Note: I DID NOT WRITE THIS FIC! Lj user slowlynow did. FULL CREDIT goes to her. Im only posting this so those without a livejournal can read :) This story also used to be on fanfiction.net, but seems to have been removed.
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Prologue.
It’s Monday and the sun’s shining and everyone’s 노래 and blah, blah, blah, Naomi really doesn’t give a shit because it’s Monday and that means college and college means she had to be amongst people. And being amongst people wouldn’t be so bad if Katie Fitch wasn’t in her class.
“Excuse me,” And there 당신 have her. “You’re in my way.” Naomi doesn’t miss the muttered lesbian that comes after, and she knows it was intentional 의해 the smile that’s on Katie’s face as the twin passes her into class.
Emily, flushed, ducks her head and follows her sister, but Naomi can hear her murmur sorry.
“It’s okay,” she whispers (no, it’s not), and Emily brightens, and pauses in her step.
“Want to sit 다음 to me?” It’s asked quickly, and all Naomi can hear is wansitnextme, but she gets the gist of it. She nods because maybe, maybe, this means Emily will finally tell everyone, tell Katie, the truth. (She’d like her friend back, even if she doesn’t want to admit it.)
So they sit together, and all fucking hell breaks loose.
“Emily, what the fuck?” Katie snaps, and Naomi frowns. Now is it, Em, she thinks. “Shut up, Katie!” But Emily already looks like she’s losing the battle as she cowers under her sister’s stare.
“Get the fuck away from her, unless 당신 want to catch her gayness.”
The class snickers, and Naomi looks away as Emily just kind of gives up. She stares at Cook’s back as he surveys the scene idly. His arm is hooked around his chair and when he catches her eye, he’s all smiles. He mouths babe at her, and Naomi, for once, doesn’t roll her eyes at him.
Fuck this, she thinks, because well, she’s really fucking had it 의해 now. She’s so sick of this, sick of Emily’s looks and sick of Katie’s sneers, sick of everyone thinking it was her who was gay. She likes Emily, 또는 used to, 또는 still does – she’s not too sure, all she knows is that she’s sick, sick, sick. She doesn’t want to take the fault anymore.
Cook’s off goofing around with Freddie now, and she’s suddenly hit with realization. “I know the cure,” he’d said at his birthday, and at that time she really hadn’t know what the hell he was on about. But now --
Emily doesn’t say anything to her for the rest of class and sits so far away that Naomi wonders if Emily thinks she really has some kind of disease. And she’s disappointed, because last week, when Emily had followed her out when she’d left Cook’s party, it really felt like something was going to change.
When everyone’s out of class, Emily turns to her and opens her mouth, but Naomi shakes her head at her. “Save it, Emily,” she sighs, gathers all of her 책 and stuffs all of her things into her bag before heading out.
I’m sick of it.
“Hey, Naomi,” Cook’s there and she looks at him, like really looks at him, and makes a decision. Emily hesitates near them, but then flees when Katie calls her, “Come on, 당신 fucking twat!”
“I missed 당신 at the party,” Cook continues, smirk and all, and she rolls her eyes, because she’s heard about him being beaten up 의해 White, so she really doubts he’s missed her at all.
So she doesn’t say anything, but takes him 의해 the hem of his 셔츠 and sidles up against him. Naomi doesn’t even bother to think about what the fuck she’s really, really doing. She wants this, she knows, and 의해 the looks of things, so does he. She wants to smile at the suprisal that light up his eyes. She just wants.
“Cure me,” it’s all she says to him before one of his hands dives into her hair while the other opens the door to the classroom they were just in, and as she catches him into a kiss, he grins against her open mouth.
She can see Freddie look at her, at them, with JJ and Effy and Katie and Emily, just before the door falls to a close behind her.
Naomi doesn’t care. 또는 she pretends not to, anyway.
It’s Monday and if fucking Cook will make her stop being so sick all the time, she won’t regret a thing.
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Ch 1: where two and two always makes a five
Freddie hands him a spliff during their twenty-five 분 break, and the three of them, him, Freddie and JJ, hang out near an oak 나무, 트리 that they’ve claimed as theirs as they watch everyone else. Cook cups his hands against his face and holds a lighter to the cigarette. He puffs a few times to make sure it’s sparked before he looks up to see Freddie watching him, curiously.
“What?” Cook laughs and Freddie grins at him. “Well?”
He waits for his mate to elaborate because he’s got no clue as to what Fred’s going on about and Freddie shakes his head, bemused. “Naomi, mate. 당신 two kind of disappeared yesterday after, well, 당신 know.”
Cook’s sure the entire college knows, but he’s fine with that. He’s about to ask ‘what do 당신 want to know?’ when someone interrupts before he can.
“Cook?” The sun’s in his eyes so he shields it with his hand before seeing it’s Emily who’d called him from a short distance away. He inhales his cigarette before he lowers it to his side and lets it burn. “What’s up, Ems?”
She gnaws on her lip and doesn’t say anything, but after a while motions at him to come closer to her, so after a glimpse back at his mates, he walks, skips, over to her and throws one arm around her shoulders.
“Are 당신 and Naomi--” Emily rushes, but falters as she says Naomi. She shifts from one foot to another, and then straightens up. “Well, together?”
He laughs, snorts with laughter even, and shakes his head. “Nah,” he says, and it’s the truth, and it’s obvious because well, he hasn’t actually been together with anyone since ever. He’s not boyfriend material, he’s sure Naomi knows it.
“Okay,” he can’t help but think she looks relieved as she says it and he wonders what’s up with her. It feels like something 더 많이 than just looking out for a friend, but he can’t really bother to ask her. Emily offers him some sort of ‘I’ll see you’ smile and starts to walk away, but hesitates as if she’s just remembered something and turns towards him again.
“Katie’s throwing a party tonight.” Cook’s interest peaks at this, and he grins. Of course Katie would do that, right in the middle of the week. And 의해 the looks of it, Emily hadn’t agreed to it at all. “We’ll be there!” he speaks for his mates, because he knows he’ll be able to persuade them into it. After all, what was a party without his Fredster and J?
Emily nods, shifts her bag from one shoulder to another and then heads back from wherever she came from. Cook watches her go before he walks back towards where he left his mates, roughs up JJ’s hair and leans one arm on Freddie’s shoulder.
“Lads, we’re going to a party.”
“But, Cook, we have college! I don’t think--”
“Not now, JJ. Tonight.” Cook inhales one last time before he flicks the butt away.
This was going to be great.
-
When they go inside the twins’ home, it’s madly crowded and all he can hear is the thump, thump coming from the stereo. He slaps high fives with people he’s never met before but sticks close to Freddie and JJ, until they see some familiar faces. JJ hurries ahead to greet Effy and Pandora, but Freddie holds Cook back.
“I’m going to ask Effy out,” Freddie tells, and Cook shrugs. He clasps one hand on his mate’s shoulder if to say go for it before he frowns. "Doesn't JJ like her?"
Freddie scratches his head casually. "Yeah, I asked, he's fine with it."
Whatever, Cook doesn't really care, he just wants a drink. He finds one soon after and for thirty minutes, he does nothing but drink, dance and drink.
“Who invited her?” Katie appears from out of nowhere and seethes, and Cook follows her line of sight to see Naomi standing in the doorway. Emily, who is beside her sister, looks flustered.
He guesses it was Emily who invited Naomi, but she didn't want to face her sister's wrath so she didn't own up to it. So he stands up and heads towards Naomi because, well, someone has to.
“Hey, babe.” Naomi looks a tad startled to see him but he takes no notice of it. He hasn’t seen her since yesterday, which isn't really a long time, but when 당신 just had sex and your shag hurries out of the door before 당신 can even say anything, 당신 kind of wonder what's going on.
"Hey, pig." She's smiling, although sarcastically. “What do 당신 want?”
“Well, I already had you--” he trails off and grins at her. Naomi leans closer towards him, not wanting to shout over the music. “Look, that didn’t mean anything, alright?” He laughs and before she can pull away, kisses her temple just for the fun of seeing her annoyed. It's really a funny sight, how her eyes screw up and how her nose scrunches up like that. "Fuck, why did I come?" she sighs, and in reply, he snorts. "Well, 당신 came twice." Before she can kick him in the balls for that, he takes her 의해 the hand and leads her to where all of the others are.
Effy nods to her, Freddie smiles and Emily looks down. He's not quite sure where Katie went, Pandora probably went to throw up and JJ's showing off his magic to people.
The song changes to something 더 많이 upbeat and suddenly, everyone's on the floor, shoving and pushing and forcing them in to each other. Cook can feel Freddie behind him, trying his best not to fall over him, while Naomi's in front of him, being pushed against his chest. Emily's squished between Naomi and some bloke behind her and she holds onto Naomi's shoulder so she doesn't get 로스트 in the crowd. Effy is 다음 to Freddie and has a hold on his arm.
"Well, isn't this cosy?" As long as his drink doesn't spill, it's cool with him.
"Fuck!" Freddie doesn't quite agree with him. "Give me some room to breathe, fuck." He pushes against a few bystanders, but was careful with the five of them. It takes a while before they can all stand properly again, but their peace doesn't last long.
"I want 당신 out of here," Katie dives back up and Cook wonders how she does it before realizing that the entire party was now looking at them. And that would be okay, if it was Cook they were looking at, not Katie making some scene about Naomi being there.
“I better go,” Naomi says and he can hear her mutter ‘I don’t know why I bothered to come’ under her breath. She turns only to stumble against Emily, who apologizes quickly. Naomi disappears into the crowds before he can even think of asking her to stay 또는 to tell her 'well, 당신 sure have a habit of leaving parties early', and Emily turns to her sister.
“Why are 당신 always such a fucking bitch?”
Katie, so surprised that she can’t come up with a retort, looks on in disbelief as Emily turns on her heels and stomps up the stairs. Cook watches the scene while he drinks his beer, and when Katie glares at him, he quickly swallows and grins down at her.
“Great party, Katie.”
She opens her mouth to (probably) tell him off, but he’s distracted 의해 the arm that snakes around his waist, and when he turns he sees Effy, a lewd smile on her 담홍색, 핑크 lips. “Come dance with me,” she requests and how can he deny her. He spins her under his arm and leaves Katie standing where she is as they 가입하기 the crowd on the dance floor.
Effy grinds her hips against his and that’s all it takes for him to forget everything that’s just happened in the last 분 또는 five, right up until he feels a tap on his shoulder and he looks over to see Freddie behind him.
“Oi, Fredster!”
I’m going to ask Effy out.
Cook’s not quick enough to avoid the punch.
Yeah, this party was great.
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Ch 2: hurry, hurry, 당신 put my head in such a flurry, flurry
When she heads into class that morning, the first thing Naomi thinks is that it’s quiet, too quiet. Everyone sort of stares at her as she enters, ten 초 before the 벨 rings to announce the start of class, and she wonders what’s up. Maybe there’s something stuck between her teeth 또는 there’s toilet paper beneath her shoe, so she runs her tongue over her teeth and checks her shoe, but finds nothing. She walks to her 좌석 and drops her bag on the 표, 테이블 beside her and turns her head to find Emily sitting at the 표, 테이블 다음 to her.
“What’s going on?” she asks and Emily looks a bit startled but shrugs, unsure. Katie glances at her and she’s ready for another round of petty insults, but nothing comes. Well, okay, she thinks, it’s the fucking apocalypse.
She looks over to Freddie and notices Cook’s not beside him, which could be the reason why everything’s so lifeless. He was usually the 별, 스타 of a party, if not the class. Freddie turns and catches her eye and she is surprised to see it is black and blue. It looks ridiculous, but he looks away before she can ask him anything.
Fucking weird, this is.
-
She finds Freddie and JJ underneath their 나무, 트리 when it’s time for lunch, and when she arrives, so do all of the others.
“Wonkers,” she hears Pandora tell Effy, but she’s not sure as to what they’re talking about.
They all just kind of stand together, until she can’t hold it in anymore. “Where’s Cook?” And now they’re looking at her, like she’s grown a 초 head. Obviously she’d missed something.
“I don’t know,” Freddie 답변 and he sighs while running one hand through his hair.
Okay. “Then what happened to your eye?” she can’t help but be curious, and Freddie stares at Effy.
“I fucked up,” he finally answers, and he looks like he’d been punched in the stomach. “And now Cook’s gone. Fuck, what if he did something stupid?”
“We’ll find him,” JJ comes in-between, and everyone murmurs in agreement. Freddie frowns as he stares at his feet, “Yeah.”
Today would not be like any other days, she knows.
-
It’s after college and Freddie tells them all of Cook’s 가장 좋아하는 spots and where he could be at before they all 스플릿, 분할 into groups; Emily comes up to her and asks whether she wants to look for Cook together, and Naomi steals a quick look at Katie’s back before she nods. Emily tells her that Freddie and Cook had gotten into a fight (and she rolls her eyes when hearing it was about Effy) and Freddie had stormed out of the party. Cook had gone after him, but Freddie hadn’t seen him since.
Fifty four 분 later and there was still no sign of Cook, 또는 any of the others, and Naomi sighs. Well, this was getting them fucking nowhere.
“I told her,” Emily says all of a sudden, and Naomi pauses in her step so she can look at her. Emily blushes before she smiles, “I told Katie it wasn’t 당신 that kissed me,” she clarifies. “I told her I kissed you,” she hesitates and 의해 now, they’ve stopped walking. “And that I wanted to 키스 당신 again.”
It’s then that Naomi notices how close Emily really is, so close that she can feel her warm breath and she wonders how this happened. Before she can ask her ‘what are 당신 talking about?’, Emily leans 앞으로 and closes the gap, and their lips brush ever so softly. It’s over before it can really start and Emily stares at her, expectantly.
Naomi’s not sure what to say, she’s not sure what to do and Emily’s looking at her still, as if she’s waiting for something, anything.
Her phone rings in her bag so she breaks eye contact to get it out and clears her throat before she answers. “Hey,” It’s Freddie, and she looks back at Emily, still a bit dazed because of it all. Freddie, she mouths, and Emily nods before she kicks at one of the pebbles that lie on the streets.
“I think I know where Cook is,” Freddie continues, “Meet up at my house, yeah?”
“Okay,” Now was it just her 또는 did her voice sound raspier? She tells Freddie they’ll see him soon and hangs up.
“They found Cook.”
Emily smiles, but it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see it’s forced.
-
They arrive just when Freddie and JJ do, and now they just have to wait for Katie, Effy and Pandora. It’s sort of awkward and she can’t look at Emily because she still doesn’t know what to say.
“Fucking finally,” Freddie sighs when the others walk up, and he’s off. He rushes to the back of his house and they all follow him, and Naomi can hear Katie huff ‘not so fast, these fucking heels are killing me!’ and she smiles because well, at least that didn’t change in the last hour. Katie still cared for nothing but herself.
JJ lets out an ‘oh’ in realization and brightens as they walk up to some kind of shed. Naomi wonders what’s going on and how Freddie thinks they can find Cook in his backyard, but doesn’t say anything. Freddie goes into the shed and JJ follows him immediately; Pandora shoots Effy a look and Effy shrugs, placidly.
But Naomi sees why JJ looked so excited after she heads inside too, because there he was, in all his glory.
Cook was sprawled out all over the floor, with his breaths coming out calm enough that she’s certain he hasn’t fallen into a coma, he’s just asleep. He’s holding onto a bottle of tequila, his lip is 스플릿, 분할 and his hair is a mess, but he’s fine.
And she feels relief and that surprises her, but when she looks around, she sees that same relief on everyone’s faces. It hits her that in such a short amount of time, they were all slowly becoming, well, friends.
It feels nice.
“Hmm, Naomi,” Cook’s eyes are still closed but that was definitely his moan, “You sure know how to suck--”
She flushes and kicks wherever she can reach him, which is against the sole of his shoe. “Cook!”
He snorts with laughter and opens one of his eyes as he props his elbows behind his head. “Tosser!” she hmphs at him but he’s looking at Freddie and Naomi can see there’s some tension between them, which instantly makes her think of Emily and that kiss.
“What’re 당신 fuckers doing?” Cook averts his eyes to the rest of the crowd and sits up straight, the 테킬라, 데 킬 라 bottle brought to his mouth right before JJ swoops in and steals it and tells him he’s had enough for now.
“Looking for you, wanker.” Katie folds her arms across her chest and turns her nose into the air, but Naomi can see there’s a hint of a smile playing on her lips. “I could have been with my boyfriend--”
“We get it, Katie,” Effy interrupts before Katie could start on how fit her boyfriend was.
“We were worried about you,” Freddie speaks up for the first time, and Naomi looks between the two. Cook’s grin falters, but it was back up before anyone else could see it and before she could think something of it. “Yeah,” Cook discards it and rises to his feet. He steals the bottle back from JJ and ducks underneath Freddie’s arm, out of the shed.
“I heard there was an underground rave tonight, 당신 comin’?”
Wanker didn’t learn a thing.
-
She wraps her 재킷, 자 켓 tighter around her as she walks 집 because it’s almost evening and the weather has turned colder, replaying all of today’s events. Freddie telling her he fucked up, Emily 키싱 her, Cook still being the jackass he always is. Idiot, she thinks. Could have been hurt, 또는 worse.
She hears someone’s heels click behind her and they almost sound familiar, which makes her want to laugh. Right, so now she could decipher footsteps. She sees the bus stop ahead and walks towards it, before she sits down on the bench to rest her feet. It’s been a long day.
Someone sits beside her and she’s surprised to discover she was right, because when she looks to her left, she sees Katie.
“My sister likes you,” she says, and all Naomi can do is look ahead, because she can’t answer that. She doesn’t know how she feels.
The sun sets down and the crickets begin to chirp as they wait for Naomi’s bus together.
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Ch 3: late 집 tonight, part 1
It’s Valentine ’s 일 and when Cook opens his locker at college, a few cards fall out. He grins and reaches down to pick them up, before he shifts through them. Twelve, ten from girls he’s never looked at twice, one from JJ and one from anonymous. He looks to his left and sees Freddie, who holds up a card similar to his, and he knows it’s from JJ too. Cook holds up the same card between his index and middle finger and Freddie laughs, shakes his head and puts the card back in his locker. Cook pockets it instead because frankly, it’s the only card he cares about.
He makes his way to go after Fredie and head into class, but then notices someone familiar and changes his course.
“Hey, babe,” he greets her cheerfully and his response is a shrilly “fuck!” that rings sharply through his ears. He winces, and Naomi turns to him, annoyed. “Fuck,” she repeats, trying to breathe even. “You fucking scared the shit out of me.”
“Yeah?” he sniggers and she rolls her eyes at him and turns back to close her locker. “I have that effect on people,” he jokes, eyeing her rather empty locker just before it snaps shut. Naomi smiles that ‘really? I couldn’t care less’ smile of hers and he laughs again, just for the fun of it.
He opens his mouth to say something, but a tap on his shoulder interrupts him and makes him look around. There’s a pretty girl, her 치마 so short that he can see her knickers, with a bundle of red 장미 in her hands. She hands them to him, looking a bit sourly.
“There will be more,” she tells him before going back to wherever she came from. He looks after her, watching her hips sway from side to side.
“I’m leaving now,” Naomi announces, but he’s too busy trying to look up the girl’s 치마 to really hear her. “Okay,” he responds distractively.
She sighs, exasperated. Boys.
-
Not even ten 초 after he has sat down in class, the very same girl in the short 치마 enters with another ten, twenty, thirty, roses. She hands them out to everyone and Cook sees Freddie get quite a few, but he himself still obviously held the record: almost half was dumped on his desk. He doesn’t even look at the cards attached to them.
“D’you think red’s my color?” he asks Freddie and bats his lashes like he thinks a girl would do. He can barely see his best mate over all the roses, but he sees how amused Freddie is.
“I bet JJ sent them all,” Freddie replies, which makes JJ look up from his desk. “I did not!” he protests, and Cook laughs.
“Excuse me,” their teacher, whose name he has already forgotten, snarls down at him. “I’m trying to teach, here.”
“Yeah?” Cook’s feeling a bit daring, and he ignores Freddie’s look that tells him to stop, “Well, maybe if 당신 did it a bit better, we’d actually listen.”
His teacher narrows her eyes.
“Would 당신 mind repeating that?” she leans closer to him and he flinches back as her breath washes all over him.
He waves his hand over his face, “Would 당신 mind taking a mint?”
She spat detention in his face.
“Thanks, but I already took a shower.”
She spat detention in his face twice.
-
“You’re a permanent resident here, aren’t you?” the teacher with who he has detention with asks him, because well, Cook has detention at least ten times a day.
Cook smirks in return, before he walks to his usual desk; but he stops half-way and stares, and then begins to laugh.
“It’s not funny, 당신 wanker!” Naomi tells him heatedly, arms crossed and a frown on her usual pretty face.
“This made my day,” he gestures at her sitting behind the 책상, 데스크 and well, Naomi being in detention would probably make every one of his days. He’d never seen it before.
“What’re 당신 here for?”
“Teacher said 부시, 부시 대통령은 was a far greater president than Obama would ever be. I said he was a wanker.”
He grins; of course Naomi did.
“I fucking hate Valentine’s Day,” she sighs after a while, her statement coming out of nowhere. Cook blinks, and looks at the 장미 he got and had brought to detention with him because they hadn’t fit in his locker.
“Want one of my roses?” he offers, and she looks back at him.
“I don’t want your pity,” she snubs, even though it wasn’t about that at all, and then adds, “And I don’t like roses.”
He raises his brow. “What do 당신 like?”
She looks a tad surprised he asked her that, but looks thoughtful. “Daffodils,” she finally 답변 and he nods like he knows what the hell those are. Naomi shakes her head, “You have no idea how they look like, do you?”
“Nope,” he 답변 because he really doesn’t give a shit about flowers. She opens one of her books, and he leans his arms on her 책상, 데스크 for a better view. She gets to a page and there it is, probably the ugliest 꽃 he’s ever seen, all bright and yellow and stuck to the page.
“Is it dead?” he asks while reaching out to touch it; she bats his hand away and childishly sticks out her tongue at him. It’s the first immature act, aside for the time she flipped him off, he’s seen. And it’s sort of funny, and when she realizes what she just did, she looks down and huffs.
“I think we just had a moment there,” he tells her solemnly.
She smiles. “I’m not giving 당신 a blowjob.”
“Aw, come on!”
-
It’s one 시간 later and Naomi has engaged herself with origami; Cook watches her make (stupid, frilly) things and wonders if it’s time to die yet. Even with Naomi, detention was boring as hell.
“Right,” the teacher that had to watch them rises from his seat. “I’m going out for a bit, an 시간 또는 so, I expect 당신 both to be here 또는 severe consequences will follow.” He glares at them both, 또는 what Cook assumes to be a glare, and leaves the classroom.
Party time.
Cook stands up from his 좌석 and wanders to the windows.
“What are 당신 doing?” Naomi whispers, as though the teacher was still there.
He opens one of the window, “I’m busting out for a while, 당신 coming?”
She looks at him, blankly, and he wonders if she’s considering the option. But finally, she shakes her head. “No! 당신 sit your arse down, I’m not covering for you.”
He shrugs, “Don’t have to. 당신 heard him, he wouldn’t be back for at least an hour.”
Naomi rolls her eyes, one of her 가장 좋아하는 hobbies, but folds her arms over her chest and stays where she is.
“Your loss,” Cook tells her, and then he’s out. He closes the window and waves at her and she gives him the finger in return.
He lights up a smoke and sticks it between his lips, before heading out towards the grounds. JJ and Freddie would probably still be there, waiting for him. They always did.
-
When he is at their oak tree, the one they always gathered under, there’s no one. He finishes his spliff and looks at his cell, just to see he had a text from Freddie; went home, it says, and Cook scoffs while he crushes the butt of his smoked cigarette under his foot. He looks down to see whether it was still burning but instead, sees something else entirely. It’s a 꽃 and it’s yellow and it’s sort of ugly, he thinks, and it looks a lot like that daffothing Naomi liked.
Cook takes it from the ground and examines it. It looked sort of nice, up close. He grins and a plan forms into mind, and he decides to head back into the building behind him. He walks through the college doors and whistles, imagining the look on her face when he presents her with it. She’d probably call him a wanker for leaving in the first place. He could say it was a make-up present, because he really doesn't have any other reason why he's doing this, really. Because she is his friend is one, but he doesn't want to look like some pussy.
He goes around corner but then stops in his tracks as he sees the sight before him. In the doorway, there’s Naomi. With Emily. Naomi's holding on to a red rose and they were kissing.
He turns back around.
-
Cook dumps the daffodil in a bin when he walks home.
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Ch 4: late 집 tonight, part 2
She looks at herself in the mirror and sees nothing but her reflection staring back at her, telling her nothing.
This day, it was fucked. And not the detention either, but what happened after it. Cook had left for a smoke 또는 whatever, and after a while, she’d decided that she didn’t want to be stuck any longer and had gone out of the classroom.
Enter surprise number one, Emily. “Hi,” Emily had said, and Naomi had smiled at her. It was then that she’d noticed the rose in her hand, and Emily, seeing what she was looking at, smiled timidly. “This is for you,” she’d said, and Naomi had felt, well, special, as she’d accepted it. No one had ever given her anything on Valentine’s Day. “Thanks, Em,” she’d whispered, looking at the rose. When she’d looked back at Emily, the girl had moved in closer, and within seconds, had pressed her lips against hers. Her mind had gone blank and she’d just kind of stood there, before she’d briefly kissed her back, wanting to know what it felt like.
Enter surprise number two, Cook. Out of the corner of her eyes she’d seen him come around the corner, with something in his hands. It was a flower, and it was yellow, and it was a daffodil. She’d pulled away from Emily, but Cook had gone. What the fuck, it was like she’d imagined it.
“Um, so, would 당신 like to go to Karen’s Valentine’s 일 party, with, uh, me? Freddie invites us.” Emily had stuttered and brought her back to the real world, and after a long while, Naomi had said yes.
So here she was, trying to make herself look just a little bit decent, not knowing why.
Whatever. Time to go.
-
When she enters Freddie’s home, all she can really think is that the 음악 wasn’t as loud as when she was outside. Which sort of made sense, but whatever.
“Hi!” Emily shows up in front of her and startles her a bit, but she smiles at her. “I’m glad 당신 came,” the twin continues, and Emily takes her hand lightly. “Everyone's already here, come on.” They push through the crowd and Naomi doesn't know any of them; probably Karen's friends.
Upon arriving in the living room, she notices ‘everyone’ was a bored looking Effy and Pandora who appeared to be listening to JJ. She thinks she hears Freddie shout, “Karen, put some fucking clothes on!” somewhere, but she’s not sure.
“Hi,” she greets them all with a timid wave, and Effy quirks a smile, Pandora looks at her and waves, her smile much brighter than Effy’s, and JJ pops out an, “Hello, Naomi! How’re you?”
“Fine, thanks,” is her automatic response, watching how some bloke comes up to Effy and asks her to dance. Effy leaves them not soon after.
“I’m just going to find the bathroom, okay?” she tells Emily, who smiles at her and nods. She doesn’t really need to use it, but Naomi just wants to freshen up a bit and well, escape a bit, too. Everyone seemed to fit right in, but she didn’t feel like she did.
So she makes a beeline out of the room, in 검색 for the bathroom. She spends five 분 looking for it and finding nothing, before she sees Freddie, sitting on the staircase.
“Freddie, where’s the bathroom?”
“Somewhere,” comes the rather lame answer, and Naomi raises a brow. Freddie isn’t paying attention at all, he’s just staring at where a bunch of people are dancing; Effy was in the middle. She sighs, and climbs on the staircase to look upstairs. That boy had to grow some fucking balls.
She stumbles into the first room she comes across, looking around her to see where she was. It looked like a room, a boy’s one at that, and there was someone on the bed. She recognizes him instantly. He's on the bed, arms behind his head.
“Cook?” It’s 더 많이 of a statement than a question, because she knows it’s him. Cook tilts his head out of his arms when he hears his name, and upon seeing her, he nods in greeting. “’Sup, babe?”
“Where the fuck is the bathroom?”
“Down the hall, left.”
At least that was a proper answer, and she thanks him for it. She’s about to turn and leave, before curiosity hits her. “What’re 당신 doing in here?” Yes, she’s curious, about 더 많이 than just that. She’s curious as to why he’d left, and why he’d been holding a daffodil.
“Dunno,” was his reply and she walks a bit further towards the bed. After realizing that was the only answer she was going to get, she gnaws on her lip, deciding what to do: leave 또는 stay. She opts for the latter in the end. Cook watches her as she gets on the bed’s end, sitting on her knees.
“You know, I saw you,” and the daffodil, she pauses and waits to see some sort of recognition on his face, but he just looks back at her, as though saying ‘so what?’ and lights up a spliff.
She shifts from her position and sits down properly, tucking her legs underneath her comfortably. “I saw you, when Emily,--” she stops again, unsure why, before she realizes she’s embarrassed. Being kissed 의해 a girl wasn’t something 당신 talked about to a boy, right? A few 초 pass where she doesn’t really know what to say.
“Want to know a secret?” Cook’s still looking at her as he asks this, a smile on his lips, but it looks wry, like he’s mocking her. She’s reminded of his birthday, when he asked the very same question, but in a complete different way.
“I saw 당신 too,” he’s grinning now, and she resists the urge to roll her eyes: stating the obvious, much.
“It’s not how it looks,” Naomi doesn’t even know how it looked to him and realizes that line is such a fucking cliché, but she can’t help but defend herself. She doesn’t know why, it’s not like she really gives a damn about what he thinks (but she does, 또는 else she wouldn’t try and give him another impression of what happened). Fuck, this was doing her head in.
He doesn’t say anything for quite a while and she would have thought he’d fallen asleep if it wasn’t for the fact his eyes were still open and focused on her. And then, he sits up, his back against the headboard behind him, as his nearly finished cigarette almost falls out of his mouth.
“You should just fuck her.”
Naomi felt her eyes widen, taken 의해 complete surprise at that. Cook takes out his cigarette and flicks the butt to the ground; it flickers brightly on the carpet, and Naomi realizes that he could start a 불, 화재 like that, but she’s too baffled. What the hell was he talking about?
“I mean,” Cook continues, “You don’t know what the fuck 당신 feel for her, right?" Well, he was clearly 더 많이 observant than she'd originally thought. "So I say fuck her and find out, it’s the best way.”
“You’re fucking insane,” is all she can come up with. She feels annoyance bubble up in the pit of her stomach. “Is that what you’re doing with Effy, then?”
His eyes darken and his face contorts into what she believes is frustration and she’s taken aback, but she doesn’t back down. Naomi feels brave, even though she really shouldn’t because she has no idea what the hell she’s talking about either. But if he could talk shit about her supposed relationship with Emily, she could do the same. “You know Freddie likes her, so why do 당신 keep messing with her, with him? You’re supposed to be his best fucking mate.”
They’re just kind of staring each other out, now. She knows she shouldn’t have brought it all up, but she just couldn’t help it.
“Freddie likes her.” Cook 답변 after a 분 (she counted), “I just want to make sure Effy likes him,” he’s looking down now and starts to murmur, but she still hears him. “I don’t want her to fuck him up.”
“It’d help if you’d stop fucking her so she could pull her head out of her arse and realize she does, in fact, like him.”
Cook grins at that and he leans his head backwards, against the wall. “Yeah,” he’s not agreeing, she knows. It’s a maybe. Then he moves his head 앞으로 again, looking back at her. “She’s just a really good fuck.”
Yeah, he could never be serious, could he? Naomi rolls her eyes at him as he smirks back at her, but he grows serious after.
“So, 당신 and Ems?” he asks, as though they’d suddenly become best mates and was expecting her to tell him everything about her life. And Naomi wants to smile because well, they’d just had a real moment there. He’d proved he was human, after all. It was nice. He was nice, when he wanted to be.
“I don’t know,” she tells him, and she looks down as her fingers start to play with the end of her skirt. “I know something’s there, but I don’t know what it is.”
“Then find out,” Cook’s smile is genuine now, which is a nice change, she thinks. “And then 당신 can fuck her, and I’ll watch, yeah?” he laughs and she slaps his knee for a lack of anything else to do, which only makes him laugh harder. So she flips him off, which doesn’t work either.
“Yeah, you’d like that,” he winks at her, and she scrunches her nose playfully. They get interrupted when the door opens with a bang and a couple, making out, stumble in. Naomi feels a bit uneasy at their public display of affection for each other and is on the verge to tell them this, when Cook snorts with laughter.
“Freds?” he asks, and it’s then that Naomi realizes it too. It’s Freddie.
Freddie pulls back from the girl and Naomi does a double take.
It’s really is Freddie.
“What the fuck are 당신 doing in here?”
And Katie.
“Well, I think it’s time to get back to the party,” Cook clears his throat and looks like he’s trying his hardest not to laugh at the irony of it all. Naomi can barely nod, but allows him to pull her up right and they head for the door, together. Katie looks at her like she’s just betrayed her (or Emily), and Naomi frowns; yeah, she’s one to talk. Wasn’t she with Danny? And Freddie, shit. What was he thinking?
Cook rumbles through his pocket before he pulls something out and hands it to Freddie; it’s a condom, Naomi sees, and she wants to hit that boy over the head. What about Effy? she wants to ask, but doesn’t. It wasn’t her fucking problem.
The door closes behind them as they walk out, and all she can think is the 음악 is loud because she doesn’t want to think about Freddie and Katie. Cook looks behind her and smiles a bit and nods to indicate there’s someone behind her. “Tape it for me, yeah?”
She looks at him in confusion, and suddenly remembers the fact she still wanted to ask him about the daffodil, but she turns around and sees Emily, and the girl didn’t look happy at all.
“Emily!” she calls out, but the twin looks down and turns her back on her, before she disappears in the crowd. Naomi frowns and follows her, pushing against a few people to get through. This was the reason why she hated parties. So fucking crowded.
“Emily, would 당신 just stop?”
It takes a while, but Emily finally turns towards her, and she looks on the verge of tears.
“You disappeared into a room with Cook, for over an hour! I thought, I mean, Christ. Happy Valentine’s Day, Emily, I’m such a fucking fool for thinking that 당신 liked me.”
Naomi does the one thing that she knows will make everything clear, 또는 she hopes so, anyway. She leans 앞으로 and presses her lips to those of Emily’s and hopes she’s doing the right thing. After a while, Emily finally kisses her back, and Naomi pulls back from her. They stare at each other and she can feel Emily’s breath ghost over her lips when she finally says something.
“I don’t want to be your 초 choice.”
“I know,” Naomi sighs, momentarily distracted 의해 a laugh she recognizes as Cook’s, before she swallows. “You’re not.”
She’s doing the right thing (she thinks).
****************************************************************************************************************************
Ch 5: slow dancing in a burning room
Three days after Valentine's, there's another reason for Cook to have an excuse to drink and party. “We’re goin’ to the woods, we’re goin’ to the woods, we’re goin’ to the woods!”
He slings one arm around Freddie, wraps the other around JJ and holds them both in his grip as he chants those words over and over again. Freddie smiles but it’s gone soon after and he removes his arm. “Yeah, but 당신 have to promise me that you’ll be nice to Katie, okay? I had to convince her to let 당신 come.”
Cook grins at him and nods his head eagerly, before he ruffles JJ’s hair affectionately and goes back to packing all of the things he needed. Freddie checks his watch and curses, “Shit, we need to go, mate.”
They help him gather his stuff and then head outside, where the rest of the gang stood waiting. Cook realizes that it had been Katie’s every intention of leaving without him, but good ol’ JJ had requested he’d come, and Freddie had backed him up and convinced the twin that he should. He had to remember to be extra nice to her. At least until they got there.
Everyone’s there; from Effy to Pandora to Emily to Naomi, who quirks her lips into a smile when they come out. Freddie tells him to get their bags into the back while he gestures to his father’s 봉고차, 반 that he had borrowed.
“So, it’ll be a tight fit, but we’ll manage, yeah?”
Cook laughs and turns to JJ, winking at him, “You can come sit in the Cookie monster’s lap, J!” JJ flushes a bit and mumbles something he can’t quite hear, but he’s smiling.
After everyone dumps his 또는 her bags in the back, it’s a battle of who gets to sit 의해 who and where, and Cook knows Freddie wants him nowhere near Effy, so that’s where he sits, right 다음 to her, in the back. Pandora’s on her other side, and Naomi’s in front of him, 다음 to her Emily, 다음 to her JJ. Freddie looks at him through the mirror, telling him to behave and Cook smirks back at him and reaches out to Effy’s hair, twists one of her strands around his finger and rewards her with a grin when she lets him. Freddie’s nostrils flare and Cook knows he’s not really doing it to annoy him (maybe a bit), but because he wants to make a point. If Freddie couldn’t handle seeing him mess with Effy, he should dump Katie and take what he wanted. If he didn’t, well, then Cook would take what Freddie wanted.
“All set to go?” Freddie asks, hands on the steering wheel and gearing up to go, and Katie, who’s sitting 다음 to him, nods. She looks excited. “Ems and I used to go there every summer,” she explains, and she tilts her head to the side to smile at her sister. Cook sees Emily smile back at her, wants to 코멘트 on sisterly love, but doesn’t. He’d promised to Freddie that he’d behave himself, at least with Katie.
As Freddie begins to drive, Cook leans further into his seat, getting comfortable. After a 분 또는 two, he looks around. “We there yet?”
Katie turns her head to look at him, and she doesn’t look happy. “If you’re going to start that shit, 당신 can step out right now.”
He holds up his hands in surrender and keeps his mouth shut. For about forty seconds, anyway. He sits up and taps on Naomi’s shoulder, which she ignores. He tugs on her hair, twice, before she looks at him, brow raised, asking him what he wanted. “Ask her if we’re there yet,” he whispers, but Katie overhears.
“Stop this car, Freddie!”
He stops talking.
-
When they finally get there, after two long hours, they follow Katie (who asks Emily for directions) to where they need to be. Freddie comes up to him while he looks at the scenery; it’s trees, trees, trees, but he’s fascinated. It’s just him and Freddie as the rest walks up ahead, and they watch how JJ talks animatedly to Pandora for a while, before Freddie speaks up.
“So, what’s up with 당신 and Naomi?”
Cook doesn’t say anything for a while, just looks up at him. “What’re 당신 talking about?”
“Well, 당신 know, 당신 were with her in my bedroom.” Freddie looks at him like he’s convinced something had happened, and he wasn’t being informed about it.
Cook snorts and nods to Naomi, who’s walking, talking to Emily, “She’s with Ems.” he says, even though he’s not really sure if they really were 또는 weren’t together. Freddie shifts his gaze to the girls, like he’s contemplating the same thing, before he shakes his head.
“Yeah, but what were 당신 doing?” Freddie persists, and Cook wants to ask him why the fuck he cares so much. Shouldn’t he be fucking Katie while mooning about Effy?
“We talked,” he ends up saying, and Freddie stares at him for a bit.
“You can’t talk to me?” It’s the mother of all questions, and Cook doesn’t know how to answer that. Can’t answer it. So he doesn’t.
“You and Katie, eh?”
Freddie grits his teeth and Cook can hear it. But before he can say anything, Katie calls to them, saying that they were there. Freddie looks at him as if saying we’ll finish this later before he jogs to meet up with his girlfriend.
He doesn’t know what Freddie had expected of him (but knows that wasn’t it).
-
They spend the entire afternoon setting up tents; only to find out they didn’t have enough. There were eight of them, and they had three tents. In the end, they’d decided Freddie, him and JJ would share one, Emily, Naomi and Katie would share another and the last one was for Pandora and Effy.
It’d been funny, to see Katie get pissed over the fact she couldn’t set one up, but not so funny when they had to listen to her rant the entire time about how she used to be really good at it and that the tent was to blame.
After that, they’d gotten out the booze and sat around the campfire. Cook sang kumbaya twice before they begged him to stop and he didn’t know how many times Freddie had looked over to Effy while holding Katie’s hand. It was beginning to look just, well, sad. It was also beginning to get dark, and he watches how several stars appear and light up the sky.
“So, who wants to go find some 더 많이 wood for the fire?” Freddie looks around at the lot of them, but no one pipes up. He looks down at Katie, who smiles back up at him. “My feet hurt,” she tells him, and he frowns, but doesn’t tell her otherwise, because no one wants to go up against Katie when she’s pouty.
Naomi sighs, and stretches her arms, “I’ll go.” Emily opens her mouth, probably to volunteer to go too, but Pandora beats her to it. “I’ll go with you!” she stands up and dusts off her skirt, and Naomi follows her lead. “Do 당신 want me to go?” Emily asks, but Naomi shakes her head and smiles at her. “No, 당신 stay here.” Cook watches her hesitate before she briefly kisses Emily on her cheek, and then she takes Pandora’s arm and they head a bit further into the woods. Emily catches him looking and smiles at him, and he grins back at her.
He’s about to strike up a conversation with JJ when they get interrupted.
“Katie!”
All heads turn, and Cook thinks that accent sounds familiar and he’s right when he sees Danny coming from behind the trees, two of his 프렌즈 with him.
Freddie’s the first to climb to his feet and he pulls Katie up with him, his arm in her grasp, and the way he holds himself up gives Cook the impression that there’s a fight about to happen. He grins, finally some fuckin’ action. He claps his hands together and pushes himself from his seat, despite the look JJ’s giving him, which plain out says what are 당신 doing?
“What the fuck 당신 doing here, Danny?” Katie speaks up, and she releases Freddie to step ahead of him, to get a better look at what used to be her boyfriend. Her fingers curl into tiny little fists; it’s obvious she’s angry. Danny laughs, some sort of odd chuckle that makes Cook glance over to Freddie, who gives him a shrug in return. Wait for it.
“You left me!” Danny slurs, and he takes a step towards her, swaying a little. Cook’s sure 의해 now that he’s drunk, and he wants to laugh. Did he really think he could win Katie over 의해 following her into the woods, pissed off his arse? 의해 the look of utter disgust on Katie’s usual pretty face, it was clear that wasn’t about to happen. Danny takes another step towards her, but Katie spits at his feet.
“I left your sorry arse because 당신 fucking cheated and 당신 know it, 당신 bastard!”
의해 now, Emily’s up on her feet and she takes a few hesitant steps towards her sister, for moral support. Cook meets her halfway, ready to step in whenever Freddie wanted him to.
“Nobody fucking leaves me.”
And then it all happens in a flash; Katie screams and Freddie backs away and Danny laughs, while out of the corner of his eye, he catches sight of platinum blonde hair and thinks, Naomi, but he’s not quick enough to warn her, he’s not quick enough to warn anyone.
A gunshot rings through his ear.
Naomi drops the pile of sticks she’d collected and Pandora, who’s right behind her, holds her hand in front of her mouth in an attempt not to scream.
He’s not sure how long he stands there, trying to see what had happened and who’d gotten shot, and Danny’s still laughing and he wants to 펀치 the motherfucker. But he still has that gun and it’s still being aimed at his best friend, and Freddie looks terrified, but still holds his ground as he keeps Katie behind him, to keep her safe. It takes a while to get through to him, but Cook realizes no one’s got hurt and the stupid fucker had missed.
But he didn’t want to risk that again.
“Fuck, run!” he shouts, not knowing what else to do, and takes a hold of Emily’s elbow at the same time, “Now, run, fuck, run!”
“No!” Danny shouts, but he wobbles and falls to his knees, probably due to so much alcohol in his system. His goons don’t help him, they’re afraid to, they know it’s gotten out of hand but Cook’s not willing to wait and see what happens next. He turns on his heels, pushes JJ up and tells him to go, afraid his mate will get locked on because this was not the time. He still has a hold of Emily when they all run, pulling her along. JJ runs ahead of them, and Cook looks back to check everyone was getting away; he sees Freddie disappearing into the woods, a hold on Katie, and Effy’s on her way to Pandora, who still stands frozen. Effy urges her to go, and he hears how high pitched her voice is, like she’s on the verge of tears.
He spots the form of Naomi and she, like Pandora, is rooted to the spot. He wills her to leave, can see Danny getting back up, and then catches Naomi’s eye; she looks so fucking afraid he wants to turn back around and help her, but Effy pushes her, screams at her, and then Naomi breaks eye contact and makes a break for it, Pandora and Effy hot on her heels.
He loses his grip on Emily and she lets out a shrilly scream as she trips over a branch; he stops dead in his tracks and runs back to help her. JJ pauses and looks back at them, a few feet ahead, trying not to panic. Emily stands back up just when Cook reaches her, and he can see her knees are bruised and bloodied even though its pitch black and he has no idea where they are. First things first, they needed to get the hell away. “Come on, Ems,” he takes a hold of her hand, and they’re running again, and he never knew this wood was so fucking big.
But even as they ran, Cook knows Danny wouldn’t be going after them, but after Katie, after Freddie.
Shit, shit, shit.
He has to go back.
****************************************************************************************************************************
Ch 6: hero/heroine
This can’t be happening.
She’s never been this fast, she can’t help but think as trees pass her 의해 in some kind of blur. Effy is ahead of her and leads the way, even though Naomi knows she has no idea where the hell they were heading either.
She doesn’t even know what had happened; all she’d heard was a gunshot, and then Cook telling everyone to get the hell out of there. She had seen a glimpse of Danny and had put two and two together. And now they were just running, further and further from him. At least she hoped.
“Wait,” Pandora squeals, and she’s slowing down, breathing hard. “I can’t go on anymore,” she cries, and just 의해 looking at her, Naomi realizes this wasn’t some kind of game. They were really being fucking chased 의해 a scorned ex-boyfriend with a gun, and he wasn’t even hers. Son of a bitch.
They all stop, and Naomi has no idea where the hell she is. She looks at Effy, like she has the answer of what they should do, but Effy doesn’t. She hears a noise and her head shoots up while Effy tries to shush Pandora, telling her to be quiet.
Oh, please don’t let it be him.
They wait and she forgets to breathe, before two figures step out from behind the trees. Freddie, Naomi recognizes him, before she realizes the other must be Katie. “Effy!” Freddie bursts out, “Pandora, Naomi, are 당신 alright?” he’s looking at Effy as he asks, and despite everything, Naomi wants to roll her eyes.
“Is Emily here?” Katie demands of them, and Naomi shakes her head, swallowing. “I think she’s with Cook,” she replies, and she sub-consciously wonders how Emily is, how Cook is, were they alright?
“Katie!”
They all tense up and she feels rooted to the spot when Danny comes into view, still waving around that gun. His 프렌즈 are there, too, but they look a lot 더 많이 hesitant. “Fuck,” she hears Effy cuss, and Naomi dreads what’s about to happen.
“Katie, why’d 당신 leave me?” Danny wallows in self-pity, and if it wasn’t for the fact he was holding a gun, she would have told him to grow up and admit defeat. But he was, and it was loaded, he’d already proven that much.
And then it happens.
She sees a flash of something and it (a rock, she recognizes) hits Danny straight in the head. His eyes, surprised, roll in the back of his head and he falls down, and then the gun lays in front of him. His 프렌즈 turn to look at each other, unsure of what to do, but before they can do anything, someone runs out of the shadows and picks up the gun. He holds it in steady hands as he stands in front of them, like a hero coming to save the day.
She breathes out as relief fills her.
It was over.
“I think 당신 should take that fucker and leave, don’t you?” Cook snarls, and Dumb and Dumber nod at him, before they take the arms of Danny, who still seemed unconscious, and leave quickly. Cook lowers the gun when they can’t see them anymore, before letting it fall to the ground. And then she hears nothing but the rustle of leaves, as they stand in the middle of the woods, still tensed.
She feels a hand on her shoulder and it startles her enough for her body to go stiff, but then she hears Cook, and she visibly relaxes against his side. “Alright there, babe?” he asks her, and she elbows him lightly in an attempt to tell him that’s not my name. “Yeah,” she breathes and then her lips quirk as she tries to brighten the mood, looking up at him with a hint of a smirk, “James.” He snorts, grins and looks right back at her, and she’s not sure what to say aside for thanks.
But then Katie freaks out, just a little. “Where the hell is my sister?” she demands of Cook, who holds his hands up in surrender. “With JJ,” he replies, but this doesn’t stop Katie from getting right into his face. “She better be safe,” she tells him, and he nods, before he slowly points down at her chest. “I think your tits are about to pop out.”
“Cook,” Naomi hears Freddie warn him, but his voice is light, as though he wants to laugh. And she smiles because Cook always knew how to ruin the tension with something light hearted, the idiot.
“Ems?” she tears her gaze from Cook to look to the side, to where Katie now stood, and she faces her back. “I’m fine, he’s gone, I’m okay.” she’s on the phone, Naomi realizes, and she feels bad, feels sort of ashamed because, why didn’t she think of that? “Do 당신 know how to get back to the tents? Okay. I’ll see 당신 there,” her voice lowers a pitch, and she ends the call softly, “I 사랑 you, too.”
As she hung up, Katie looks back at them, even smiles when she sets sight on her. “They’re alright, they’re going back to the camp. I think we should, too.” Naomi bites the inside of her cheek to stop herself from commenting; funny how it seemed like Katie got a bit smarter in a crisis.
“Yeah,” Freddie agrees wholeheartedly, and Naomi sees him 덮개, 랩 one arm around his girlfriend’s shoulders. She looks back at Effy, who is looking anywhere but at them. She didn’t know who to root for anymore, so she wasn’t going to root for anyone. Pandora literally bounces up to Cook, and takes a hold of his arm. “Will 당신 protect me, Cookie?” the way she says it makes Naomi think of her like a child, and Cook laughs in response.
“’Course, Panda.”
-
It takes about half an hour, even though Katie probably took a detour because she couldn’t remember where the camp was anymore, until they’re at the camping pitch. They’re there first, and everything’s right where they left it. It’s eerily dark, and she almost expects Danny to show up again, and she’s not really sure if she wants to stay now. Her pile of sticks and branches are still right where she’d dropped them, and Freddie gathers them in his arms. He builds up another fire, and Naomi watches him trying to get the matches to work, only for the wind to blow the flame out again once it was lit. His third attempt at lighting it finally works.
“Emily!” Katie’s the first to notice the newcomers, and Naomi looks from the now lit 불, 화재 towards them. It’s dark but the first thing she sees is Emily holding onto JJ’s hand, and she wonders what’s up before she notices something’s not quite right with JJ. He’s shaking and his eyes are wide and frightful; she can hear him mumble, and Emily looks concerned. Freddie arises from his knelt position and Cook’s already half-way there, and she watches both of them take one of JJ’s shoulders and force him to look at them. She hears Emily tell them, “he’s been like that since 당신 left, Cook,” before she carefully releases JJ’s hand to walk towards Naomi.
“He’s having some sort of lockdown,” Emily tells her, her voice strained and tired. “I kept telling him everyone was fine, but he wouldn’t believe it.” Naomi murmurs an ‘ah’ in recognition as she watches the three boys. JJ looks a bit calmer now, he’s stopped shaking. And then, he wraps his arms around his two best 프렌즈 and holds them close, as if he’s afraid they’ll leave him if he lets go. Naomi can’t help but smile; she’s seen firsthand that while Cook could be a bastard, Freddie was a bit too self-righteous and JJ was a nut at times, these three were family.
“I’m glad you’re alright, Naomi,” Emily says after a while, and she turns to look at her. “Me too,” she tells her, and she means it, because Emily had become important to her, as friend, as something 더 많이 than just a friend.
But, her mind supplies, and she chews on her lip. But nothing, everything was fine. She really liked Emily, she was giving them a try. It just takes a while before 당신 fall in love, right?
“So what’re we doing now?” Effy pipes up once they’re all sitting around the fire.
“Sleep,” Cook says, as he stretches. “I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty fucking tired.”
And Naomi’s still not sure whether she wants to stay, but she can’t help but agree. She is tired, worn down from all of this, and all she really wants is some sleep. Maybe it was stupid of them not to just pack up and leave because of all of this, but she didn’t want their trip to be ruined because of this, even though it kind of was. Think positive, Naomi.
Yeah. If Danny came back to murder them all in their sleep, she’d totally blame Cook.
-
Yet, when she’s in the tent, zipped up in her sleeping back, she just can’t seem to fall asleep. She looks over at Emily, who is fast asleep, curled on her side. Katie’s 다음 to her, in pretty much the same position. Naomi watches them for a while, before she climbs out of her sleeping bag. No use just lying around if she could, well, walk around. She gets out of the tent as quietly as she can and once she’s outside, winces at the harsh wind as it collides with her figure.
She looks over at the 불, 화재 as it flickers, the flame smaller than before but still awake. And then she notices someone near it, and smiles softly upon closer inspection. “Couldn’t sleep either?” she asks as she walks closer.
Cook looks up at her as he blows out some smoke, and then he shrugs. “Nah,” he replies once she sits down 다음 to him, offers her his spliff. She takes it from his hand and puts it to her lips, taking a drag.
“Is JJ feeling better?” she 질문 after a while when she hands the cigarette back, and Cook nods at her. “Yeah, he’s fine. Took him a while to fall asleep, wanted to sleep with one of us but Freds convinced him it would be a little too tight,” he grins at her, and she returns it.
They sit in front of the 불, 화재 until it dies out, and when Cook stands up and tells her he’s going back to his bed, she arises just as quickly to take a fist full of his 셔츠 and to pull him towards her. He kind of stumbles into her and she entangles her arms around his shoulders in a hug. They’re kind of in an awkward position and her nose is pressing against his shoulder a little bit too hard, but he allows her.
“Thank you,” she mumbles into his shirt, and she feels him 옮기기 his head for a nod, and it lasts another ten 더 많이 초 before she releases him and looks down at her feet.
“G’night, Naomi,” she hears him say, and then there are footsteps and the sound of a zipper, a tent being opened.
“G’night, Cook.”
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Ch 7: gonna take her 집 'cause she's over romancing
“This is the life, aye, lads?”
He stretches languidly, squints his eyes as he tries to look up, into the sun. He chugs back some of his 맥주 before he looks back at his companions, watching Freddie balance his skateboard on his two legs. They were sitting on Freddie’s 가장 좋아하는 홍어, 스케이트 ramp, just the three of them, the musketeers. Like it ought to be, he thinks, pleased.
“Yes!” JJ holds his 맥주 can out like it’s a sword and grins widely, though quickly retreated his arm when he nearly fell off the ramp. “What’re we going to do today, lads?” Freddie asks after a while, and Cook shrugs, leaning on his elbows. “Dunno,” he says, “Just sit here, drink, look at that hot girl’s arse over there.” At this, both Freddie and JJ turn their heads quickly, only to find no one there. When they turn to glare at their mate, they’re rewarded with a laugh.
“You know, speaking of hot girls,” Freddie starts, and Cook groans, “You’re not gonna talk about Katie now, are ya?”
“Oi, what’s your deal with her?” Freddie frowns, before he shakes his head. He didn’t want to talk about his girlfriend. “Nah, mate, I was talking about Naomi and Emily.”
“Emily’s great,” JJ pipes up and smiles, and Cook thinks he looks kind of love-sick-y. He clasps a hand around his mate’s shoulder. “I think 당신 have to grow tits to get her attention, J,” when seeing his friend’s crestfallen look, Freddie quickly adds, “But we like 당신 just the way 당신 are.”
“I
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Prologue.
It’s Monday and the sun’s shining and everyone’s 노래 and blah, blah, blah, Naomi really doesn’t give a shit because it’s Monday and that means college and college means she had to be amongst people. And being amongst people wouldn’t be so bad if Katie Fitch wasn’t in her class.
“Excuse me,” And there 당신 have her. “You’re in my way.” Naomi doesn’t miss the muttered lesbian that comes after, and she knows it was intentional 의해 the smile that’s on Katie’s face as the twin passes her into class.
Emily, flushed, ducks her head and follows her sister, but Naomi can hear her murmur sorry.
“It’s okay,” she whispers (no, it’s not), and Emily brightens, and pauses in her step.
“Want to sit 다음 to me?” It’s asked quickly, and all Naomi can hear is wansitnextme, but she gets the gist of it. She nods because maybe, maybe, this means Emily will finally tell everyone, tell Katie, the truth. (She’d like her friend back, even if she doesn’t want to admit it.)
So they sit together, and all fucking hell breaks loose.
“Emily, what the fuck?” Katie snaps, and Naomi frowns. Now is it, Em, she thinks. “Shut up, Katie!” But Emily already looks like she’s losing the battle as she cowers under her sister’s stare.
“Get the fuck away from her, unless 당신 want to catch her gayness.”
The class snickers, and Naomi looks away as Emily just kind of gives up. She stares at Cook’s back as he surveys the scene idly. His arm is hooked around his chair and when he catches her eye, he’s all smiles. He mouths babe at her, and Naomi, for once, doesn’t roll her eyes at him.
Fuck this, she thinks, because well, she’s really fucking had it 의해 now. She’s so sick of this, sick of Emily’s looks and sick of Katie’s sneers, sick of everyone thinking it was her who was gay. She likes Emily, 또는 used to, 또는 still does – she’s not too sure, all she knows is that she’s sick, sick, sick. She doesn’t want to take the fault anymore.
Cook’s off goofing around with Freddie now, and she’s suddenly hit with realization. “I know the cure,” he’d said at his birthday, and at that time she really hadn’t know what the hell he was on about. But now --
Emily doesn’t say anything to her for the rest of class and sits so far away that Naomi wonders if Emily thinks she really has some kind of disease. And she’s disappointed, because last week, when Emily had followed her out when she’d left Cook’s party, it really felt like something was going to change.
When everyone’s out of class, Emily turns to her and opens her mouth, but Naomi shakes her head at her. “Save it, Emily,” she sighs, gathers all of her 책 and stuffs all of her things into her bag before heading out.
I’m sick of it.
“Hey, Naomi,” Cook’s there and she looks at him, like really looks at him, and makes a decision. Emily hesitates near them, but then flees when Katie calls her, “Come on, 당신 fucking twat!”
“I missed 당신 at the party,” Cook continues, smirk and all, and she rolls her eyes, because she’s heard about him being beaten up 의해 White, so she really doubts he’s missed her at all.
So she doesn’t say anything, but takes him 의해 the hem of his 셔츠 and sidles up against him. Naomi doesn’t even bother to think about what the fuck she’s really, really doing. She wants this, she knows, and 의해 the looks of things, so does he. She wants to smile at the suprisal that light up his eyes. She just wants.
“Cure me,” it’s all she says to him before one of his hands dives into her hair while the other opens the door to the classroom they were just in, and as she catches him into a kiss, he grins against her open mouth.
She can see Freddie look at her, at them, with JJ and Effy and Katie and Emily, just before the door falls to a close behind her.
Naomi doesn’t care. 또는 she pretends not to, anyway.
It’s Monday and if fucking Cook will make her stop being so sick all the time, she won’t regret a thing.
****************************************************************************************************************************
Ch 1: where two and two always makes a five
Freddie hands him a spliff during their twenty-five 분 break, and the three of them, him, Freddie and JJ, hang out near an oak 나무, 트리 that they’ve claimed as theirs as they watch everyone else. Cook cups his hands against his face and holds a lighter to the cigarette. He puffs a few times to make sure it’s sparked before he looks up to see Freddie watching him, curiously.
“What?” Cook laughs and Freddie grins at him. “Well?”
He waits for his mate to elaborate because he’s got no clue as to what Fred’s going on about and Freddie shakes his head, bemused. “Naomi, mate. 당신 two kind of disappeared yesterday after, well, 당신 know.”
Cook’s sure the entire college knows, but he’s fine with that. He’s about to ask ‘what do 당신 want to know?’ when someone interrupts before he can.
“Cook?” The sun’s in his eyes so he shields it with his hand before seeing it’s Emily who’d called him from a short distance away. He inhales his cigarette before he lowers it to his side and lets it burn. “What’s up, Ems?”
She gnaws on her lip and doesn’t say anything, but after a while motions at him to come closer to her, so after a glimpse back at his mates, he walks, skips, over to her and throws one arm around her shoulders.
“Are 당신 and Naomi--” Emily rushes, but falters as she says Naomi. She shifts from one foot to another, and then straightens up. “Well, together?”
He laughs, snorts with laughter even, and shakes his head. “Nah,” he says, and it’s the truth, and it’s obvious because well, he hasn’t actually been together with anyone since ever. He’s not boyfriend material, he’s sure Naomi knows it.
“Okay,” he can’t help but think she looks relieved as she says it and he wonders what’s up with her. It feels like something 더 많이 than just looking out for a friend, but he can’t really bother to ask her. Emily offers him some sort of ‘I’ll see you’ smile and starts to walk away, but hesitates as if she’s just remembered something and turns towards him again.
“Katie’s throwing a party tonight.” Cook’s interest peaks at this, and he grins. Of course Katie would do that, right in the middle of the week. And 의해 the looks of it, Emily hadn’t agreed to it at all. “We’ll be there!” he speaks for his mates, because he knows he’ll be able to persuade them into it. After all, what was a party without his Fredster and J?
Emily nods, shifts her bag from one shoulder to another and then heads back from wherever she came from. Cook watches her go before he walks back towards where he left his mates, roughs up JJ’s hair and leans one arm on Freddie’s shoulder.
“Lads, we’re going to a party.”
“But, Cook, we have college! I don’t think--”
“Not now, JJ. Tonight.” Cook inhales one last time before he flicks the butt away.
This was going to be great.
-
When they go inside the twins’ home, it’s madly crowded and all he can hear is the thump, thump coming from the stereo. He slaps high fives with people he’s never met before but sticks close to Freddie and JJ, until they see some familiar faces. JJ hurries ahead to greet Effy and Pandora, but Freddie holds Cook back.
“I’m going to ask Effy out,” Freddie tells, and Cook shrugs. He clasps one hand on his mate’s shoulder if to say go for it before he frowns. "Doesn't JJ like her?"
Freddie scratches his head casually. "Yeah, I asked, he's fine with it."
Whatever, Cook doesn't really care, he just wants a drink. He finds one soon after and for thirty minutes, he does nothing but drink, dance and drink.
“Who invited her?” Katie appears from out of nowhere and seethes, and Cook follows her line of sight to see Naomi standing in the doorway. Emily, who is beside her sister, looks flustered.
He guesses it was Emily who invited Naomi, but she didn't want to face her sister's wrath so she didn't own up to it. So he stands up and heads towards Naomi because, well, someone has to.
“Hey, babe.” Naomi looks a tad startled to see him but he takes no notice of it. He hasn’t seen her since yesterday, which isn't really a long time, but when 당신 just had sex and your shag hurries out of the door before 당신 can even say anything, 당신 kind of wonder what's going on.
"Hey, pig." She's smiling, although sarcastically. “What do 당신 want?”
“Well, I already had you--” he trails off and grins at her. Naomi leans closer towards him, not wanting to shout over the music. “Look, that didn’t mean anything, alright?” He laughs and before she can pull away, kisses her temple just for the fun of seeing her annoyed. It's really a funny sight, how her eyes screw up and how her nose scrunches up like that. "Fuck, why did I come?" she sighs, and in reply, he snorts. "Well, 당신 came twice." Before she can kick him in the balls for that, he takes her 의해 the hand and leads her to where all of the others are.
Effy nods to her, Freddie smiles and Emily looks down. He's not quite sure where Katie went, Pandora probably went to throw up and JJ's showing off his magic to people.
The song changes to something 더 많이 upbeat and suddenly, everyone's on the floor, shoving and pushing and forcing them in to each other. Cook can feel Freddie behind him, trying his best not to fall over him, while Naomi's in front of him, being pushed against his chest. Emily's squished between Naomi and some bloke behind her and she holds onto Naomi's shoulder so she doesn't get 로스트 in the crowd. Effy is 다음 to Freddie and has a hold on his arm.
"Well, isn't this cosy?" As long as his drink doesn't spill, it's cool with him.
"Fuck!" Freddie doesn't quite agree with him. "Give me some room to breathe, fuck." He pushes against a few bystanders, but was careful with the five of them. It takes a while before they can all stand properly again, but their peace doesn't last long.
"I want 당신 out of here," Katie dives back up and Cook wonders how she does it before realizing that the entire party was now looking at them. And that would be okay, if it was Cook they were looking at, not Katie making some scene about Naomi being there.
“I better go,” Naomi says and he can hear her mutter ‘I don’t know why I bothered to come’ under her breath. She turns only to stumble against Emily, who apologizes quickly. Naomi disappears into the crowds before he can even think of asking her to stay 또는 to tell her 'well, 당신 sure have a habit of leaving parties early', and Emily turns to her sister.
“Why are 당신 always such a fucking bitch?”
Katie, so surprised that she can’t come up with a retort, looks on in disbelief as Emily turns on her heels and stomps up the stairs. Cook watches the scene while he drinks his beer, and when Katie glares at him, he quickly swallows and grins down at her.
“Great party, Katie.”
She opens her mouth to (probably) tell him off, but he’s distracted 의해 the arm that snakes around his waist, and when he turns he sees Effy, a lewd smile on her 담홍색, 핑크 lips. “Come dance with me,” she requests and how can he deny her. He spins her under his arm and leaves Katie standing where she is as they 가입하기 the crowd on the dance floor.
Effy grinds her hips against his and that’s all it takes for him to forget everything that’s just happened in the last 분 또는 five, right up until he feels a tap on his shoulder and he looks over to see Freddie behind him.
“Oi, Fredster!”
I’m going to ask Effy out.
Cook’s not quick enough to avoid the punch.
Yeah, this party was great.
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Ch 2: hurry, hurry, 당신 put my head in such a flurry, flurry
When she heads into class that morning, the first thing Naomi thinks is that it’s quiet, too quiet. Everyone sort of stares at her as she enters, ten 초 before the 벨 rings to announce the start of class, and she wonders what’s up. Maybe there’s something stuck between her teeth 또는 there’s toilet paper beneath her shoe, so she runs her tongue over her teeth and checks her shoe, but finds nothing. She walks to her 좌석 and drops her bag on the 표, 테이블 beside her and turns her head to find Emily sitting at the 표, 테이블 다음 to her.
“What’s going on?” she asks and Emily looks a bit startled but shrugs, unsure. Katie glances at her and she’s ready for another round of petty insults, but nothing comes. Well, okay, she thinks, it’s the fucking apocalypse.
She looks over to Freddie and notices Cook’s not beside him, which could be the reason why everything’s so lifeless. He was usually the 별, 스타 of a party, if not the class. Freddie turns and catches her eye and she is surprised to see it is black and blue. It looks ridiculous, but he looks away before she can ask him anything.
Fucking weird, this is.
-
She finds Freddie and JJ underneath their 나무, 트리 when it’s time for lunch, and when she arrives, so do all of the others.
“Wonkers,” she hears Pandora tell Effy, but she’s not sure as to what they’re talking about.
They all just kind of stand together, until she can’t hold it in anymore. “Where’s Cook?” And now they’re looking at her, like she’s grown a 초 head. Obviously she’d missed something.
“I don’t know,” Freddie 답변 and he sighs while running one hand through his hair.
Okay. “Then what happened to your eye?” she can’t help but be curious, and Freddie stares at Effy.
“I fucked up,” he finally answers, and he looks like he’d been punched in the stomach. “And now Cook’s gone. Fuck, what if he did something stupid?”
“We’ll find him,” JJ comes in-between, and everyone murmurs in agreement. Freddie frowns as he stares at his feet, “Yeah.”
Today would not be like any other days, she knows.
-
It’s after college and Freddie tells them all of Cook’s 가장 좋아하는 spots and where he could be at before they all 스플릿, 분할 into groups; Emily comes up to her and asks whether she wants to look for Cook together, and Naomi steals a quick look at Katie’s back before she nods. Emily tells her that Freddie and Cook had gotten into a fight (and she rolls her eyes when hearing it was about Effy) and Freddie had stormed out of the party. Cook had gone after him, but Freddie hadn’t seen him since.
Fifty four 분 later and there was still no sign of Cook, 또는 any of the others, and Naomi sighs. Well, this was getting them fucking nowhere.
“I told her,” Emily says all of a sudden, and Naomi pauses in her step so she can look at her. Emily blushes before she smiles, “I told Katie it wasn’t 당신 that kissed me,” she clarifies. “I told her I kissed you,” she hesitates and 의해 now, they’ve stopped walking. “And that I wanted to 키스 당신 again.”
It’s then that Naomi notices how close Emily really is, so close that she can feel her warm breath and she wonders how this happened. Before she can ask her ‘what are 당신 talking about?’, Emily leans 앞으로 and closes the gap, and their lips brush ever so softly. It’s over before it can really start and Emily stares at her, expectantly.
Naomi’s not sure what to say, she’s not sure what to do and Emily’s looking at her still, as if she’s waiting for something, anything.
Her phone rings in her bag so she breaks eye contact to get it out and clears her throat before she answers. “Hey,” It’s Freddie, and she looks back at Emily, still a bit dazed because of it all. Freddie, she mouths, and Emily nods before she kicks at one of the pebbles that lie on the streets.
“I think I know where Cook is,” Freddie continues, “Meet up at my house, yeah?”
“Okay,” Now was it just her 또는 did her voice sound raspier? She tells Freddie they’ll see him soon and hangs up.
“They found Cook.”
Emily smiles, but it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see it’s forced.
-
They arrive just when Freddie and JJ do, and now they just have to wait for Katie, Effy and Pandora. It’s sort of awkward and she can’t look at Emily because she still doesn’t know what to say.
“Fucking finally,” Freddie sighs when the others walk up, and he’s off. He rushes to the back of his house and they all follow him, and Naomi can hear Katie huff ‘not so fast, these fucking heels are killing me!’ and she smiles because well, at least that didn’t change in the last hour. Katie still cared for nothing but herself.
JJ lets out an ‘oh’ in realization and brightens as they walk up to some kind of shed. Naomi wonders what’s going on and how Freddie thinks they can find Cook in his backyard, but doesn’t say anything. Freddie goes into the shed and JJ follows him immediately; Pandora shoots Effy a look and Effy shrugs, placidly.
But Naomi sees why JJ looked so excited after she heads inside too, because there he was, in all his glory.
Cook was sprawled out all over the floor, with his breaths coming out calm enough that she’s certain he hasn’t fallen into a coma, he’s just asleep. He’s holding onto a bottle of tequila, his lip is 스플릿, 분할 and his hair is a mess, but he’s fine.
And she feels relief and that surprises her, but when she looks around, she sees that same relief on everyone’s faces. It hits her that in such a short amount of time, they were all slowly becoming, well, friends.
It feels nice.
“Hmm, Naomi,” Cook’s eyes are still closed but that was definitely his moan, “You sure know how to suck--”
She flushes and kicks wherever she can reach him, which is against the sole of his shoe. “Cook!”
He snorts with laughter and opens one of his eyes as he props his elbows behind his head. “Tosser!” she hmphs at him but he’s looking at Freddie and Naomi can see there’s some tension between them, which instantly makes her think of Emily and that kiss.
“What’re 당신 fuckers doing?” Cook averts his eyes to the rest of the crowd and sits up straight, the 테킬라, 데 킬 라 bottle brought to his mouth right before JJ swoops in and steals it and tells him he’s had enough for now.
“Looking for you, wanker.” Katie folds her arms across her chest and turns her nose into the air, but Naomi can see there’s a hint of a smile playing on her lips. “I could have been with my boyfriend--”
“We get it, Katie,” Effy interrupts before Katie could start on how fit her boyfriend was.
“We were worried about you,” Freddie speaks up for the first time, and Naomi looks between the two. Cook’s grin falters, but it was back up before anyone else could see it and before she could think something of it. “Yeah,” Cook discards it and rises to his feet. He steals the bottle back from JJ and ducks underneath Freddie’s arm, out of the shed.
“I heard there was an underground rave tonight, 당신 comin’?”
Wanker didn’t learn a thing.
-
She wraps her 재킷, 자 켓 tighter around her as she walks 집 because it’s almost evening and the weather has turned colder, replaying all of today’s events. Freddie telling her he fucked up, Emily 키싱 her, Cook still being the jackass he always is. Idiot, she thinks. Could have been hurt, 또는 worse.
She hears someone’s heels click behind her and they almost sound familiar, which makes her want to laugh. Right, so now she could decipher footsteps. She sees the bus stop ahead and walks towards it, before she sits down on the bench to rest her feet. It’s been a long day.
Someone sits beside her and she’s surprised to discover she was right, because when she looks to her left, she sees Katie.
“My sister likes you,” she says, and all Naomi can do is look ahead, because she can’t answer that. She doesn’t know how she feels.
The sun sets down and the crickets begin to chirp as they wait for Naomi’s bus together.
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Ch 3: late 집 tonight, part 1
It’s Valentine ’s 일 and when Cook opens his locker at college, a few cards fall out. He grins and reaches down to pick them up, before he shifts through them. Twelve, ten from girls he’s never looked at twice, one from JJ and one from anonymous. He looks to his left and sees Freddie, who holds up a card similar to his, and he knows it’s from JJ too. Cook holds up the same card between his index and middle finger and Freddie laughs, shakes his head and puts the card back in his locker. Cook pockets it instead because frankly, it’s the only card he cares about.
He makes his way to go after Fredie and head into class, but then notices someone familiar and changes his course.
“Hey, babe,” he greets her cheerfully and his response is a shrilly “fuck!” that rings sharply through his ears. He winces, and Naomi turns to him, annoyed. “Fuck,” she repeats, trying to breathe even. “You fucking scared the shit out of me.”
“Yeah?” he sniggers and she rolls her eyes at him and turns back to close her locker. “I have that effect on people,” he jokes, eyeing her rather empty locker just before it snaps shut. Naomi smiles that ‘really? I couldn’t care less’ smile of hers and he laughs again, just for the fun of it.
He opens his mouth to say something, but a tap on his shoulder interrupts him and makes him look around. There’s a pretty girl, her 치마 so short that he can see her knickers, with a bundle of red 장미 in her hands. She hands them to him, looking a bit sourly.
“There will be more,” she tells him before going back to wherever she came from. He looks after her, watching her hips sway from side to side.
“I’m leaving now,” Naomi announces, but he’s too busy trying to look up the girl’s 치마 to really hear her. “Okay,” he responds distractively.
She sighs, exasperated. Boys.
-
Not even ten 초 after he has sat down in class, the very same girl in the short 치마 enters with another ten, twenty, thirty, roses. She hands them out to everyone and Cook sees Freddie get quite a few, but he himself still obviously held the record: almost half was dumped on his desk. He doesn’t even look at the cards attached to them.
“D’you think red’s my color?” he asks Freddie and bats his lashes like he thinks a girl would do. He can barely see his best mate over all the roses, but he sees how amused Freddie is.
“I bet JJ sent them all,” Freddie replies, which makes JJ look up from his desk. “I did not!” he protests, and Cook laughs.
“Excuse me,” their teacher, whose name he has already forgotten, snarls down at him. “I’m trying to teach, here.”
“Yeah?” Cook’s feeling a bit daring, and he ignores Freddie’s look that tells him to stop, “Well, maybe if 당신 did it a bit better, we’d actually listen.”
His teacher narrows her eyes.
“Would 당신 mind repeating that?” she leans closer to him and he flinches back as her breath washes all over him.
He waves his hand over his face, “Would 당신 mind taking a mint?”
She spat detention in his face.
“Thanks, but I already took a shower.”
She spat detention in his face twice.
-
“You’re a permanent resident here, aren’t you?” the teacher with who he has detention with asks him, because well, Cook has detention at least ten times a day.
Cook smirks in return, before he walks to his usual desk; but he stops half-way and stares, and then begins to laugh.
“It’s not funny, 당신 wanker!” Naomi tells him heatedly, arms crossed and a frown on her usual pretty face.
“This made my day,” he gestures at her sitting behind the 책상, 데스크 and well, Naomi being in detention would probably make every one of his days. He’d never seen it before.
“What’re 당신 here for?”
“Teacher said 부시, 부시 대통령은 was a far greater president than Obama would ever be. I said he was a wanker.”
He grins; of course Naomi did.
“I fucking hate Valentine’s Day,” she sighs after a while, her statement coming out of nowhere. Cook blinks, and looks at the 장미 he got and had brought to detention with him because they hadn’t fit in his locker.
“Want one of my roses?” he offers, and she looks back at him.
“I don’t want your pity,” she snubs, even though it wasn’t about that at all, and then adds, “And I don’t like roses.”
He raises his brow. “What do 당신 like?”
She looks a tad surprised he asked her that, but looks thoughtful. “Daffodils,” she finally 답변 and he nods like he knows what the hell those are. Naomi shakes her head, “You have no idea how they look like, do you?”
“Nope,” he 답변 because he really doesn’t give a shit about flowers. She opens one of her books, and he leans his arms on her 책상, 데스크 for a better view. She gets to a page and there it is, probably the ugliest 꽃 he’s ever seen, all bright and yellow and stuck to the page.
“Is it dead?” he asks while reaching out to touch it; she bats his hand away and childishly sticks out her tongue at him. It’s the first immature act, aside for the time she flipped him off, he’s seen. And it’s sort of funny, and when she realizes what she just did, she looks down and huffs.
“I think we just had a moment there,” he tells her solemnly.
She smiles. “I’m not giving 당신 a blowjob.”
“Aw, come on!”
-
It’s one 시간 later and Naomi has engaged herself with origami; Cook watches her make (stupid, frilly) things and wonders if it’s time to die yet. Even with Naomi, detention was boring as hell.
“Right,” the teacher that had to watch them rises from his seat. “I’m going out for a bit, an 시간 또는 so, I expect 당신 both to be here 또는 severe consequences will follow.” He glares at them both, 또는 what Cook assumes to be a glare, and leaves the classroom.
Party time.
Cook stands up from his 좌석 and wanders to the windows.
“What are 당신 doing?” Naomi whispers, as though the teacher was still there.
He opens one of the window, “I’m busting out for a while, 당신 coming?”
She looks at him, blankly, and he wonders if she’s considering the option. But finally, she shakes her head. “No! 당신 sit your arse down, I’m not covering for you.”
He shrugs, “Don’t have to. 당신 heard him, he wouldn’t be back for at least an hour.”
Naomi rolls her eyes, one of her 가장 좋아하는 hobbies, but folds her arms over her chest and stays where she is.
“Your loss,” Cook tells her, and then he’s out. He closes the window and waves at her and she gives him the finger in return.
He lights up a smoke and sticks it between his lips, before heading out towards the grounds. JJ and Freddie would probably still be there, waiting for him. They always did.
-
When he is at their oak tree, the one they always gathered under, there’s no one. He finishes his spliff and looks at his cell, just to see he had a text from Freddie; went home, it says, and Cook scoffs while he crushes the butt of his smoked cigarette under his foot. He looks down to see whether it was still burning but instead, sees something else entirely. It’s a 꽃 and it’s yellow and it’s sort of ugly, he thinks, and it looks a lot like that daffothing Naomi liked.
Cook takes it from the ground and examines it. It looked sort of nice, up close. He grins and a plan forms into mind, and he decides to head back into the building behind him. He walks through the college doors and whistles, imagining the look on her face when he presents her with it. She’d probably call him a wanker for leaving in the first place. He could say it was a make-up present, because he really doesn't have any other reason why he's doing this, really. Because she is his friend is one, but he doesn't want to look like some pussy.
He goes around corner but then stops in his tracks as he sees the sight before him. In the doorway, there’s Naomi. With Emily. Naomi's holding on to a red rose and they were kissing.
He turns back around.
-
Cook dumps the daffodil in a bin when he walks home.
****************************************************************************************************************************
Ch 4: late 집 tonight, part 2
She looks at herself in the mirror and sees nothing but her reflection staring back at her, telling her nothing.
This day, it was fucked. And not the detention either, but what happened after it. Cook had left for a smoke 또는 whatever, and after a while, she’d decided that she didn’t want to be stuck any longer and had gone out of the classroom.
Enter surprise number one, Emily. “Hi,” Emily had said, and Naomi had smiled at her. It was then that she’d noticed the rose in her hand, and Emily, seeing what she was looking at, smiled timidly. “This is for you,” she’d said, and Naomi had felt, well, special, as she’d accepted it. No one had ever given her anything on Valentine’s Day. “Thanks, Em,” she’d whispered, looking at the rose. When she’d looked back at Emily, the girl had moved in closer, and within seconds, had pressed her lips against hers. Her mind had gone blank and she’d just kind of stood there, before she’d briefly kissed her back, wanting to know what it felt like.
Enter surprise number two, Cook. Out of the corner of her eyes she’d seen him come around the corner, with something in his hands. It was a flower, and it was yellow, and it was a daffodil. She’d pulled away from Emily, but Cook had gone. What the fuck, it was like she’d imagined it.
“Um, so, would 당신 like to go to Karen’s Valentine’s 일 party, with, uh, me? Freddie invites us.” Emily had stuttered and brought her back to the real world, and after a long while, Naomi had said yes.
So here she was, trying to make herself look just a little bit decent, not knowing why.
Whatever. Time to go.
-
When she enters Freddie’s home, all she can really think is that the 음악 wasn’t as loud as when she was outside. Which sort of made sense, but whatever.
“Hi!” Emily shows up in front of her and startles her a bit, but she smiles at her. “I’m glad 당신 came,” the twin continues, and Emily takes her hand lightly. “Everyone's already here, come on.” They push through the crowd and Naomi doesn't know any of them; probably Karen's friends.
Upon arriving in the living room, she notices ‘everyone’ was a bored looking Effy and Pandora who appeared to be listening to JJ. She thinks she hears Freddie shout, “Karen, put some fucking clothes on!” somewhere, but she’s not sure.
“Hi,” she greets them all with a timid wave, and Effy quirks a smile, Pandora looks at her and waves, her smile much brighter than Effy’s, and JJ pops out an, “Hello, Naomi! How’re you?”
“Fine, thanks,” is her automatic response, watching how some bloke comes up to Effy and asks her to dance. Effy leaves them not soon after.
“I’m just going to find the bathroom, okay?” she tells Emily, who smiles at her and nods. She doesn’t really need to use it, but Naomi just wants to freshen up a bit and well, escape a bit, too. Everyone seemed to fit right in, but she didn’t feel like she did.
So she makes a beeline out of the room, in 검색 for the bathroom. She spends five 분 looking for it and finding nothing, before she sees Freddie, sitting on the staircase.
“Freddie, where’s the bathroom?”
“Somewhere,” comes the rather lame answer, and Naomi raises a brow. Freddie isn’t paying attention at all, he’s just staring at where a bunch of people are dancing; Effy was in the middle. She sighs, and climbs on the staircase to look upstairs. That boy had to grow some fucking balls.
She stumbles into the first room she comes across, looking around her to see where she was. It looked like a room, a boy’s one at that, and there was someone on the bed. She recognizes him instantly. He's on the bed, arms behind his head.
“Cook?” It’s 더 많이 of a statement than a question, because she knows it’s him. Cook tilts his head out of his arms when he hears his name, and upon seeing her, he nods in greeting. “’Sup, babe?”
“Where the fuck is the bathroom?”
“Down the hall, left.”
At least that was a proper answer, and she thanks him for it. She’s about to turn and leave, before curiosity hits her. “What’re 당신 doing in here?” Yes, she’s curious, about 더 많이 than just that. She’s curious as to why he’d left, and why he’d been holding a daffodil.
“Dunno,” was his reply and she walks a bit further towards the bed. After realizing that was the only answer she was going to get, she gnaws on her lip, deciding what to do: leave 또는 stay. She opts for the latter in the end. Cook watches her as she gets on the bed’s end, sitting on her knees.
“You know, I saw you,” and the daffodil, she pauses and waits to see some sort of recognition on his face, but he just looks back at her, as though saying ‘so what?’ and lights up a spliff.
She shifts from her position and sits down properly, tucking her legs underneath her comfortably. “I saw you, when Emily,--” she stops again, unsure why, before she realizes she’s embarrassed. Being kissed 의해 a girl wasn’t something 당신 talked about to a boy, right? A few 초 pass where she doesn’t really know what to say.
“Want to know a secret?” Cook’s still looking at her as he asks this, a smile on his lips, but it looks wry, like he’s mocking her. She’s reminded of his birthday, when he asked the very same question, but in a complete different way.
“I saw 당신 too,” he’s grinning now, and she resists the urge to roll her eyes: stating the obvious, much.
“It’s not how it looks,” Naomi doesn’t even know how it looked to him and realizes that line is such a fucking cliché, but she can’t help but defend herself. She doesn’t know why, it’s not like she really gives a damn about what he thinks (but she does, 또는 else she wouldn’t try and give him another impression of what happened). Fuck, this was doing her head in.
He doesn’t say anything for quite a while and she would have thought he’d fallen asleep if it wasn’t for the fact his eyes were still open and focused on her. And then, he sits up, his back against the headboard behind him, as his nearly finished cigarette almost falls out of his mouth.
“You should just fuck her.”
Naomi felt her eyes widen, taken 의해 complete surprise at that. Cook takes out his cigarette and flicks the butt to the ground; it flickers brightly on the carpet, and Naomi realizes that he could start a 불, 화재 like that, but she’s too baffled. What the hell was he talking about?
“I mean,” Cook continues, “You don’t know what the fuck 당신 feel for her, right?" Well, he was clearly 더 많이 observant than she'd originally thought. "So I say fuck her and find out, it’s the best way.”
“You’re fucking insane,” is all she can come up with. She feels annoyance bubble up in the pit of her stomach. “Is that what you’re doing with Effy, then?”
His eyes darken and his face contorts into what she believes is frustration and she’s taken aback, but she doesn’t back down. Naomi feels brave, even though she really shouldn’t because she has no idea what the hell she’s talking about either. But if he could talk shit about her supposed relationship with Emily, she could do the same. “You know Freddie likes her, so why do 당신 keep messing with her, with him? You’re supposed to be his best fucking mate.”
They’re just kind of staring each other out, now. She knows she shouldn’t have brought it all up, but she just couldn’t help it.
“Freddie likes her.” Cook 답변 after a 분 (she counted), “I just want to make sure Effy likes him,” he’s looking down now and starts to murmur, but she still hears him. “I don’t want her to fuck him up.”
“It’d help if you’d stop fucking her so she could pull her head out of her arse and realize she does, in fact, like him.”
Cook grins at that and he leans his head backwards, against the wall. “Yeah,” he’s not agreeing, she knows. It’s a maybe. Then he moves his head 앞으로 again, looking back at her. “She’s just a really good fuck.”
Yeah, he could never be serious, could he? Naomi rolls her eyes at him as he smirks back at her, but he grows serious after.
“So, 당신 and Ems?” he asks, as though they’d suddenly become best mates and was expecting her to tell him everything about her life. And Naomi wants to smile because well, they’d just had a real moment there. He’d proved he was human, after all. It was nice. He was nice, when he wanted to be.
“I don’t know,” she tells him, and she looks down as her fingers start to play with the end of her skirt. “I know something’s there, but I don’t know what it is.”
“Then find out,” Cook’s smile is genuine now, which is a nice change, she thinks. “And then 당신 can fuck her, and I’ll watch, yeah?” he laughs and she slaps his knee for a lack of anything else to do, which only makes him laugh harder. So she flips him off, which doesn’t work either.
“Yeah, you’d like that,” he winks at her, and she scrunches her nose playfully. They get interrupted when the door opens with a bang and a couple, making out, stumble in. Naomi feels a bit uneasy at their public display of affection for each other and is on the verge to tell them this, when Cook snorts with laughter.
“Freds?” he asks, and it’s then that Naomi realizes it too. It’s Freddie.
Freddie pulls back from the girl and Naomi does a double take.
It’s really is Freddie.
“What the fuck are 당신 doing in here?”
And Katie.
“Well, I think it’s time to get back to the party,” Cook clears his throat and looks like he’s trying his hardest not to laugh at the irony of it all. Naomi can barely nod, but allows him to pull her up right and they head for the door, together. Katie looks at her like she’s just betrayed her (or Emily), and Naomi frowns; yeah, she’s one to talk. Wasn’t she with Danny? And Freddie, shit. What was he thinking?
Cook rumbles through his pocket before he pulls something out and hands it to Freddie; it’s a condom, Naomi sees, and she wants to hit that boy over the head. What about Effy? she wants to ask, but doesn’t. It wasn’t her fucking problem.
The door closes behind them as they walk out, and all she can think is the 음악 is loud because she doesn’t want to think about Freddie and Katie. Cook looks behind her and smiles a bit and nods to indicate there’s someone behind her. “Tape it for me, yeah?”
She looks at him in confusion, and suddenly remembers the fact she still wanted to ask him about the daffodil, but she turns around and sees Emily, and the girl didn’t look happy at all.
“Emily!” she calls out, but the twin looks down and turns her back on her, before she disappears in the crowd. Naomi frowns and follows her, pushing against a few people to get through. This was the reason why she hated parties. So fucking crowded.
“Emily, would 당신 just stop?”
It takes a while, but Emily finally turns towards her, and she looks on the verge of tears.
“You disappeared into a room with Cook, for over an hour! I thought, I mean, Christ. Happy Valentine’s Day, Emily, I’m such a fucking fool for thinking that 당신 liked me.”
Naomi does the one thing that she knows will make everything clear, 또는 she hopes so, anyway. She leans 앞으로 and presses her lips to those of Emily’s and hopes she’s doing the right thing. After a while, Emily finally kisses her back, and Naomi pulls back from her. They stare at each other and she can feel Emily’s breath ghost over her lips when she finally says something.
“I don’t want to be your 초 choice.”
“I know,” Naomi sighs, momentarily distracted 의해 a laugh she recognizes as Cook’s, before she swallows. “You’re not.”
She’s doing the right thing (she thinks).
****************************************************************************************************************************
Ch 5: slow dancing in a burning room
Three days after Valentine's, there's another reason for Cook to have an excuse to drink and party. “We’re goin’ to the woods, we’re goin’ to the woods, we’re goin’ to the woods!”
He slings one arm around Freddie, wraps the other around JJ and holds them both in his grip as he chants those words over and over again. Freddie smiles but it’s gone soon after and he removes his arm. “Yeah, but 당신 have to promise me that you’ll be nice to Katie, okay? I had to convince her to let 당신 come.”
Cook grins at him and nods his head eagerly, before he ruffles JJ’s hair affectionately and goes back to packing all of the things he needed. Freddie checks his watch and curses, “Shit, we need to go, mate.”
They help him gather his stuff and then head outside, where the rest of the gang stood waiting. Cook realizes that it had been Katie’s every intention of leaving without him, but good ol’ JJ had requested he’d come, and Freddie had backed him up and convinced the twin that he should. He had to remember to be extra nice to her. At least until they got there.
Everyone’s there; from Effy to Pandora to Emily to Naomi, who quirks her lips into a smile when they come out. Freddie tells him to get their bags into the back while he gestures to his father’s 봉고차, 반 that he had borrowed.
“So, it’ll be a tight fit, but we’ll manage, yeah?”
Cook laughs and turns to JJ, winking at him, “You can come sit in the Cookie monster’s lap, J!” JJ flushes a bit and mumbles something he can’t quite hear, but he’s smiling.
After everyone dumps his 또는 her bags in the back, it’s a battle of who gets to sit 의해 who and where, and Cook knows Freddie wants him nowhere near Effy, so that’s where he sits, right 다음 to her, in the back. Pandora’s on her other side, and Naomi’s in front of him, 다음 to her Emily, 다음 to her JJ. Freddie looks at him through the mirror, telling him to behave and Cook smirks back at him and reaches out to Effy’s hair, twists one of her strands around his finger and rewards her with a grin when she lets him. Freddie’s nostrils flare and Cook knows he’s not really doing it to annoy him (maybe a bit), but because he wants to make a point. If Freddie couldn’t handle seeing him mess with Effy, he should dump Katie and take what he wanted. If he didn’t, well, then Cook would take what Freddie wanted.
“All set to go?” Freddie asks, hands on the steering wheel and gearing up to go, and Katie, who’s sitting 다음 to him, nods. She looks excited. “Ems and I used to go there every summer,” she explains, and she tilts her head to the side to smile at her sister. Cook sees Emily smile back at her, wants to 코멘트 on sisterly love, but doesn’t. He’d promised to Freddie that he’d behave himself, at least with Katie.
As Freddie begins to drive, Cook leans further into his seat, getting comfortable. After a 분 또는 two, he looks around. “We there yet?”
Katie turns her head to look at him, and she doesn’t look happy. “If you’re going to start that shit, 당신 can step out right now.”
He holds up his hands in surrender and keeps his mouth shut. For about forty seconds, anyway. He sits up and taps on Naomi’s shoulder, which she ignores. He tugs on her hair, twice, before she looks at him, brow raised, asking him what he wanted. “Ask her if we’re there yet,” he whispers, but Katie overhears.
“Stop this car, Freddie!”
He stops talking.
-
When they finally get there, after two long hours, they follow Katie (who asks Emily for directions) to where they need to be. Freddie comes up to him while he looks at the scenery; it’s trees, trees, trees, but he’s fascinated. It’s just him and Freddie as the rest walks up ahead, and they watch how JJ talks animatedly to Pandora for a while, before Freddie speaks up.
“So, what’s up with 당신 and Naomi?”
Cook doesn’t say anything for a while, just looks up at him. “What’re 당신 talking about?”
“Well, 당신 know, 당신 were with her in my bedroom.” Freddie looks at him like he’s convinced something had happened, and he wasn’t being informed about it.
Cook snorts and nods to Naomi, who’s walking, talking to Emily, “She’s with Ems.” he says, even though he’s not really sure if they really were 또는 weren’t together. Freddie shifts his gaze to the girls, like he’s contemplating the same thing, before he shakes his head.
“Yeah, but what were 당신 doing?” Freddie persists, and Cook wants to ask him why the fuck he cares so much. Shouldn’t he be fucking Katie while mooning about Effy?
“We talked,” he ends up saying, and Freddie stares at him for a bit.
“You can’t talk to me?” It’s the mother of all questions, and Cook doesn’t know how to answer that. Can’t answer it. So he doesn’t.
“You and Katie, eh?”
Freddie grits his teeth and Cook can hear it. But before he can say anything, Katie calls to them, saying that they were there. Freddie looks at him as if saying we’ll finish this later before he jogs to meet up with his girlfriend.
He doesn’t know what Freddie had expected of him (but knows that wasn’t it).
-
They spend the entire afternoon setting up tents; only to find out they didn’t have enough. There were eight of them, and they had three tents. In the end, they’d decided Freddie, him and JJ would share one, Emily, Naomi and Katie would share another and the last one was for Pandora and Effy.
It’d been funny, to see Katie get pissed over the fact she couldn’t set one up, but not so funny when they had to listen to her rant the entire time about how she used to be really good at it and that the tent was to blame.
After that, they’d gotten out the booze and sat around the campfire. Cook sang kumbaya twice before they begged him to stop and he didn’t know how many times Freddie had looked over to Effy while holding Katie’s hand. It was beginning to look just, well, sad. It was also beginning to get dark, and he watches how several stars appear and light up the sky.
“So, who wants to go find some 더 많이 wood for the fire?” Freddie looks around at the lot of them, but no one pipes up. He looks down at Katie, who smiles back up at him. “My feet hurt,” she tells him, and he frowns, but doesn’t tell her otherwise, because no one wants to go up against Katie when she’s pouty.
Naomi sighs, and stretches her arms, “I’ll go.” Emily opens her mouth, probably to volunteer to go too, but Pandora beats her to it. “I’ll go with you!” she stands up and dusts off her skirt, and Naomi follows her lead. “Do 당신 want me to go?” Emily asks, but Naomi shakes her head and smiles at her. “No, 당신 stay here.” Cook watches her hesitate before she briefly kisses Emily on her cheek, and then she takes Pandora’s arm and they head a bit further into the woods. Emily catches him looking and smiles at him, and he grins back at her.
He’s about to strike up a conversation with JJ when they get interrupted.
“Katie!”
All heads turn, and Cook thinks that accent sounds familiar and he’s right when he sees Danny coming from behind the trees, two of his 프렌즈 with him.
Freddie’s the first to climb to his feet and he pulls Katie up with him, his arm in her grasp, and the way he holds himself up gives Cook the impression that there’s a fight about to happen. He grins, finally some fuckin’ action. He claps his hands together and pushes himself from his seat, despite the look JJ’s giving him, which plain out says what are 당신 doing?
“What the fuck 당신 doing here, Danny?” Katie speaks up, and she releases Freddie to step ahead of him, to get a better look at what used to be her boyfriend. Her fingers curl into tiny little fists; it’s obvious she’s angry. Danny laughs, some sort of odd chuckle that makes Cook glance over to Freddie, who gives him a shrug in return. Wait for it.
“You left me!” Danny slurs, and he takes a step towards her, swaying a little. Cook’s sure 의해 now that he’s drunk, and he wants to laugh. Did he really think he could win Katie over 의해 following her into the woods, pissed off his arse? 의해 the look of utter disgust on Katie’s usual pretty face, it was clear that wasn’t about to happen. Danny takes another step towards her, but Katie spits at his feet.
“I left your sorry arse because 당신 fucking cheated and 당신 know it, 당신 bastard!”
의해 now, Emily’s up on her feet and she takes a few hesitant steps towards her sister, for moral support. Cook meets her halfway, ready to step in whenever Freddie wanted him to.
“Nobody fucking leaves me.”
And then it all happens in a flash; Katie screams and Freddie backs away and Danny laughs, while out of the corner of his eye, he catches sight of platinum blonde hair and thinks, Naomi, but he’s not quick enough to warn her, he’s not quick enough to warn anyone.
A gunshot rings through his ear.
Naomi drops the pile of sticks she’d collected and Pandora, who’s right behind her, holds her hand in front of her mouth in an attempt not to scream.
He’s not sure how long he stands there, trying to see what had happened and who’d gotten shot, and Danny’s still laughing and he wants to 펀치 the motherfucker. But he still has that gun and it’s still being aimed at his best friend, and Freddie looks terrified, but still holds his ground as he keeps Katie behind him, to keep her safe. It takes a while to get through to him, but Cook realizes no one’s got hurt and the stupid fucker had missed.
But he didn’t want to risk that again.
“Fuck, run!” he shouts, not knowing what else to do, and takes a hold of Emily’s elbow at the same time, “Now, run, fuck, run!”
“No!” Danny shouts, but he wobbles and falls to his knees, probably due to so much alcohol in his system. His goons don’t help him, they’re afraid to, they know it’s gotten out of hand but Cook’s not willing to wait and see what happens next. He turns on his heels, pushes JJ up and tells him to go, afraid his mate will get locked on because this was not the time. He still has a hold of Emily when they all run, pulling her along. JJ runs ahead of them, and Cook looks back to check everyone was getting away; he sees Freddie disappearing into the woods, a hold on Katie, and Effy’s on her way to Pandora, who still stands frozen. Effy urges her to go, and he hears how high pitched her voice is, like she’s on the verge of tears.
He spots the form of Naomi and she, like Pandora, is rooted to the spot. He wills her to leave, can see Danny getting back up, and then catches Naomi’s eye; she looks so fucking afraid he wants to turn back around and help her, but Effy pushes her, screams at her, and then Naomi breaks eye contact and makes a break for it, Pandora and Effy hot on her heels.
He loses his grip on Emily and she lets out a shrilly scream as she trips over a branch; he stops dead in his tracks and runs back to help her. JJ pauses and looks back at them, a few feet ahead, trying not to panic. Emily stands back up just when Cook reaches her, and he can see her knees are bruised and bloodied even though its pitch black and he has no idea where they are. First things first, they needed to get the hell away. “Come on, Ems,” he takes a hold of her hand, and they’re running again, and he never knew this wood was so fucking big.
But even as they ran, Cook knows Danny wouldn’t be going after them, but after Katie, after Freddie.
Shit, shit, shit.
He has to go back.
****************************************************************************************************************************
Ch 6: hero/heroine
This can’t be happening.
She’s never been this fast, she can’t help but think as trees pass her 의해 in some kind of blur. Effy is ahead of her and leads the way, even though Naomi knows she has no idea where the hell they were heading either.
She doesn’t even know what had happened; all she’d heard was a gunshot, and then Cook telling everyone to get the hell out of there. She had seen a glimpse of Danny and had put two and two together. And now they were just running, further and further from him. At least she hoped.
“Wait,” Pandora squeals, and she’s slowing down, breathing hard. “I can’t go on anymore,” she cries, and just 의해 looking at her, Naomi realizes this wasn’t some kind of game. They were really being fucking chased 의해 a scorned ex-boyfriend with a gun, and he wasn’t even hers. Son of a bitch.
They all stop, and Naomi has no idea where the hell she is. She looks at Effy, like she has the answer of what they should do, but Effy doesn’t. She hears a noise and her head shoots up while Effy tries to shush Pandora, telling her to be quiet.
Oh, please don’t let it be him.
They wait and she forgets to breathe, before two figures step out from behind the trees. Freddie, Naomi recognizes him, before she realizes the other must be Katie. “Effy!” Freddie bursts out, “Pandora, Naomi, are 당신 alright?” he’s looking at Effy as he asks, and despite everything, Naomi wants to roll her eyes.
“Is Emily here?” Katie demands of them, and Naomi shakes her head, swallowing. “I think she’s with Cook,” she replies, and she sub-consciously wonders how Emily is, how Cook is, were they alright?
“Katie!”
They all tense up and she feels rooted to the spot when Danny comes into view, still waving around that gun. His 프렌즈 are there, too, but they look a lot 더 많이 hesitant. “Fuck,” she hears Effy cuss, and Naomi dreads what’s about to happen.
“Katie, why’d 당신 leave me?” Danny wallows in self-pity, and if it wasn’t for the fact he was holding a gun, she would have told him to grow up and admit defeat. But he was, and it was loaded, he’d already proven that much.
And then it happens.
She sees a flash of something and it (a rock, she recognizes) hits Danny straight in the head. His eyes, surprised, roll in the back of his head and he falls down, and then the gun lays in front of him. His 프렌즈 turn to look at each other, unsure of what to do, but before they can do anything, someone runs out of the shadows and picks up the gun. He holds it in steady hands as he stands in front of them, like a hero coming to save the day.
She breathes out as relief fills her.
It was over.
“I think 당신 should take that fucker and leave, don’t you?” Cook snarls, and Dumb and Dumber nod at him, before they take the arms of Danny, who still seemed unconscious, and leave quickly. Cook lowers the gun when they can’t see them anymore, before letting it fall to the ground. And then she hears nothing but the rustle of leaves, as they stand in the middle of the woods, still tensed.
She feels a hand on her shoulder and it startles her enough for her body to go stiff, but then she hears Cook, and she visibly relaxes against his side. “Alright there, babe?” he asks her, and she elbows him lightly in an attempt to tell him that’s not my name. “Yeah,” she breathes and then her lips quirk as she tries to brighten the mood, looking up at him with a hint of a smirk, “James.” He snorts, grins and looks right back at her, and she’s not sure what to say aside for thanks.
But then Katie freaks out, just a little. “Where the hell is my sister?” she demands of Cook, who holds his hands up in surrender. “With JJ,” he replies, but this doesn’t stop Katie from getting right into his face. “She better be safe,” she tells him, and he nods, before he slowly points down at her chest. “I think your tits are about to pop out.”
“Cook,” Naomi hears Freddie warn him, but his voice is light, as though he wants to laugh. And she smiles because Cook always knew how to ruin the tension with something light hearted, the idiot.
“Ems?” she tears her gaze from Cook to look to the side, to where Katie now stood, and she faces her back. “I’m fine, he’s gone, I’m okay.” she’s on the phone, Naomi realizes, and she feels bad, feels sort of ashamed because, why didn’t she think of that? “Do 당신 know how to get back to the tents? Okay. I’ll see 당신 there,” her voice lowers a pitch, and she ends the call softly, “I 사랑 you, too.”
As she hung up, Katie looks back at them, even smiles when she sets sight on her. “They’re alright, they’re going back to the camp. I think we should, too.” Naomi bites the inside of her cheek to stop herself from commenting; funny how it seemed like Katie got a bit smarter in a crisis.
“Yeah,” Freddie agrees wholeheartedly, and Naomi sees him 덮개, 랩 one arm around his girlfriend’s shoulders. She looks back at Effy, who is looking anywhere but at them. She didn’t know who to root for anymore, so she wasn’t going to root for anyone. Pandora literally bounces up to Cook, and takes a hold of his arm. “Will 당신 protect me, Cookie?” the way she says it makes Naomi think of her like a child, and Cook laughs in response.
“’Course, Panda.”
-
It takes about half an hour, even though Katie probably took a detour because she couldn’t remember where the camp was anymore, until they’re at the camping pitch. They’re there first, and everything’s right where they left it. It’s eerily dark, and she almost expects Danny to show up again, and she’s not really sure if she wants to stay now. Her pile of sticks and branches are still right where she’d dropped them, and Freddie gathers them in his arms. He builds up another fire, and Naomi watches him trying to get the matches to work, only for the wind to blow the flame out again once it was lit. His third attempt at lighting it finally works.
“Emily!” Katie’s the first to notice the newcomers, and Naomi looks from the now lit 불, 화재 towards them. It’s dark but the first thing she sees is Emily holding onto JJ’s hand, and she wonders what’s up before she notices something’s not quite right with JJ. He’s shaking and his eyes are wide and frightful; she can hear him mumble, and Emily looks concerned. Freddie arises from his knelt position and Cook’s already half-way there, and she watches both of them take one of JJ’s shoulders and force him to look at them. She hears Emily tell them, “he’s been like that since 당신 left, Cook,” before she carefully releases JJ’s hand to walk towards Naomi.
“He’s having some sort of lockdown,” Emily tells her, her voice strained and tired. “I kept telling him everyone was fine, but he wouldn’t believe it.” Naomi murmurs an ‘ah’ in recognition as she watches the three boys. JJ looks a bit calmer now, he’s stopped shaking. And then, he wraps his arms around his two best 프렌즈 and holds them close, as if he’s afraid they’ll leave him if he lets go. Naomi can’t help but smile; she’s seen firsthand that while Cook could be a bastard, Freddie was a bit too self-righteous and JJ was a nut at times, these three were family.
“I’m glad you’re alright, Naomi,” Emily says after a while, and she turns to look at her. “Me too,” she tells her, and she means it, because Emily had become important to her, as friend, as something 더 많이 than just a friend.
But, her mind supplies, and she chews on her lip. But nothing, everything was fine. She really liked Emily, she was giving them a try. It just takes a while before 당신 fall in love, right?
“So what’re we doing now?” Effy pipes up once they’re all sitting around the fire.
“Sleep,” Cook says, as he stretches. “I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty fucking tired.”
And Naomi’s still not sure whether she wants to stay, but she can’t help but agree. She is tired, worn down from all of this, and all she really wants is some sleep. Maybe it was stupid of them not to just pack up and leave because of all of this, but she didn’t want their trip to be ruined because of this, even though it kind of was. Think positive, Naomi.
Yeah. If Danny came back to murder them all in their sleep, she’d totally blame Cook.
-
Yet, when she’s in the tent, zipped up in her sleeping back, she just can’t seem to fall asleep. She looks over at Emily, who is fast asleep, curled on her side. Katie’s 다음 to her, in pretty much the same position. Naomi watches them for a while, before she climbs out of her sleeping bag. No use just lying around if she could, well, walk around. She gets out of the tent as quietly as she can and once she’s outside, winces at the harsh wind as it collides with her figure.
She looks over at the 불, 화재 as it flickers, the flame smaller than before but still awake. And then she notices someone near it, and smiles softly upon closer inspection. “Couldn’t sleep either?” she asks as she walks closer.
Cook looks up at her as he blows out some smoke, and then he shrugs. “Nah,” he replies once she sits down 다음 to him, offers her his spliff. She takes it from his hand and puts it to her lips, taking a drag.
“Is JJ feeling better?” she 질문 after a while when she hands the cigarette back, and Cook nods at her. “Yeah, he’s fine. Took him a while to fall asleep, wanted to sleep with one of us but Freds convinced him it would be a little too tight,” he grins at her, and she returns it.
They sit in front of the 불, 화재 until it dies out, and when Cook stands up and tells her he’s going back to his bed, she arises just as quickly to take a fist full of his 셔츠 and to pull him towards her. He kind of stumbles into her and she entangles her arms around his shoulders in a hug. They’re kind of in an awkward position and her nose is pressing against his shoulder a little bit too hard, but he allows her.
“Thank you,” she mumbles into his shirt, and she feels him 옮기기 his head for a nod, and it lasts another ten 더 많이 초 before she releases him and looks down at her feet.
“G’night, Naomi,” she hears him say, and then there are footsteps and the sound of a zipper, a tent being opened.
“G’night, Cook.”
****************************************************************************************************************************
Ch 7: gonna take her 집 'cause she's over romancing
“This is the life, aye, lads?”
He stretches languidly, squints his eyes as he tries to look up, into the sun. He chugs back some of his 맥주 before he looks back at his companions, watching Freddie balance his skateboard on his two legs. They were sitting on Freddie’s 가장 좋아하는 홍어, 스케이트 ramp, just the three of them, the musketeers. Like it ought to be, he thinks, pleased.
“Yes!” JJ holds his 맥주 can out like it’s a sword and grins widely, though quickly retreated his arm when he nearly fell off the ramp. “What’re we going to do today, lads?” Freddie asks after a while, and Cook shrugs, leaning on his elbows. “Dunno,” he says, “Just sit here, drink, look at that hot girl’s arse over there.” At this, both Freddie and JJ turn their heads quickly, only to find no one there. When they turn to glare at their mate, they’re rewarded with a laugh.
“You know, speaking of hot girls,” Freddie starts, and Cook groans, “You’re not gonna talk about Katie now, are ya?”
“Oi, what’s your deal with her?” Freddie frowns, before he shakes his head. He didn’t want to talk about his girlfriend. “Nah, mate, I was talking about Naomi and Emily.”
“Emily’s great,” JJ pipes up and smiles, and Cook thinks he looks kind of love-sick-y. He clasps a hand around his mate’s shoulder. “I think 당신 have to grow tits to get her attention, J,” when seeing his friend’s crestfallen look, Freddie quickly adds, “But we like 당신 just the way 당신 are.”
“I