FEBRUARY 25TH 2000
AOIFE
“I DON’T GET IT,” Paul said down the line on Friday night, tone impatient. “I told you that I wouldn’t do it again. Why can’t you let it go and meet up with me?”
“Because the last time I met up with you, you told people about our private business,” I shot back, rolling my eyes at his new ground-breaking level of stupid. “I’m still mad at you. You broke my trust. And if I can’t trust you, then I can’t be with you—“
“You can! You can trust me,” he urged, quickly changing his tune from hard to groveling. “I’m sorry, babe. I am. It will never happen again.”
“No,” I agreed wholeheartedly, only half-mad because the truth was I only half-cared. “It won’t happen again, because your hand will never get that close to my knickers again, Paul Rice.”
“But I love you.”
“Oh my god.” I rolled my eyes to the heavens. “Get a handle on yourself. We’ve only been going out for a few weeks.”
There was a long pause before the sound of soft laughter filled my ear. “Too far?”
“Just a tad,” I shot back, grinning. “I love you,” I mimicked his earlier declaration. “You big sap. What if I was one of those girls who actually believe the crap boys tell them?”
“Then I might be one step closer to getting my hand back in your knickers?” he asked hopefully.
“Not so much as your pinky finger will get anywhere near my knickers again.”
He laughed down the line before saying, “Listen, there’s an underage disco at the GAA pavilion tomorrow night. Come with me. Let me make it up to you.”
“So, you want to make up being a sleazebag to me by taking me to a sleezy underage disco, where girls line the walls for boys to grope them?” I arched a brow. “Gee, that is so tempting, but no thanks.”
“You’re really going to make me suffer, aren’t you?”
“Yes,” I wholeheartedly agreed. “Yes, I am.”
“You liked the necklace I bought you, didn’t you?”
“It was okay,” I mused reaching up to thumb the shiny stud around my neck. “But buying me presents won’t win me over, Paul.”
He sighed down the line. “Aoife.”
“Now off you go, I’m busy.”
“Doing what?”
“People-watching.”
“You’re out?” His tone was curious and laced with jealousy. “With who?”
“My other boyfriend,” I countered, dangling my legs, from my perch on my front garden wall. “Didn’t I mention him before? He’s very trustworthy.”
“Not funny.”
“It was a joke.”
“Who are you with, Aoife?”
“Nobody,” I laughed. “Night, Paul.”
“No, wait, who are you really with—’
Hanging up, I slid my phone back into my dressing gown pocket and sighed as a familiar wave of strange frustration settled over me.
It had been almost two weeks since Joey Lynch dropped the pink-lace-thong bomb on me, and I wasn’t really angry with Paul anymore.
I wasn’t even that irritated about the whole debacle to begin with.
Sure, I was far from happy with him for discussing me with his buddies, but I knew enough about lads my age to know that was what they did.
They talked shit.
A lot of it.
My best friend, Casey, thought I should be raging about what Paul did, and maybe she was right, but I didn’t seem to care enough about it – or my relationship – to wrangle up the necessary feelings.
Besides, being with Paul was nice. He was good-looking, clever, and, for the most part, we had a lot of fun together.
Still, though, I couldn’t help but feel restless.
For what, I couldn’t fathom.
Yes, you can, you little liar…
‘What are you doing out here, Aoif?’ Katie Wilmot, my next-door neighbor, asked, dragging me from my daydream.
Friends since childhood, our paths had changed course last year when I left her behind in primary school for BCS. Next year, she would be pushing the bar out further by heading off to Tommen, the private school outside of Ballylaggin, but living next door to each other meant that our friendship would remain intact.
Hoisting her small frame onto my garden wall beside me, she slipped her arm through mine and rested her head on my shoulder. ‘It’s freezing out here.’
‘Yeah, I know.’ I let out a heavy sigh and rested my cheek on her red curls. ‘I’m just people watching.’
‘You mean you’re boy watching,’ Katie corrected with a smirk.
Not bothering to deny something we both knew was true, I turned my attention back to the commotion occurring across the road from our row of houses.
It was half past eleven on Friday night and the Gardaí were making an arrest – which was nothing new for this area of town.
Lately, they had been cracking down on underage drinking, and had scored a coup for themselves in the form of a gang of teenage boys.
I knew them all.
Some were from my street, more were from my school, and then there was him.
“Hey, isn’t that the lad who works with your dad?” she asked, voicing my thoughts aloud, as we watched one of the male Gardaí pin Joey Lynch to the side of the paddy wagon.
Instead of keeping his mouth shut like the others, Joey laughed and taunted the Garda, who was roughly patting him down.
Dressed in his usual attire, an oversized navy hoodie that concealed his blond hair, he continued to talk back to the Garda, goading the Gard into losing his cool with him.
“Joey Lynch,” I replied with a heavy sigh. “And yep. It sure is.”
Snatching the cigarette that was balancing between Joey’s lips, the Garda tossed it on the ground before stamping on it.
The move earned him a slew of verbal abuse from my classmate.
“What an idiot,” I grumbled with a shake of my head, feeling sourly disappointed in his behavior, mostly because I knew he could do better.
Never mind do better, he was better, dammit.
I thought that sharing a box of cereal with him two weeks ago had somehow melted those arctic walls erected around him, but I was sorely mistaken.
He had shown up to school the following day more closed off than ever, sporting one hell of a nasty shiner, and an even nastier attitude to match it.
Joey never mentioned it to his friends either, something I knew for sure because Paul would have taken leave of his senses, had he gotten wind of my cereal encounter with our classmate.
“He’s a walking red flag,” Katie agreed, before adding, “Isn’t he a little young to be hanging out with Shane Holland? Isn’t Shane like seventeen—”
“Shane’s eighteen,” I corrected, glaring at the biggest scumbag in Ballylaggin.
Shane was bad news, and everyone knew it. He was in sixth year at BCS and the worst kind of wrong to be knocking around with.
It was common knowledge around here that he was a dealer, and while he might be small time, his brothers were not. Apparently, the older Holland brothers were in deep with some of the big-time dealers from the city.
Joey was only in first year.
If he was hanging around with Shane, then he was playing with fire.
It was a bad move.
A really bad move.
I watched the Gardaí shove three of the older boys into the back of the paddy wagon and released a sigh of relief when they didn’t take Joey – his young age, no doubt, the deciding factor.
‘Why do you think he does it?’ I asked, verbalizing aloud the question I’d been asking myself since I first laid eyes on him.
Tonight wasn’t the first time I’d seen the boy get collar-boned by the authorities.
It happened frequently.
‘Why do you think he self-destructs like that?’
Self-destruction. It was the only way I could describe his reckless behavior.
“Who?” Katie asked. “Joey?”
“Yeah,” I replied, eyes trained on the Garda van, as it drove past my house.
‘Because he’s a teenage boy?’ Katie offered with a shrug.
‘Yeah, but it has to be more than that,’ I replied, my gaze returning to my classmate, who was staring after the Garda van with a look of frustration etched on his face. ‘You just saw how he reacted with the Garda back there, Katie. It was almost as if he wanted them to take him away.’
‘What?’ my neighbor laughed. ‘That’s crazy talk. Nobody wants to be taken away by the Gards.’
‘Most don’t,’ I whispered. But he does.
“I don’t know, Aoif,” she said, worrying her lip. “He seems like kind of a bad guy to me.”
I shook my head. “He’s not a bad guy.”
“How can you be so sure?”
No clue. “I just am.”
“How?”
“Okay, so here’s the deal.” I heard myself blurt. “I know he’s a walking disaster, okay? I know he takes drugs and gets into fights, hangs out with all the wrong people, and can be a real dickhead like we’ve just witnessed.”
“But?” Katie interjected with a teasing smile.
“Just look at him, Katie.” Sighing heavily, I threw a hand up and gestured towards him. “Take a good look.”
“Yeah,” she agreed quietly. “He’s sort of beautiful.”
“More than sort of,” I corrected with a shiver. ”But it’s more than that.” Chewing on my bottom lip, I tried to find the words to explain my feelings. “There’s just something about him that intrigues me. I don’t know what it is, but from the first day I saw him, I was just, sort of…curious?”
“Of course you are,” Katie laughed. “It’s the age-old trope. There’s always a reason why the good girl lusts after the chemically dependent bad boy.”
I smirked. “Funny.”
“Well, intriguing or not, messing around with a guy like that is a recipe for disaster,” she added. “Seriously, Aoif, he looks dangerous. You should steer clear of him if you don’t want to end up getting hurt.”
And just like that, his head turned in our direction; green eyes meeting mine.
And just like every time I felt his eyes on me, my heart, the traitorous bitch, thundered violently in my chest.
He didn’t look happy to see me.
He never did.
He stood on the corner of my street, unmoving, eyes never leaving mine.
Nostrils flaring, he continued to stare at me boldly.
With what I knew wasn’t a cigarette now balancing between his lips, he tilted his head to one-side, eyes glazed over, but still sharp and full of mistrust. “You got a staring problem, Molloy?”
Okay, so we were back to throwing insults.
I arched a brow. “No worse than your attitude problem.”
His brows narrowed. “Enjoying the show?”
“More like a shit show,” I taunted back. “And hey, looks like you snagged yourself one of the leading roles. Congrats. Stellar performance.”
“What are you doing, Aoife?” Katie whisper-hissed, digging me in the ribs with her skinny elbow. “Don’t talk to him. I thought we established that he’s bad news – oh great, he’s coming over.”
I knew he was trouble, or maybe just troubled.
Either way, I knew he wasn’t going to be anyone’s knight in shining armor.
Casey always joked that Joey Lynch would never reach his twenty-fifth birthday. His latest antics only stacked the odds even further against him. It should have been a warning enough. And still, something about the boy made me want to jump off the ledge.
With my stomach doing somersaults, I watched as Joey crossed the road, closing the space between us.
His lips were puffy and swollen. Whether that was a natural attribute or from constantly fighting, I couldn’t tell, but those lips were almost too pretty to belong to a boy.
And so damn tempting…
“You’re out late,” he said, coming to stand in front of me. Because of my height advantage from sitting on the wall, he had to look up at me, and when he did, I swear I felt the air whoosh from my lungs.
Not because he was insanely sexy – something he very much was – but because the left side of his face was a dark shade of purple, with his left eye swollen almost entirely shut.
“Your face,” Katie gasped, voicing my thoughts aloud. “What happened to you?” Her eyes drifted to his hand. “Oh my god, are you smoking a—”
“I asked too many questions,” he interrupted, giving my friend a menacingly cold glare. “Do you do that, too?”
I could feel Katie wilt beside me.
“No,” she croaked out. “It’s just that the Gards are around and I don’t want to be seen with…drugs.”
“Drugs?” Joey stared at her like she had two heads. “It’s a joint, not a line. Relax, will ya?”
“Hey.” I narrowed my eyes in warning. “Don’t be a dick.”
“I’m going to go inside now,” Katie whispered, clearly unnerved by his words, as she hopped down and practically legged it towards her front door. “Night, Aoif.”
“Was that necessary?” I asked when my friend had hurried inside. “You scared her off.”
He shrugged noncommittally and steered the conversation towards my attire. “Nice housecoat, grandma.”
“Nice face, Rocky,” I shot back, tightening the knot on my robe.
A faint trace of a smile teased his lips. “Shouldn’t you be inside catching up on all of your soaps?”
“Nah,” I replied breezily. “Nothing on Fair City could ever be as entertaining as your earlier spectacle.”
“Happy to oblige.”
“So, what are you doing hanging around with Shane Holland and the rest of those dopes?”
“What’s it to you?”
I shrugged. “Call me curious.”
“You know what happened to the curious kitty,” he replied coolly, giving me his best mind-your-own-business glower.
“Don’t even bother with those scare tactics,” I countered, feeling a flash of heat below my navel. “I’m not my friend. I don’t scare easily.”
“Good for you,” Joey muttered. Taking one final drag from his smoke, he exhaled a cloudy puff of sickly-sweet smelling smoke before tossing the butt away. Shoving his hands into his front pocket, he retreated a few steps. “Don’t tell your father about tonight.”
“Fine,” I agreed, jumping down from the wall, partially because my ass was numb from the cold concrete, but mostly because I wanted to stop him from leaving. “What are you going to do for me in return?”
Pausing, he turned back to face me. “What do you want?”
Your attention, I thought to myself, as I closed the space between us, only stopping when I was standing right in front of him.
He was a lot taller than me now that I had lost my wall advantage.
“I’m not sure yet.”
Tilting his head to one side, Joey stared down at me for the longest time.
Mistrust, wariness, and reluctant curiosity were all emotions evident on his face when he asked, “What are you doing, Molloy?”
I wasn’t one-hundred percent sure.
On the one hand, I had a boyfriend, who, aside from suffering from the rare case of loose lips, treated me well enough. But on the other hand, I found myself drawn to this boy much more than was good for me.
I had felt it, the weird invisible pull, the very first day he walked into my world, and it hadn’t let up since.
“My friend thinks you’re dangerous,” I told him with a smile. “She thinks I need to steer clear of you.” Tilting my head to one side, I added, “She’s thinks that messing around with boys like you will get a girl like me hurt.”
“Wise friend,” he replied coolly. “You should listen to her.”
“That’s the thing about me, Joe,” I pushed back and said, “I don’t like being told what to do.”
I watched him watch me, his gaze trailing down my body.
When his eyes locked on mine, I swear I saw something shift inside of him. “Then I guess we have something in common after all.”
“Yeah,” I blew out a shaky breath. “I guess we do.”
With a dark look etched on his beautifully bruised face, he took a step towards me, and I desperately attempted to feign nonchalance as a shiver racked through me. “But that still doesn’t make us friends.”
“I get it,” I replied, breath hitching in my throat, as I continued to poke the bear. “It’s too hard for you to be friends with someone when you want them as badly as you want me.”
“Is that so?” Smirking, he took another step closer and I found myself backing up with every step he took, until my back hit against my garden wall. Resting a hand on the wall next to me, he leaned in close. “You think I like you, Molloy?”
“I know you do,” I breathed, heart galloping recklessly in my chest.
Reaching down with his free hand, he tucked a tendril of hair behind my ear and whispered, “You think I want you?”
The air left my lungs in an audible whoosh, and I knew that I was standing in the face of danger.
This boy possessed all of the terrible traits that mothers warned their daughters about.
Trouble.
It should have been his middle name.
Every bad, wrong, and dirty teenage boy characteristic wrapped up in a perfect, fucked-up package.
Physically, he trumped me in every way.
Taller.
Stronger.
Darker.
Meaner…
Still, I wanted him to come closer.
“Go inside, Molloy,” he said in a softer tone now, as his green eyes searched and found in mine something that had put the fire out for him. “You don’t belong out here in the dark with someone like me.”
“Yes, I do,” I was quick to blurt, before quickly adding, “I live on this street, remember?”
“Aoife!” My father’s voice echoed from our front doorway. “What are you doing outside at this time of night? The Gards are crawling all over the terrace, pet.”
“Jesus.” Jerking away from my body like I had scalded him, Joey shoved his hands into his pocket and muttered a string of curse words under his breath, as he shook his head and blew out a ragged breath.
My father’s confused gaze flicked to Joey, and he blinked for a moment before a look of resignation settled on his face.
“Joey,” he acknowledged with a heavy sigh. “I hope you weren’t in that crowd I saw the Gards taking away. You’re a good lad, and you know I’m fond of ya, but those lads are bad news. I’m not comfortable having someone who knocks around with that kind talking to my—“
“He wasn’t with them,” I answered before Joey could. “He was dropping Katie home,” I quickly added, feeling the lie roll surprisingly easy off my tongue. “They went to the cinema together, isn’t that right, Joey?”
“Uh, yeah.” Joey nodded slowly, his green eyes wary and locked on mine. “That’s right.”
“Yourself and young Katie?” My dad frowned at Joey. “You kept that one quiet.”
Joey shrugged. “It’s ah, early days?”
“Ah, mighty stuff. Good lad yourself,” Dad called back with a cheerful grin before turning around to go back into the house. “Aoife, don’t be long outside now, ya hear? Only the bad types are out at this time of night.”
“Yeah, Dad, I’ll be two minutes,” I called back and then sagged in relief when the door closed behind him.
‘You lied for me.’ Joey’s tone was cold and full of unspoken accusation. ‘You covered for me.’
‘Yeah.’ My heart hammered against my chest bone, as if it was trying to beat its way out of my body and join forces with his. ‘I did.’
‘Why?’ His green eyes were laced with a mixture of heat, annoyance, and reluctant curiosity. ‘What do you want from me?’
‘I’m not sure yet.’ My gaze locked on the recently healed cut on his bottom lip. ‘I guess you’ll just have to owe me for now.’
‘For now?’ Breathing hard, he stepped closer until there wasn’t an inch of space between our bodies. ‘I don’t like owing people.’
‘Well, that’s too bad,’ I replied, snaking my tongue out to wet my lips. ‘Because you’re not in control of this situation.’
He tilted his head to one side and a ghost of a smile teased his full lips. ‘And you are?’
“Answers,” I blurted out then, feeling the heat of his stare entirely too much to handle. “I want answers.”
“If it’s answers to homework, then you’re barking up the wrong tree,” he drawled lazily. “In case it skipped your attention, Molloy, I’m far from a scholar.”
“That’s a lie.” Nothing to do with Joey Lynch skipped my attention, which was how I knew that he was far more intelligent than he led the teachers at school to believe.
“You think I’m a scholar?”
“I think you’re smarter than you let on.” He might have a horrible attitude and rarely turned in his homework on time, if at all, but he had a sharp mind.
“How’d you figure that one, Molloy?”
“Your work in class is never wrong, it’s your homework that’s lacking,” I stated unabashedly. “You never have a problem completing any assignment we’re given in any of our subjects. Maths, English, Science, Home Economics. None of it phases you. When you’re in class, that is.”
What he seemed to be lacking wasn’t brains.
It was time.
“Jesus,” he muttered, rubbing his jaw. “Stalker much?”
“Fuck-up, much?” I shot back before adding, “And it’s called being perceptive. So no, I don’t want to copy your homework, I have my swot of a brother to copy that from, but I do know what I want.”
“Which is?”
“I want to know why you’re so hellbent on insisting that you don’t like me when we both know you do. I want you to explain why I’m the only girl in our year that you go out of your way to not flirt with. And while we’re at it, I want you to admit the real reason you blew cold on me in September?”
“Jesus Christ.” Rubbing a hand over his bruised face, Joey muttered a string of curse words. “You’re not back to this shit again.”
I shrugged. “Either tell me why you don’t like me or admit that you do.”
“I just don’t like you anymore, okay?”
“Anymore suggests that you once did.”
“Just stop, okay!” Throwing his hands up, he took several steps backwards, putting space between us. “I thought I liked you, but I changed my mind. I have zero interest in you. None. And last time I checked, that wasn’t a crime. So let it go – and stop watching me. Christ, you’re like my own personal little stalker.”
“And you’re like my own personal little fuck up.” I reclaimed the space he put between us. “So, let’s have it, huh? The truth, this time. Why’d you hit Paul if you don’t like me?” I cocked a brow. “He told me that you threatened to cut his fingers off and shove them up his own ass if you caught him talking about putting his hand in my knickers again.” I dragged that particular confession out of Paul when he was groveling and begging my forgiveness. “Well, Joe?” Blowing out a shaky breath, I added, “Why’d you do that if you have zero interest in me? Why bother fighting my battles, defending my honor, if you don’t care?”
“I did that for your dad,” he replied, jaw ticking. “Because he’s been good to me.”
“And because he told you not to go there with me, right?”
He shook his head but made no reply.
“I’m right, aren’t I?” I pushed, unwilling to let it go. “That’s why you don’t look at me at school. Why you’re so determined to pretend that I don’t exist. Well, I’m not going to make it that easy for you.”
Fury danced in his eyes as he stalked back to where I was standing. “Listen carefully to me,” he said in a deathly cold tone, as he walked me backwards until my back was flush against my garden wall again. “When I hit your prick of a boyfriend, I was defending your father’s honor, not yours.” Eyes narrowing, he leaned so close that his nose brushed against mine. The move caused a jolt of electricity to rock through my body, predominantly the parts of my body south of my bellybutton. “I was thinking that your dad’s a good guy, who doesn’t deserve to find out that his daughter is so—“
“Finish that sentence,” I warned, beyond furious, as I reached up and fisted the front of his hoodie. “I dare you.”
“Easy,” he spat, glaring down at me. “You want to know why I don’t like you, Molloy?” Narrowing his eyes, he added, “It’s because you’re too fucking easy. I could have had you like that on the very first day.” He snapped his fingers for emphasis. “Do you know how boring that is? Do you know how incredibly uninteresting that makes you?”
Shoving him roughly away, my hand swept up of its own accord, slapping him hard across the side of the face. “Screw you, Joey.”
His head twisted sideways from the contact and for a moment I held my breath, not daring to move an inch, as I waited for him to retaliate.
It didn’t come.
He never touched me.
Instead, he nodded sharply, more to himself than me, and whispered, “Now, you get it.” Backing away slowly, he locked eyes on me and said, “That’s why, Molloy.”
“That’s what?” I called after him. “That’s why you don’t like me?”
“No,” he called over his shoulder, as he walked away from me. “That’s why you shouldn’t want me to.”
And then he was gone.
