broken | shyland ✓

chapter eighteen

s h a n e

a/n: to avoid confusion, dan is dan howell. daniel is daniel preda. i'm so hungover right now.

'please, shane?' joey begged, elongating the words as much as he could. i smirked, playing hard to get with a simple shrug.

'i don't know, who's going?' i poised, raising an eyebrow and trying not to laugh. 'i'll have to check my schedule.' he broke out into a grin, shoving me playfully and yelling for daniel to come over.

the tall, newly dark-chocolate-brown haired boy walked over from garrett's dining table with a wry smile. 'what now, princess?' he asked with a roll of his eyes, perching on the arm of the sofa in which the two of us sat.

'shane should totally come to your party tonight, right? he keeps talking shit about his non-existent schedule.' joey probed, leaning into his boyfriend's arms.

'c'mon, it's my birthday, and we're holding it at my place this year, not joey's.' the darker boy added, quirking an eyebrow.

i grinned widely. 'fuck off, it's at daniel's?' they nodded. 'well, i can't pass down the chance to go to the preda mansion, can i?' daniel flipped me off, whilst garrett and joey cheered excitedly.

joey showed me the invite list displayed on daniel's phone. it was a secluded party, only a few people coming, a "boys night" they had labelled it.

my eyes scanned through the names. dan, phil, garrett, drew, myself and then my eyes fell on ryland. why did he have to be coming? i couldn't hide the fact that he still made my heart beat so fast, or that he still caused pins and needles all over my body. but i was mad at him.

he had basically called me a man-whore, saying that i used garrett and that he wouldn't kiss me because he didn't know where i'd been. somehow, i had been displayed as the one in the wrong, yet again. sure, maybe i'd told a little lie and said that garrett and i stopped hooking up months ago, but still. i poured my heart out to him that night, saying that three words were not enough for the indescribable feeling i felt towards him. he said he felt the same way. evidently, he did not.

'i don't know, i just...' i mumbled, his name seemingly standing out among the others.

at this point, all three boys were begging me. garrett has crawled from the floor and onto the sofa next to joey, whose back rested against the soft fabric of daniel's shirt.

'c'mon, shane, please?' garrett begun to plead next to my ear, giving me a puppy-dog eyes look. the other two laughed and copied him.

i caved in with an over exaggerated sigh. 'fine, okay. but if i feel bored or uncomfortable at any second–'

'then i'll be right here.' the blonde boy whispered, giving my arm a friendly squeeze.

we spent the next few hours at the mall, picking up as much alcohol as possible and throwing it into the shopping basket. garrett and drew were jumping through the store picking up every drink they could find and tossing it into the trolley, assortments of smirnoff vodka, cherry liquor, tequila beers and multiple bags of brightly coloured shot glasses.

'remind me how we're doing this again?' joey hissed under his breath as daniel caught up with the two skipping boys ahead of us.

i smirked. 'my brother, jacob, lost his id card so got it replaced with a new one. i found it last night when looking for his old call of duty dvds under his bed, and since i'm the spitting image of him except his hair is buzz cut and mine is in a quiff, my plan is to use it until he finds out.'

'you're so lucky to have an older brother,' he whined in reply, 'he's twenty-two now, right?'

i nodded, grinning as drew threw himself onto garrett piggy-back style, kicking his ribs to make him run faster. 'we're gonna get kicked out this fucking shop if we don't hurry up.' i smiled at joey, who giggled in reply as we followed the three maniacs ahead of us. the purchasing of the drinks at the cashier went well, with me using the nonchalant excuse of looking young for my age and leaving with the big bags of drinks.