6
Owen
Amelia charges out of the room like a freight train.
And it’s not that I’m surprised she would fight me, or yell at me, or storm out just to get away from me—no, none of that is surprising at all.
But the look in her eyes before. It’s almost like she was…
afraid of me. Like my touch was a violation.
I fucking hate myself for it.
The arrival of the grocery delivery is a mercy.
I force Andy, Sophie, and Nolan to go get settled in while I unload everything into the fridge and cabinets, and by the time I’m done, Amelia’s back—that social media smile on her face like nothing happened.
It’s fake. Convincing, but fake. And I’m the one who put it there.
“You guys hungry?” she asks the group. “I was thinking burgers for dinner if that’s alright.”
“Ooh, yes please,” Sophie says. “That sounds amazing.”
Perfect, another opening to give them some space—to hopefully do something right this weekend. I say, “I’ll get the grill started,” and don’t wait for a response, just turn and head into the kitchen.
But sure enough, the clap of Amelia’s heels follows me there.
“I can do it,” she says, but I already have the fridge door open and the hamburger package in my hand.
“That’s okay,” I reply as neutrally as I can. “I’ve got it.”
“Why?” she asks. “Because grilling is for men?”
“Jesus Christ, Amelia.” I can feel my shoulders slumping forward, exhausted by it all. “I’m offering to cook dinner so you can sit with your friends.”
“Right, I’m sure it’s for the benefit of my relaxation.”
“Why can’t I do one nice thing?” I ask. “I’m sure Andy would rather have you in there than me. I can grill a burger without you supervising every single thing.”
“Fine.” Her hands fly up in a surrender that’s all passive-aggression. “Whatever. If you really think you can do it then just go.”
I scoop the supplies into my arms and march out the back door without another word.
Twenty minutes later, I carry the heaping platter of burgers back inside—with and without cheese, toasted buns on the side, so beautifully plated that there’s no chance Amelia could find a thing wrong with it.
We serve ourselves and find seats in the living room before Nolan brings out a cooler full of beers, the handle of vodka, and a shot glass.
“Maybe we should take it easy for the first night,” Andy says cautiously, eyeing the bottle of clear poison as he drapes an arm around Sophie on the couch.
“Overruled!” Nolan yells, slapping the shot glass down on the coffee table and taking a seat in an oversized armchair.
Amelia says, “Bride’s choice. How do you want to get drunk tonight? We could do beer pong, think while you drink, truth then dare, text or drink, a power hour…”
“Ooooh.” Sophie folds her legs underneath herself. “I think… well, since Owen is here and there’s still so much I don’t know about him, I’m gonna go with truth then dare.”
“Phenomenal choice.” Amelia beams, and that alone makes me nervous.
“I’m sorry, did you say ‘truth then dare’?”
“Yeah,” Sophie says. “It’s like truth or dare but better, because everyone has to do a truth first and then everyone has to do a dare.”
“Oh God. Okay.” I lean forward to pick up my burger from the coffee table. “I have a feeling I’m gonna need food in my stomach before this starts.”
“We’ll let you ask first,” Sophie assures, “so you don’t feel put on the spot or anything.”
“Great. Thanks.” I bite into the burger, chewing slowly, buying a moment of time, then swallowing before I ask, “How evil do you guys usually go with these ques—”
Before I can finish the sentence, all four of them say, “Evil.”
Well, that’s interesting. And, hey… if they insist.
I turn to the person in this circle that I will get the most joy from embarrassing. “Alright… Andy, before you were dating Sophie, how many times did you jerk off thinking about her?”
The room explodes into laughter. Nolan roars backwards until he falls right out of his armchair. Amelia’s drink seems to shoot out of her nose—actually, literally shoot out of her nose—and Sophie is immediately crying tears of mirth.
“I—I’m not answering that,” Andy stammers. His cheeks flare hot pink as he reaches for the vodka. “I’ll do the penalty shot.”
Sophie tries to stop him with a hand on his wrist. “Andy, we’re getting married. You can tell me.”
“I can tell you,” Andy returns, “but I’m not telling them.” He fills the lone shot glass then throws it back and grimaces. “Ugh. Horrible.”
“Alright then, Sophie,” I continue, knowing the next best way to torture Andy is through his fiancée. “Same question. How many times did you think about my brother while—”
“Don’t ask my wife that,” Andy spits.
“She’s not your wife yet, ya big sap.” Amelia swats at his leg, but her smile is real again. Thank God.
“These questions are amazing, man.” Nolan is still dying—hasn’t gotten up from where he collapsed onto the rug. “You really understand the spirit of the game.”
Sophie takes a breath, looks around the circle, then says, “I didn’t do that… very much.”
“Oh my God!”
“Sophie!”
“Jesus Christ.”
Laughter grabs everyone again until Amelia forces the matter. “Okay, okay, everyone shut up so we can hear her real answer.”
Sophie raises her glass in front of her lips, hiding there as she says, “I’m gonna go with… ten times.”
“Ten times!?” Amelia spins so her whole body is facing her friend. “Sophie, you horny bitch!”
“That’s barely anything!” Sophie yells, freckle-covered skin turning pink. “We knew each other like a decade before we started sleeping together.”
“I guess so, but damn.” Amelia shakes her head. “Thinking about someone specific is so… I don’t know, intimate? You were down bad, girl.”
Andy leans in towards Sophie and whispers something the rest of us can’t hear.
Sophie kisses his cheek and replies, “Maybe.”
“Alright, who else has a question?” Nolan asks.
The room is warm, and the alcohol makes it warmer. The soft couches have us all relaxed as we finish off our first round of beers and Andy says, “I don’t know. We kind of know everything about each other.”
“I don’t,” I say. “And I’m happy to keep going. Nolan, were you and Sophie ever a thing? Did you ever try to make a move?”
“Christ have mercy,” Andy mutters.
But Nolan has no shame as he says, “I can admit I was interested in the beginning.”
“You were?” Sophie asks from under Andy’s arm.
“Yeah, of course! I mean you’re so fun and pretty—”
“Hey,” Andy interjects—the protective side of my brother that literally only comes out for Sophie. “Remember that time I punched a guy over her? You want to finish that sentence?”
“Oh calm down, lover boy.” Amelia rolls her eyes.
“But,” Nolan continues emphatically, “as I was saying before someone interrupted, we never had the kind of chemistry that Sophie and Andy have. It was just kind of obvious that if she was going to end up with one of us it would be him.”
And I think I know what he means. There’s something magnetic between those two. I could see it from the first time I met Sophie—when they were still “just friends” and I had barely talked to Andy for years. Even then it was obvious.
What must it have been like, I wonder, for Nolan and Amelia to witness it all?
From the moment they met, through years of watching them date other people, to Sophie finding herself without a place to live and moving in with Andy and suddenly—in a flash—nine years of wanting turned into not being able to wait another moment, and they were engaged.
It’s an amazing story.
I should’ve been there for it. But I wasn’t. And I can’t blame anyone but myself.
I must be making a face I don’t mean to make because suddenly everyone’s eyes are on me. Shit—time to change the subject. “Dare I ask but… Amelia, what about you and Andy? Was there ever anything there?”
Sophie lets out a loud “Ha!” and that sets them all laughing again.
“No offense, Andy,” Amelia says. “I love you, but you are the last person I would ever date.”
“None taken. Couldn’t agree more.” Andy leans forward to clink his beer can against hers.
“It’s like we’re simultaneously way too similar and way too different,” Amelia says.
“Yeah,” Nolan adds. “You’re both angry little storm clouds, but Lia is a loud, attention-loving storm cloud and Andy is a reclusive, silent storm cloud.”
“I think I’m offended?” Andy looks across the circle at Nolan.
“I might be too,” Amelia says, “but I’m honestly not sure.”
Then Sophie chimes in. “Alright, someone needs to ask Owen a truth now.”
“Oh, I’ve got it!” Nolan says, sitting up straighter with the brilliance of his idea. “Do you have any tattoos?”
“Oh,” I reply. “Yeah I’ve got lots.”
“Really?” Andy asks, genuinely surprised. And now that I think about it, I guess he would have no way of knowing that.
I clear my throat before responding, “Yeah. They’re just mostly on my chest and upper arms so they’re easy to hide.”
Now everyone’s eyes are on Andy, watching his reaction to this news. He must hate that, so I go for the pivot. “These drinks are getting low. Should we open some wine?”
And it works. Nolan says, “Yeah, good idea. We’re gonna need it for the dare round.”
“Ooh I love a good dare round,” Sophie says, rubbing her palms together. “Can I go first?”
“Of course,” Amelia says as she stands to get the wine. “It’s your special weekend.”
She crosses over to the kitchen, grabs an unchilled bottle of white wine off the counter, and then—my God—twists open the top. How did a twist-top bottle of wine even get here? Are these people so destitute that they can’t afford a cork?
I’m so distracted by this heinous act that I barely register Sophie’s next words.
“Alright Owen, I dare you to… kiss someone in the circle.”
Simultaneously, Andy, Nolan, and I groan. Sophie’s intentions are clear, and she may be the bride, but she’s not getting her way in this. Not after what happened earlier.
I say, “Okay, well I’m not kissing my brother, my brother’s fiancée, or Lilith Queen of Hell, so Nolan—buckle up, brother.”
Nolan stands, arms open wide. “Lay one on me, man.” Then to Sophie, “But this counts as my dare too.”
When Sophie nods, I bite the bullet. I stand, approach, grab him by both sides of the face, and peck him right on the lips.
Light applause and laughter bubble through the room as we retake our seats.
And when I look over to Amelia, who’s still passing out the cups of wine, there’s a slight upturn at the corner of her lips.
“Okay, can I go next?” Nolan asks, not waiting for a response. “I dare Andy to tell us how many times he jacked off thinking about Sophie.”
Everyone screams “Yes!” and “Do it, Andy!” but he’s already reaching for the vodka on the coffee table for the second time.
“It’s not happening,” Andy says.
“That many, huh?” I joke.
“Are we talking every week?” Amelia pushes. “Every day?”
“It was every day wasn’t it,” I say.
“Twice a day?” Amelia volleys. “Andy, that’s a lot…”
“Where’d I put that shot glass?” Andy looks frantically around the room, trying to put an end to his misery.
“Stop you guys,” Sophie giggles. “I’ll make him tell me later and report back.”
Amelia’s gaze finds mine again and—finally—I’m offered the full force of her smile. I get the sense we really could be good co-conspirators. If everything were different.
“Okay, Soph,” Amelia says, breaking our eye contact. “I dare you to… go skinny dipping.”
“Just me?” Sophie asks.
“Yep,” Amelia says. “Are you saying you want us to do it with you?”
“If the options are me alone or me with my friends then yes, I’m asking you to come with me.”
But again, there are some lines I won’t cross. I say, “No way. There are way too many siblings here for skinny dipping. I’ll do a penalty shot if I have to.”
“Ugh, fine,” Amelia says. “Fair point. I’ll come up with something else.” She thinks for all of one second before a new idea flashes in her mind and she says, “I dare you to give Andy a lap dance in front of everyone.”
Sophie replies with a chipper “Okay!” just as Andy says “Absolutely not. I will do the shot for her.”
“What is wrong with you?” Amelia scolds. “You don’t want a lap dance from your hot fiancée?”
“In front of you guys? I would rather die.” Then he turns towards Sophie. “Sorry, baby.”
But Sophie isn’t looking at him. She’s looking down at her phone as “Toxic” by Britney Spears starts blaring from its speakers at full volume.
“Too late for sorry.” She grins, standing up in front of him as everyone else cheers.
Her “lap dance” is deliberately more silly than sexy, but that doesn’t stop Andy from blushing beet red.
He seems tortured by the decision of where to put his hands.
At his sides? On her hips? Covering his own eyes?
And when Sophie’s finally done, he pulls her onto his lap and buries his face into the side of her neck, hiding from the public spectacle they just became.
“Who’s left?” Nolan asks. “Just Lia?”
“Oh, we have to make this good,” Sophie says from her perch on top of Andy.
“I’ve got it,” I say. “I dare you to hand over control of your phone and let us text anyone we choose.”
“Caveat,” Amelia says, leaning forward to place her glass on the table. “After you write the text, can I have a second to decide to take the shot before you hit send?”
I shrug. “Fine.”
Nolan is the one to snatch her phone up first. “Do you still have Professor Zinka’s phone number? We could text him.”
“No, don’t,” Sophie says. “She’ll just take the shot. It has to be someone right on the borderline so it’s embarrassing for her but she’ll still send it.”
But Nolan doesn’t reply. Instead, a bold wrinkle appears on his brow. He looks up from the phone screen to ask, “That asshole is texting you again? Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Wait what?” Sophie’s gaze whips towards Amelia. “Is it Con—”
“Give me that.” Amelia snatches the phone back, then quickly slides her finger over the text thread and hits Delete.
“He said he really wants to see her,” Nolan tells them, and they all seem to know exactly who and what he’s referring to.
“Okay, this was a dumb idea,” Amelia says. “I’m gonna take the shot.”
“What’s happening right now?” I ask.
Amelia pointedly doesn’t answer, just pours the shot and throws it back remorselessly.
Nolan’s the one who explains, “He’s one of her exes from college and they were horrible together. Please tell me you’re not starting something with him again, Lia.”
She reaches for her wine and takes a big swig like it’s a chaser, then says, “Nope. Won’t be a problem.”
And then it’s back, that fake smile of hers. It’s muted and constrained and everything Amelia isn’t.
Dammit if I don’t miss the real one.