5. Nick
5
NICK
M y heart skips a beat watching Penelope laugh with her head thrown back. I don’t miss the way her eyes sparkle with joy, the edges of her eyes crinkling with delight. Her gorgeous smile lighting up the room. This room hasn’t seen laughter in a long time, and I miss it.
“You have a mischievous look, Pen.”
She smiles at me, and I feel it hit right in the gut. Why does she have this effect on me? She’s my best friend’s little sister, I should be seeing her as my sister but for some reason I am seeing her in a very different light right now. One that I quickly need to hit the brakes on.
I grab the whiskey bottle from her and pour more into my glass. Although drinking is probably not going to stop these feelings that I get from just looking at her.
“I mean, you said it, and I think that sounds like a great idea.”
I take a sip from my freshly poured glass. “We aren’t in middle school, Pen.”
“But we are stuck in the middle of nowhere in a snowstorm.”
“I live here.”
She grins at me. “It’s still the middle of nowhere.”
I chew on my bottom lip as I take her in. She has a point. I do live in the middle of nowhere. But I feel like this could be a really bad idea. I don’t know what kind of questions she is going to ask me, and there are some truths I would rather keep hidden.
She grabs my arm and pulls on it. “Oh, come on, Nicky.”
I raise a brow at that. “I haven’t heard that nickname in years.”
“See? So we can pretend we are young and dumb again. I can call you Nicky, and you can call me—”
“Penny?” I question her. The name she used to hate but her parents always called her when she was a kid.
She gives me a closed-mouthed smile. “You can call me Penny.”
I smirk at her. “It looks like it pains you to hear that name.”
She shrugs. “It just makes me feel like I’m eight years old. There was a reason I insisted on being called Penelope when I went to high school.”
“The kids really make fun of you that much?” I ask her, genuinely curious.
“You and Wesley were the worst, and I just knew that once I was in high school the kids would be even worse.”
“It was the same kids.”
She groans. “Yeah, I know, but you know how it is. It’s like high school hits, and everyone just acts differently. I mean, you and Wesley used to let me play with you up until you started high school.”
“Yeah, and then we didn’t want to be freshmen hanging out with a third grader.”
She throws her hands in the air. “Exactly what I mean.” She sighs and runs her hand through her hair. “I guess I just didn’t want to risk being made fun of. It was already bad enough that you and Wes made fun of me.”
“Yeah, but you were like a little sister.”
She blows a raspberry and then waves a hand in front of her face. “Well anyway, it doesn’t matter, I was a kid and didn’t want to be called such a childish name. Penelope sounded sophisticated.”
I can’t help but smile at her. “Whatever you say.”
She folds her arms over her chest and glares at me. “Are you making fun of me now?”
“I didn’t say anything,” I manage to get out without a laugh.
“Oh my god, you are.”
I smirk at her and stretch out on the couch, whiskey glass in hand. “Well, are we doing this or not?”
She sits up on her knees and nods with the biggest smile on her face. “Truth or dare?”
I run my finger across my bottom lip as I think about what to choose. I really don’t want to say truth because I know she will ask prying questions, and there are some things I would rather not share. But I also know Pen, or at least I knew her in the past, and I don’t think her dares are going to be any better than her truths.
I take a deep breath. “Dare.”
She claps her hands together as she sits up on her knees. “Oooh yay!” She taps her chin. “What shall I have you do?”
“I figured you had a bunch of dares lined up ready to go.”
She gives me a devious look. “Hmm. Do you have any grapes?”
I raise a brow at her. “Grapes?”
She nods. “Yeah. I dare you to stuff as many grapes in your mouth as you can.”
I try to hold in my laughter, but I can’t and burst out, a snort even slipping out. “That was the best you got, Penny?”
She folds her arms over her chest and pouts. “I thought it would be funny. Besides, you didn’t let me finish. I was going to say that you then had to take a selfie and post it on your social media.” Her eyes light up. “Oh wait, even better. As your profile picture on your photography website.”
I shake my head at her laughing as I hold up a hand. “Okay, I do have to say that is a bit better. But hate to break it to you. I don’t have any grapes.”
“So unprepared,” she sighs.
“I will make sure that next time my best friend’s little sister is stranded in my home that I have grapes on hand for this kind of occasion.”
“Good.” She sits back on her feet, and I think she is going to take a while to come up with another dare for me, but she has one instantly. “Go stand outside your balcony door and howl at the moon like a wolf for an entire minute.”
“That’s all I have to do?”
She nods.
“Why do I feel like you are going to add something else to that?”
She holds up her hands. “I promise that is all.”
I don’t trust this girl for shit, but I just nod and stand up from the couch. I walk over to the balcony doors that sit right off the great room and open one up.
“Outside.”
I jump when I find her standing two feet behind me.
“I’m not wearing any shoes.”
She shrugs. “It’s not my fault you came unprepared for this game. Yet again. No grapes, no shoes. You really are disappointing me, Nicky.”
I let out a sigh and step onto the snow-covered balcony. Luckily, the wind is blowing in the opposite direction so there are only a few inches on the deck. I cup my hands around my mouth and start howling like an idiot.
I’m surprised when I don’t hear her laughing at me, but I know she is there watching so I just keep going, no doubt in my mind that she is timing me while I do this. And if I don’t give her exactly one minute, she will make me start over.
My throat grows scratchy from the constant howling, and I know I’ve been at it for well over a minute when I turn around and look at her and find her recording me on her phone.
“Pen, what the hell?”
She starts cackling so loud it echoes into the night sky.
“You better delete that.”
She puts her phone behind her and shakes her head. “No way. This is comedy gold. You were howling for almost three minutes. I can’t wait until your fans see you in the wild like this. Nick Snow, world-famous photographer and secret wolfman.”
I lunge for her, and she yelps as she slips out of my grasp as my wet feet slide across the hardwood floor.
“Penelope,” I yell.
She runs around the living room, jumping over the side of the couch and toward the kitchen. I run to the other side of the kitchen island to try and catch her, but she spins quickly and heads back to the living room. She stands back on the couch, jumping up and down, laughing her head off.
“Pen,” I say sternly as I approach her.
I feign walking away and then grab her out of nowhere pulling her down onto the floor making it easy for me to straddle her.
“What’s the big deal?” she asks me as I pin her arms over her head, trying to pry the phone out of her slender fingers.
“You are not sharing that with the world.”
“Why not?”
“I have a reputation to uphold.”
She snorts. “You mean moody butt face with a stick up his ass?”
Yes, actually. “Precisely.”
“Glad you are self-aware,” she says as she lets go of the phone and I pick it up off the floor and stand, deleting the video from her camera roll.
“Just so you know, I’ve already emailed it to myself and uploaded it to the cloud. It’s too late, sucker.”
“Pen, please don’t post that.”
She gets up off the floor and adjusts her top before grabbing her whiskey glass off the table. “Calm down, prissy pants. I won’t post it.”
“Thank you.”
“But I am so glad I have blackmail material.”
I roll my eyes at her before sitting back on the couch. She walks around the coffee table back to the spot she was taking up on the floor.
“So, I guess it’s my turn,” I say to her once I take a deep breath and try to forget about the stupid video. “Truth or dare?”
She smiles at me. “Truth.”
I nearly snap my neck, turning to look at her. “Truth? After all that, you won’t even ask for a dare?”
She shakes her head. “Nope. I don’t want to be made a fool of like you.”
“Whatever you say, Pen. It was just a stupid dare.”
She snorts. “If it was so stupid then why did you throw a hissy fit when you found out I recorded it?”
I sigh. “It doesn’t matter.”
She purses her lips at me, trying to find some kind of deeper meaning in my words. But there really isn’t any. I just don’t share much of my personal life on the internet, and me doing some stupid dare sounds far too personal.
“All right. Truth.” I tap my finger on my chin. “What’s the most embarrassing thing that’s happened to you?”
Her cheeks turn red immediately, and I know it’s something good.
She drops her face into the palm of her hands. “Oh god. I do not want to live this nightmare over again.”
I can’t help the smile that covers my face knowing she is about to tell me something real.
“You promise you won’t share this with anybody?”
I hold up three fingers. “Scout’s honor.”
She sighs then grabs the whiskey bottle but instead of refilling her glass she takes a long pull straight from the bottle. She grimaces as she pulls it away from her mouth then wipes the back of her hand across her lips.
“I was in Hanoi. I had just had the best Bo Kho ever. It was so good like the beef just melted in your mouth and the broth was just…chef’s kiss. But it was also the spiciest thing I had eaten in a while. And my stomach and spice don’t always mix well together even though I absolutely love it. Well anyway, I was wearing these adorable white elephant pants I had bought the day before at a street market. Well, we were walking around after lunch, and my stomach started to turn, but we were blocks away from the hotel. I tried to walk as fast as I could. But the streets of Hanoi are crowded, and there were so many people.”
She drops her face into her palms again. “I could not hold it in, Nick. Explosive diarrhea is a thing. And my stomach just said no and boom. What I was hoping was just a fart turned into the worst case of explosive diarrhea I’ve ever experienced in my life. And I was wearing loose-fitting white pants! Poop everywhere. I’m not even kidding. It was running down my legs and out the bottom of my pants. For all I know, I sprayed diarrhea all over the people walking behind me. It was so crowded, and so many people saw me shit my pants. I saw looks of disgust, people laughing, some even had phones out taking pictures and likely recording me. And I had to walk back three more blocks to the hotel with poop everywhere and everyone staring. I did not want to leave my room for a week. I almost made Derrick go out and buy me hair dye so I could color my hair as a disguise.”
I’m half in shock as I feel horrified for her. “At least it was Hanoi. That city has got to have close to eight or nine million people. No one was going to remember you.”
She shakes her head. “The hotel staff saw, though. And I was staying there for five more days. They gave me weird looks every time I walked through the lobby. I wanted to die.”
“At least it wasn’t posted on the internet.”
“Thank God! I am sure it’s out there somewhere, but it’s not viral. And I am kind of grateful I never made it as some big influencer, or else I am sure it would have gone viral.”
“I’ll make sure to steer clear of you anytime you have spicy food. Don’t want to get a shit spray.”
“It’s not funny.” She pouts.
“Yes, it is.” I laugh. “I can’t imagine walking three blocks with shit dripping into my shoes.”
She scrunches up her nose in a way that I should not find adorable, but I do.
“Well, if you think that’s so funny, then I deserve to learn your most embarrassing story.”
“You’re the one that chose truth, not me.”
She lets out an exasperated sigh. “Fine then. Truth or dare?”
I don’t even hesitate. “Dare.”
“Another dare?” she says with a slight hint of disappointment on her face. I know she wants to get something personal from me. “Really? Even after you got so grumpy over the last one?”
“Hit me,” I say, since I would much rather do something stupid again than have to spill my secrets to her.
“I dare you to put the Santa suit on that you were wearing earlier, with no shirt underneath, mind you, and run around the outside of the house in the snow.”
“No absolutely not.”
“Oh, why not? It will be so fun.”
“Why? You want to gawk at me shirtless?”
Her cheeks turn pink, and she looks away from me before turning her sudden embarrassment into a laugh. “Why would I want to do that?”
“Maybe because I saw the way you were looking at me earlier.” I grin at her. “I knew you wanted to see me naked in the flesh.”
She stutters as she tries to come up with an answer. “I-I…well, ugh, no…that was—that’s not at all what happened.”
I take a long drink of my whiskey and set the glass down on the coffee table. “But I guess I did agree to this stupid game, and I said dare so I may as well…” I trail off as I stand and walk down the hall to my bedroom. I don’t miss the look on her face as I walk by, pure lust etched all over it.