"Outdone yourself, cap, truly." Gibs clapped Johnny on the shoulder, perhaps a bit too hard, causing Johnny to almost spill his drink off of the rim of the balcony. He was sloshed, and a messy drunk, as it was. Johnny just nodded dully and reached forward, grabbing ahold to the balcony so that his best friend didn't send him sprawling. "Can't believe you got us invited to this!" Gibsie bumped his hip against his girlfriend's, Claire Biggs.

Johnny found himself nodding again, eyes bleary from the alcohol and the heat. "Mm." He grunted out, before realizing it wasn't a proper response, and then corrected; "No problem, Gibs. They let me invite whoever I wanted." Johnny Kavanagh, the youngest Rugby star, outside center of Ireland, an international legend, bound for states. He'd been instructed by his managed (Christ, Johnny could still hardly believe he had manager) to attend the occasional party, keep up his public appearance. Helped with his reputation, some useless shite like that. When Gibs practically got down on his hands and knees and begged, he was forced to ask if he could bring his friends, to which his manager reluctantly agreed. Johnny didn't particularly know why he was in a shite mood. According to Claire, it was because he was missing his family. According to Gibsie, it was because he hadn't gotten laid in months. Johnny figured it was a bit of both.

Girls were clinging onto his arm all night, so it wasn't as if Johnny was optionless. But no matter how sexy the girl, Johnny just felt a pang of annoyance deep in his gut when the tipsy ladies hung off of his arm, purring in his ear and pressing their tits against his arm. Gibs would call him mental for refusing the offers, but Johnny wasn't in the mood. He was leaving as soon as he got the all-clear from his manager, and planning to collapse on the couch and watch the re-run of Love, Actually until he passed out. Shite craic, wasn't he?

Johnny swiped his hand down his face, trying not to pass out from exhaustion and beer. When his hand slipped back to the railing, his eyes peeled open and stared down at the wide expanse of greenery, the fancy house at which the party was held. Trimmed bushes stood in neat rows, flowers of magenta sprouting out from them, a line of trees near the pristine entrance gate. The trees, Johnny dully remembered from an extremely boring party guest who informed him, were tangerine trees.

Johnny traced the line of trees to the end, and was about to sway back inside and beg to go home, when his eyes paused on the last one. He waited a tick as his tipsy brain processed what he was seeing. There was a girl under the far tree. Johnny swiped his hand across his face again, seeing if she would go away. No. There was definitely a girl. Curled up under the far tangerine tree, legs pulled into her chest, a book tucked in her lap.

"Gibs," Johnny choked out, yanking on his friend's shoulder. "Tell me there's a girl there and I didn't hit my head." Gibsie craned his neck towards where Johnny was staring and frowned, his lips crinkling down in confusion. Johnny felt his tongue grow heavier in his mouth, his chest fluttering as he watched the girl, the little ball of light, the tiny outcast from the party. She was pretty, he realized, as he gnawed on her swollen bottom lip.

"Uh... yep, that's a girl, lad." Gibsie replied, not giving much thought to it. Johnny did. Johnny gave too much thought too it. Before he could think better of himself, he shoved his drink into Gibs' chest and stumbled into the kitchen, climbing down the steps to shoot out the front door, ignoring the grabby hands from drunk girls along the way.

Johnny didn't know what took over him, but he needed a closer look at the girl underneath the tangerine tree, the one reading when everyone else was drinking and fucking. Johnny saw two of her as he approached, merging back into one as he walked closer. One gorgeous, tiny tangerine girl. Johnny felt the alcohol flush his cheeks as he stumbled forward, moving on impulse.

"Tangerine." Johnny blurted out to the pretty girl.