I guess it made sense though, what with the muddy kit he was currently wearing and the bruised cheekbone.
But I didn’t have anything to say to him, so I kept my mouth shut and waited for him to speak.
He would.
They always did.
"And I have to be honest, Shannon." He reached up and tugged on my braid with his mud stained hand, not hard, it was in more of a playful way, but I didn’t like the intrusion. "I haven't been able to stop thinking about you since."
Feign indifference, Shannon.
Pretend you don’t care.
Stepping sideways to free my hair from his grasp, I brushed off his words with a small shrug and readjusted my bag on my shoulders.
He stared at me for a long time, eyes dancing with excitement, before saying, "You're a shy little thing, aren’t you?"
"No," I replied, voice small, and it was the truth.
I wasn’t shy.
I could be as outspoken and verbose as anyone when I was with people I trusted.
But I was cautious.
I had good reason to be.
And I didn’t trust him.
"Well, shy or not, you're fucking gorgeous under those clothes," he stated lowly, dragging his bottom lip into his mouth as his eyes roamed shamelessly down my body. "I would really love your number."
My mouth fell open.
Was he serious?
I gaped up at his face, trying to gauge him.
He looked completely serious.
"I, ah, I, no…" Shaking my head, I narrowly avoided his hand once more when he tried to tug on my braid again. "I'm sorry, Ronan, but I don’t give out my number to strangers."
The very last thing I wanted to do was give anyone aside from Claire and Lizzie my phone number.
Giving out my details meant the bullies had a direct line to my psyche 24/7.
And while I had made that mistake once before in my old school, a new phone number and the burning remnants of hard-earned wisdom meant that I would never do so again.
Ronan scoffed. "I'm hardly a stranger."
"You are to me," I replied, forcing myself to stand strong.
"Come on, Shannon, I don’t bite." He continued to smile at me, but it was harder, his eyes a little cooler now. "Just give me your number."
"No." I shook my head. "I'm sorry, but I don’t know you well enough to give you my number."
"You could always get to know me," he purred, placing a firm hand on my shoulder.
Even though I couldn’t feel his touch through my thick winter coat, I immediately recoiled from the contact, but he didn’t move his hand.
"I have a bus to catch," I strangled out, repeating my earlier words. My shoulders were stiffer than concrete when I added, "I need to go now or I'll miss it." I was clutching at straws, but I wanted away from this boy. "Seriously, the driver won't wait for me."
"There’ll be another bus," he shot back. "There won't be another me."
Dear god, I hoped not.
"Listen," Ronan pressed, tone taking on a flirtatious lilt. "I'm supposed to be at an after-training talk with the team down on the pitch. Coach likes to get us all together to talk strategy after our training sessions."
He told me this like he actually thought I cared.
I didn’t.
I only cared about him getting the hell away from me.
"But I don’t have to go." His hand trailed from my shoulder to my elbow. "I could blow it off for you." His hand moved lower, tracing the hem of my skirt. "What'd'ya say?" he asked, leaning into my ear. "Fancy going back into that bathroom and getting to know me a little better?"
"No," I snapped, jerking away from his touch. "I'm not interested."
"Come on, Shannon," he snapped, tone heated now, eyes flashing with frustration. "Look around." He clamped his hand on my shoulder again, not gently this time. "No one's going to see us –"
Ronan didn’t have the chance to finish that statement when he was carted off – literally dragged away by the scruff of his neck by a much bigger, much older, boy.
"You're a suicidal little fucker, aren’t you?" the boy was saying in an oddly light tone as he sauntered down the hallway with his huge hand cupping the back of Ronan's neck, forcing him to double over and waddle to keep up with his long strides.
He was dressed in the same attire; a black and white striped jersey, white shorts, and boots that made clickety sounds against the floor as he walked, sods of muck and grass falling away from the studs.
The only contrast was a number 9 on the back of Ronan's jersey and a number 7 on the big guy.
Immediate recognition hit me.
Number 7.
Gerard 'Gibsie' Gibson.
Claire's crush.
The cat walker.
The strange one.
Thank god!
The students still loitering in the hallway all stopped what they were doing to watch the drama, but no one stepped in.
Not one person intervened on Ronan's behalf as the giant, fair-haired, man-child marched him through the corridor.
"Get the fuck off me, Gibsie," Ronan was screeching, trying and failing to break free of the monster man's hold. "I was only messing around."
"You know he's going to kill you, don’t you?" Gibsie asked, tone laced with humor, as he walked Ronan over to the front entrance and then ceremoniously tossed him out the double glass doors.
"Gibsie!" Ronan was screaming, red-faced, as he battled with the door handle. "Stop messing around. I was only being friendly to her."
"That didn’t sound friendly, kid," Gibsie taunted. "That sounded desperate – and a little rapisty."
Right now, both boys were pulling; with Ronan furiously trying to pull the door open, and Gibsie pulling it closed with reasonable ease.
"Let me the fuck in, Gibsie!" Ronan roared, yanking on the handle like a lunatic. It was a push and pull system and he was failing to push it inwards. "I need my inhaler."
"Nope, don’t even try that shit with me, McGarry," Gibsie called out with a laugh, holding the door shut when Ronan tried the handle. "You knew the rules – and you don’t have asthma."
"So, what?" Ronan demanded, looking outraged. "You're just going to lock me out of school because he said no?"
What?
"Absolutely."
What the hell were they talking about?
"He's not my captain!" Ronan snarled, pressing his forehead to the glass.
I was so confused.
"Oh, but he is," Gibsie called back, still laughing, and I was sure he was finding the situation highly amusing. "And dogs that can't behave themselves around Cap's new buddy stay outside."
"You're going to pay for this, Gibs," Ronan hissed. "I swear to god, if you don’t let me in, I'm going to tell my uncle about this."
"Is that so?"
"You'll be thrown off the team for this."
"For the threat, I'm going to fuck your mother, McGarry," Gibsie shot back. "And then I'm going to cum all over her tits, and she's going to love every minute of it." With another chuckle, he said, "Go and tell uncle-coachy all about what I have planned with his sister."
"I'm going to kill you!" Ronan screamed, slamming his fists against the glass.
"Suck my balls –"
"What's going on?" a familiar male voice boomed through the air.
Recognition immediately dawned on me.
I knew that accent.
Without conscious decision, my eyes searched frantically for the owner of the voice, and when I found him, walking stiffly out of the lunch hall, holding an icepack to his right thigh, my heart hammered wildly against my ribcage.
Standing a good twenty or so feet away, I was at a visual disadvantage, but I was close enough to see how every inch of Johnny's upper body strained against the confinement of his jersey, from his broad shoulders to his tree-trunk sized biceps and long, lean torso.
His legs were long, his thighs thick and muscular, all of which were caked in grass and mud. I noted the small tear on the sleeve of his jersey where his bicep was bulging.
Lord, he was quite literally bursting out of the fabric.
He was dressed identically to the other boys, in the same jersey and shorts, but was incomparably different because of the sheer size of his body.
He was almost too big.
Too muscular.
Too scary.
Too beautiful.
Too much.