My head jerks back. I don’t even know what “slag” is but I’m guessing it isn’t good. I’m about to look to John and Thierry for some sort of support, since Lachlan has gone catatonic, when suddenly there’s a looming shadow over our table.
“What the fuck is going on here, huh?” A voice booms and I look up to see a big bruiser of a dude with a bald head and beady eyes standing behind the slaggy chick. He’s staring at the girl and the way she’s on Lachlan, like he’s got laser beams for eyes and is trying to burn a hole through both of them.
“Hey!” the guy yells, grabbing the girl by the arm and throwing her off of Lachlan. “What the fuck you doing with my girl, you cunt?”
I wince. Oh no. Oh no.
Wrong thing to say buddy.
I’m frozen in my seat, watching Lachlan closely, my breath in my throat. I can feel Thierry and John do the same thing. In fact, the whole bar seems to quiet, though it could just be my imagination. It’s as if everything stills, holding its breath.
Lachlan doesn’t turn around, just cocks his head as if finally listening. He has that mad dog stare going on, a volcano about to erupt. His shoulders and neck tense, like someone has wound him up as far as he will go and he’s about to spring.
“What?” Lachlan says, voice so stiff, so low, I can barely hear him.
“Are you fucking deaf?” the guy says, leaning closer so his face is practically shouting in Lachlan’s ear. “I said stay the fuck away from my girl, faggot.”
Lachlan swallows slowly. I watch his fists curl so tight his skin grows white. His eyes sharpen, pupils growing tiny, mean, hard as hell. I want nothing more than to grab him, lead him out of here. I should have done that a long time ago.
And the guy doesn’t back off. The guy might have muscles but he’s a fucking idiot. Instead he smiles at Lachlan, showing misshapen teeth. “You rugby players think you’re the cock of the walk, don’t you. Like your shit don’t stink. Like you can do anything you fucking want. Well you can’t. I know all about you, you pathetic little fuck. You want it all and you don’t deserve any of it, not like the rest of us.” He looks over Lachlan’s head at me and there’s so much disgust in his eyes it nearly makes me sick. “Why don’t you go take care of your chink girlfriend and leave mine alone.”
I feel like I’ve been slapped in the face. It takes me a moment to register that he just called me a fucking chink, one of the oldest, most-outdated racist terms in the book. I can’t even think, or breathe or react other than to stare dumbly at him, like I’m not even sure who I am for a moment. But holy hell does that make me feel like garbage.
Lachlan’s reaction, unlike mine though, is immediate.
Lachlan explodes up from the table and with a terrifying roar that silences the whole pub, he whirls around and punches the guy square in the face. It’s hard enough that blood flies out of his mouth, hard enough for the sound of bone crunching to settle somewhere inside me.
The man flies back but doesn’t fall. He grabs his face, still smiling somehow though I swear a tooth falls out of his mouth and in his eyes he’s taunting Lachlan.
There is no time for that. Lachlan storms toward him, fists out, shoulders raised, his eyes as crazed as I’ve ever seen them. He’s like a whole new person and if the guy had any brains at all he would get the fuck out of here because I don’t think Lachlan will be stopped.
And he doesn’t. The guy tries to put in a punch and it catches Lachlan in the jaw, but he didn’t even try to duck or move, he just takes the hit and keeps coming like nothing happened. And when he comes again, he’s coming with both fists and the guy goes flying back through chairs and onto someone’s table.
Lachlan pins him down and punches him in the nose.
The cheek.
The chin.
And again.
And again.
Over and over and over.
A wild, feral animal.
The same sound of smashed bone and spilled blood, like someone thudding two pieces of raw meat together, echoing through the pun.
This is a nightmare.