Secrets And Lies

Chapter 37: St. Patrick's Day Madness

Ryan

The halls were filled with people wearing green and acting like jackasses. Everyone wanted to be or thought they were Irish this time of year. It was just an excuse for everyone to get wasted. I hated this day, even more than Valentine's Day, which thankfully Axel kept low key without any grand gestures or expensive gifts. It was just the two of us enjoying each other in every possible way in bed, aside from actually having sex that wasn't oral.

Luke jumped in front of my path, breaking my trip down memory lane.

"Top o' da' mornin' to ya" He exclaimed with a horrible accent. " Where you be headed this fine mornin?'" He grinned.

"Not you too!" I rolled my eyes and sidestepped my friend.

I've been getting greetings like this all morning. Luke fell into step beside me.

"You coming to my shindig tonight?" He asked full of hope.  "It's going to be epic. Green beer, Irish music, and dancing. People getting wasted."

"And what do you know about Irish music?" I stopped and turned to him, narrowing my eyes.

He opened his mouth to answer. I held my hand up effectively halting his effort.

" 'Danny Boy' doesn't count. It's technically not even an Irish song, even if it's been adopted as one. It's written by an English lawyer. Even if it was Irish, You can't exactly play that on a loop."

"Well then Ms. Smarty pants, I guess my little songbird is just going to help me out in that department."

Again I rolled my eyes and continued my walk to the cafeteria. He put his hand on my shoulder and gave me his best pout.

" Pleeeaaassseee" He whined.

I sighed in defeat.

"Fine. I'll text you a list by the end of the day." He gave me a bone-crushing hug and literally skipped into the double doors of our destination.

I'm a pushover. I scanned the room and found our usual table empty. Weird. I sat down and went through my phone to compile a list of Irish music. I started with more known artists like Van Morrison, U2, The Cranberries, Hozier and The Corrs. I threw in a lot of traditional instrumental music to replace Luke's need for 'Danny Boy'. By the time I was finished, Quade sat down and slid my tray in front of me.

"What took you so long? I could have done it quicker myself." I shot him a smirk.

"Sorry, I kept getting bombarded with dumbass questions." He shook his head.

He had been asked questions about our traditions too?

The way people were acting you'd think they never met anyone with Irish roots. I'm sure that at least a quarter of the school had a smidge or two of Irish in them. But they chose us as living google. Maybe it was because they knew that we spent a lot of time in Ireland over the years.

My brother wasn't in the mood either. I had to admit that only half of my bad mood had to do with this holiday. The other half was the fact that my dad had decided to prolong his stay in the guest house, canceling his reservation at the hotel. Axel was too afraid to be the slightest bit intimate with me while he was there and we had gotten lucky on Valentine's Day, when my dad had to cover for someone at work. Other than that, intimacy was a no go.

Melinda had also  finished the guest room downstairs so she thought I should at least move my things there, knowing that I would end up sleeping in Axel's room any way, or he would come to mine. But that's as far as it went. I felt like when I finally got the nerve to be closer with him, we took two steps back.