by Chloe Walsh
"Oh, well happy seventeenth birthday," I replied. "I hope you have a great night."
"Ah, I'm only heading for a few quiet ones with the lads," he explained as he walked up the garden path. "The big celebrations will happen the end of May."
"What's in May?"
"My best friend's eighteenth," he told me. Smiling knowingly, he added, "You know him, right? Johnny Kavanagh?"
"Oh." My face turned a bright shade of red at the mention of Johnny's name. "Yeah, we've met."
"He'll have gotten the call up by then," Gibsie added proudly. "It'll be a double celebration and a session and a half that night."
The call up?
What call up?
I wanted to ask him about it, but I held my tongue, knowing that it wouldn’t do me any good.
I didn’t need to add any more Johnny obsessed thoughts into my already Johnny-filled mind.
"He's coming out with us tonight," Gibsie continued to ramble on, oblivious to my blushing. "Which is a fucking miracle in itself considering he never comes out with us anymore." He opened the front door of the Biggs' house and gestured for me to walk in first. "Hughie's actually picking Kav and Feely up after dropping Katie home." Glancing at the clock hanging in the kitchen, he added, "They'll be here in a few. You should wait around down here and say hi to him." Winking, he added, "I bet he'd love to see you."
Was he teasing me?
I didn’t think so.
But he was definitely stirring.
I just wasn’t sure if it was for my benefit or not.
Either way, I was not staying downstairs to say hi to anyone.
"No, that's okay," I mumbled, feeling every ounce of blood rush to my face. "The girls are waiting for me."
"Suit yourself, Little Shannon," Gibsie chuckled.
"Happy birthday." Offering him a weak wave, I turned to bolt up the staircase. "Have a nice night."
"Will do," he called after me.
I didn’t have to turn around to see he was grinning; I could hear it in his voice.
9
Birthday Bashes and Broken Glasses
Johnny
Pubs and bars were a temptation that I tried to stay away from as much as possible.
With my training schedule, I couldn’t afford to mess around like my friends did.
Alcohol wasn’t in my diet and I was always sluggish for days after a session.
However, tonight was Gibsie's seventeenth birthday, so after relentless phone calls and texts, I'd given in and agreed to go out to celebrate with him and some of the team at Biddies.
Biddies was our local haunt in town, and contrary to the name, it was pretty modern with minimal culchies propping up the bar.
During the day, Biddies served the best food in town, and at night, it transformed into the hub for the town's younger generation.
I ate there a lot when my folks weren't home. The co-owner and head chef, Liam, was a really decent guy who had no problem with catering for my dietary needs. It was the only place in town I knew I could go to where I was guaranteed to get clean food.
As far as nights out went, I didn’t drink there very often, that was more of Gibsie's thing, but when I did, we were guaranteed to get both served and shitfaced.
It was a bad idea considering we both had a club match tomorrow morning, but Gibsie had justified our recklessness by repeating the sentiment that a fella only turns seventeen once.
That was true.
Problem was, it wasn’t as easy for me.
The lads could let loose on a night out and go mental if they wanted to.
No one except their mothers would judge them in the morning.
If I messed up, on the other hand, my name would be publicly dragged through the mud, the rugby heads would be on my case, and my position at The Academy would be in jeopardy.
Which made tonight worse for several reasons.
The first being, I was seventeen and had given into Gibsie's relentless pressure by drinking myself into a semi-paraletic state right along with him.
And second, Bella was here.
Both of these were very bad things with a possible disastrous ending.
Within minutes of my arrival at Biddies bar, it became pretty clear that Cormac wasn’t Bella's top priority; the minute I sat down at the table with the lads, she'd made a beeline for my lap and hadn't left since.
I spent most of the night trying to avoid making eye contact with the short skirt she was wearing and the view of that scrap of black lace between her thighs whenever she bent over the table to whisper something in one of her friend's ears.
It physically pained me.
Not because I was having some emotionally charged reaction towards her or anything like that, but because my balls ached.
It wasn’t that Bella wasn’t an attractive girl.
To give her credit, she was probably the best-looking girl in the bar.
With black hair styled into a bob, a tall, curvaceous body, and a massive pair of tits, she was a serious looker.
The issue was that I was done.
I was over it, whatever the hell it had been between us, and I had been for a long time.
And I wasn’t interested in stepping back into the ring for another round.
It didn’t seem to make a blind bit of difference to the girl because she was like a dog with a bone.
Me being the bone.
I'd lost count of the number of times I'd gone to the bar for another round just so I could reposition myself on a seat far away from her.
It didn’t work.
Her ass always found its way back to my lap, and I just ended up getting drunk faster.
No amount of no's or not tonight's or never agains' seemed to make a difference.
She wouldn’t leave me alone.
I didn’t want to embarrass or hurt the girl, though.
I wasn’t a complete prick.
Which was why I was tolerating this shite.
By half one, my head was swimming; the alcohol in my veins, mixed with the strong-ass medication I was still taking, making me clumsy and uncoordinated.
On a bright note, I wasn’t in pain anymore.
I couldn’t feel a fucking thing.
Super.
"Do you want to go somewhere else?" Bella purred, leaning close to my ear. Sliding her hand into the opening of my shirt, she trailed her fingers over my collarbone. "Somewhere a little more private?"
"No." Shaking my head, I brushed her hand aside – the one that was tiptoeing up my arm – and reached for the vodka and red bull I'd switched to eight pints in.
My movements were clumsy, causing my drink to slosh over the rim of the glass and onto the knee of my jeans.
All fucking night she'd been trying to kiss me and pet me, and all night, I'd been turning my head and brushing off her wandering hands.
I wasn’t a PDA kind of guy and she knew this.
Sitting on my lap like this wasn’t something I would tolerate on a normal night when we were on good terms, and the only reason she hadn't been ejected from my lap by now was because I was drunk as fuck and didn’t want to accidentally drop her on the floor and cause damage.
I didn’t like this, though.
Drunk or not, I didn’t appreciate this touchy-feely crap.
"Come on, sexy." Unperturbed by my actions, Bella reached for the collar of my shirt again. "We could always go out to the car?" she suggested, flicking another button open.
It had to be the fourth fucking button she'd managed to undo.
"No, Bella," I grumbled, my words coming out slurred. "Stop doing that." Capturing her hand, I removed it from my shirt and put it back on her lap. "I'm not in the mood."
"I can get you in the mood," she teased, hand moving to my belt buckle.
"Stop." I snagged her hand and placed it firmly on her lap. Again. "I'm still recovering – and we're done."
"Oh really?" She slid her hand inside my shirt, ignoring the we're done part. "I can change that,
too."
"No." I brushed her other hand away from my crotch, grunting in pain when she roughly palmed my dick. "Bella, stop –" I paused to shake off the hand curling around the back of my neck. "Please just stop."
Jesus Christ, if I kept touching her after she'd told me to stop, there would be war.
Double fucking standards.
"Stop?" Bella snapped, glaring at me.
"Yes." Setting her hand back down on her thigh, I shifted out from beneath her. "I'm tired."
"You're always tired, Johnny!" she bit out. "And you're never in the mood anymore."
I wonder fucking why, I thought to myself, but made no move to answer her.
I was careful with my words around girls.
They could – and would – be misconstrued to her advantage.
Drunk as I was, I remembered exactly what I had been taught at The Academy, and this girl wasn’t going to get a rise out of me.
Not tonight, Satan.
Shrugging, I cast a bleary gaze around our table.
Our friends were watching.
No surprises there.
My gaze landed on Gibsie and I gave him my best 'you're a fucking bastard' glare.
His returning grimace was an apologetic one.
"Don’t ignore me when I'm talking to you," Bella demanded, voice high and pitchy, letting me know, even in my drunken state, that she was in worse condition.
"I'm not ignoring you," I replied, trying to remain calm through the haziness.
"Yes," she hissed, voice rising. "You are!"
"No, Bella." I released a weary sigh. "I'm not."
"Fine." Cupping my face with both her hands, Bella dragged my face down to hers, pressing her mouth to mine. "Then prove it," she growled before smashing her lips to mine.
Because of the alcohol coursing through my veins, it took me an extra few seconds to register what was happening.
The feel of her tongue sliding against my lips was like a douse of water.
I jerked my head away, but she had a death grip on my hair, keeping my lips on hers.
Temper rising, I stood abruptly, knocking the table in the process, and thankfully freeing myself from her hold.
Drinks smashed to the floor, glass shattering around us, drawing the whole room's attention to our table.
"What the fuck, Johnny!" Bella screeched, glaring up at me from her seat. "What's your problem?"
"When I tell you no," I growled, wiping the back of my mouth as I glared down at her. "I fucking mean no!"
"I just wanted you to kiss me," she screamed. "Is that too much to ask?"
"I don’t want to fucking kiss you!" I roared back, losing control of my temper. "I don’t want your mouth on mine. I don’t want your hands on my body. Because I don’t fucking want you!"
I regretted my words immediately.
But it was too late.
Bella burst into tears, and of course, I was the bastard who made her cry.
Dirty looks from half a dozen girls at the table all directed at me and I was done for the night.
Releasing a low growl, I ran my hand through my hair and staggered out of the barmaid's way as she shoved past me with a dustpan and brush.
Stalking outside, I dragged my phone out of my jeans pocket and called for a taxi, relieved as hell when the voice on the other end said five minutes.
I needed out of here and far away from my poor decisions.
The poorest of those being that dangerous fucking girl I'd tangled myself up with.
In this moment, I was glad my body was broken.
I was glad that I hadn't been able to have sex since Halloween.
Maybe it was fate?
Without my cock blinding my ability to make good choices in lieu of pussy, I was able to see through Bella's façade.
And it wasn’t pretty.
Knowing that I would rather peel my skin off than touch her again gave me some semblance of comfort.
Never again, Johnny.
Never a-fucking-again, lad.
Leaning against the wall of the pub, I allowed my thoughts to wander back to those lonesome eyes.
I wanted to see those eyes.
And the girl they belonged to.
The alcohol running through my veins provided a block on my conscience, making it easier for me to obsess about Shannon Lynch without feeling like a piece of shite.
Tomorrow, when I woke up with a clear head, I would no doubt feel every ounce of the implications of my wayward thoughts, but for now, while I was temporarily void of a moral compass, I envisioned all the terrible fantasies in great, colorful detail.
It was nice.
She was nice to think about.
She was fucking beautiful.
Her voice.
Her hair.
Her smell.
The way she spoke.
Every single part of her.
I was deep in thought, contemplating how different it would have been had it been Shannon who put her mouth on me, when the sound of the taxi honking distracted me.
"Johnny, lad," the taxi driver, whose name I never seemed to be able to remember, called out in a happy tone. "How's it going?" To be fair, on the rare occasion our paths had crossed, I had been drunk off my tits. "Your pal not with you tonight?"
By pal, he meant Gibsie.
Because Gibsie was usually the influencer behind terrible decisions like the one I made tonight.
"He's still inside," I explained, using every ounce of concentration to not stagger as I pushed off the wall. "Thanks for coming so fast, man."
"Like I'd leave you here, boyo," he chuckled. "Don’t forget your old friend Paddy when you're up in the big smoke with the big boys."
I couldn’t remember my old friend Paddy now, but I wasn’t about to tell him that.
"Johnny – wait up, lad!" Hughie Biggs, called out as he stumbled out of the pub towards me. Grabbing my arm, he pulled me to a stop. "You'll have to take us with you."
"Who's us?" I replied slowly. "If you're talking about that crazy fucking girl then forget it, Hughie. She's not my responsibility, and I'd rather cut my cock off than go back inside and deal with her."
"Who – Bella?" Hughie frowned and shook his head. "No, man. Fuck her. She's already gone back to Cormac. He was hiding in the lounge all night. Didn’t come out until you were gone, the coward." He dragged me over to the window and pointed inside. "You can't leave them here."
My gaze flicked from Hughie to Gibsie, who was currently face down on the table, snoring his head off, to Patrick Feely, who was being molested by one of Bella's friends, to Bella, who was dry-humping Cormac Ryan, and then back to Hughie.
"Why me?" I groaned.
"Because we're your babies," Hughie announced, leaning his weight on me.
"My babies?" I slurred. "How the fuck are you three anyone's babies?"
"You're our captain," Hughie slurred. "We're kind of your responsibility."
"On the pitch, ya gobshite."
"Come on, Cap, you're the one with the empty house. You know Feely's mother will lose her shit if he goes home in this condition, and my mam won't let us through the front. And Gibs –" he gestured a thumb to the window. "He's as good as your brother, lad."
All unfortunate truths.
"You're a bunch of bleeding eejits, is what ye are," I grumbled before relenting. "Fine." I ran a hand through my hair and sighed. "Get them. I'm going now."
"You absolute legend, Kavanagh," Hughie praised as he staggered back into the pub to get the lads.
On any other occasion, I would offer to help him. Gibs was a handful after drink, but I'd sooner walk over hot coals than go back inside and face Bella.
"Sorry about this, Paddy," I mumbled, wandering over to lean against the taxi while I waited for the three fucking stooges to come out of the bar. "I thought I'd be alone."
"No worries, boyo," the plump little man replied. "Any friend of Johnny Kavanagh's is a friend of mine."
"Yeah? Well, my friends are as
sholes," I admitted with a shrug.
And partial to puking.
In taxis...
"Paddy –" Scratching the back of my head I turned to look at him, my mind set on potential damage control. "Remind me to drop you off a couple of tickets to one of our home games in the summer, if you're interested."
"Jesus, Johnny, are you serious?" The taxi driver's eyes lit up. "I'd be delighted, boyo. Thrilled to pieces. I watch all your matches. I even get my daughter to live stream the ones not aired on the telly. I'm always telling my wife that young Kavanagh is the best I've ever seen wearing the green 13."
I shrugged off his words, knowing that at seventeen years old I should be rattled to hear a man more than three times my age giving me such high praise, but I had heard those exact words so many times that the compliment ran off me like water off a duck.
"Appreciate the support, man," I replied. "You have my number on your call list. Just send me a text to remind me because I'm drunk as fuck right now and won't remember a word of this in the morning."
"Will do," Paddy replied. "And not to be overstepping the line here, but you're well rid of that girl."
I frowned at him, mentally racking my head for a time in history when I'd been foolish enough to take her home with me. That's the only way the taxi driver would know.
In the fogginess of my mind, I vaguely remembered a night out over Halloween break last year when Bella had thrown a huge tantrum outside the pub because I refused to take her home in the taxi to my house.
It was one of the last times I'd been with her.
"The one your pal was talking about," he explained. "She's bad news for a lad like you." Tapping his temple, he added, "Trust old Paddy, lad. Girls like that one are takers."
He had that right.
Fucking hell.
Hughie and Feely staggered out of the bar carting Gibsie, who was singing his own rendition of The Blizzard's Trust Me I'm A Doctor at the top of his lungs.
I shook my head at the sight of him.
"Nobody," I slurred as I walked over and took his weight from the lads. "And I mean nobody, would ever trust that you're a doctor, Gibs."
"Your future wife saved me from a bad fucking pussy today," he slurred. "Buy a ring, lad." Slinging an arm over my shoulder, he added, "Pussy whisperer's a keeper."
