Releasing 10 (Boys of Tommen, #6)

by Chloe Walsh

“Thank you,” she offered, shoulders shaking. “I’ve never had a friend stick up for me before.” “I’ll always stick up for you,” I promised.

Claire was loud and funny, and she made me feel happy. Shannon was quiet and calm and made me feel safe.

When our teacher walked me over to a round table and sat me next to a small girl with dark brown hair, I felt out of place. But when Shannon smiled and told me this was her second time in junior infants and that she was turning six next March, I felt better. That feeling only grew when I realized that I already knew her big brother, Darren. He was friends with Caoimhe, and I’d even met him a couple of times. He looked just like Shannon and was just as nice as her, too.

A little while later, the teacher brought another girl over to sit with us. She wasn’t shy like Shannon or strange like me. This girl looked like sunshine. Everyone wanted to sit with Claire Biggs and be her best friend, but she only wanted to sit with us and be our best friend.

“You’re different, Lizzie Young.” “I am?” She nodded and smiled. “You’re special.” “Is that bad?” “No.” She shook her head, still smiling. “You remind me of Joe.” “Your brother?” “Yep.” She nodded again. “And that’s a very good thing.”

Joey & Lizzie my babies☹️

Clasping my hands together tightly, I smiled back at my mother. I loved looking at her face. Mam had kind eyes, dark blue like Caoimhe’s, and she had my favorite voice. It was soft and gentle and wrapped around me like a hug.

Daddy had blue eyes, too, but they looked pale and sad. Like mine.

“He pushed Shannon,” I heard myself say, growing angry. “He was being a bully, Daddy.” “Did he push you?” Dad demanded, glaring at me in the rearview mirror. “Did he put his hands on you?” Shaking my head, I turned to look out my window. “No, Daddy.” “Then you had no right to put your hands on him,” Dad replied. “You’re lucky you weren’t expelled for that stunt, Elizabeth. God knows, they had bloody good reason to.” “But he pushed Shannon,” I argued back, feeling my skin grow hot as my eyes followed the raindrops splattering against the window. “He pushed my friend.” Was I saying it wrong? Why couldn’t he hear me? “He’s a mean boy, Daddy,” I added, hands balling into fists on my lap. “He pulled Claire’s hair last week, and he made her cry on the first day of school, too.”

Breathing fast, I kept my eyes shut, too afraid to open them in case I saw her again—the scary lady, with the claws, the one with the voice that crawled inside my head at bedtime. Or when I got mad. She crawled out of the water, dripping wet, with her hair in clumps and her long claws. She was the lady I saw from my window sometimes. The one the doctors said wasn’t there. The one my family said was a figment of my imagination. I wasn’t supposed to see her. But I did.

“Wow, that’s a lot of invites, sweetheart.” “I invited the entire class,” I explained.

Oh to attend a Hugh Biggs party

“It turns out that we have a genius on our hands, Sinead,” Dad announced, wrapping an arm around me. “He won’t be seven for another week and he wrote every word of those invitations himself. And have you listened to him read lately? He was reading The Hobbit the other night, and I’ve never heard anything like it. The school were right to have him tested, Sinead. He’s leaps and bounds ahead of the pack.” He squeezed my shoulder. “This young fella of ours is going to do great things.” Mam smiled indulgingly at me. “Is that so?” My face turned beetroot red, and I beamed with pride.

“Pete, let the child be a child,” Mam instructed, moving for the fridge. “Hugh has a long life ahead of him. His childhood is only a small fraction of that, so let’s not make it even shorter, sweetheart.”

And he still had to grow up so much faster to be there for Liz😭

“So you never know, son,” Dad teased. “One of these names could be the name you say on your wedding day.”

“So can you come?” I said yes at the same time Shannon said no. Claire started to smile and say yay, before it morphed into a sad, “How come?” Shannon shifted from foot to foot, looking uncertain, but didn’t answer. “I’m not allowed to go to birthday parties?”

Shannon was a good friend to me. Being around her helped me keep my mind clear and get my voice out. It didn’t matter to me where she lived. She was kind and sweet and made me feel safe. I wanted to scratch these girls’ eyes out. I wanted to make them bleed, make them pay for hurting my friend.

“Take it back,” I warned, breaking free from my friends and balling my hands into fists at my sides. “Take back what you said right now!” “Or what?” she goaded, leaning down to smirk in my face. “What are you going to do, looney tune?” “Heads up!” I heard a boy call out moments before the bully staggered away from us. “Omigod!” Gripping her head, the girl started to scream like a banshee. “My head, my head!” Shocked, I turned to see Joey Lynch coming down the steps that led from the pitch to the school gates with a hurley slung over his shoulder.

Shannon’s big brother was only in second class, but the older boys still moved out of his way. Because they were afraid of him. Because he got into a lot of fights at school. Even more than me. “I said heads up.” Joey yanked the school gate open with such force that it clattered against the wall. He didn’t need to shove through the crowd to get to his sister; everyone scampered out of his way. “It’s not my problem if you’re deaf.” “Maybe you should have better aim,” the bully wailed, still holding her head, while the friends that had been with her all rushed for the bus pulling up. “Maybe you shouldn’t stand so close to my baby sister,” Joey replied, purposefully stepping in front of us and blocking her from view.

“She called Shannon a scab,” Claire blurted out, tugging on the sleeve of Joey’s white school shirt. “And she pushed her, too.” “Oh, did she now?” Joey replied, keeping his eyes locked on Loretta. “That was a mistake, wasn’t it, Loretta?” “I’m not afraid of you,” she replied, but she backed up several steps. “You’re a scumbag.” “Yeah,” Joey agreed with a dangerous chuckle, closing the space she put between them. “But I’m a scumbag that’ll tear your fucking world apart if you touch my sister again.” Whoa.

I zoned out, focusing on Claire’s big brother instead. I knew she had one, I even knew his name—Hugh—but Claire told us he was stinky and looked like the troll on the cover of storybook The Three Billy Goats Gruff. Claire told a lie. Her brother did not look like the troll.

“That’s Lizzie,” Claire announced then, pointing in my direction as the bus pulled off again. “She’s right over there, see?” Claire’s brother looked my way then, and I felt a sudden wave of warmth flush through my body. Not the angry warm feeling or the scary warm one that happened at nighttime. No, this was a different kind of warm. Like the warm I felt when I saw Shannon’s brother at school. Except nicer. So much nicer.

Her brother started to walk toward me, and I felt my body lock tight, while the warm feeling grew hotter and hotter. When he reached my seat, he slid his headphones down to rest on his neck before offering me a hopeful smile. “Lizzie?” Whoa. Claire was a big, fat liar. Nodding eagerly, I grabbed my schoolbag off the seat and smiled up at him, hoping and praying he would sit down. He did. “Thanks,” he said, placing his bag on the floor with mine. “I’m Hugh.”

Hugh Biggs had whiskey eyes that didn’t look away. Instead, they stayed right on mine, warm and kind and chasing away the scary feeling in my head.

“Your eyes are nice,” I told him, feeling my heart flip-flop when I looked at him. “I like them.” “Uh, thanks?” His cheeks reddened. “I like yours, too.” “Your face is red.” He shifted in discomfort. “So is yours.” “I know why.” I beamed back at him. “It’s because I give you the hots.” “Uh.” He looked surprised and his face turned even redder. “I, uh…” “It’s okay.” Grinning, I grabbed his hand and pressed it to my cheek. “See? You give me the hots, too.”

“Here,” he said then, thrusting an envelope into my hands, brown eyes watching me warily. “It’s an invitation to my birthday party.” His cheeks started to turn pink. “I hope you can come.” “I can,” I blurted out, gripping the envelope for dear life. “I’ll come.”

His laughter caused me to laugh along with him, and I shivered when a rippling feeling settled in my belly. “What are you dressing up as?” “Dr. Grant from Jurassic Park.” “Dr. Grant,” I repeated to myself, tucking that information safely away. “So, no tights then?” “Definitely not,” he mused, brown eyes twinkling with amusement. “You really don’t have to dress up.” His tone was gentle when he added, “You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to.” “Really?” “Yeah.”

Hugh shook his head and turned to leave, only to swing back around and lean in close. “I think you’re right,” he whispered, breath fanning my cheek. I turned to ask him what he meant, but he was already walking away. Pulling up on my knees, I rested my chin on the back of my seat and watched Claire’s brother join a group of boys wearing the same uniform as him at the back of the bus.

When Claire’s brother broke free from his friend’s headlock, he craned his head up and looked in my direction. When his eyes landed on mine and he grinned, my heart flip-flopped again. I quickly sank back down on my seat and exhaled a shaky breath. Feeling my face burn with heat, I clutched his invitation to my chest and smiled.

What I didn’t intend on was freezing up in the middle of the aisle when my sister pointed out her. Holy crap. This was my sister’s friend? This is Lizzie?

I used to think my sister had the lightest blond hair I’d ever seen, but this girl’s hair was white. Like snow white. Her skin was so pale it was almost see-through, like one of Claire’s porcelain dolls. She didn’t have a single freckle on her face, either. Not even one. And her blue eyes, the ones locked on my face? Well, I had never seen eyes like that before.

I blinked a few times, not entirely sure if I was seeing her properly because this girl didn’t look like the other girls on the bus. She didn’t look like anything I’d ever seen before. She sort of resembled a gh...

“Lizzie?” Because if Claire had pointed out the wrong girl, I was going to be embarrassed. God, please let this be the right girl.

When she nodded and offered me the seat next to her, I almost fell into it. This confused me because I never wanted to sit with girls, but I wanted to sit with this girl. I wanted to look at her, too.

Her long, poker-straight hair wasn’t tied up with any fancy ribbons or bows like the other girls. Instead, she had it tucked behind her ears to keep it out of her way. She wasn’t wearing tights like the other girls, either. She wore white socks that stopped below her knees. Her coat was black, not pink or colorful, and both her knees were littered with bramble scratches. Everything about this girl was different, but it was her eyes that really caught my att...

When I introduced myself and we started to talk, I couldn’t hear a word of it. I had no clue what was coming out of my mouth. I was too distracted by the sound of my pulse drumming in my ears and the way my eyes enjoyed looking at this girl. It honestly couldn’t be hel...

I didn’t feel awkward or embarrassed when she paid me a compliment. Instead, I felt pleased. Because I quickly realized that I wanted her to admire me. Like I was definitely admiring her.

When the lads started teasing me about her, I found myself not caring one bit. Instead, I laughed off their taunts, feeling smug instead of embarrassed. Because they didn’t know what I did. They didn’t have the strangest girl in Ballylaggin coming to their birthday party. My eyes locked on hers from across the bus and I smiled. Or the prettiest.

“But I can’t turn my mind off,” I protested. “It never stops talking to me.” “No.” Smoothing my hair, she gave me a warning look. “You don’t say things like that.” Swallowing down my words, I nodded my head in understanding. I knew what that look meant. It was the same one Dad gave me. Shut my mouth and keep it in my head.

“He’s really pretty,” I sighed, feeling my mind drift back to Claire’s brother. “He’s got brown eyes and he’s tall, and he smells like soap and strawberries, and he doesn’t look like a troll at all.” “Aw,” Caoimhe gushed, pressing her hand to her chest. “You like him, don’t you?”

“Peter Pan!” My sister’s high-pitched scream of excitement pierced the air moments before she came barreling past both me and Feely. Looking every inch the fairy in her Tinker Bell costume, Claire launched herself at the snake-stuffer himself. “I missed you so much!” When Gibsie straightened up to his full height, he took my sister with him, causing her feet to lift off the ground. “I missed you more, Claire-Bear.”

Gibs was always looking at her, and on the rare occasion he wasn’t, Claire was looking at him. Our mothers called it harmless puppy love, but I wasn’t so sure about that. I had a niggling feeling they would always look at each other like that.

“Ah, crap,” Feely muttered under his breath. “Another one.” Meanwhile, my heart started to thump violently in my chest. She’s here.

“Just keep backing up,” Feely whisper-hissed, moving backward in the direction of the house. “Maybe your mam won’t see us.” “Yeah,” I tossed back with a forced laugh but made no move to follow him. I had no intention of running away from this girl. “Hugh? Oh good. Come here, love. You can bring Lizzie inside.” Yes!

I would never admit it to a soul, not even Gibs, but I wanted to see Lizzie Young again. I’d thought about her a lot over the weekend and hoped she would come today. Now she was here, I felt nervous and sick and excited all at once.

I didn’t have a word left in my head to fulfill my mother’s promise because all my words had flown clean out of my head, and all I could do was stand there and take in the sight of her. Last week, on the school bus, when I told her my party was fancy dress, I could tell she wasn’t a fan, but she was here right now, rocking the coolest costume I’d ever seen.

“You’re Dr. Sattler,” I finally found my voice and said, eyes raking over her costume with approval. “From Jurassic Park.”

She wanted to match with him😣😣😣

The fact that Lizzie showed up to my party in full costume made me feel special, but knowing that she was matching me? Well, I didn’t know how to handle the way that made me feel.

“Hugh, be a good boy and look after Lizzie, will you?”

“This is her first time at a birthday party, so don’t leave her on her own, love.” I arched a brow in surprise. “I’m your first birthday party?” “You’re my first,” she confirmed with a shy smile.

“I still have your invitation.” Releasing my hand, she reached into the pocket of her shorts and retrieved the invitation I had written her. “I like your g.” “My g?” “Uh-huh.” Nodding eagerly, she unfolde...

“You work hard on your handwriting.” I did work hard on my handwriting. In fact, I worked hard on everything when it came to school. Not because I had to—learning came easily to me—but because I wanted to. English. History. Geography. Nature. Science. Irish. Religion. It didn’t matter. I soaked it all in. Everything about the world fascinated me, and I read ...