Binding 13 (Boys of Tommen, #1)

by Chloe Walsh

"Maybe," Johnny mused, nodding in agreement. I sagged in relief. "Or maybe it was those Legos again." My heart sank. "Was it?" Johnny demanded. "Did you fall over the same Legos getting those fingerprints on your throat that you did when you busted up your face on your birthday?" "Johnny–" "And how about the bruise on the back of your neck the time before that? Or the red mark on your face the time before that again? Or the bruises on your thighs? And your arms? And the rest of you?" He glared at me. "Was that those pesky Legos, too?" "Do you think my uniform's ready yet?" I changed the subject by asking. "I should probably get home." Yeah, I needed to get out of here. And fast. "No. No! Don’t do that," Johnny called me right out on my diversion. "Don’t try and brush me off," he growled. "I want to know what happened to you, Shannon." "I want to go home." Sniffling, I quickly wiped my face with the back of my hand. "Now, please." He ran a hand through his damp hair and sighed. "Christ, Shannon, don’t cry!"

"I want to help you." He placed his hands on my outer thighs and looked up at me, blue eyes wide and sincere. He squeezed my thighs gently. "All you have to do is tell me what's happening, okay?" Reaching up, he tucked a wet strand of hair behind my ear, "Just tell me who's hurting you and I'll make it go away." You can't help me. No one can. I took that beating for talking to you. For taking a fucking picture with you. You are the last person who can help me. "I'm okay, Johnny," I croaked out, feeling the tears pooling my eyes. "You don’t need to help me." "You're lying to me," he growled, looking furious. "You're fucking lying to me and I can't stand it."

Someone put their hands on her. Those kinds of marks didn’t happen in a bleeding ruck, never mind during a soccer game in P.E. It was ridiculous, and she was ridiculous for feeding me that line. What did she think I was; some thick eejit who couldn’t tell the difference between an accidental bruise and foul play?

"Wait!" I regrettably called out, snaking a hand out and catching her wrist. Shannon looked at me with wide eyes. Let her go, asshole. Let the girl go. You can't do right by her. "Here –" Reaching into the glove compartment, I pulled out a leather case and quickly flicked through a bunch of mix CDs, stopping when I found the one I wanted, "Listen to track nine." I practically shoved the CD into her hand and shrugged, "Reminds me of you." "Oh, okay," she replied, holding the CD carefully. "I will."

Wait til she listens to it...

"Oh, I almost forgot –" He shoved a hand into his jeans pocket and retrieved a travel sized bottle. "Here," he said, tossing the bottle across the room at me. "From my balls to yours." I caught it mid-air and read the description on the bottle. "Lube?" I barked. "Jesus, Gibs." "Hey – don’t knock it until you try it," he scoffed. "I went to a huge fucking effort combing a dozen different chemists to get that for you." Waggling his brows, he added, "The pharmacist told me it's sensitive touch." I stared at him. "It's half empty." He shrugged. "I had to test it before I could recommend it to you." I immediately dropped the bottle on my bedroom floor. "You are fucking disgusting," I groaned, wiping my hands on my thighs. "Christ." "Don’t be a prude," Gibsie chuckled. "It's perfectly normal." "Lube is normal," I agreed. "You, on the other hand, are not." "I don’t see what the problem is," he huffed. "I bought you a present. There's nothing weird about that. You should be thanking me for taking an interest in your life." "Lad, you just bought my dick a present," I deadpanned. "It doesn’t get much weirder than that."

"Did you listen to track nine?" Now I was embarrassed again. "I did," I whispered. "Did you like it?" "Um." I shrugged, unsure what to say. "What's wrong?" "I don’t know what to make of it, really?" He frowned, waiting for an explanation. I shifted uncomfortably before saying, "Fuck her Gently?" Johnny gaped at me. "What?" "Track nine on the CD?" I shrugged. "It was Fuck Her Gently by Tenacious D." "Dammit." "No, that's Blink 182 and that was track four," I replied. "Fuck." "No," I corrected. "FACK by Eminem was track ten." "What – no!" Johnny shook his head and groaned. "Jesus, what else was on it?" I thought about it for a moment before saying, "Pretty Fly for a White Guy, The Ballad of Chasey Laine, um, Stacey's Mom, The Bad Touch, Pony, and a few others that I can't remember." Johnny groaned again. "I gave you the wrong CD." "You did?" He nodded slowly. "That was Gibsie's." "What one did you mean to give me?" Johnny had a pinched expression when he said, "A Maroon 5 song." "Oh?" I looked up at him. "Which one?" He shifted in discomfort. "She Will Be Loved

Never gets old aha

"I reckon I can make those pretty cheeks of yours turn pink." I turned scarlet. "Wh-what?" "Too easy," he laughed, thoroughly delighted with himself.

He'll let you down, the defensive part of my brain argued. He'll hurt you worse than all the others. "I won't," Johnny stated, seemingly able to read my thoughts. "Whatever you're used to," he continued to say, eyes locked on mine. "Or whoever you're used to. Whatever's responsible for that sad look in your eyes –" he paused to brush his thumb over my cheekbone. "That's not me, I'm not like that, and I won't do that to you." "You promise?" I whispered, then quickly chided myself. When I was anxious, I always asked for a promise. It was a terrible habit I had from spending years of my life living in a constant state of uncertain anxiety. Usually, I asked for those promises from my brother, and Joey supplied me with an abundance of them to ebb some of the stress. Whether my brother meant to keep those promises or not, the small affirmation, however impossible or ridiculous, appeased something inside of me for a little while, making life a little more bearable. "I promise," Johnny surprised me by saying. In that moment, and with those two small words, Johnny Kavanagh unknowingly blasted a hole clean through the wall around my heart. "Please don’t do that," I whisper/begged, as I frantically tried to repair the hole he'd left in me with facets of information like: don’t get attached because he's leaving soon, and past experiences like the night he hurt me, or worse, the night he rejected me. Johnny frowned. "Do what?" "Make promises," I breathed, heart slamming against my ribc...

I glanced down at the page and choked out a laugh. In neat capital letters were the words: Shannon like the river. Will you please be my friend? Two hand drawn boxes were sketched below the writing. One box had a yes over it, and the other had a no. The yes box had a smiley face. The no box had a sad face. At the bottom of the page were the words: Signed by alongside a slightly crooked line with his signature scrawled across it. Beneath the line with Johnny's name was an empty line for my name and he had dated the note January 10th 2005, my first day at Tommen. A side note stating: PS: Shannon promises not to sue Johnny when he's signed for the pros for any injuries he may or may not have caused her on the date mentioned above. This is a valid disclaimer, I shit you not, took up the last few lines of the page. It was ridiculous, adorable, and I couldn’t wipe the stupid smile off my face. "To be fair, I think we've been friends for a while," Johnny offered with a boyish smile. "I'm just putting it down on paper so you can stop ducking and dodging me at school." "I haven't been avoiding you at school," I denied quickly – too quickly. Johnny arched a brow and the look he gave me screamed bullshit. "Fine, I've been avoiding you at school." I admitted, mortified. "I like honesty," he encouraged with a teasing lilt to his voice. "It's the foundation of a solid friendship." I laughed and smiled down at the note. "And you actually want me to sign this?" "I exerted a great deal of ...

Shaking my head, I gave up on trying to crack the code of their unspoken conversation and turned my attention to Johnny's iPod – something he had given me to listen to during one of our reflection breaks earlier. Slipping the headphones on my ears, I carefully scrolled through his playlists and almost had a heart attack when my eyes landed on the one named Songs for Shannon. With my heart racing, I cast a quick peek up at Johnny, but he was still fully immersed in vulgar sign language with Gibsie. Exhaling a small puff of air from my lungs, I pressed into the playlist and quickly scrolled through the list of songs. Coldplay – Yellow Guns N’ Roses – Sweet Child O' Mine Goo Goo Dolls – Iris The Fureys – When You Were Sweet Sixteen Howie Day – Collide Declan Ó Rourke – Whatever Else Happens The Offspring – Want You Bad Busted – Fall At Your Feet Aerosmith – Crazy Counting Crows – Colorblind David Gray – This Year's Love Bon Jovi – In These Arms Westlife – World of Our Own Eagle-Eye Cherry – Save Tonight Metallica – Tuesday's Gone. Snow Patrol – Run The Verve – Lucky Man HIM – Wicked Game The La's – There She Goes These were love songs. These were all love songs. Saved to a playlist with my name on it.

"We make a pretty good team, Shannon like the River." Yes. Yes, we did.

"Shannon?" Johnny called after me. Pausing at the door, I swung back to look at him. "Yeah?" His blue eyes burned holes inside of me when he said, "Thanks." "For what?" I whispered. Johnny smiled. "For being nothing like the rest of them." "Uh, okay?" "I'll see you in a bit, okay?" I nodded. "Bye Johnny."

I already knew what those lips felt like. I wanted so badly to taste them again. I would taste them again. I was starving for her and everything she was. Every part of her. Inside and out. I wanted to fight all her battles. I wanted to give her all her smiles and make her laugh and snatch her away from the rest of the world and keep her all to myself. I just wanted her. For keeps.

"There's a girl, Da. A girl." "Where son?" "There's a girl on the bus," I slurred. "I need you to find her for me." "There's no girl, pet," Dad coaxed. "There's no bus, either. You're jacked up on morphine." "Oh, fuck," I groaned. "Am I dying or something?" "No, Johnny, love, you're not dying." "Thank fuck," I groaned. "'Cause I wanna see that girl again." "Okay, Johnny. Just relax, buddy." "No, no, no, Da, I'm serious," I slurred. "I think I love that girl." "Well, who's this girl?" "She's a river," I sighed and closed my eyes. "I'm keeping her, Da." "Okay, son," he coaxed. "You keep the girl." "She makes my heart go, like, whoa." "Is that right?" he mused. "So bad, Da," I sighed. "Boom, boom, fucking boom." I shook my head. "All the time."

"The fractions, Ma," I groaned. "They're closing in." "Fractions of what, love?" "Not too much longer to wait." I sighed. "Thank fuck, 'cause I'm in love." "You're in love?" I nodded happily. "And she's a river." "Well that's…lovely, pet," Mam coaxed, sounding confused. "Good boy." "I'm gonna sail my boat down her river," I snickered. "My dick boat." "Can they knock him back out?" Ma grumbled. "He's going to give me a stroke with all this talk." "It's okay, Ma," I coaxed. "I'm gonna keep her, too. Make all my babies with her because my balls work– and Da says I can pull on my dick again. Woo!"

"You found her, Gibs!" I exclaimed. "Thank fuck. I thought I lost her." "I did, buddy," Gibsie chuckled softly. "I brought Shannon back to you." "Shannon like the river," I sighed contently. "Shannon Lynch?" Mam exclaimed. "That's who he's rambling on about?" "Oh, yeah," Gibsie mused. "What happened to being friends, Johnny?" Mam asked. "I lied," I snickered. "I've been lying all along." "Oh, Johnny," Mam sighed. "You never had to lie, baby. I like that girl." "She's mine," I grumbled. "You can't have her." Gibsie laughed loudly. "Everyone knows that, Cap."

"Hi, Johnny." "Boom, boom, fucking boom, Da," I groaned, slapping a hand against my chest. "I'm done for."

"Who's making you sad?" he asked then, voice slurred and sleepy. "Tell me, baby." "Nobody, Johnny." "You lie and it hurts my heart," he groaned, tightening his hold on me. "All those marks. It hurts when I know someone's hurting my Shannon." "Johnny –" "Who's hurting you, baby?" he slurred sleepily. He yawned loudly and then sighed. "I'll fix it." "It's a secret," I breathed, feeling my body shake. "I won't tell," he whispered. Inhaling a trembling breath, I clenched my eyes shut and pressed my lips to his ear. "My father." I waited several beats for him to say something. He didn’t. When I opened my eyes and looked at his face, I realized why. Johnny was asleep.