Her List of Kisses

Chapter 15- Drinking Games and Gemma-The-Bitch

“Hurry up, Kate, we’re going to be late!” I groan.

My best friend has been locked in the bathroom for the past half an hour, plaiting and loosening and restyling her hair, knotting her hands together, and then changing her mind. As much as Joey’s party should be awkward at best for me, for Kate it’s a whole other realm of uncomfortable.

“Okay, fine. How do I look?” she says, throwing the door open far too hard.

I don’t answer. I am too busy thinking fine, fine, fine, and picturing the glaring anger on Will’s face as he spat that word at me.

“Um, Chloe? A little help here?”

“Oh sorry,” I blink my eyes and shake my head. “You look…” I take her in. She wears a short, tight black dress, high heels that make her just on the safe side of intimidating, and a glistening crystal hairpiece in her straight hair. She is gorgeous with substance. “You look like a woman on a mission.”

“Good answer,” she grins.

“What about me?” I say, somewhat reluctantly, picking at the hem of my top. I wear a moderately cropped, tight top, and skinny disco pants. In clothes that make my skin feel less than skin, I am completely out of my comfort zone, but Kate insisted upon them right after I told her Will was going.

“Hotter than fire, my friend! He’ll get so jealous!” she’d squealed. I don’t know why she was excited about that. The point wasn’t to make him jealous- I just wanted him to keep his distance so I’d forget how much I wanted him. Kate, however, didn’t seem to see the sense in that.

“Right, okay, so let’s get going then,” I say.

“Yep! I’ll just grab my purse then we’ll go,” she says. And then, “Shit! Where did I leave it?”

Another twenty minutes later, we finally arrive at Joey’s house.

Music pounds, but it’s a different type of music to that of Kelly’s. This music is for when you’re drunk- the words are barely decipherable and the general impression you get is that there’s a thumping heart behind the notes to hide their lack of invention. A rapper rants in the background, but nobody can sing along because his words spill out so fast. Immediately, my head spins- perhaps that was the plan. I imagine that this noise is what goes on inside a boy’s mind.

“I’m gonna get a drink or two, you coming?” Kate says. I nod. It will be weird to actually spend time at a party with her, after all the times she’s taken off with one or both of her boy toys.

“Yeah, right behind you,” I smile, trying to walk to the beat and ending up almost jogging.

We find Jenna and a group of friends, and become engrossed in a selection of drinking games. Before long, Kate and I have both been given dares; she dances suggestively on the table while the boys take glances up her dress, and then, when her dare is fulfilled, Jenna turns to me.

“What to do, what to do…” she slurs. “Help me out here, guys? What shall we make Chloe do?”

The group of participating boys huddle together in their little bromance way, a woozy jury deciding my sentence. Someone spills their drink down Sid’s shirt, and he grabs a fistful of the poor guy’s hair. Minutes later, they’re both laughing.

“A kiss!” one of them calls, just when I was daring to hope they had forgotten about me.

“A kiss with who?” Jenna presses. My heart pounds. Who will they choose?

“With me,” say two guys at once, entering from opposite ends of the room.

From the left comes Josh Gibbons, grinning with his lopsided grin and shrugging it off as if it’ll be a laugh, easy and enjoyable, like most of the time I spend with him. From the right emerges Will, his black shirt half unbuttoned, the sleeves showing off his muscles, and his hair tousled in the way I like it best.