Author's Note- Ugh! You guys spoil me. I love you all! And just for that very reason, here's Day 3! :D

Trying another new POV in this one. Enjoy!

Day 3- Gaming

(Post: What You do to Me- Pre: Played)

Dad broke down and finally got us a gaming console. The GameCube may be outdated, but that didn't make it anything less than an awesome gaming platform. Derek and I had built our childhoods off Nintendo, and the nostalgia of playing some of those games again was pretty cool.

Currently, I was kicking his ass on Smash Bros.

"You've gotten rusty, bro." I snickered, using Fox to kick his Kirby out of the arena.

"Shut up," Derek grumbled, trying to focus on his retaliation. He thought he had this strategy of using Kirby to absorb the other character's abilities- which, yeah, that's what Kirby did- and using multiple powers to defeat his opponents. More options, he'd said. He just wasn't too good at executing it. Fox hit harder than Kirby and the game wasn't really about strategy. More about aggression and follow through. You wanted to hit your opponents harder and faster than they could react to.

Meaning, with Derek's scientific brain always trying to analyze his every move and interpret the moves of the other players- well, he sucked.

"Yes!" I cheered, pumping my fist into the air once I took Derek's fifth and final life. "Suck it," I smirked over at him. I could see his jaw working despite his apathetic expression as he glared at the screen. He tried to act like losing didn't bother him, that it was just a stupid game; but Derek had always been a sore loser.

"Rematch."

"You're on."

"Hey guys."

We glanced over our shoulders and up from our position of lounging on beanbags on the living room floor. Chloe walked up to us and smiled a knowing smile at the television screen.

"Hey Chloe," I greeted. Derek's lips quirked up from his previous scowl but he didn't say anything, just looked at her expectantly. The poor puppy was head over heels for our band of misfits' sole necromancer, sulking one minute, then jumping up, tail wagging and tongue lolled out the moment she stepped into the same room. I chuckled at the analogy.

It had been nearly two years since I'd kissed Chloe. Even though, for the first few months, that hadn't really been a pleasant memory, seeing how much my brother and one of my closest friends loved each other had helped me realize that there had never been a chance for Chloe and I. Not even a little. And I was cool with that. Really, cool with it, actually. I liked her, sure. A lot. And the rejection stung for a good minute. But there was something bigger than Chloe choosing my brother over me. An invisible force that connected them that transformed my regret from her denying me for someone else, to me having gotten in their way in the first place.

Now it was all just water under the bridge. Derek was my brother and Chloe was my best friend. All I cared about was seeing them make each other so happy. Even if they argued a good chunk of the time.

"You guys aren't giving that poor thing a break are you?" Chloe said, pulling me from my thoughts. "You've been at it since Kit brought that home hours ago."

"Well, Derek refuses to stop until he's actually won a match. So, really, it could take a while."

I dodged the pillow he had pulled off the couch and chucked at me and met his glower with a cheeky grin.

"Can I try?"

"You like to play?" I asked her. She shrugged.

"Yeah, but I haven't exactly played any videogames in a while. I think the last time I did was with Rae when the Edison Group had us in the lab. We played Legend of Zelda and I enjoyed it."

"Awesome. Then you'll like this game."

Derek reached up to the entertainment shelf and grabbed a third controller. He plugged it into the console and handed it to Chloe. She took it with a smile and sat down beside Derek's beanbag and leaned against it, her arm pressed against his.

"You can play as either Link, Zelda or Ganondorf in this game." I explained as I took us back to the character selection page. Chloe chose Zelda, remarking that it was cool to play as the princess for once instead of the hero. Then she raised an eyebrow at Derek when he- once again- selected the pink puff ball, Kirby.

"He's got a 'strategy' with that character." I muttered, using my fingers for air quotes on the word strategy. Chloe rolled her eyes but Derek grumbled something about there being more pillows on the couch behind him.

When we started the match I quickly realized that if Derek was bad, then Chloe was awful. The first match didn't even last five minutes as Chloe kept falling off the arena and didn't know the controls well enough to save herself. On the second match, Derek leaned over and explained all the controls to her. We let our players stand idle while she practiced with the buttons a little bit. She got a little better by the third round.

On the fourth match I noticed out of the corner of my eye Derek leaning over and whispering something into Chloe's ear. Probably just encouragements since, quite frankly, she sucked. But then she got this strange smirk on her face. I shrugged it off and concentrated on attacking Derek's Kirby. Chloe easily killed her player herself more times than Derek and I did.

It took me a couple minutes, though, to realize that neither Derek nor Chloe were going after each other.

"What the hell, you two are ganging up on me!" I exclaimed, dodging the pokeball Derek hurled at me and Chloe's zapping attack.

She giggled and he grunted an affirmation before knocking me out of the arena.

"You dirty, cheating-"

"Hey, you're just mad that you didn't think of it first." Derek rumbled, knowing full well that if I had asked Chloe to team up with me against him, she would have. And she would have.

Two minutes later, I was out.

"Yeah, congrats." I muttered dryly as they boasted and threw me some trash talk. Then I tossed Derek a sardonic grin. "But it doesn't count as a win. Not unless you beat Chloe."

His response was instantly charging Chloe's player, gearing up for an attack.

"Damn, bro. That's cold." I laughed, but stopped short, staring at the screen in shock when Chloe suddenly used Zelda's transformation to turn into Sheik and expertly maneuvered out of Derek's assault before blowing him out of the match.

The living room went quiet. Derek and I shared a perturbed glance before looking questioningly at Chloe.

"Huh. That was lucky, wasn't it?" She murmured in mock innocence.

Only, it wasn't luck. Derek's last two lives were quickly and deftly taken by Chloe's abrupt and dumb-founding skill. As if her inner gaming freak had suddenly awakened and she knew all the right moves that would blow Derek out of the water…

Or she had suppressed it until then.

When the game announced Sheik as the winner, Chloe grinned and chirped, "Wow, thanks for that, guys! This was a lot of fun!"

Then she promptly turned towards Derek, leaned in and pecked his slightly gaping, shell-shocked lips – his disbelieving eyes never left the television screen- then stood and skipped from the room.

"Pfffffftahahahahaha!" It took a few seconds before laughter erupted from my lips. My lungs heaved for oxygen as I fell back into my beanbag and gripped my gut and whooped with wave after wave of laughter.

"Oh-ho, oh man! Aha! She to-hotally hu-hustled you, man!"

Getting to see the stupefied- if not slightly amazed and admiring- look on his face was priceless and it made me all the more grateful that Derek had wound up with Chloe and not me.

Because, not only did she enjoy making him happy- in ways that Dad and I couldn't- but she also enjoyed torturing him as much as I did.

Simon's POV is not the easiest to write. What did you guys think? I personally don't think it's as good as Day 1, but I'm still pretty fond of it. Until tomorrow, review and Happy Halloween!