The Tech Wiz

Chapter Three

A groan of frustration left my lips as I jumped at the sound the door of the tech lab slapping shut behind me. I'd always managed to startle myself by leaving the door wide open when I walked in, and the wind took over from me to shut the door with force.

"That's loud. Did you just throw the door open?"

I blinked at the sound of someone's voice, before looking around the room. I found someone sitting at the desk at the far end as they used their laptop. A frown took form on my face as I tried to think of why the person was there in the first place. I usually came here during this period, and I was usually the only one.

Holding on to my laptop bag, I walked towards the table at the other end of the room. When I'd settled down and turned on my laptop I let my gaze wander to the person at the other end. I blinked, realizing it was Felix when the person raised their head a bit.

"Felix?" I said in surprise. I wasn't sure he heard me until he turned towards me with a smile on his face.

"Hmm?" he mumbled with a frown, looking at me before returning his gaze to his computer screen. I looked away, a little disappointed but his blunt reply. Maybe he was really busy?

I shook my head, deciding to work on the paper I had due for my critical thinking class. I started working on it, and a few minutes in I heard Felix's voice echo in the room.

"I'm sorry about my reply, I wasn't really listening..." He trailed, making me look over to the desk he was sitting at. He was staring straight at me as he used a hand to rearrange his dark bangs. "I'm trying to figure out what I'm doing wrong in regards to coding, but it's just not working."

"Oh," I mumbled, looking towards the document on my computer. I'm guessing it can wait a few minutes. "I can help," I said, turning my attention back to him.

"You can?" he asked, looking at me with a grin. I nodded, getting off my seat before heading over to him. He leaned back on the wooden chair so that I could take a proper look at the laptop's screen, but he was still close enough that the denim jacket he was wearing was brushing against my arm when I leaned in. I tried not to think about the fact that Felix was so close by as I took a proper look at the running code and the displayed preview of what it was supposed to produce at the side.

"It's just a simple error. You're leaving spaces everywhere and breaking the code," I eventually said after having a proper look at what he'd done. He was coding for what looked like a comment section.

I wonder what it's for.

"Darn it, I should have noticed," he laughed, his voice ringing in my ear and making the hairs on my neck stand up. I got out of the way as calmly as I could in hopes that he wouldn't know that his laugh had affected me.

"I'm clumsy when it comes to computer numeric. It's going to be impossible to finish this before the deadline," he muttered to no one in particular as he made to correct the mistake I'd pointed out.

"What are you even trying to do?" I dared to ask as I watched him work, his fingers gliding on the laptop's keyboard swiftly as he typed. I was starting to wonder if it was some sort of assignment.

"I entered a young innovators' contest," he answered, his words quickly followed by a short-lived laugh. "I might be innovative, but I'm not much of an inventor. All my silly mistakes prove it."

"Hmm, but what exactly are you trying to make?" I asked, leaning in to try and see if I could figure it out. "Is it a website?"

"Something close..." he trailed as he stopped typing to hold his chin as his eyes examined the preview result. "I'm trying to build a social media site."

"Oh, like a blog or chat room?" I asked, frowning. There were a couple of people who ran sites like that in our school. Aiyana, for example, had a writing blog, and she also posted her stories on a writing site. Some people kept gossip blogs and had chat rooms.

"No, like a proper one like Twitter, f*******: — You know?" Felix sighed as he leaned into his laptop again to continue typing.

"Oh," I muttered, standing up straight before looking over at the wall clock in the lab. I saw that it was already twenty minutes into the period. I headed back to my seat, deciding that it was probably wise to work on my essay before the period passed by entirely. Aiyana said she won't help me edit if I didn't even have words to be edited.

Time went by as I worked on my essay and the fifty minute period was soon over. I sighed when the bell went before saving the document and shutting my laptop down. I had to get up and head to the physics lab before the ten minutes break between periods was over.

"See you later, Ben."

I heard Felix's voice say. Turning, I found him slipping his laptop into his backpack as he stood up from the seat he'd been sitting on. He gave me a small smile when he noticed I was staring, making me look away sharply.

"Err, see you too," I mumbled as I watched him adjust the straps of the bag on his shoulders. He spared me another one of those smiles that got me nervous before he walked towards and out the lab's door. I watched him throughout, snapping out of my thoughts when the door clicked shut behind him.

I left the lab soon after, heading to the physics lab that was on the same floor. I was the first to get to class, and it wasn't surprising since every other person had to change their books and climb up the stairs to the top floor.

Watching the clock, I waited for the class to fill out. Ji-Hun and Wyatt were one of the first to come in after me. They took the two stools to my right as they continued to talk to each other, probably continuing a conversation that had started before they got into the lab.

"Okay, we're doing a practical on electricity today," our physics teacher announced as he walked into the room. He was a dark smallish man in his prime. The class seemed to let out a unified groan in distress. I didn't blame them. The practicals on electricity were frustrating. Half the school's multimeters were faulty so readings were bound to be incorrect.

"Weren't we going to do the practical on heat today?" Wyatt asked, making our teacher turn to him as he shook his head.

"We were, but we couldn't get everything we needed in the set. We'll just have to do the electricity practical now, we'll do the one on heat next week," he said, making Wyatt nod. It was then I noticed that he looked tired and not in the mood to do anything.

"What's up with him?" I asked, looking over at Ji-Hun. He shrugged, taking the answer sheets from the person distributing them. He passed one to me and kept the two others meant for Wyatt and him.

"Wyatt had fifty minutes of biology practical class testing food samples. I guess he's just nauseous," Ji-Hun said as he ran a hand through his boyfriend's hair. Wyatt had rested his head on the table while our teacher had headed to get a pack of wires from the storage room.

Ji-Hun was soon resting his head on the table as well. I watched him speak to Wyatt softly before turning away at the feeling of being intrusive. I decided to do something productive with the short time our teacher was using to search the storage room, so I took out my physics notes and flipped to the page I'd jotted tips for practicals to read.

After a while Mr. Joseph, our physics teacher came out and set up the practical equipment with the help of the lab technician. It was five students to a multimeter since most of them were faulty so Ji-Hun helped Wyatt take his reading while he rested.

I wish someone would look after me like that. I thought all of a sudden as I watched Ji-Hun transfer the double reading he'd taken into his sheet and Wyatt's as I waited for someone to be done with the multimeter.

"What are you looking at?"

I heard Ji-Hun's voice say, bringing me out of my thoughts.

"It's nothing," I muttered, looking down at my paper. I needed to finish taking my readings but a 'perfectionist' was unfortunately still using the multimeter I'd been assigned to. How many readings did someone need to take an average for God's sake?

"Ah, okay then," he said, but he didn't look very convinced. "Should I take him to the sick bay after class?"

Ji-Hun asked all of a sudden, making me look over at Wyatt who was now napping. Our teacher had come to our table to ask why he was sleeping, but Ji-Hun had explained things to him.

"Yeah, right after the period," I suggested, making Ji-Hun nod.

"There's a council meeting after school. You're coming, right?" Ji-Hun asked, making me nod as I ran a hand through my short kinky hair. He gave me a small smile, turning back to the two sheets of paper he was working with.

The rest of the class went by and eventually ended with only a handful of people finishing the experiment. We were allowed to take our readings with us, so we all left as soon as we finished. I headed to our critical thinking class with Aiyana after changing my books at my locker, while Ji-Hun took Wyatt to the sick bay. He came to class halfway through the period, apologizing to our teacher before heading to sit with Aiyana and me at our regular table.

Ji-Hun asked for Aiyana's notes and while he used them Aiyana helped me with my essay. We were learning how to prepare a personal statement. Something they usually taught the seniors, but our teacher, Mrs. Rivers figured that it would be better if we learned it now instead of waiting for when we'd be applying to colleges.

A sigh escaped my lips as I worked on what Aiyana told me. I felt the whole exercise was useless. Seeing as I wasn't going to college I didn't see the point.

It's not like I'll be needing a personal statement. I thought as I continued to type up the essay.