“The reins.” James chuckles.
“Har, har,” I say then huff. “I won’t ask anything else, but what the hell does that mean?”
“It means …” Alexa begins.
Abhi quickly cuts her off, “Alexa.”
“Not like a girl will get anything out of being quiet, except maybe an orgasm, so why should I be quiet?”
“You know”—Brisa smirks as she holds her hand up and wiggles her fingers a bit—“you can do that all by yourself.”
“I think I’m in love.” Baker coughs loudly, holding his hand over his chest and batting his eyelashes.
“Oh, aren’t you adorable?” Brisa croons.
“Go to prom with me?” he asks.
Of course she’d get asked.
“I’m all sorts of sorry, Baker, but I’m taken.”
“So, who’s my competition?”
Here we go, I sigh loudly in my head.
Holding up my Claw, I answer for her, “Me.”
“You don’t have a date?” Alexa gasps.
“Hey.” Brisa laughs. “She has me, and I guarantee a good time.”
Abhi chuckles. “Now two of us are in—”
“Stop trying to poach my date.” I laugh.
“Don’t worry; no one could take me away from you.” Brisa grins then jumps and pulls my phone from her pocket and looks at it.
“Who is it?” I ask.
“Uncle Cyrus, but your battery is dying,” she says, typing back a message … to my father.
“What did he say?” I ask.
She holds up my phone. “That you need to charge your battery.”
“Jesus.” Alexa laughs. “He runs a tight ship, huh?”
“You have no idea,” I sigh, scanning the room for a charger.
“I’ll get it charged.” Brisa walks toward a closed door.
“Don’t go in there, Bri,” James calls after her.
She holds up my phone. “Trust me; Uncle Cyrus is scarier than the …” She looks back at me. “What did you call them?”
“Four horsemen of the apoc—”
“Yeah, that.” She pushes down on the door handle then pushes open the door and slides in.
“Jesus,” Baker grumbles.
“It’ll be fine,” Alexa says on a hiccup.
“Fuck it will,” Abhi huffs.
“Back off,” James, the laidback, shaggy-haired stoner one of the group, grumbles, surprising us all.
Brisa walks back into the room as quickly as she walked out. “Found one. Should be good to go.”
When they all look at her, she asks, “What?”
Baker sighs. “Nothing.” Then he looks at his watch. “We have an hour.”
“What is this? Motel 8?” I ask, plopping down on the couch that is much more comfortable than it appears.
They all look at me with disgust.
“Oh my God.” I laugh. “You’re all too much.”
Alexa sits next to me. “Have you actually stayed at a Motel 8?”
Brisa sits on the other side of me and gives me a very quick, pleading look that I’m sure no one else caught.
The truth is no … “I wouldn’t be opposed to staying at a motel.”
“Girl.” Alexa laughs. “Two words—Bed. Bugs.”
“More than two words—that’s so freaking gross.” I laugh, and Brisa does, too.
The guys sit across from us on the other sofa, looking much more relaxed now. Thank God.
“So,” I say, looking around.
“So …” Brisa sighs, leaning into me.
“Let’s play three lies and a truth.” Alexa grins.
I hold back correcting her by mentioning that it’s normally two truths and a lie … for now.
“Really?” Abhi quirks a brow.
Alexa defends, “What? It’s a good way to get to know people.”
Baker sighs. “It’s lame.”
I don’t want to point out that we—all six of us—are actually, in fact, pretty lame at this moment. Buzzed or not, I’m not about to put that out for them to chew on, because I am pretty sure, when I go to school Monday, I will do so knowing at least these three aren’t judging me, Brisa doesn’t count, she’s Crew. Crew doesn’t judge… publicly.
“I’ll go first,” Brisa pipes in, clearly helping Alexa off the hot seat.
I hold up two fingers reminding her it’s two truths and she begins, “My parents encourage masturbation”—the guys laugh, and Alexa giggles—“my younger sister had a boyfriend before me, and I loved my old school.”
“Number one was a lie.” Baker laughs, and everyone agrees.
“That’s definitely a truth.” I raise my near-empty drink.
“Shut up!” Alexa gasps.
“Sunday dinner with the Steel family is always interesting,” I say then take a drink.
“Why would your dad—”
“They want us to know the difference between physical and emotional,” Brisa cuts Alexa off.
“I don’t understand.”
“It means an orgasm can trick a young, impressionable mind into thinking the boy, or girl, caused it when in fact, it’s the body’s natural reaction to pleasurable touch.”
“Fuck …” Abhi sighs.
When I look at him and see he and Baker both staring at Brisa, I glance over at her to see she has a smirk playing on her face.
My cousin is certainly a natural flirt and, in a way, I envy that. When I try to flirt, I’m a million percent sure I look more crazy than cute.
“I get that,” James speaks for the second time this entire evening. “But if two people are into each other on a spiritual level, that orgasm can be way more intense.”
I notice his eyes shift, albeit briefly, in Alexa’s direction. I also notice that she doesn’t notice at all.
“My turn.” Alexa grins.
“Two truths and a lie,” I whisper.
She nods. “My mom made me get a nose job last summer, I’m going to fat camp for the third year in a row, and my dad isn’t really my real—”
“I call bull on fat camp,” James interrupts.
“No, those are all true. I haven’t said my lie yet.” She smiles. It’s that same plastic smile that I see every day at school that all the girls exchange with one another. The kind of smile that is so disingenuous that I can’t wrap my mind around, or fathom why, they bother offering a smile when there is no truth behind it.
My heart literally aches for her truths, and I immediately want to take them away.
“You’re not fat; you have big boobs and—”
“Curvy hips,” James interrupts me. “Hips that a real man, and a woman, want, not jealous, delusional people feeding into an unrealistic social norm set by wannabe waifs.”
Alexa’s face starts to turn red as she looks down at her hands. “That your lie?”
He narrows his eyes as he looks at her. “No, that’s the truth.”
Brisa and I glance at each other, both thinking the same thing.
Aw …
Regardless of the incredible sweetness James just tossed to Alexa, I know what it feels like to see yourself through others’ eyes, and I won’t let her be alone in it.