The night of the party, Tyler and I show up at Sydney's house a few hours early to help her get everything ready. For safety precautions, she put all valuable objects that could get broken or stolen inside her parent's bedroom and locked the door, hiding the key in her own room.
The weather is nice tonight, so we set up outside to minimize the mess that will be left to clean up in the house. Her invitation was B.Y.O.B. (bring your own booze), but Ty, Syd, and I still put some money together to buy a few bottles just in case. Once everything is prepared, we head up to her room to get ready.
For tonight, I let Syd pick out my outfit and my overall look again, because she did a great job last time. I'm wearing a burgundy, lacy top, paired with a black leather skirt and matching jacket, sheer tights to keep me warm, and a pair of black ankle boots. Syd accessorised with a golden necklace, and completed the look with some light makeup.
As I look at my reflection in the mirror I'm feeling way more confident in the way I look tonight than I did last time I let Syd choose my clothes. This is more my style, and I've got to say, I'm feeling pretty cute.
By the time we're both done getting ready it's already 9pm and people should start arriving any minute now. Adding some finishing touches. we rush downstairs and wait for guests to start showing up.
Tonight, we took my car and agreed that I would be the designated driver in case Tyler wants to drink. "Can you promise me one thing?" Syd asks me.
"Depends on what that is." I respond.
"Can you promise me you won't let Mason ruin your night like last time we went out? And the time before that?"
"I promise. You don't have to worry. He doesn't affect me anymore." I assure her. "The only thing I feel for him is resentment." Sydney gives me a skeptical look.
"Okay that's not completely true, but it's 99% true." I say.
"You sure? I'm just looking out for you Mads, you can tell me the truth."
"I know, and I am! Seriously, you don't need to worry, I'll be fine."
"Okay good. Now take this," She says grabbing my wrist and placing something in my hand.
"What is it?" I ask right before she lets me go and I get to see what's sitting in my palm.
"It's the key to the guest room upstairs," she whispers in my ear, "In case you get lucky with Noah." she winks.
"Syd!" I protest but I'm interrupted by the doorbell ringing and Syd bolts to open it, leaving me no choice but to keep the key.
People start showing up and the music gets turned up as the party kicks off. I stay with Syd near the front door, letting people in and checking that no one is showing up uninvited. Once everyone in her mental checklist is here, Syd links her arm with mine and says "Let's go find Ty." So we head to the back, where the party is going strong.
We find him pretty quickly and walk over to him. "Heyy! There's my favorite girls!" He brings us in for a hug, clearly already a bit tipsy.
"How's everything going out here? Anyone thrown up yet?" Syd asks.
"I don't know, and I really don't want to find out." He answers in between giggles. There's actually not that many people here, Syd didn't want any strangers in her house, so she kept the guest list pretty limited, which ensures I know pretty much everyone who came. Oddly, I find myself looking for a specific green-eyed boy.
"He's over there," Sydney whispers to me as she takes a sip of her drink.
I look in the direction she pointed and there he is, Noah Reed in all his glory. He's sitting with a group of his friends, smoking a cigarette and looking bored. As he lifts his gaze he looks directly at me and I dart my eyes away as quickly as possible, addressing Syd again.
"How did you even know I was looking for him?" I ask her.
"Oh honey that's cute," she says patting my hair. "C'mon let's have some fun!" she says dragging me towards a big table where some of her girlfriends from the cheer squad are gathered around. They are joined by some of the guys from the football team and a few of them scoot over, making room for us and we take a seat next to Ashley.
"What were you guys doing?" Syd asks.
"We're getting ready to play spin the bottle, you guys want to play?" Ashley asks back. I've never played that game before. When we were younger and playing spin the bottle was very popular amongst prepubescent teens, I never joined because I didn't want to give my first kiss to a random guy in a childish game. I wanted it to be with someone I actually liked, and it was. I went out a couple of times with this guy a couple of years ago, he was really nice and he was the first guy I really ever had feelings for, but he had to move away and we lost contact before anything could really come of it.
I've always been very cautious with what I do, guarding my emotions because of my fear of being rejected. I realized that I've been hiding and shying away from everyone because I'm so afraid of what people might say or think about me. If I'm being honest with myself, being this way hasn't gotten me anywhere.
Thinking of everything I could be missing out on, simply because I decide to constantly play it safe. I don't want to look back one day and realize I've missed all of these opportunities to experience new things. What is the point of being cautious? Why not be reckless for once?
"I'll play" I blurt out.
"Really?" Syd and Ashley ask in unison.
"Mhm."
"All right," Syd nods approvingly, "let's get this party started, shall we?"
"We just need some more guys so that the boy-girl ratio is even. I'll be right back." Ash responds, getting up from her seat.
She comes back a few minutes later, and trailing behind her are Jackson, Tyler, Mason, and Noah.
Everyone starts looking for a place to sit. I'm in the corner of the table, Mason sits across from me, Tyler is next to him across from Syd, and Noah sits at the head of the table. Jackson eagerly takes the place beside Sydney and Ashley squeezes in next to Tyler.
"Okay, we all know the basic rules, but we're switching it up a bit!" Ash says standing up so that everyone can hear her.
She continues, "First round, just a peck on the lips. Second round, you have to kiss for at least 10 seconds," Okay, that doesn't seem so bad. "And third round...the couple picked has to go into one of the rooms alone, for at least 15 minutes."
Excuse me, what?
"Everyone got that? Great. I'm going first." Ashley says and spins the bottle before anyone can object. What did I get myself into?
It lands on Jackson and she leans across the table and gives him a quick peck. Jackson spins, it lands on Syd, same thing. Syd spins, it lands on Noah.
"I'm not playing, just watching." he says.
"Oh, c'mon Noah why not?" Ash asks, batting her eyelashes flirtatiously at him.
"Because I don't want to, Ashley. Now drop it." Noah replies seriously and an awkward silence falls upon the group.
"Okay...I guess I'll just spin again." Syd says and takes her turn again.
The game goes on like this for a couple of rounds until Mason spins and it lands on me. He stares, expecting me to make the move but my ass is glued to my seat. So he stands up walking around the table and bending down to kiss me. As our lips meet, I get the feeling that something is wrong, or at least missing. I always thought that after all these years of crushing on him, kissing him would feel different, that I would feel something but I don't at all. He holds my face to his for a few seconds before pulling away.
"That wasn't so hard now, was it?" he asks with a smirk.
I roll my eyes at his cockyness and stand up to spin the bottle.
"Oh, before you spin it, we're moving on to round two now, so whoever it lands on, you have to kiss for 10 seconds." Ashley ads.
Just my luck. I spin and as I nervously watch it go around I repeat to myself 'Anyone but him again. Please anyone but him.'
I watch the bottle spin and spin before slowing down and finally coming to a stop. I look up, tracing it's direction with my eyes and I'm relieved to see it landed on Tyler. He looks at me with wide eyes but doesn't move, I guess he's not sure I'd be okay with him kissing me, but he's my closest friend, I'd rather kiss him than any of these other guys who are practically strangers to me. So I stand up, walk over to his side of the table and kneel down next to him so we're at the same level, since he's turned around to face me but hasn't stood up. I place both my hands on his cheeks and bring my mouth to his. He noticeably tenses up, audibly drawing in a breath as our lips make contact. Thankfully, after a couple of seconds, he relaxes and starts moving his soft lips against mine slowly and carefully. Almost too carefully. I try to get him to loosen up by playfully nipping at his bottom lip, but that results in another intake of a sharp breath on his part. The rest of the group just stares and times us, which is a bit uncomfortable I'll admit.
"3...2...1"
The countdown ends and I pull away first, smiling at him to let him know not to worry, that it's not a big deal. His blue eyes just stay fixed on my face, and I push his stray hairs out of his face before going back to my seat.
The game continues and thankfully the bottle doesn't land on me again for a while. Eventually, we move on to round three, changing the rules as couples start getting paired up and go off to have their 15 minutes alone. Tyler gets paired with Ashley, much to her delight, and Syd is lucky enough to go off with Jackson, leaving me and a couple of other girls with Mason, Noah, and one other guy.
At some point, I'm picked, and I spin. It goes around a couple of times and then it starts slowing down, finally landing on Noah. I look at him, who stays silent casually smoking his cigarette, so I break the tense silence. "I'll just spin again." I shrug. But as my hand reaches for the bottle, Noah's hand reaches for mine.
"Don't." he finally speaks up.
"Why not? I thought you didn't want to play." I challenge him.
"I changed my mind."
His hand is still resting on mine and my skin is being set on fire. I just stare at him because I don't know what to say.
"Look, we don't have to do it if you don't want to." he reassures me.
"No," I say, "I want to."
He looks taken aback by my words. "You sure?" he asks, and I nod holding his gaze.
With that, he gently takes my hand in his and leads me inside the house.