Chapter 3 River #2
He lit a clove cigarette and observed the group of the school’s most popular kids without a care in the world.
His peridot eyes landed on me and widened slightly.
The icy green color warmed and grew cool again as he dissected me.
According to Evelyn, Holden was some kind of super genius.
Whatever it was, it seemed as if he could see through my carefully crafted persona to the confused mess beneath.
Evelyn slunk to his side and linked her arm in his. “Everyone, you remember Holden Parish,” she said as if his very existence were her doing.
“Smoking’s outside, dude,” Chance grumbled.
“You sure about that? Your living room smells like a Snoop Dogg concert.” Holden handed Chance a small paper bag. “A token of gratitude for having me at your little shindig.”
Chance’s frown vanished when he pulled out a bottle of Patrón Silver. “Dude. Thanks.”
“Perfect,” Evelyn purred. “Line up the shots, boys, because it’s time to play seven minutes in heaven.”
The kitchen erupted in cheers as Chance lined up Solo cups on the island counter. Holden plucked the bottle from Chance’s hands and poured shots for them both.
“To our host,” he said, his gaze flickering to me and then away.
The guys tossed the liquor back. It whacked Chance hard, making his eyes water, while Holden drank his down smoothly and poured another.
“Step right up, ladies and gents, and let’s make some beautiful memories,” he said and instantly became the party MVP.
“You still cutting out?” Chance asked me under a swell of cheers.
“Nah,” I said, sipping my beer. “Changed my mind.”
“Hell yeah!” Chance pressed a cup with a shot of tequila in it into my hand. “Maybe you’ll get lucky and wind up in my hall closet with that sweet Violet.”
I tossed back the shot and felt recklessness infiltrate my thoughts. My gaze wandered drunkenly back to Holden. “Maybe.”
We headed past the formal dining room to the living room where Chance barked at people to clear a space for Evelyn’s game of seven minutes in heaven.
The music was turned down, and some partygoers gathered in to watch.
Others sat on the floor where I noticed Miller Stratton with a guitar on his lap.
Another new guy, Ronan Wentz, stood over him, arms crossed like a sentinel or bodyguard.
I didn’t know Miller very well except that he was an intense guy and that he was friends with Violet.
Four years ago, he passed out in her backyard and had to be hospitalized for diabetes.
I’d hardly spoken two words to him in those four years, but as we took up our seats on the floor to play the game, he glared at me as if I’d run over his dog.
Chance and I, Donte, Isaiah, and Holden sat on one side of a semicircle on the floor.
Five girls—Violet and Evelyn among them—sat on the other.
I was as far from Holden as possible, though it seemed like my every damn sense was attuned to him.
He’d sprawled his lean frame on the carpet, elbow propping his head, cuddled up around the Patrón bottle.
Every time I looked over at him, he was looking over at me, intently and obviously.
Part of me wanted to grab him by the collar and demand to know what the hell his problem was. Another part of me wanted to grab him…
And what?
Nothing. I was drunk.
Holden’s brows rose in amused curiosity, and I realized I’d been staring. Quickly, I turned my attention to Evelyn, who was explaining her version of seven minutes in heaven while tearing strips of paper to write down the players’ names.
“If your name is picked, you go in. Then we pick someone who joins you in the dark. I’ll leave it up to you to decide how to figure out who,” she added with a sly smile.
“When time’s up, you leave, but that person stays in the closet, and another name is picked.
You get it? Like a chain. If you’re not picked to go in, you drink! ”
Since I was unable to keep my damn eyes off Holden, I noticed him take a sip from the tequila bottle and swallow it as if it were water. Again, he caught me staring. A drop of tequila lingered on his lower lip. With merciless eye contact, he rolled his tongue over his lip to catch it.
I dove into my beer cup, my skin heating. Why was he here? To mess with me? Torment me?
It’s only torment if you care about what he thinks. Or about him…
“This is an enlightened version of seven minutes in heaven,” Evelyn was saying, writing our names on the strips of paper.
“That means I don’t give a fuck if you’re a guy and get paired with another guy or a girl with a girl.
You go in and get to know each other. How well you get to know each other is up to you. ”
I was instantly more sober at the thought of winding up in a closet with Holden.
Goddammit, Evelyn…
“Someone have a timer?”
“Yes, my queen,” I heard Holden say, but this time, I kept my damn eyes to myself.
Evelyn chose a name from the pile of paper strips. “Up first…Violet McNamara.”
Violet hesitated and then picked her way between us seated players toward the closet. Evelyn shot me a knowing look, and I understood what would happen next. She pulled a strip with a new name, showing no one.
“River Whitmore!”
The guys thumped me on the back.
“Remember,” Chance said too loudly. “Be gentle.”
From the corner of the living room came a discordant note from Miller’s guitar. Now he glared at me as if I’d run over his dog, backed up, and did it again.
I hauled myself to my feet, pinned between Miller’s evil eye and Holden’s relentless gaze. I stumbled inside the closet, brushing heavy coats aside to feel my way along a wall in the near-total blackness.
“Violet?”
“I’m over here,” she called from the back.
“It’s dark as shit.”
I felt my way to the wall opposite her, not wanting to crowd her in or make her uncomfortable. I fought for something smooth to say to pave the way for asking her to the dance. I had nothing.
“This is a crazy party, huh?” Violet said finally. “That Holden is a strange guy.”
“Yeah,” I blurted. “He’s fucking weird. Reminds me of that vampire, Lestat.”
“Oh my God, I said almost the exact same thing, different vampire. I didn’t know you read Anne Rice.”
“I don’t. Saw the movie. I mean…my mom watched it once. I remember some of it, I guess.”
“Okay.”
Another silence fell. I leaned my head against the wall and stared at the black of the ceiling. I was in a dark, enclosed space with a beautiful girl who was clearly into me. And I felt nothing. Had nothing to say. Not even my prescribed lines.
Violet jumped in. “How are football practices going?”
“Good. Long. You play a sport too, right?”
“Soccer. We don’t start until spring.”
“Cool.”
The convo sputtered and died.
Enough of this bullshit. Just do it. Like tearing off a Band-Aid.
“So, Violet.”
“So, River.”
“Homecoming dance is in a few weeks.”
“Yes.” Hope came alive in her voice.
“Are you going with anyone?”
Miller Stratton maybe?
“Nope!” she practically shouted.
“Cool. So…would you like to go with me?”
“Yeah. Yes. I’d like that. Thank you.”
Mission accomplished.
“Great. We can work out the details later.”
“Sure.”
Another silence fell. I’d come to do what I needed to do, but Violet’s expectations filled the quiet until a rapping on the door jolted us.
“Time’s up! Come on out, Violet. River, stay put.”
“That’s my cue.”
Violet started to rise, and all I could think about was Holden Parish lying stretched out on the carpet, watching me. Getting into my head and monopolizing my attention.
His tongue tasting that drop of tequila…
My hand shot out and grabbed Violet’s like a lifeline.
I inhaled the scent of her perfume—something sweet and flowery and feminine—and willed it to have the same intoxicating effect on me as Holden’s cologne.
Violet’s breath caught, waiting for my kiss.
I waited too, for my body to respond to the beautiful girl in the dark, wanting this.
My lips landed on her cheek.
“Thank you, Violet,” I managed weakly. I lingered there for a minute because I should kiss her again. A real kiss. She was ready, and I should’ve been willing…
Instead, I let her go and slumped back down on my side of the closet, humiliation burning my skin. “You’d better get out of here before Evelyn starts screeching.”
“Oh. Right.” Disappointment laced Violet’s words as she stood up and made her way to the door. “Okay…uh. Bye.”
My head fell into my hands. I had a beautiful girl waiting for me to kiss her in the dark, wanting me to kiss her. From somewhere inside, deep and neglected, a small voice whispered, What do you want?
Before I could contemplate an answer, the door opened, and Holden Parish stepped into the closet.
Because of course he did. Goddamn this stupid game.
The light from the living room outlined his tall form, and I stuffed my hands in the front pockets of my jeans.
The closet went black as he shut the door, but I’d have known it was Holden if I were blind; the closet was infused with his clove-and-cologne scent, overlaid with the stringent sting of tequila.
It hit my senses harder than the booze I’d drunk and was a million times more potent than Violet’s feminine scent.
“Hey, man,” I said. Casual as hell.
“Hey, man,” Holden mimicked me, and his dark shape slid down the side of the wall perpendicular to me. There was a metallic scrape, and his Zippo flared to life, illuminating his face and nothing else.
I held perfectly still, watching as the shadows cut his cheekbones into even sharper lines, contouring shadows that led to his full lips and the cleft in his chin. His green eyes glittered over the flame, then he snuffed the light.
It was too dark to see; my body sensed Holden instead. I felt his presence in the small room like a low hum. A current moved between us, but he said nothing, and I had nothing to say. I felt guilty of a crime I hadn’t committed…or had yet to commit.
“So,” Holden said after a minute of silence. “River, was it?”
“Whitmore, yeah.”
“Tell me something, River Whitmore.” Light flared as he lit his Zippo. His eyes bored into mine, seeing through me as if I were made of cellophane. “Aside from me…who else knows you’re gay?”
I froze, every molecule in my body petrifying at once.
I couldn’t move or breathe, yet I fell into the clear green depths of Holden’s eyes, tinged gold and fiery in the flickering light.
He watched a storm of emotions I couldn’t control play over my features, and the sharp angles of his face softened.
“You’re crazy,” I said, my voice hoarse. “And drunk. You don’t know shit about me.”
Holden leaned forward until our faces were inches apart, the flame dancing between us. His nearness was all over me; I felt it along my skin, a tingling shiver that danced up my arms, down my spine, and straight to my cock.
“Your secret is safe with me,” he whispered. Then his lips parted—I couldn’t tear my eyes from his mouth—and he inhaled slowly and blew out the flame.
The darkness washed over me, breaking me from whatever fucking voodoo this guy was working on me. I got up off the floor and pushed my way to the door, unable to keep from slamming it open and storming out.
“Fucking asshole,” I spat and strode through the room, drawing attention. Making a scene.
Shit.
I sucked in deep breaths and tapped the keg for another cup as Chance, Donte, and some guys followed me into the kitchen.
“What was all that about?” Donte asked.
“Did the new guy try something on you?” Chance asked, chugging laughter.
“Yeah, get a little action you weren’t ready for?” another guy, Mikey Grimaldi, asked with even more glee. As if consent were a big joke.
I could’ve made up any story I wanted. Whether it was true or not, they’d kick the shit out of Holden for no other reason than I told them to.
“Nah, it’s nothing,” I said, taking a long sip of beer. “He shoots off at the mouth, and I’m not in the mood for it. It’s all good.”
The guys absorbed this, and because I was their king, they accepted it without question. But how far would that acceptance stretch?
Who else knows you’re gay?
The question was a flare sparking in a pitch-black night or a bomb dropped into a dark pit, shaking the foundation and threatening the entire edifice.
I watched the guys—my supposed friends—laugh and joke as if nothing had changed.
Because it hasn’t, I told myself fiercely. Not one damn thing.
Yet the image of green eyes watching me—seeing me—over the flicker of flame wouldn’t snuff out, no matter how much beer I tried to drown it in.
It’d taken less than seven minutes, but everything had changed.