Page 20 of The Secret We Keep
My feet stop. “Definitely. But I’m in the mood for a walk.” I start moving again, ignoring the irregular thudding in my chest.
Morgan takes a breath before she begins following me. And for that, I’m grateful. Because all I want to do now is spend more time with her.
You've gone quiet on me
Morgan
Fiveminuteslater,andwe’ve made it onto the country road that leads straight through Stoney Grange to where I live. I want to ask why we’re taking the long way back to mine instead of cutting across the fields. But it’s late, and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t enjoying the company.
He holds open the gate next to the cattle grid. I don’t miss the way he looks me up and down as I pass him. It makes me feel strange. All tingly and self-aware. Like I’m standing naked in front of him and he’s seeing every part of me. It’s new. Odd. Kind of nice in a really painful way.
He’s never looked at me like this in all the times that I wanted him to.
“If you’d have told me yesterday that Paddy O’Keefe would be walking me home after I found his lost puppy, I’d have laughed in your face.”
He smirks. “You don’t have to use my full name every time you refer to me you know. Only my mother does that.”
I shrug as we continue walking. “Guess it’s out of habit.”
Paddy makes my insides twist when his dark brown eyes land on me. “Oh yeah?”
I give him a nervous glance. It suddenly occurs to me that Paddy and I may have grown up in the same village, and he may be one of my best friend’s older brothers, but we have never been alone like this. Not since the night I told him I thought he looked cute after drinking too many jelly shots at his nineteenth birthday. Of course, I wasn’t actually invited, but Fi had a few of us over while Paddy and the other boys all went out.
He came home blind drunk, stinking of cheap vodka. We watched him trying to sober up with his head over the toilet and I found myself taking care of him. Short of rubbing his back and telling him to drink plenty of water, he asked me how he looked. And my sixteen-year-old-self gave her own half-drunk reply.
“Really cute.”
The ground should have swallowed me whole. Paddy’s reply was one I’ll never forget either.“You’re not so bad yourself, curly fries.”But it didn’t matter. He was drunk, and the next morning when he woke up, he never mentioned it. Never once acted like we’d had a conversation.
And that’s when I tried shutting the door on my feelings for Paddy. I locked so much away around that time. A time when everything got turned upside down.
There was a shift. A monumental changing of the tide. Lives that needed living.
Suddenly we weren’t kids anymore. There were jobs to be found, girlfriends and boyfriends that needed us. Well, needed everybody else except me. I can’t explain it, the loneliness. The void. A moment in time where I got forgotten. And now…
“You’ve gone quiet on me.” Paddy’s softly spoken words pull my train of thought.
“Just thinking.”
“About?” he says back, staying close enough to me that our arms brush.
It makes my heart race, but I doubt he even notices. I give myself enough time to think about my next words. “About the past.”
“That’s deep.”
A small smile graces my face. “Not really.” I peer up at him.
He looks down at me with a soft, curious gaze. “Anything in particular from the past? Or are we talkingallthings that have passed like The Black Death or Spanish Flu?”
I shake my head with a light chuckle. “No, nothing like that.”
We round the corner at the top of the hill overlooking the small graveyard. “What about this bus shelter? Remember this?” Paddy lifts a hand, pointing to the wooden frame. It’s old, with closed sides and an open front. “Because I seem to remembersomebodywriting that I liked oral sex, along with my home telephone number.”
A burst of laughter rushes out of me. I lift a hand to my mouth. And snort. “Oh, God, I’m so sorry.” I stop walking. “It was Fi’s idea.”
He shakes his head but smiles widely when he turns to look at me. “I don’t know,” he sings playfully. “I seem to remember finding you on your own in here on more than one occasion.”
“Hey, this is a village don’t forget. Bus stops take the brunt of rebellious kids and their antics.”
