by Chloe Walsh
I moved for the door, but she grabbed my hand again, pulling me back.
"Wait – are you with someone else?" she demanded, squeezing my hand. "Is that what your problem is?" Her eyes widened. "Oh my god," she exclaimed. "You are, aren’t you?"
Jesus.
What the hell had I been thinking messing around with this girl?
"No, Bella, I'm not with anyone else." Yanking my hand free, I shook my head and released a frustrated sigh. "But I'm not with you, either. And I won't ever be with you again."
"I've heard rumors, Johnny!" Bella pressed, ignoring my words. "About you and the new girl in third year. I heard you beat up Ronan McGarry because of her. And I saw that picture of you with her in the paper."
"That's none of your business," I bit out through clenched teeth as I struggled to rein in my temper.
"Come on, Johnny," she challenged. "You never had me in any pictures with you for the media and I'm the longest girl you've ever been with. What's the story with her? "
"None of your bleeding business," I spat, fresh out of patience. "Christ."
"Why were you fighting with McGarry over her?" she demanded. "Why did Cormac tell me you warned all the team off her?"
"I'm not doing this with you," I warned, shaking my head. "Not anymore."
"Stop dodging the question, Johnny," she hissed. "If you're with another girl then I have the right to know."
"I already gave you a fucking answer," I snapped, done with this bullshit. "You're the one who can't seem to listen."
"You're lying! I can see it in your eyes!" she screamed, loud enough to wake the dead. "It's written all over your face, Johnny. Something's going on with that girl."
"You need to get a handle on yourself," I said, tone laced with disgust. "This is pathetic."
"Fine," Bella sneered, looking wholly enraged. "If you won't tell me, I'll ask her." Smiling darkly, she added, "Shannon – that's her name, right?"
Yeah, fuck that.
"You'll stay the hell away from her," I whisper-hissed, aware that we were within hearing range of the office.
While Dee wouldn’t cause any trouble for me, I didn’t fancy my chances if Mr. Twomey came out and saw I was having problems with another girl.
"Whatever shite that's going on between us has nothing to do with Shannon."
"What's the matter?" she taunted, pushing every one of my buttons. "Afraid I'll find out something you don’t want me to?"
"I mean it, Bella," I snarled, feeling a surge of anger rise up inside of me. "I'm not fucking around here. Keep your distance from her."
"Well," she mused, eyes narrowed. "Look who's showing emotion now."
She was absolutely right.
I was showing emotion.
Because I cared.
I cared a great deal more about a girl I barely knew than I ever did Bella.
It was warped, and confusing, and completely fucked up, but I did.
Instead of admitting this terrifying new development, I said, "Leave. Her. Alone."
And then I did what I should have done the first time I laid eyes on her.
I walked away from Bella Wilkinson.
"I'm going to make you so sorry for walking away from me," she called after me.
"Believe me, I'm already sorry," I called back. "Sorry I ever went there in the first place."
Furious, I stormed away from the girl that seemed to be hell bent on making my life a living hell.
Loaded with bitter regrets and burning anger, I rounded the corner of the main building feeling like I was two seconds away from breaking something.
Unfortunately for me, that something turned out to be a girl.
Not just any girl.
Shannon.
24
I'm taking you home
Shannon
I always knew when there was a storm brewing at home.
I could always sense it.
It was like a sixth sense of some kind, warning me and alerting my body to danger and pain.
All day during school on Friday, I had the most gut-wrenching feeling of dread lodged in the pit of my stomach.
That sensation of dread followed me all day long, and no amount of deep breathing or calming exercises could shift it from my heart.
It was so severe, so potent and transparent, that I was actually afraid to go home.
Wednesday night's antics hadn't helped matters.
It was a night that consisted of my parents screaming at each other so loudly that the Gardaí came to the door, having received an anonymous call about a disturbance of the peace.
My peace.
Because I made the call.
Because I was afraid he would hurt her.
Furious with my mother or not, I couldn’t bear the thought of him knocking her around downstairs while I hid in my bedroom like the coward I was.
Joey was once again staying with Aoife, and I wasn’t nearly big enough or brave enough to save her myself.
Thankfully, my father hadn't laid a finger on Mam, and once he had convinced the Gards that his wife was having a pregnancy related tantrum, he left for the night.
Of course, he returned yesterday morning with a bunch of flowers and a promise to never do whatever the hell he had done this time again.
It worked.
She hugged him and kissed him, and I was fairly sure that if she wasn’t already pregnant, she would have been after spending the morning locked in their bedroom with him.
I hated her.
Sometimes more than I hated him.
Yesterday was one of those times.
When I returned to school Friday morning, it was with a sore neck and a serious lack of hope.
Oh yeah, because even though Dad and Mam were all loved up again, I was still his favorite target.
Apparently, he still wasn’t over that picture of me with Johnny.
Something I was reminded of late last night when I foolishly made a food run to the kitchen and got tangled up in his whiskey tantrum.
He added fresh bruises to old bruises and I had spent a good portion of the night contemplating the worst possible thoughts.
By the time last class of the day finished, my body was so tightly coiled with tension that I could hardly make my feet walk a straight line from the science building to the main building where I needed to get to.
I knew I had to go back there and the thought was crippling me.
I didn’t want the weekend to come and now it was here, staring me in the face.
It was a terrifying prospect.
I had a horrible, niggling pain in my stomach all day that was bordering on unbearable.
My mind was in such overload, running through list after list of potential problems I might face when I walked through the front door, that I wasn’t paying attention to the rain belting down on me or the students whizzing past.
I wasn’t paying attention to anything.
Because I knew.
I just knew deep down in my heart and soul that danger was coming.
I didn’t know where, or when, or how it might unfold.
But I knew it was coming.
However, the danger I was predicting arrived prematurely when I rounded the corner of the main building and collided with a solid male chest.
I was so unprepared for the contact, so deeply caught up in my own thoughts, that I didn’t have time to steady myself or break my fall.
I folded like a deck of cards, no match for the person I had smashed into, and collapsed on my arse on the cold, wet ground.
"Oh, shit – I'm so sorry," a deep, familiar voice said from above me.
I didn’t need to look up to know who I had bumped into, though.
I would recognize his voice anywhere.
"Shannon, are you okay?" Johnny asked as he dropped his schoolbag on the ground and reached down to help me up.
"I'm okay," I mumbled, batting his hand away.
I didn’t need him touching me.
I was alr
eady too affected by him.
Keeping my eyes trained on the concrete, I twisted onto my hands and knees and pulled myself up.
"I’m so sorry," he continued to say.
"It's okay," I whispered, brushing my skirt down. "I'm okay."
"Are you?"
I nodded but kept my gaze down.
I couldn’t look at him.
I didn’t want him to see me.
Not like this.
"Shannon?"
"I need to go," I croaked out, and then stepped around him, moving for the main building.
With my head down, I hurried into the main building and straight to the third-year locker area.
Breathe.
Stop panicking.
Just breathe.
When I reached the third-year locker area, which was thankfully empty, I let my schoolbag fall from my shoulders and pressed my forehead against the cool, hard metal, inhaling sharp, audible breaths.
Trembling, I leaned my forearms against the locker and just held my head, desperately trying to get a handle on this ridiculous terror threatening to possess me and stop my body from going into vomit mode.
My legs were shaking so bad I knew I wouldn’t make it to the bathroom in time, so my only hope was to calm myself down before I threw up.
Too late, I thought to myself just as my legs buckled beneath me.
I dropped to the floor on my hands and knees, as my stomach emptied itself right there in the middle of school.
I didn’t have much in my stomach to begin with, I never usually had, but the water and half bar of chocolate I had at lunch made a reappearance in glorious fashion.
The sound of footsteps pounding down the corridor filled my ears and I groaned to myself, knowing that I would never in a million years live this one down.
Moments later, I felt a hand on my back as someone knelt down beside me and pulled my hair back from my face.
"It's okay," Johnny's voice filled my ears as he rubbed soothing circles over my spine with his big hand. "Shh, you're okay."
Oh god, no.
Why did he do that?
Why did he follow me?
He wasn’t supposed to talk to me.
That was the plan.
I dry heaved for a solid two minutes longer before my stomach finally settled, and all the while he knelt beside me, holding my hair out of my vomit, and rubbing my back.
"Are you okay?" Johnny asked, when I was breathing again and not gawking.
I nodded weakly, and then felt his hand still on my back.
I coiled tight on instinct.
"What's this?" I heard him ask moments before his fingertips grazed my neck, right above the collar of my school shirt. "Your neck is bruised."
Panic seized my heart as I felt him shift more of my hair aside and touch my neck again.
"Shannon?" Johnny repeated. "How'd you get this?"
"It's old," I croaked out, still gasping for air.
"Doesn’t look old," he replied, touching my neck.
"Well, it is," I strangled out, shaking off his touch.
Thankfully, he complied and shifted away from me.
Weak and mortified, I remained exactly where I was on my hands and knees, just staring at the floor as a wave of utter humiliation washed through me.
"Shannon?" he said in a soft tone, hand on my back once more. "Are you okay?"
Nodding weakly, I pulled back to a kneeling position, hands on my lap, gaze cast downwards.
"Wait here, okay?" Johnny ordered as he pulled himself up to a standing position. "I'll go get the caretaker."
"No, no," I strangled out, mortified. "I'll clean it."
"No, you won't," he argued. "It's okay. Just wait here for me and I'll be right back."
The moment I heard his footsteps retreating, I scrambled to my feet, grabbed my schoolbag, and bolted into the nearest bathroom on this wing of the school.
Hurrying inside, I went straight to the sink, unzipped the front pocket of my schoolbag and retrieved the travel-sized toothbrush and paste I religiously carried around with me.
I was an anxious person and my anxiety made me sick.
It happened in the most inappropriate and inconvenient places, usually at school, like today, so I was always prepared.
Trembling from head to toe, and with tears burning my eyes, I quickly brushed my teeth, gagging when the brush poked the back of my throat.
When I was finished cleaning my mouth, I rinsed off the toothbrush and tucked it back inside the small zip lock bag with the paste before packing it back into my schoolbag.
You're okay, I mentally coaxed as I washed my hands and splashed water on my face, everything is going to be okay.
I knew I wasn’t, though.
No matter how much I tried to lie to myself, nothing was okay about my life.
Sniffling, I strapped my school bag to my back, pushed open one of the toilet cubicle doors and grabbed a bottle of disinfectant tucked away behind the cistern.
Walking back to the sink, I pulled a couple dozen paper towels out of the dispenser and headed back to the crime scene.
But it was gone.
Erased by the caretaker wandering back down the hall with a mop and bucket trailing after him.
"I told you to wait for me," a familiar voice came from close by.
Swinging around, I found Johnny leaning against the lockers.
"I had to brush my teeth," I blurted out, sniffling.
He arched a brow. "At school?"
"It happens a lot," I strangled out.
He frowned, watching me with those intense blue eyes. "Are you feeling better now?"
I nodded, mortified. "I'm okay."
"Good." Pushing off the lockers, Johnny walked over to where I was standing and took the disinfectant and paper towels out of my hands.
Reeling, I watched as he opened the girls' bathroom door and tossed the disinfectant and paper towels back inside.
"I'm taking you home now," he said as he slid my schoolbag off my shoulders and slung it over his left shoulder.
My eyes widened. "No, no, you don’t have –"
"I'm taking you home," he repeated, blue eyes locked on mine. "Let's go."
"Why?" I croaked out.
Johnny frowned. "Why what?"
"Why are you helping me?"
He stared at me for the longest moment before exhaling a heavy sigh. "Because I want to."
"You do?"
He nodded. "Do you have a coat?"
"A coat?" I croaked out, feeling helpless as I stared up at this beautiful boy.
"Yeah, it's hammering down with rain outside."
"I, uh –" I pressed my hand to my forehead, striving to gather my thoughts. "It's on the coat hook," I finally managed to say. "In the science building."
With wide eyes, I watched as Johnny unzipped the black coat he was wearing and draped it over my shoulders.
"Come on," he said in a coaxing tone as he wrapped an arm around my shoulders, tucked me into his side, and led me out of school. "I'll take care of you."
25
Trouble
Johnny
I unintentionally hurt Shannon Lynch.
Again.
I knocked her on her ass at school.
Again.
And then she went and almost gave me a bleeding-heart attack.
Honest to god, I never felt fear like I had when I saw her collapse on the floor next to her locker.
I knew it was a stupid idea to follow her back into school, but I needed to check on her.
To be honest, I was afraid of Bella intercepting her.
Finding her on the floor like that was beyond terrifying.
My heart literally seized in my chest when I saw her and only kick started back up when I got to her and realized that she was okay.
She was mortified, but she was okay.
I didn’t care about puke.
Everyone puked.
Even girls.
Apparently, this girl d
id it a lot.
I remembered exactly what was written in the file.
She threw up a lot.
That worried me.
More than it should.
What worried me further was why this happened.
Shannon was clearly an anxiety puker.
It was as good as written in her school file.
For Christ's sakes, she brought a toothbrush to school with her.
I was burning with my own form of anxiety from the need to know what had upset her.
I didn’t want to push my luck though, or make the situation worse, so I kept my mouth shut.
Putting her in my car probably wasn’t my best idea, given the fact that she didn’t seem to want to speak to me ever again, but I wasn’t leaving her here to take a shitty bus.
She didn’t speak a single word to me the entire drive to her house – with the exception of apologizing a million fucking times for something she obviously couldn’t control.
I didn’t know what to do or say to put her at ease.
I kept telling her it was okay, but she wasn’t hearing me.
It was like she was stuck in her own head, worrying herself to death over something I couldn’t see
I felt helpless.
I wanted to help her, but it was an impossible thing to do when I couldn’t see who she was up against.
"I'm sorry," Shannon told me when I pulled up outside her house, after spending a solid five minutes trying to coax her into telling me which one hers was. "I really am so –"
"You have nothing to apologize for," I told her before cutting the engine and turning to look at her.
Jesus Christ, what was wrong?
Had someone given her shit at school?
Was someone giving her hassle again?
She looked terrified.
"Johnny, I, uh…" her words trailed off as she flicked her gaze towards the small, terraced house at the end of the street and then back to me. "Please don’t tell," she finally said, voice small, eyes wide and full of unshed tears.
I frowned, feeling my heart race. "Tell what, Shannon?"
She tucked her hair behind her ears and exhaled a shaky breath. "What I did at school."