Johnny was exhausted. All day, he had been pissed off and pissing off - shoving the boys around the pitch with a scowl on his face like the Grinch on bleeding Christmas. He'd been running on empty since last summer after playing a challenging course in Europe, just to return to an intense conditioning camp in Dublin, and then thrown back into rugby at Tommen college. It was requiring constant energy and dedication that he lacked. Not to mention the stupidity of his team members recently. It's like they were trying to test him. Their plays were sloppy and disorganized. So, you couldn't blame Johnny when he saw a girl stumble onto the field in the middle of practice, and sent her a glare, barely acknowledging her. He wasn't just angry at her, but at his team, for how fucking bad they were. The lads were shouting at her to get off the field as she scurried away, Johnny felt his anger grow.

Johnny couldn't stand it any longer after throwing a ball at the face of a useless eejit on his team and then getting yelled at by coach, he threw the ball and kicked it with his foot as hard as he could, not bothering to track where it landed. It wasn't until the coach swore in the middle of lecturing him that Johnny realized his mistake. Johnny located the crumpled ball on the side of the pitch, and the same girl who had been prancing around on the field, lying on the ground and clutching her head.

Fuck, Johnny swore in his mind and rushed over to her. The last thing he needed was an assault accusation on his hands. After an awkward interaction with the tiny girl, who was covered head to toe in mud and clutching her forehead, she started to cry. It tugged at Johnny's chest uncomfortably, watching the tiny, young thing sob like that, because of him. He felt like a right dick. As she rejected Johnny's help to lift her up, and she moved the hand holding her skirt up to her temple, her skirt fell away in an instant.

Johnny's eyes widened of their own accord, an unfortunate reaction of seeing a female's underwear. Wolf whistles and cheering erupted from the lads. "Go on, gorgeous!" "Give us a twirl!" The shouts rang out, to which Johnny promptly growled at them to shut up and fuck off. He was a dick, but he wasn't the kind of guy to take advantage of a young, muddy girl in her panties. Johnny reached for his jersey and slipped it over her muddy curls, watching as it engulphed her whole body. He wondered if she was even old enough to be in secondary school. She didn't look it. She looked so disoriented, Johnny worried he'd given her a concussion.

"Look, alright," Johnny grabbed her pink backpack off of the ground and her ripped skirt, slinging it over his shoulder. "I'll take you to the office." Fucking hell. Johnny tucked her skirt into the waistband of his shorts, placed his hand on her back, and tried to coax her up to the hilly bank separating the pitch from the school grounds as she wobbled like a baby foal.

Twenty minutes later, Johnny sat on a bench in the school after being lectured by the principal and told that her parents would be there to pick her up. The girl was nuzzled against his chest as Johnny sat frozen, stiff like a board. Johnny leaned down and cupped her face in his hands, trying to keep her conscious as her eyelids fluttered. "Hey... girl?" He asked lamely, because he didn't know her name. Christ, he'd almost killed her, and he didn't know her fucking name. "Hey, hey, look at me. Look at my face." And she did.

She opened her eyes, and fuck me, Johnny thought, unintentionally sucking in a sharp breath. Jesus, this girl was beautiful. He'd noticed it earlier, of course. But now, seeing her up close like this, being able to count the freckles on her face - eleven, by the way - it was hitting home just how pretty she was.