Thanks for your reviews Kelly & EC Brenway!
Kelly - I love writing Elly's love for Chloe so openly! It's what we missed out on on the show! Let's see if your still looking forward to this night without Pierce!
EC - Ooh I like all of where you were going with your predictions for the night...but will they go anywhere like where they do here? Elly could explode if something doesn't happen! I better not let that happen aye?!
Check my twitter handle Cutebabe79 for a GIF of this drinking game - in case I haven't explained how it works properly. Also my recollection of shot skis may've been impacted by the drinking part of all the shot skis... ? ﾟﾘﾂ
The Chemistry In Darkness
Chapter Forty-Two
Friday 13th December 2024
Chloe, Elly, Bea and Yashvi arrived at the Back Lane Bar not long after all the guests at the engagement party had headed home for the night. The four women wanted to keep the celebration going after their fun at the party held at the Rebecchi's. Chloe was secretly astounded that her husband hadn't felt well, gone home early and even encouraged her to spend the rest of the evening with her friends.
Maybe Pierce knew he'd be puking his guts out for a while and thought that'd kill the romance between us…or maybe he actually saw how happy it made me spending time with my family…and now with my friends.
As the four women walked into the bar, they immediately headed to the bar for a round of drinks.
"We're doing shots," Yashvi declared as they walked to the bar.
"I think I'll just stick to wine," Chloe replied.
"We're doing shots," Bea agreed, then smiled at Chloe, "Like I'm gonna disagree with my wife to be on our first night out in over three weeks."
"We're doing shots," Elly winked at Chloe, "C'mon now, you don't want to disagree with the madly in love couple we're celebrating tonight, do you?"
"We're doing shots," Chloe conceded, "I'll get the first round."
"Perfect," Bea smiled, "Then the rest of us can get another three rounds of shots."
"We're not doing four rounds of shots," Chloe exclaimed.
"Sure we are, Chlo," Yashvi giggled, "Why else come to the Back Lane Bar? If we wanted more wine, we'd have gone to the Waterhole. It's your first night out in forever without Pierce, it's Elly's first night out since she got back, and Bea and I have been kept apart nearly a month because of my job. We are going all out to celebrate so…shots!"
"I haven't done this many shots in…a good long while. Probably not since shot skis in Whistler ten years ago," Chloe mused.
As the foursome waited at the bar to be served, with a handful of people in front of them, Elly glanced at Chloe, "Shot what?"
"Shot skis, it's a tradition over in some Canadian cities or mainly up on the snowy mountains there," Chloe half-explained.
"Tell me about this tradition," Elly pushed, "Is this a drinking game?"
"Yes and no," Chloe recalled, "Okay so you have 3 or 4 people with a round of shots. The bars have wooden boards, long, thin like an individual ski only without the front of the ski slanted upwards, it's all one straight board. You place the shots on the board in these holes designed to hold the shots half out of the board and then all of you have to work together to lift the board from the bar, tip the board to your mouths without all the shots falling out of the grooves and off the board or y'know…"
"Spilling all over all of those that take up the task of shot skis?" Elly finished.
"Don't tell me you also do this one handed, Chlo," Bea giggled.
"You can if you really want a challenge and it's quite the accomplishment if you can down your shots from the board one handed. It's all about synchronicity between the group. You all have to be aligned to the same motion. The two at either end of the board have the responsibility of lifting the board. The one or two in the middle have more of the responsibility of tipping the board to have the shot glasses reach everyone's mouths in place to drink the shot," Chloe explained, "Oh and if everyone successfully downs their shot without spilling it, you yell out 'Shot Skis'."
"Synchronicity between the two of you…duh I mean the group of you," Elly replied thoughtfully, "Too bad there's no ski-like boards in an Aussie bar."
Yashvi glanced behind the bar, annoyed after the bartender served the girl beside her who had arrived after them, "Well they've got those paddle-like boards they use to try to be fancy with when they serve chips and whatnot on."
"Bit too small, Yashvi, wouldn't have room for 4 shots on them and also without the holes to sit the shot glasses in you have even more of a chance to spill them everywhere," Chloe commented.
Ignoring Chloe's last point, Elly saw an opening and went for it, "But it will for two on each board. Teams of two then. Bea and Yashvi. Chlo and I. Four shots each. Let's see if we can synchronize and down each shot at a time."
"Perfect," Bea agreed, knowing what Elly was doing with Chloe and allowing her to pair up with her ex, "Yash and I are gonna crush this cause we are so in sync with one another."
As the bartender finally came over to them, Yashvi ordered, "Four tequila shots and can we borrow two of those boards to drink them off of?"
Chloe screwed up her face, "You never said it'd be tequila shots."
"We're here to have fun," Elly reminded her, "No responsibility…and the rate we're going, the morning off going for a run, that's for sure."
As the bartender placed all four shots down then the wooden boards, he took Chloe's credit card before watching the four of them place two tequila shot glasses on each of the boards, he warned them all that if they spilled the drinks on the floor of his bar, he'd be charging them a cleaning fee or handing them a mop to clean up themselves.
With no one else at the bar to be served, and nobody needing the bar space, Bea and Yashvi shooed him off, as they eagerly started to lift the wooden board with their outside hands before placing their inside hands on the bottom of the board and tipped the board up to their mouths.
Bea groaned when half her shot dripped down her dress, "Yash, you tipped it too fast."
"And you tipped it too slow, my love," Yashvi teased back.
Elly winked at Chloe once more, "We've got this. Synchronized is us to a t."
Chloe couldn't even find words to agree with Elly, silently struggling to work out if she was imagining Elly was flirting with her.
Within seconds, Chloe and Elly slapped the wooden board back on the bar, with Chloe proudly yelling out, "Shot skis!" at their victory for managing to tip the tequila shots into their mouths without spilling a drop.
"Okay, that's not fair they did it perfectly. Another round of shots now for us to try," Bea grumbled as she tried to get the bartenders attention but then stopped when Elly held her hand back.
"Let's hang out at the free table over there for a bit, we can do the second round of shots in a little while where you and Yashvi can attempt to beat Chloe and I all over again," Elly grinned, unable to stop feeling like such a simple game proved to herself how Chloe and her were made for one another.
Now, when will Chloe realize that?
"You want to pace yourself with the shots, don't you?" Bea teased, "Don't want to get completely out of control and spend the rest of the night vomiting in a bucket?"
"Something like that," Elly groaned before leading the four over to the table, smiling as she realized it was small enough for her to sidle right up to Chloe without it being too obvious since the space around the table was limited.
A little while later, Elly had reluctantly left Chloe's side for a bathroom break. Exiting the stall, Elly rolled her eyes at realizing the two women who'd entered the bathroom after her were Bea and Yashvi and they were making out with one another against the wall.
Ugh all the tequila and alcohol in general that this bathroom stinks of put me off smelling that it was these two.
"Seriously, you two, this is twice in the last couple hours I've walked in on you two in a bathroom. Aren't I lucky you're not doing anything more than making out with my little sister this time, Yashvi," Elly tutted at the pair.
Bea broke her lips apart from Yashvi's but moaned when Yashvi moved to begin kissing against her neckline, "Sorry, El, it's been a long and lonely three weeks without my girl at home every night. We're just making up for lost time, we're not like this all the time."
"Yes, we are," Yashvi mumbled.
"Okay, yes, we are," Bea blushed, "But you'll get this feeling one day, El, when you get to be with the person of your dreams."
Chloe…
"Wait," Elly frowned, "Where is Chloe?"
"At the bar ordering us another round of shots with my card so Yashvi and I can finally achieve shot skis like you two have done the past three rounds," Bea answered.
Elly shifted to quickly washing her hands at the sink, "You left Chloe alone out there?"
"Chloe's an adult, Elly," Yashvi pointed out, "She can spend a few minutes alone in a bar while me and my fiancé make out with one another here by the bathroom sink."
Bea teased, "Til we take up in one of the stalls once you leave so we can-"
"Ugh, I just worry about her," Elly complained at the couple, interrupting Bea's teasing, then when she saw they were more interested in one another, dried her hands on the paper towels provided before heading back to the bar.
As soon as Elly walked back into the room the bar was set in, she felt uncomfortable, then even more so when she saw Chloe was at the bar with a group of four guys hanging off of her. Chloe tried to shrug away from the guys.
Chloe, just use your martial arts and kick their asses…and end up with an assault charge and needing to explain to Pierce where her martial arts training came from…ugh.
Elly had barely taken two steps towards the group, hoping to drag Chloe away from them, when she was quickly enraged as she saw the man who had his arm around Chloe's shoulders, removed it only to place his arm against her lower back, then squeeze her ass.
Elly tore over to the group within seconds, reaching for the guy's hand. Wondering why Chloe hadn't reacted to push him away as soon as he had grabbed her, Elly squeezed the guys' hand. He immediately turned to Elly in dismay, yelling at her by asking what she was doing to him.
Trying very hard not to snap your hand in ten different places for touching my girls' ass!
Elly released her grasp of the man's hand, throwing it back at him, where it smacked the side of the bar and he yelped in pain, "Get your hand off of her, you pathetic man."
As the guy shook his hand in front of him, trying to eliminate the pain from it and ignore the feeling that this woman shouldn't have been able to squeeze his hand that hard, he boasted in front of his friends, trying to make out he wasn't a jerk touching Chloe without her permission, "What, are you her guard dog? This bitch was lapping up my attention before you got here."
Elly noticed Chloe cower in the corner of her eyes, worried about how meek Chloe was being with this group of guys when she had the ability to knock them all out together, "You touch a woman like that again, I'll snap that hand of yours in two. Let's go, babe."
Babe…? Well, I didn't want to give this guy Chloe's name and 'babe' was the first thing that came to mind…
Babe…? Is my heart fluttering at Elly calling me 'babe'? Stop that, you're with Pierce and need to be…and being here tonight is probably such a big mistake and yet…here you are…
Elly led Chloe away from the group, placing her hand on Chloe's lower back for a moment, then removed it, fearing she was just making a similar move that she'd yelled at the random guy for. As they stood back at the table, specifically standing with their backs to the group of guys, Chloe leaned over to Elly, "It's okay, Elly, you weren't invading my personal space by placing your hand on my back."
Elly blushed at Chloe knowing exactly what she was fearing, "Good to know. About the…'babe' thing…I just didn't think that guy warranted knowing your name. 'Babe'…seemed like the word that came to mind."
Chloe blushed just as heavily, glad for the darkness of the bar hiding it, "I didn't mind. Sorry, I didn't get around to ordering our last round of shots."
Elly shrugged, "That's okay, think you and I proved what a pretty good team we were tonight with your drinking game. Bea and Yashvi were a little upset they couldn't master it like we did."
"We do make a really good team," Chloe agreed, then as she felt Elly's eyes staring deeply at her, Chloe swallowed hard, "I'm gonna…go outside for a breath of fresh air. Just after that incident with the guys, I need to recollect myself for a moment y'know."
"Do you want me to come with you?" Elly offered.
Chloe shook her head, "No, you wait here for Bea and Yashvi otherwise they'll think we've left."
"You do know my sister and her fiancé are probably semi-naked together in one of the toilet stalls going at it like the loved-up couple they are?" Elly pouted.
Chloe nodded, "Knowing those two…you'd be right. I'll only be a few moments. Just need to take a few deep breaths in the fresh air."
Elly reluctantly let Chloe leave the bar, watching her every step as she left through the exit.
Why couldn't tonight be about Chloe and I celebrating our engagement as the happy, in love couple…? Steady on, Elly, you've been back in Chloe's life for a month…plenty of time ahead of us for that.
Elly was quickly distracted by a guy coming over to her table, placing a cosmopolitan drink in front of her, but before he could even get his opening line started, Elly snapped, "Not on your best day."
The guy stared at her with surprise at the brutal rejection, then shrugged, when Elly told him to "move along and find someone else to crack onto."
As he did, Elly stared towards the entrance of the bar, counting down the seconds until Chloe would return, but she hadn't seen that the guy harassing Chloe had slipped outside after Chloe…
Next time - Uh oh, what happens if Elly comes across random guy cracking onto Chloe again? Will he need to watch his back...or will Chloe...?