13
After Avalon , Elena suggested playing Codenames because we would be able to split evenly into two teams. We tossed a game piece to randomly split up the teams. Elena, Atticus and Nick were on the red team, while Leo, Edwin and I were on the blue team.
“Oh my god, the smart people are all on one team,” I said, staring at Elena, Atticus and Nick, who’d all gathered to sit together.
“What does that make us, idiots?” Edwin asked.
I turned around, skin going hot. “No! Sorry, I didn’t mean—”
“We may be idiots, but we’re also creative, and that’s what counts,” Leo said with the cadence of a motivational speaker.
“Speak for yourself,” Edwin told him.
“Are you talking about the idiots part or the creative part?”
Edwin rolled his eyes and unsuccessfully stifled a smile.
Leo chuckled and pulled him close, placing a kiss on the top of his head. “Alright,” he said after he let go. “Who wants to be the spymaster?”
“I’m happy to,” I said. “I’ve played this game a few times before.”
“Go ahead,” Edwin said.
I moved to the end of the table and saw that the other team had chosen Elena to be their spymaster. We gave each other the narrow-eyed glare of siblings/rivals before turning our attention to the little picture that showed which tiles were blue and which tiles were red.
As spymasters, we had to give a single-word clue that referred to multiple tiles on the board. The aim of the game was to get my team to flip over all of the blue tiles while avoiding the red tiles or the black ‘assassin’ card. The first team to flip over all their coloured cards won.
“Penicillin, two cards,” Elena announced.
Nick and Atticus put their heads together, muttering quietly. Looking over the cards, I had no idea what the clue referred to, but a second later, Atticus tapped on doctor , and after that was correct, mould .
“Amazing!” Elena said, giving them both a high five.
“How do you get mould from penicillin?” Edwin wondered aloud.
I brought my hands together, not about to be outdone. “Kelly. Three cards,” I announced.
Edwin and Leo blinked at me.
“Kelly?” Leo said.
I nodded. “Kelly.”
“What the fuck is a Kelly?” Edwin muttered to Leo.
“It’s a name, right?”
“Maybe…” Edwin hovered his hands over the card. “Music? Like Kelly Clarkson, the singer?”
“But what about the other two cards?” Leo asked.
“Let’s just start with this one and see.”
“Okay.”
Edwin lowered his finger towards the card.
No, no, no, no, no.
He tapped the card. I placed a bystander tile on it.
The game finished very quickly. Elena gave what was seemingly the most random clues, but Atticus and Nick understood them and rarely made mistakes.
“Oh my god,” Edwin said in horror when our team had gotten two words right, and they had seven. “Maybe we really are idiots.”
Unsurprisingly, the other team won, and they celebrated with a round of high-fives.
“I’m gonna need you to explain your clues because we didn’t understand any of them,” Edwin said to me.
“Yeah, what was Kelly supposed to mean?” Leo asked.
“ Grace , Princess and Millionaire ,” I said, pointing to the tiles.
They stared at me.
“I’m not even gonna ask,” Edwin said.
“What about the Bible one?” Leo asked. “I thought for sure it was cross.”
“It was garden and snake,” I said, pointing to the tiles.
Once again, they stared at me.
“Don’t you think something like ‘Eden’ would’ve been better?” Edwin asked.
“Oh yeah. I didn’t think of that.”
Leo laughed. “Even if we got those clues, I don’t think we’d have stood a chance. It’s like those three share the same brain.”
I followed his gaze to where Atticus, Nick and Elena were still celebrating, discussing the clues as they snacked on some of the lollies I’d laid out.
The final game we played was called The Mind , and this was one I hadn’t played before. Atticus assured us it was easy and wouldn’t require much thinking.
“It’s more about intuition,” he said, shuffling the cards. “This is how it works. Each card has a number from 1 to 100 on it. We have to place our cards in order without speaking. If we succeed, we move to the next level. If we fail, we lose a life.”
Nick frowned. “Without speaking? How does that even work?”
“Can we use body language?” Leo asked.
“You can’t communicate your number with your body,” Atticus said. “You can’t put up a certain number of fingers, for example.”
“But that means there’s no strategy involved,” Nick said. “It’s impossible.”
“You’ll see,” Atticus replied, dealing a single card to each player.
Everyone glanced at it, making sure it was hidden from everyone else. My card was 56 .
We all looked at each other. Atticus shrugged. Elena shook her head.
“This is impossible,” Nick insisted, then brought a hand to his face. “Sorry. I forgot I’m not supposed to talk.”
Edwin inched his card forward, glancing at everyone.
I shrugged. Nick frowned. Leo leaned back, holding his card tightly.
Edwin flipped his card over. 19.
“No!” Leo declared, flipping his own card over. 7 .
“Seven?” Atticus almost yelled. “Why didn’t you put your card down immediately?”
Leo winced. “I don’t know. There are tons of numbers that are lower than seven.”
Atticus covered his face with a hand. “Alright, let’s try again. That’s one life gone.”
He removed one of the ‘life’ cards he had sitting beside him.
After he dealt a single card to everyone again, we all looked at each other. Atticus shook his head quickly. Elena shook her head too, looking sad. When Edwin and Leo didn’t move their cards forward, I started to inch mine towards the middle.
Nick inched his towards the middle too, and we locked eyes.
I have 14 , I tried to communicate with my eyes.
He tilted his head, then made a ‘ you go ahead ’ motion with his hand. I placed my card down.
He let out a relieved sigh and placed 16 on top.
The remaining four people looked at each other with serious expressions, like they were rival gang members, unsure who to trust. Atticus, Elena and Edwin shook their heads. Leo hesitated, then started to push his own card towards the centre. When no one stopped him, he flipped his card. 76 .
“Leo!” Edwin yelped. “What the hell?”
“No one else was going!” Leo replied. “I thought you must all have numbers that were even higher.”
The others flipped over their cards. 49 , 62 and 85 .
“You jumped sixty numbers,” Elena said.
Leo slumped in on himself. “I’m sorry, guys.” He sounded truly devastated.
Edwin huffed a laugh and leaned over to kiss his cheek. “We’ll get the next one, okay?”
Leo glanced at him and nodded. “Okay,” he said softly.
Atticus dealt out a single card to each of us again. “We only have one life left, alright? We can’t screw this up.”
After we all got our cards, Leo started to push his towards the middle.
“It’s either going to be 2 or 90 ,” Elena said, which made everyone laugh.
He flipped his card. 12 .
Nick placed the second. 21 .
Atticus put down 36 . Immediately after, Elena set down 40 .
Edwin and I looked at each other. He gestured for me to go. I shook my head and gestured for him to go. He shook his head quickly. I shook my head quickly. He shook his head even faster. I shook my head even faster.
Finally, he gave in and placed down 97 .
While everyone else held their breath, I sighed in relief and placed down 98 .
“We did it!” Leo said, reaching out to high-five everyone.
“I thought we’d never get there,” Atticus replied. “Want to go to the next round?”
We played The Mind for another forty minutes. I hadn’t expected it to be so engaging, but there was something extremely funny about communicating with each other with widened eyes and shaking heads.
We managed to get up to round five, where each person had five cards. After we died, losing our last life, I checked the time and was shocked to see it was almost ten o’clock. The evening had gone by so quickly.
People needed to get home soon, so we started tidying up. Edwin and Leo insisted on leaving the remaining beer with us, but Elena and I tried to get them to take it. In the end, Edwin and Leo insisted, and so we stored the leftover cans in the fridge.
Elena did try to serve up leftovers for the guests to take home, but everyone was too polite to accept.
Atticus, Edwin and Leo left together since they were taking a tram in the same direction. Nick stayed behind for a few minutes, insisting to help with the dishes.
“I’ll walk you down,” I said to Nick when he was about to leave. We left my apartment and walked down the hallway. After pressing the button for the elevator, I turned to him. “I would’ve asked you if you wanted to stay over, but Elena’s here.”
“It’s all good,” he said.
We still hadn’t had a chance to do anything since that dinner. It was silly, but it felt different to ask Elena to stay out of the apartment because I wanted to have sex with Nick rather than because I needed privacy for my bedroom lessons.
The elevator arrived, and we stepped inside. Nick cleared his throat. “Maybe you could stay over at mine some time,” he said.
I perked up. “Really?”
He glanced away. “I have to warn you, my place is nowhere as large as yours. It’s tiny, practically a shoebox. But, uh… it would be private.”
I smiled. “I’d love to. When? Tomorrow?”
His brows jumped up, and I wanted to shake him. How could he be surprised? “Sure, if you want to. I’ve got work all afternoon, but you could come over after six?”
“Sounds great.”
He gave me one of his rare smiles.
The elevator arrived on the ground floor, and we walked through the lobby and out the front door. A gust of wind blew over me, and I crossed my arms. I should’ve brought a jacket.
In the distance, Atticus, Edwin and Leo were waiting at a nearby tram stop. Edwin and Leo were holding hands, and suddenly, I felt an overwhelming urge to hold Nick’s hand.
I shoved my hands deep in my pockets.
“I hope you had a good time,” I said. “I know it was a bit different, with the board games and the four people you’ve never met before, but—”
“No, I had fun.”
“Was it a good pretend date?”
Another hint of a smile. “It was.”
“Rate it out of ten. One is the worst, ten is the best—”
“Nine.”
My eyes widened. “Nine? You’re not just saying that to be nice, are you?”
Nick gave me a flat look. “Do you think I’m the type who says stuff just to be polite?”
A chuckle escaped me. “No,” I admitted.
We looked at each other for a moment. I shifted my weight from one foot to the other. “I’m not sure how to end this pretend date,” I said. “Kissing you would be too forward, wouldn’t it?”
Something flickered over Nick’s face, and I knew it was the wrong thing to say. He didn’t want to kiss. Maybe because we weren’t in a bedroom. He quickly resumed his usual nonchalant expression. “You could hug me.”
“Hug you?” I repeated.
“Why are you saying that like it’s a fate worse than death? Loads of people hug at the end of dates.”
“Yeah, but… you’re about as huggable as an echidna.”
Nick’s brows came together. “What? You’ve hugged me before.” In bed was the unsaid end of that sentence.
“Yeah, when your defences were down.”
“What defences?”
“Come on, Nick. You have to know how prickly you look most of the time. Like right now! You’re giving me that scowly expression.”
“‘Scowly’ is not a real word.”
“You know what I mean—” I began.
“Jesus fucking Christ, fine,” Nick said over me, leaned forward, grabbed my shoulders and kissed me on the cheek. It happened so fast I could barely comprehend what was happening.
He pulled back, and all I could do was stare, speechless.
“See you tomorrow,” he said and started to walk away.
I brought my hand to my face, feeling the spot his lips had brushed. “You just kissed me on the cheek.” My voice was airy with shock.
Nick picked up his speed, walking so fast he was practically running.