Kiss Cam

Chapter 5

I slightly reconsidered going to the party when I realized that someone had finished off my cart. Why would I go to a hockey party if I'm not high? But Jessie the GOAT pulled through and let me use hers. Deciding on contacts after being high was not my best move but honestly, I don't care.

Jessie ordered us one of those expensive silent Ubers for no reason but I loved it. We showed up at that party 15 minutes early and stoned out of our minds. Jessie and I both know the hockey house like the back of our hands. It's where most of the parties happen plus it's where our favorite player on the team, Oliver, lived.

We knocked on the door and a tall man with dirty blonde hair opened the door. It was Ivan who smiled at us and led us into the mud room. As we started to try to go in further he frowned and said,

"No shoes! House policy!"

Jessie giggled, "Good luck trying to keep up with that. With your win tonight there is bound to be more people here than you can keep track of." He thought about it for a minute before realizing she was probably right and would just have to expect to clean the floors tomorrow.

Jessie kept her ratty old Chuck Taylors with every doodle imaginable on. I swear she's had those rats since seventh grade. One of them ripped on the side and had a massive layer of duct tape to keep her foot from falling out. It's okay, Jessie's black mini-dress was slaying tonight, and we had our hearts set on finding hot partners and getting out of there.

Three steps into the living room I see Oliver. Oliver is wearing jeans and his signature puppy dog grin. He watches Jessie, Ivan, and I walk in and he runs over to tell us he's excited.

"I am very stoked! So very stoked, Bailey, we win!" He was jumping and flailing his arms around exaggeratingly. It felt like I was watching my little brother again.

"Hell yeah, we did! You did amazing out there, Norway." I praised him and hugged him. I pulled away from the outrageously tall boy- I keep forgetting he's like 6'2"- and looked around the living room to try and find a drink and a spot to sit because my mouth is cotton right now.

I go and grab a red solo cup and fill it with seltzer, walk back into the living room, and plop my ass on the left side, draping myself over the arm of the couch. Looking around for Jessie, she seems to have gone missing in the kitchen or something because the only guys in here are the hockey players and a few others so I decide to lay myself down like a sickly Victorian child.

"Bailey, you good?" Atlas, the Greek student and fellow hockey player asks me from the loveseat. He looks over at me with a knowing glance as he knows my answer before I even open my mouth.

"High as a kite, man!" I exclaimed, stretching myself out like a cat, arching my back, and standing up to go sit on the floor near the other players. Quite a few of them laugh at my statement as they make room for me on the floor between their legs. "Living the dream."

"Oh yeah, looks like it," Ivan says sarcastically, and suddenly, everyone is giggling like ninth-grade girls at slumber parties.

"You know what, Ivan?" I smirk up at him on my left. "You're a lot hotter when I'm high."

Everyone is howling with laughter, even Ivan as he's wiping away stray tears from his eyes. We all recover and soon they're talking about random college shit like exams and girls.

I lose interest in the topic and lean my head back onto someone's thigh, turns out it is Oliver and he smiles down at me as they continue chatting. I close my eyes and sigh a bit as my neck stretches and the world becomes this peaceful sort of dizzy daydream. It takes a bit for me to regain that consciousness, the only reason I do is because I hear a familiar voice.

"Hey Bailey," a very deep, and very French-accented voice purrs from very close to my ear, "Fancy seeing you here."

I physically jump and yelp a bit, covering my heart with my hand and breathing deeply to try and regain that dignity I've now lost.

"Hey Louis, nice to see you." I guess I greet him a little too cheerfully because Oliver is not happy about it, his nose scrunched up in distaste. "Uh, team, this is Louis, Louis this is most of the hockey team."

Louis purrs out a sweet hello and Ivan is the first one to respond.

"Hey, you're the guy who made out with Bailey on the kiss cam!" As soon as the statement left Ivan's mouth I got up and smacked him upside the head.

"Shut it." I glared at him and sat down next to Louis again, looking through the faces of my teammates to see that they were snickering at my red face. "Anyways, yes this is Louis. He and I uh-" I stopped and cleared my throat, "kissed on the kiss cam."

"Yes, I had a very wonderful first experience of an American hockey game." Louis declared with an easy, handsome smile on his face and his hands rested on his knees.

"I promise they're not all like that!" I piped, my voice seeming to be a slight bit higher than usual. "I've never even been in the stands before so I'm sure if you go next time you can sit beside Juliette."

Louis seemed to frown a bit, his nose wrinkling and his eyebrows kneading.

"But, I would like to always sit next to you," Louis's hand made its way to my shoulder, "That was the best part of the game." I giggled like some high school girl, regained my bearings by clearing my throat, and pushed his hand off my shoulder. I looked at the other guys in the room to see a mix of expressions.

Oliver seemed mad like he didn't like Louis. Ivan had his normal RBF and stormy demeanor. Atlas was looking between me and Louis with a suggestive look. I was turning red, beat red. My face was the shade of a balloon you find in a carnival.

"Oh! Hey guys!", a cheerful voice cut through my awkwardness like a knife as my favorite senior ever, a British exchange student named Lynn, walked into the room and plopped onto the couch next to Oliver. "Bailey, come here! Let me do your hair."

Everyone looked a bit surprised and when I got up and scooched over to Lynn, Louis followed. I slid between Lynn's legs as she immediately started combing her fingers through my brown hair. I peered over at Oliver to see how he was doing with Louis so close and almost lost my shit.

The kid was a darker red than I was! Lynn was close to him, but I didn't think she was that close. I looked for the source and realized that one of her thighs was on top of his due to her crisscrossing. He tried to gently push her knee but she gave him a look and spread her thighs over him again, this time her knee was in his crotch. His face was almost purple now as he hid it in his hands.

Lynn continued to comb, braid, unbraid, and rebraid my hair as many times as her drunk little heart desired. As I could tell she kept messing up because she was too busy flirting with Oliver to pay attention to how big the chunks of my short hair were.

I ended up getting pretty tired of that fast and leaned my head on Louis's shoulder.

Wait what the fuck why am I doing this? I should move my head, this is awkward on his part. I didn't even ask him if I could put my head here. God, I'm an idiot.

I quickly tried to move my head but Louis rested his hand on top of my head and easily pushed it back to where it was resting previously. I quickly stuttered out an apology.

"I'm so sorry Louis, I didn't even ask and- Oh my god I'm so sorry, I can leave! Yeah, I'm sorry I'll leave-"

"No." He said quickly, interrupting me, "I liked that, you should put your head back where it was."

"O-oh," I stuttered, "okay!"

As soon as the excited words left my mouth, my high brain took over and I nuzzled my nose into the crook of Louis's neck. He smelled just like a stereotypical man. Musky leather and campfire smoke. My new favorite scent, as I drifted off to sleep.