AN: Trying to get another chapter or two in before I go back to school next week :) Lots of teenage drama in this chapter lol because of course! It's a game of truth or dare at a high school party! XD
Trigger warnings: highly toxic relationship (manipulation, harassment, non-sexual non-con, aggressive physical treatment).
Evie and Carlos entered the kitchen, eyeing the state of complete disarray Anthony and his buddies had left it in with disgust and annoyance, already feeling exhaustion at the mere thought of having to clean it all up the next morning.
"They can be such pigs sometimes," Evie sighed as she refilled her cup with lemonade and got another coke for Ben.
"Yep," Carlos agreed as he grabbed a can of root beer for himself and a bottle of Mal's favourite beer, "You've got quite the classy guy on your hands."
"Carlos, please don't start," the brunette requested tiredly.
Anthony was really the only thing that always led to an argument between the two best friends. Evie really hated that there even was something that could make them argue with each other and that it was no one else's fault but her own.
Therefore, she relentlessly avoided talking about him with any of her friends, really, as much as she could. It was mentally tiring and often very difficult, having to be so cautious about not talking about a pretty big part of her life, but nevertheless absolutely necessary in order for her to keep both her cherished friendships intact as well as her boyfriend satisfied and out of trouble.
"I'm sorry. I'm sorry. It-it just slipped out. I didn't mean to," Carlos apologized.
It was true. He hadn't meant to upset Evie and it was a knee-jerk response that had inadvertently escaped him. He always made a conscious effort to remember to be careful of what he said about Anthony in front of her and if he did happen to forget himself, he'd make sure to always apologize for it
He was the only one of her best friends who really ever did that. Audrey never took crap from anyone, especially from Anthony, and so she never regret calling him out for it one bit, which was sometimes good and other times not so good, depending on the situation. Lonnie usually pushed the limits a little before eventually letting things go and internalizing her annoyance from then on. And Jane barely ever said anything bad about Anthony out loud until Evie was out of earshot, so she never really needed to apologize to the other girl about mouthing off in front of her anyway.
All this said though, Carlos would never ever apologize for dissing that asshole, especially when all of his critiques were nothing but the complete and utter truth.
Evie bit her lip as she regarded the younger boy for a moment, then rounded the table and wrapped her arms around his shoulders, speaking softly into his ear, "I know you disapprove of Anthony and I can understand why, but thank you for always trying to tolerate him for me. I know I don't say it nearly often enough, but I really appreciate it and, most of all, you more than you know."
Carlos didn't hesitate to immediately circle his own arms around his best friend's waist in turn and he replied, "Of course, Eves. I may not like him"—more like hate—"but I love you."
"I love you too, 'Los," the singer returned, tightening her hold ever so slightly, as she leaned her forehead against the boy's neck.
A sudden and loud clatter sounded from behind Evie, making the pair jump. Evie leaned more into Carlos, who tightened his hold on her in a protective manner. They both looked over to find none other than Ray, righting a couple of beer bottles he'd knocked over.
"Shit," the brunette girl mentally cursed as she hurriedly, but in as subtle a way as possible so as not to raise her best friend's suspicion, retracted herself from Carlos.
"Oops," the blond said disingenuously, staring right at the two younger teenagers with a worrying glint in his eyes, "Evie, there you are. I've been looking for you. Anthony wants you. We're about to start a Spin-the-Bottle game in the living room and he wants you to play. You can even bring your little puppy with you too."
"Ray—" Evie tried to scold the football player for his name-calling.
However, he ignored her in favour of inserting himself between her and Carlos and draping an arm over each of their shoulders, much to their discomfort and the latter's annoyance. He then led them back into the living room, where Anthony and his football players had also gathered participants for the game, including both Evie's and Carlos's entire friend groups, drinks for themselves, Mal, and Ben inadvertently abandoned.
It seemed like their friends had been forcibly enrolled in the game too as none of them looked incredibly pleased to be there. Mal and Ben were still at the bar, looking both confused and suspicious, but now with an annoyed and equally sceptical Uma and a bored Jay and Harry. Audrey and Aziz were clearly reluctantly sharing a couch with a practically vibrating from excitement Luke and Robbie. And Lonnie and Jane were sharing a single large living room chair, looking slightly curious but mostly wary.
Ray pushed Evie and Carlos further into the room and towards Anthony, who was sitting on the love-seat. He placed Evie onto her boyfriend's lap obviously, who immediately wrapped his arms around her. He then made Carlos sit on an ottoman beside Ethan Nakamura before taking the seat beside his best friend for himself, so that he and Ethan were both purposely separating Carlos and Evie.
There were handfuls of other partygoers hanging around as well, waiting for the game to begin, and an empty beer bottle resting on the coffee table.
"Okay, everyone's here now! We're finally ready to start!" Ray announced excitedly, obviously having downed a couple more drinks since having arrived at the party based off of his unusual liveliness.
"Wait, what are the rules? What version are we playing? Truth or Dare or kissing?" Maddy Mim asked, blatantly eyeing Ben hopefully.
Everyone, including the aforementioned boy, caught the unwanted attention and he cleared his throat uncomfortably, leaning closer to Mal, who in turn scowled at the other girl and wrapped her boyfriend's arm around herself. This made him relax and chuckle, giving her a calming and reassuring peck on the temple.
"Truth or Dare," Ray answered.
"No one's kissing my girl but me," Anthony declared, emphasizing his statement by pulling his girlfriend closer against him and clumsily kissing her.
He too had evidently gotten pretty drunk already along with Ray and their buddies.
"Well, that's gonna depend on what happens when the bottle lands on her, Anthony," Chad Charming retorted with a wink directed at the brunette girl.
He'd had a creepily particular fascination with Evie ever since he'd first seen her in his freshman chemistry class, so though it was repeatedly unwelcome, this was not uncommon behaviour for him. And per usual, it succeeded in making Evie react uncomfortably and in pissing Anthony off.
Mal caught the senior boy pinch his girlfriend's side hard enough to make her jump a bit and whisper something into her ear, making her shudder and pale ever so slightly. She'd just about called him out for whatever it was he had done to Evie if not for Ray.
"As always, fuck you, Charming. Now let's just play already!" the blond ordered as he spun the bottle first to get the game started.
The bottle went through four rounds until it finally landed on one of Evie's or Carlos's friends. Ally had spun it rather aggressively, her face a little red, after having had to confess that Ethan was her current crush, who had merely awkwardly taken a sip of his drink (with a subtle and fleeting glance towards Evie that her friends had definitely noticed) in response, the bottle coming to a slow stop on Audrey.
She chose dare. No way was she going to choose truth and reveal anything potentially embarrassing about herself after having witnessed Ally's turn, especially not right in front of her own crush.
"Ooh hoo hoo hoo! I call this one!" Ray giddily exclaimed before anyone else had a chance to volunteer, making Audrey roll her eyes and brace herself for the worst, "I dare you…to…give up your phone to…Ally and let her send a sext to any guy in your contacts who is not in this room right now."
"Oh fuck," the party hostess mentally cursed.
Ally was the worst gossip. She was kind of a basic, blonde, British "popular" girl. They weren't close friends and she absolutely adored drama. Therefore, she knew the other girl would really go all out with this text just to see if she could get a good reaction and Ray knew that too. The bastard. Well, there was no way Audrey was ever going to give him the satisfaction of seeing her sweat.
She maintained confident and challenging eye contact with the blond boy as she got up, unlocked her phone, and handed it to Ally.
"You have to give us a play-by-play by the way, Ally, if that wasn't already obvious," Ray added arrogantly.
"Yeah, yeah. I know how this dare goes. It's not my first time," the British girl dismissed the unnecessary instruction as she already began scrolling through Audrey's contact list.
"Of course it isn't," Audrey internally retorted.
She ended up choosing Dom Tremaine of all people and wrote some stupid message about how hot and muscular and attractive he was and how "Audrey" was totally "dtf."
The dare, however, unknowingly to anyone but Audrey and people who actually knew her well enough, ended up being a complete bust for a few reasons.
First of all, Dom was a pretty chill guy and a friendly acquaintance, so he probably wouldn't take the text seriously if he'd read it right away. Second of all, he knew Audrey was already into Aziz after he'd accidentally overheard her asking Ben about him once at a football/cheerleading practice. Third of all, no one specified that she couldn't send a follow-up text nor did anyone notice that she did exactly that, apologizing and explaining that this was a stupid dare.
Audrey spun the bottle and it landed on Lonnie, who chose dare and had to do a shot race against Jay, Harry, and Gil. She won with Jay finishing behind by a close second, Harry right after in third, and Gil in last.
Lonnie then spun, a little clumsily, and it landed on Maddy, who chose dare as well. Unfortunately for her, no one dared her to flirt, kiss, or make out with Ben. Instead, she had to post her most embarrassing selfie from her camera roll onto her Instagram and Facebook.
Maddy spun and the bottle landed on Ethan, who sighed and reluctantly chose dare too.
"I dare you to kiss the person who turns you on the most in this room," Luke said, laughing with Robbie, both of them eager to see who their friend would choose.
Ethan blushed and his gaze instinctively travelled to Evie, who had been watching the entire game mostly with disinterest until she must've felt eyes on her. He tried to look away as quickly as possible and seek someone else who wouldn't be as big a deal, but he unfortunately wasn't fast enough.
"Woah, woah, woah, wait! Hold up! No way! Dude, do you have a thing for Evie?" Robbie demanded wearing matching shit-eating grins with Luke, their intoxication taking away their filters and their usual awareness of Anthony's discontent.
Both Evie and Ethan flushed red, the former in embarrassment and discomfort and the latter in embarrassment as well and annoyance.
Evie stared at the floor, unable to find it within herself to look at the boy. She had really hoped Audrey and Lonnie had just been reading too deeply into their earlier interaction because she liked Ethan, just not that way. However, apparently they hadn't.
"You know the rules, Nakamura! You gotta do it, man!" Luke encouraged the younger boy.
"Okay, hey. I think we can let this one slide. Just go with your second choice, Nakamura," Ray strongly suggested, his sense of loyalty to Anthony overpowering any level of inebriation.
"Or just let it go entirely," Ally chimed in, the frustrated flush returning to her face with an added hint of envy as she did not want to have to watch her crush kiss another girl, especially one as pretty and admittedly likeable as Evie Grimhilde.
"Hey, come on! We all had to do ours full-out!" Maddy protested, unabashedly really wanting the exact opposite of what Ally wanted; to see some other guy kiss Anthony Tremaine's girlfriend and the aftermath of that.
"Yeah, Nakamura. Come on," Anthony told the other boy, a dangerously daring glint in his eyes and edge in his tone, despite his arm tightening around Evie, "Just do it. Kiss my girlfriend."
Everyone went silent all of a sudden, no one having expected Anthony to agree with, let alone encourage, this, especially since he'd just claimed that no one else was supposed to kiss his girl. Anticipation and tension filled the room as everyone sat on the edges of their seats, awaiting Ethan's response. Mal and Ben were practically holding their breaths. She so hadn't gotten drunk enough—or at all for that matter—for this shit.
Anthony rolled his eyes over-exaggeratedly and snapped, grabbing Evie by the chin and forcibly raising her face to look at the other boy, "Get the fuck over here and kiss my fucking girlfriend, Nakamura!"
All of Evie's friends immediately went on high alert, some of them even momentarily snapping out of their drunken states. Mal, Carlos, Jay, and Audrey jumped out of their seats and Ben, Uma, Harry, Lonnie, and Jane sat up straight right away, all of them read to intervene.
"Okay! Okay! I'll do it! Let her go! I'll do it!" Ethan shouted, standing up as well and placing a grounding hand onto Carlos's chest, right over his hammering heart, before muttering under his breath, "Jesus. Fucking psychopath."
He gently pushed Carlos to sit back down, prompting all of his friends to hesitantly do the same. Well, all except for Mal, who remained on her feet just in case, although her stance the slightest bit more at ease.
Ethan then sighed and slowly walked over so that he was awkwardly standing in front of Evie, who apprehensively and uncomfortably looked up at him at last, on her own this time. Her cheeks were still a little flushed, she had light, pink marks on her face where Anthony had grabbed her, and her eyes were shining with what he could only identify as fear. Fear of what else her boyfriend would do afterwards.
Feeling more sympathy for her than he'd ever felt for anyone else, Ethan leaned down and gave Evie a simple and quick kiss on the cheek.
"Boo! Weak!" Luke and Robbie jeered jokingly as the younger boy stepped away from his crush to begrudgingly spin the bottle.
"Yeah, well, you never specified, okay? So fuck off, assholes," Ethan replied in irritation as he plopped back down next to Carlos, not catching the fact that Mal had sat back down as well nor the grateful and respectful glances he was receiving from the two other teenagers and their friends.
Though the teasing was annoying, he knew he'd made the right decision when Evie eased up a tiny bit and Anthony sat back once more, looking not content but not angry nor crazy anymore either.
Sure, he wasn't the guy's biggest fan and he was really only using him to stay on the wrong guys' good sides. However, he truly liked Evie and thought she was a great girl who didn't deserve the secondhand embarrassment and whatever other crap her boyfriend had ready for her to endure had he actually kissed her. On the lips. Pouring all of his unspoken feelings for her into it, like he'd really wanted to ever since their first interaction wherein she was the first person in this entire town to be so nice and warm and welcoming towards him.
No. He had made the right choice.
"Ooh hoo hoo! Who knew? Quiet dude has some fire! I like it! I like it. Okay! So," Luke exclaimed, rubbing his hands together excitedly, "Who's our next loser?"
The bottle had just started slowing down when everyone redirected their attention to it at Luke's prompt and it stopped on Ray.
"Okay, yo, I dare you the same thing as Nakamura since he fucking pussied out," Robbie said.
"No problem," Ray replied smugly as he turned to his right, wrapped a hand around the back of Evie's neck, taking her by surprise, and yanked her toward him into a sloppy kiss, pulling her halfway off of her boyfriend's lap.
Even as he let her go, he left one last quick peck on her lips as if he were reluctant to stop and then, to add to all of that, he draped an arm across the back of the love-seat, the new weight resting heavily on Evie's shoulders and his hand landing on one of Anthony's.
"Hey, WHAT THE HELL?" Ethan immediately protested as he shot up from his seat, his complaint surprisingly sounding over anyone else's, even Mal's and Audrey's, which was a serious feat, "She and I almost get our fucking asses kicked for an almost kiss, but Ray can fucking shove his tongue down her throat and you do shit all? What the hell is wrong with you?"
"Ray is my best friend. I trust him," Anthony calmly responded as if it were the simplest thing in the world.
Ethan just stared back at the older boy in disgust and disbelief and uttered, "That is so screwed up. She's your girlfriend for fuck's sake"—he scoffed and shook his head—"I'm done, man. I'm out. I don't care what you think of me after this, but I don't wanna be anywhere near you or any of your stupid friends anymore if it's gonna make me into another one of you or even give off the idea that I am.
"And the only reason I'm not just straight-up ditching this party and leaving you here stranded is because I know that wouldn't be fair to Audrey and you'd end up trying to drive yourselves home and probably kill some innocent person on the way back."
And just like that, Ethan threw Ray's keys at him, much like he'd done to him at the beginning of the night, and walked off, heading in the direction of the video games and muttering, "Evie's got the others."
Ray simply scoffed and leaned forward to spin the bottle, saying, "Fine. Good riddance."
"Ray, come on—" Evie spoke softly to the blond, trying to let the game continue while also trying to pull some compassion out of him, only to be cut off.
"No, Evie. He's a quitter and a loner, so let him go be that," Anthony told his girlfriend.
The girl's breath trembled, but she nevertheless cautiously suggested, "Maybe…maybe you should go apologize to him."
"For what?" her boyfriend demanded in a dark tone that indicated he was starting to lose what little patience he had.
"I-I don't know. F-f-for yelling at him earlier?" she replied, her voice doubtful even though her answer was completely sure.
"I yelled at him to help him grow a pair and do the stupid dare," Anthony corrected his girlfriend, "Jesus. What? Did you want him to actually kiss you?"
"Wh—No! I didn't say that," Evie responded truthfully, genuinely confused as to how he had arrived at that conclusion.
"Yeah, you never say anything, do you, Evie?" the football player said in an accusatory voice, his anger growing and beginning to affect his girlfriend's own mood too.
"I-I-I…I'm sorry," Evie submitted, knowing that this conversation would only escalate into an argument, which she had wanted to avoid for the night, especially a public one.
"Good," Anthony replied, his demeanour lightening a tiny bit, "Now get over here."
The brunette slowly laid back into the sofa cushion and reluctantly leaned her head onto her boyfriend's shoulder (Well, Ray's hand that was still on his shoulder).
Anthony, in return, hooked his hand around her knee, almost as if he was securing her in place if she were to stupidly try to escape him.
Evie tried to ignore the uncomfortable physical contact as much as she could by tuning back into the game. She watched the bottle spin again after someone—she hadn't the slightest clue whom—had just finished their turn.
It was almost hypnotizing. So much so, in fact, that she hadn't even realized the bottle had stopped until all eyes were on her, waiting for her to voice her decision between a truth or a dare. Christ, she really couldn't catch a break, could she?
The lead actress froze, a little voice in the back of her mind wondering how the hell she was able to perform whatever one of her art forms really well in front of a large audience and yet she couldn't even form a sentence in front of a group of her classmates staring unwaveringly at her during a stupid game of truth or dare.
"Um—"
"She wants truth," Anthony announced for her, making his girlfriend lift her head and turn it towards him with a questioning expression on her face.
"You sure about that, Anthony?" Mal asked from across the room, an eyebrow quirked challengingly, "Because it doesn't really look like she is, so maybe you should just back off and let her speak for herself."
"She's sure. Right, babe?" the football player pretended to ask, knowing that his girlfriend would just agree with him since she'd already angered him that night, especially if he gave her one of his looks.
"Yeah. Sure. I guess," Evie acquiesced tiredly, not even really caring at that point.
Throughout this entire game, a friend had been embarrassed, she'd been embarrassed, she'd been grabbed at, yelled at, kissed without her consent by both her boyfriend and her boyfriend's best friend. It wasn't really anything out of the ordinary for her, but it was also something that she never got used to and always grew exhausted from. What was one more exhausting thing?
"Good. See? And I've got the question already too, so everyone shut the fuck up," Anthony ordered, making Evie and her friends feel unsettled, especially with the malicious glint in his entire behaviour, "What were your first impressions of the people who you met for the first time on the first day of freshman year in this room?"
AN: I know it seems like kind of a weird place to end the chapter, but it's leading somewhere, I swear lol. As always, thanks for reading.