School, Noise, and the People Who Get Me

School ain’t never been simple for me. Soon as I walk through them double doors, it’s like the whole building starts hollerin’ at my brain. Lights buzzing, lockers slamming, teachers talking fast like they tryna beat a timer, kids laughing loud enough to shake the walls was just too much going on at once. My head be spinning before first period even starts.

But I got Chris and Nevaeh. And honestly, they the only reason school don’t eat me alive.

Chris swears he my “fidget dealer.” He keeps a fidget toy in his pocket at all times. These little poppers, squishy balls, clickers, whatever he grabbed that morning. He’ll slide one across the desk without even looking at me.

“Here,” he’ll mumble. “Before you start vibratin’ out the chair.”

He say it like a joke, but he mean it. Chris got Autism and ADHD, diagnosed way back in elementary, so he know exactly what overstimulation feel like. That buzzing in your chest, that pressure behind your eyes, that feeling like your thoughts done spilled all over the floor and you can’t pick ’em up fast enough.

Funny thing is how we became friends. Back in middle school, some boy kept pickin’ on me. Making little slick comments, messing with my backpack, just being annoying. I guess Chris got tired of it, ’cause one day he shoved that boy straight into a bookshelf. Books came raining down on him like somebody pulled the fire alarm. Boy was fine, barely a bruise, but Chris still got suspended for a week.

Mama ain’t liked him since. She call him “that crazy ass Spanish boy,” ’cause sometimes Chris’s autism make him do things she don’t understand. Things she think look strange. But to me? Chris always made sense. The way he went about stuff was questionable sometimes, yeah, but he never made me feel weird. Never made me feel broken. Never made me feel like I was too much.

So, I kept him close.

And then there’s Nevaeh, my girl since forever. We basically grew up side by side. Her mama, Ms. Whitney Shepherd, went to school with Mama and they work together now. I wouldn’t say they friends, but they get along, and Ms. Whitney help Mama out here and there when work get rough.

Me and Nevaeh got all the same classes and we in band together. She loud, organized, and bossy in the best way. She keep track of assignments for both of us, tapping my notebook when she see me drifting off.

“Lyric,” she whisper. “Come on now. Stay with me.”

When it come to schoolwork, the three of us, me, Chris, and Nevaeh, always work together. We finish homework in class so we ain’t gotta do it at home. For me, it ain’t just convenience. I don’t have time at home. Not when I gotta cook, clean, check homework, braid hair, and make sure Miracle and Sariya fed and bathed before Mama get back.

School the only place I get to breathe. The only place I get to be sixteen. The only place I get to hang out with my people without somebody calling my name every five minutes.

Sometimes on Fridays, when Mama off and Miracle at her daddy’s, I get a few hours with them after school. We sit outside the band hall, talking about everything and nothing. Chris spinning a fidget toy between his fingers. Nevaeh braiding little pieces of my hair just ’cause her hands always gotta be doing something.

Those moments feel like freedom. Like borrowed peace. Like the quiet my brain been begging for.

School still overwhelming. Life still loud. But Chris and Nevaeh make it bearable.

They my people. My safe place. The ones who remind me I ain’t alone, even when everything else feel too loud.