it is usually Kayla that Lexi is paired with. God must be doing me one hell of a favour right now.

“Hey I’m not that bad!” Dylan shouts back, Miss Wilson comes over to tell us off and start planning. We all switch seats so where near our partners, Lexi walks over to me with a radiant smile on her face. She’s a vision of beauty and I don’t think I’ll ever get enough of her. She sits down next to me and our legs touch, I half expected her to pull it back but she didn’t. Even being next to her put me at ease.

“So your in charge of this then Lexapedia”

I lean back in my seat jokingly, placing my hands behind my head. She swats my hand with her text book and rolls her eyes.

“You actually have to help you know” she stated.

“Fine fine, I’ll be over at 5:30 for our study date” i chuckled. Her cheeks blushed pink, and I know she was thinking about the word date and as if on que;

“Date!?” She blurted out, everyone’s eyes landed on us, their mouths falling open. Apart from Myles who was throwing me daggers. For a moment I panicked as fear washed over me, I know he’s my best-friend but I’m scared of the things he would do to me if this was a actual date.

“S-T-U-D-Y” I spell the words out, disguising my fear with cockiness.

“Then you wouldn’t mind if we all come” Kayla chirped in. My body sagged, there goes my chance of any alone time with Lexi.

“What a great idea” Spat Myles, his eyes not leaving me once, I rolled my eyes knowing fully well it would get a reaction.

“Great 5:30 my house everyone” Lexi beamed, obviously defusing the situation before me and Myles started a fight during the lesson. And just as it was intended the sound of her voice calmed me and I turned to focus on the project.

“Great” I muttered to myself in the hope that none would hear me.

Class seemed to drag after the heated exchange, I only spoke to Lexi a handful of times and that was just to make sure we were both on track. The bell rang for lunch and I’d never been more greatful for football trials.

“Right we’ll we will see you boys after cheer tryouts” beamed Kayla, practically skipping her way out of class.

“We?” I stammer, she couldn’t mean Lexi? Lexi cheerleading? The image of her in a cheerleading outfit nearly made me moan on the spot, I had to cough to mask the noise.

“Yeah I managed to persuade Lexi to try out with me! It would be so fun if we both made it on to the squad wouldn’t it Lexi?” Everyone turns to Lexi and I can tell by the look on her face she don’t actually want to do it. I bet she was just trying to make Kayla happy because that’s how selfless she is.

“Uh— yeah I thought I’d give it a try” she half heartedly smiled, I gave her a reassuring smile. She nodded her head at me as if to say thank you before she was dragged away by Kayla. We didn’t say anything on the matter and we all headed to tryouts.

Try outs went well, well atleast for me, Myles and Callum anyway. Dylan didn’t make the cut and I feel so disappointed for him, he keeps saying he’s okay but I know he’s not. I don’t press him on the matter because he’s not really a touchy feely person. We go to our usual spot under the bleachers, and the girls are already there. They have smiles that reach under their eyes, and they are quite literally radiating so much happiness that I could supply us all for a week.

“We both got on” Lexi beams, im shocked that she’s actually happy about getting on the squad. The Lexi I know hated anything that would stereotyped her as a “mean girl”. Cheerleading included, but I was going to be happy for her, if this was what she wanted then it’s what I wanted.

“Well done, so your a bookworm and a athletes now Lexapedia, what else you going to become? A artist?” I chuckled, she walked over and shoved me playfully. I could feel Myles watching us, he had calmed down during practice, probably releasing all his anger towards me on the field. I throw him a look as if to say ‘Your worrying to much’ but when I’m all honesty he had the right to look that way. I did like his sister.

“How did football tryouts go” Lexi looked up at me, her eyes filled with so much hope for me to get in, she always knew I wanted to be a football player going up, that or being a lawyer like my dad.

“Let’s not talk about it” i mutter, throwing a look at Dylan who was sulking in the corner in his phone, she looked from him to me and nodded. Stepping on her tip-toes she whispered in my ear “well congratulations you deserve it”. The thought of her being this close to me gave me shivers.

“Thank you Lexapedia” I whisper back and she gives me a quick hug before returning back to Kayla. Myles and Callum stop there conversation, Callum goes over to check on Dylan and Myles heads straight towards me. F**k I knew this was coming I just thought I could delay it a little while longer. He stops right in front of me.

“What is going on with you two?” He questions, his eyes looking straight into mine as if he was trying to detect if would give anything away. I shrugged dismissively.

“Don’t know what your on about” I put on the best disguise I could in the hopes of fooling him.

“Your both acting weird around each other..Your closer then usual?” He continues, just give in Myles!

“Are we? Didn’t notice” I retorted, going into my bag and retrieving my bottle of water, taking a sip.

“Yeah it’s almost as if you like her” he accused. I almost spat the water everywhere, and he would be right in the line of fire but it’s not like he wouldn’t deserve it. I gulped down what I had left in my mouth and started to fake laugh, let’s hope he don’t realise it’s fake.

“Me and Lexapedia? Are you insane” I chuckle, I turn to Lexi and the look I see on her face breaks me. It’s like I just tore her heart out in front of everyone. She turns away quickly when she notices me staring and I instantly regret everything I said.

“And what if I did what would you do about it?” I spat back, he just ruined every chance I had with her, not like there would be one anyway. And what he says next confirms it.

“Getting with my sister is a line you do not cross Asher. If you ever even tried it we would be done, friendship gone” he barked back, his hands balling in to fists. It takes everything in my power not to yell ‘Throw a punch I dare you’ but I keep my composure. I look at Lexi again and it looks like what her brother said hurt her. Is she genuinely upset that she couldn’t be with me? I know what I’m about to say is going to hurt her and I don’t want to see the pain on her face when I do.

“Lucky that I don’t see her like that then isn’t it” I pick my bag up and head as far away from the bleachers as I can.