About Us

Three

Spin the Bottle

If there was one thing in middle school that will always keep haunting and horrifying me, that would probably be my first kiss, which I received when I was still in seventh grade. It was a fine Tuesday morning when Julian Martinez, one of our classmates, decided to invite us to play Spin the Bottle. Thinking it was a cool idea, my friends and I joined in. We formed a circle and sat on the floor, Xavier Graham and Sam on either side of me. Julian, being the host of the game, placed his hand on the bottle and spun it around. Once the bottle stopped, it pointed to Xavier, which means he'll have to do whatever Julian dares him to.

"I dare you to," Julian, a mischievous smile on his face, looked around. Then, he turned back to Xavier and said, "kiss the girl next to you."

My mouth went dry and I could feel shock and nervousness building up inside me for I was the only girl beside Xavier. But even before I could protest and say it was a stupid idea, Xavier had already nodded, agreed. He made me turn to him, pulling my face closer.

And that then, I received my first kiss.

The kiss had lasted for like two or three seconds. But since it was my first time ever to be kissed by someone, it made me feel really weird.

Once Xavier pulled away, everybody were already staring at the two of us, different priceless reactions on their faces, as if we had just done something ridiculous or some kind of crime or mischief. One of the reactions I remember the most was from Tristan, who had this ridiculous grimace on his face. Thankfully, Julian decided to break the ice by clasping his hands together and saying, "Okay. Next. Your turn to spin the bottle, Xavier."

From that day on until the end of middle school, our batch mates teased us endlessly about the kiss. It pissed me off, of course, for every time I entered the class, people would start interrogating me, asking if Xavier and I were dating, which was stupid because we don't even like each other and we just kissed because of a fucking dare.

One more annoying thing I had to bear with after sharing my first kiss with the boy who's considered as the campus crush were his fangirls, who got jealous and kept on shooting hate at me like I was some bitch who seduced Xavier to kiss me. Sometimes, I wonder if they had common sense. Do they even know what a fucking dare means?

Such annoying aftershocks did not stop until we were in freshman year, the first year in high school. That year, all the rumors and teasing slowly died down. Our batch mates finally found a new topic to make a laughingstock out of or spread rumors about. We entered a new stage of school life and finally got to move on from the horror that middle school was.

"Drew?" someone tapped my shoulder, pulling me off my train of thoughts. I looked up to meet Xavier's gaze. "Have you received the invitation?"

"Why are you even inviting me?" I asked, showing him the invitation written on a blue piece of paper that I found on the door of my locker. "You know I don't join parties."

"Yeah, but," he furrowed his eyebrows, "Tristan was the one who had this idea to invite you to the party, you know. I mean, I also wanted to invite you but I knew you never liked parties so I had some doubts. But, Tristan insisted and-"

He trailed off, as if he realized he had just said something he shouldn't have. "D-Did I mention anything about Tristan?"

"Yeah," I nodded. "You actually mentioned his name twice."

"Fuck," I heard him mumble. "Nevermind. Just tell me if you're going."

"Uh," I cocked an eyebrow, "okay..."

After Xavier was gone, I decided to call Sam, asking her if she was going to walk home with me.

"I'm in detention," she said softly, almost whispering. "I can't go with you."

"What'd you do?" I asked.

"Killed some bitch," she answered. "It's okay. No need to wait for me."

"Your mom thinks I'm a bad influence to you."

"Of course not," she assured. "Don't worry, I'll be the one to defend you if ever she confronts me about it. Okay? Okay, I have to hang up before Mrs. Harris catches me and glares at me for two months. Bye."

Before trudging down the hall and walking out of the campus, I looked back at my locker and saw a piece of paper, not the one Xavier has given me. I took it and realized it was a paper plane. I unfolded it, curious and wondering if it was some kind of prank. But, nada. Nothing was written inside. Blank.