She looked like a Barbie only with black hair instead of blonde.
Emily drops the necklace on my dresser and spins around to face me. “Oh my god. This is great.” She glances at the clock on my nightstand and grins. “It’s only 7:30, we have plenty of time!”
She prances over to my closet door and starts yanking hangers in every which direction. She’s zooming through my clothes like she’s a designer getting ready for her first runway show. She pulls out a tight black dress I didn’t even know that I had. “What’s this? You never wear this!”
I shrug. “Must belong to my mom. She probably put it in my closet by mistake. Why are you acting like a crazy person?”
“Go take a shower,” she demands, not taking her eyes off of my closet.
I frown, looking down at my comfy pajama pants. Why would I go take a shower? I was all warm and cozy in my bedclothes, that didn’t even make any sense. Take a shower to go to bed? No thanks.
“Why would I do that?”
“Because,” Emily says, still not looking at me, “we’re going to that party.”
Chapter 4
Emily has completely and totally lost her mind.
“You have completely and totally lost your mind,” I say aloud.
Her back is still facing away from me but I swear I can tell she’s rolling her eyes at me. “Come on, Kayla, get in the shower. We have plenty of time but not if you don’t get a move on.”
“Why the hell would we go to the party? I don’t even know any of those people! I can’t just show up at one of the most popular girls in schools house and demand to be let in so I can party with her and her friends! I’ll get laughed out of there!” I don’t even realize that I’m up from my bed, waving my hands up and down like a crazy person until these words are out of my mouth.
Emily turns around, laughing at my crazy rant. “First of all, if you show up later on no ones going to say anything to you. Everyone’s drunk by a certain point of the night to say or do anything that makes any sense. Plus, you’ll be with me and I was invited. Plus…”
“Plus what?” I ask her exasperated at her for taking so long to get her words out at such a critical moment.
“Zane’s going to be there, and he ‘s not going to let anyone be mean to you, not when this whole bet thing is going on. He needs to stay on your good side, and whatever Zane says is like the law to these people, trust me.”
I turn the idea over in my head. I had never been to a party before, any party, let alone one that was at one of the coolest kids in schools house. Part of me wanted to go, just to say I had done it, just to prove that I wasn’t as scared as I thought of every damn thing in the world.
“Besides, why should Zane get to have a night off? He gets to go to some party and get drunk with his friends while you sit and home and stress about the bullshit his friend and him are putting you through? No way in hell that’s fair. No nights off for him.”
“That’s true,” I say slowly, still trying to decide if this is the best idea or not. “I don’t get any nights off from thinking about it, why should he?”
“Exactly.” She looks at me with intense green eyes, waiting for me to get on board with her plan. “Besides, Zane definitely won’t hook up with any girls if you’re there.”
I perk up at this. “What do you mean?”
“Think about it, he’s not going to hook up with any girl while you’re at the same party as him. He knows he has to be on his best behavior when you’re around, any little thing might turn you off to him. Yup, if you were there he would definitely not be paying attention to any other girl but you,” she says, delivering the final nail on the coffin.
“Well, I guess I could make an appearance. You know, just for a few minutes, it couldn’t hurt.” I’m trying to play it off like I don’t care, but Emily’s not stupid and she knows just as much as I do what she just said was a big part of why I wanted to go.
I couldn’t help it. I didn’t want to care about Zane hooking up with other girls, but I did. And knowing that my presence would have anything to do with why he didn’t was exciting and thrilling. Having any type of control over the females Zane was in contact with turned me on and made me want to go anywhere or do anything to make sure that it played out the way I wanted. It was crazy; but I didn’t care. In fact, deep down, I liked it. Deep down, I was happy about it.
“Great,” she turns her attention back toward the closet. “Go shower.”
I shake my head. “I don’t need to shower. I’ll just throw on a pair of jeans, or something.”
“No, go shower. You aren’t wearing jeans. And you aren’t wearing your hair up either.”
“What? Why not?”
“Because tonight, Kayla is the night that you and the rest of the world discover your sexy side.”
***
As soon as my mom hears what is going on she’s all too willing to get involved. It’s been my mom’s dream forever to dress me up like a little doll, never understanding why I didn’t want to be more of a girly girl. Of course, we don’t tell her anything about Zane or the bet. We do tell her we are going to a party though, but we say it’s a birthday party for a girl in our grade, not an unsupervised drinking party.
Anyway, my mom’s too excited to ask that many questions. Instead, she takes Emily and me into her room and lets us look through her rows and rows of clothes. She has dress after dress and skirt after skirt. Emily and her are the same size and everything Emily puts on of hers looks absolutely amazing on her. I don’t have the same luck. Most of her dresses barely fit me, and the ones that fit me are really tight and uncomfortable. Every dress I try on Emily thinks is just right, but they just make me feel uncomfortable, clinging to me in the wrong places or making me feel like a body builder compared to most of the girls we go to school with.
Finally, I find one that works. It’s white and gold with a light sparkly design that flows just right around my stomach, managing to not make it look like it’s too tight for my body. It’s tight around my butt, making it look thick and toned. My boobs are practically up to my chin, and the heeled boots my mom gave me are a little big on my feet but they manage to make my legs look long and tan.
I have a sweater that goes over the dress too, but as soon as my mom is out of ear shot Emily informs me that we well be ditching that as soon as we’re out of the house. The thought is enough to make me turn red, but I try to take it one step at a time, only thinking about making it through the immediate task at hand. Baby steps.
My mom has hair and face products spread all over her bathroom. I’ve never seen so much makeup or hair accessories in my entire life. You would think we were on a movie ser or something, instead of in my mom’s bathroom. It was that crazy. My mom and Emily refuses to allow me to look at myself until they’re all done. They’re taking the whole thing extremely serious, like I’m going to the prom for the first time, or something.
The whole thing takes at least two hours and by the time they’re done I feel like a whole new person. When they spin me around to face the mirror that’s in the middle of my mom’s bedroom I almost don’t recognize myself. My normally flat hair is bouncing in long flowing curls all over my face. My normally bare face is covered in bronzer, blush, a smoky eye shadow, mascara, and a deep red lipstick. My dress shows off all the curves I had tried so hard to hide for all these years. But the best part, my favorite part, is my eyes. The thick glasses that normally cover my deep blue eyes are no longer there, replaced instead by the contacts I had gotten when I was much younger.
The thought of touching my eye had totally freaked me out, but my mom and Emily had talked me through it. They both had contacts and after a few tries I was a pro at taking them in and out. Now, looking at my eyes for the first time in what felt like forever without the thick glasses covering my deep sea of blue I was reminded of how lovely they were. They were just like my mom’s, and for the first time in my life I could see me in her. For the first time in my life I felt like I had gotte
n her beauty. I had never thought I looked like her until this moment.
It was more than that though. It was something else. For the first time in my life I felt… I felt…
“You look fucking sexy,” Emily says, taking the words out of my head.
My mom shoots her a look and Emily clears her throat loudly. “I mean, you look beautiful, Kayla. Really beautiful.”
I meet my mom’s gaze in the mirror and she nods, a huge grin on her face. “You do, you look beautiful.”
And for the first time in my life, I believe it.
Chapter 5
It was one thing to feel sexy standing in front of a mirror in your mother’s master bedroom with her and your best friend standing right next to you, it was a complete other thing to feel sexy in front of a house full of your peers, most of whom you had never even spoken to in your life. That’s what I had been trying to explain to Emily for the last twenty minutes while we waited to go inside Morgan’s house. We were sitting outside in Emily’s car while I came up with every excuse in the world as to why we shouldn’t go inside.
“Come on, we can’t stay out here all night,” Emily tells me, glancing at the clock on the dashboard. It was almost eleven now and from the looks of it the party was in full swing. I could hear the faint sound of loud music inside and shadows moving about through the many windows. Morgan’s house was huge. I mean, we lived in a pretty nice house, but this one even put ours to shame.
I take another swig out of the water bottle that’s resting in between my legs. The cold red liquid that’s inside causes the inside of my legs to ache. It was fruit punch mixed with vodka. Emily had kept my mom occupied while I snuck into the basement and filled a few water bottles with vodka for us to bring with us. I knew that Zane’s dad and her would never notice, they rarely paid attention to that kind of thing. Although, judging from how easy it was for me to get my hands on this, maybe they should.
I had never had alcohol before. Ever. The idea seemed foreign to me. None of the friends I had grown up with had been into that kind of thing, and it’s not like I had ever been to a party or anything. The thought never really occurred to me until tonight. The red liquid I was currently downing tasted like candy. If there was alcohol in it, I couldn’t taste it.
“Isn’t drinking supposed to make you feel more relaxed?” I ask Emily, taking a longer gulp out of my drink.
“It probably just hasn’t hit you yet. Which is why you really shouldn’t be drinking it so fast,” Emily tells me for what feels like the hundredth time since we left my house. She had insisted on driving the second she saw me take my first swig of alcohol.
I had no idea what she was talking about. I didn’t feel anything.
“I don’t feel anything!” I tell her, kind of whining.
“Trust me, you will. No more putting it off, it’s time to go in.” She opens the door to her car and puts one foot on the sidewalk as if to prove her point.
I glance at her from the other side of the car and immediately start to feel sick to my stomach. Her long hair was straightened perfectly around her face, her makeup bold and beautiful. She had on a short pink dress that made her legs look like they were miles long. She looked like she belonged at a party like this. And she did. Even if she didn’t talk to them that much anymore, Emily would always belong. She had whatever it was they looked for, whatever it was that was important to them. I didn’t, and I never would. Suddenly this whole thing felt more like a joke than ever.
“Maybe we should just go home,” I try one more time.
Emily puts her other heeled foot out of the car and jumps out in one quick motion. She smoothes her pink dress out and reaches in to grab her purse out of the center counsel where it rests between the two of us. “Kayla, Zane could be in there right now, enjoying his life and making out with random girls. Now I love you, but get your ass out of the car.” Then she slams the door shut in my face.
I clutch the water bottle of alcohol that’s in my hand slowly, taking one last sip before I put the cap back on and face the music. I knew I couldn’t stay in the car avoiding it all night. I had to go in. It wasn’t just about Zane hooking up with girls. (It had a lot to do with it.) But it was more than that, too. This was something I had to do for me. I wasn’t going to keep playing by his rules. I wasn’t going to keep losing face. I had to do this.
It was show time.
Okay, so walking with all the alcohol I had consumed in my body was a lot easier than sitting with all the alcohol I had consumed in my body. As soon as I got out of the car and tried to walk, it was like it had all hit me at once. Plus, it didn’t help that this was the first time I had ever worn heels in my life. It’s not like they were the easiest things to walk in.
“Are you okay?” Emily asks after I’ve almost fell for the tenth time on our way up to the door of Morgan’s house.
“Yeah,” I stand up straight, smoothing out my dress like I had seen her do just seconds before. “I think that fruit punch is catching up with me a little.”
She laughs. “I told you it would! No more of that.” She reaches for the water bottle that I had brought out of the car with me, but I throw it into my purse before she has a chance to get her fingers on it.
She laughs again. “Fine, but just take it easy.”
I manage to get to the front of the house without any more almost falls. I put my hand up to reach the doorbell and Emily grabs my hand, pulling it back down to my side. She smirks. “Just be cool. Everything is going to be fine, I’m right here with you.” Then she reaches out and opens the door without knocking.
I’m not sure what I’m expecting to happen when I walk in the door, but nothing does. No one stops and looks at me like I’m some kind of freak. No one stops and demands that I leave or kicks me out of the house. Instead, everyone just carries on like I’m not present at all. Pretty much just like they do at school.
I scan the room, taking in my surroundings. I try to tell myself I’m not looking for Zane, even though he’s one of the only things on my mind. The house is packed, kids all over the place, all talking and socializing. Some dancing with each other, a few taking shots in the corner. I can see some beer pong tables set up in the kitchen, games in progress.
It’s all people that I would never talk to at school. People that I have classes with, that have been in my school for years, but that have never given me the time of day before. I feel nervous all over again, like I don’t belong here.
Before I have too much time to think about it, Morgan herself is in the flesh. She’s standing in front of us, a huge grin on her face. Her dark hair is pulled up in a high bun with curly pieces falling down randomly around her face. Her makeup looks like she had it done by a professional makeup artist, and her dress puts mine to shame. It’s tight and low cut in a deep red color, making me feel insecure all over again.
“Oh my god!” Her green eyes sparkle as she jumps up and down. “You came! You came! You really came! Megan didn’t think you would come! She was all ‘I don’t know why you keep inviting her, she’s never going to come’ but you did come! You did!” Morgan is practically jumping out of her skin, and suddenly it makes perfect sense that she’s the captain of the cheerleading squad. She certainly was awful… peppy.
Emily smiles and grinds her teeth a little bit together. “Yup. Here I am! And this is…” she gestures toward me but Morgan waves her off.
“Kayla! Of course I know Kayla!” She screeches all happy, still jumping up and down. “I’m so glad you could come! I think your brother is around here…” she trails off again, looking for Zane. “Well, I’m sure he’s here somewhere! You look great by the way!” She’s grinning again, sounding like she really means it.
“I… I… thank you,” I somehow manage to get out. This whole thing is too weird for me, I didn’t even think Morgan had any idea who I was and here she was talking about how great I looked and how glad she was I could come. Clearly not what I had thought would happen walking into this house.
“No problem, let’s get you girls some drinks.” She leads the way across the living room and into her kitchen. I can feel some people’s eyes on my now, but not in a bad way, more in a curious way. I make my way through the sea of people that are all around and stop by the sink in the kitchen when Morgan does.
“Pick your poison,” she says. There’s an assortment of alcohol and beer spread out all over the counter. Cups and mixers are all stacked neatly next to it. I have no idea how they even got all this alcohol, no one here was 21 that I had seen. I was guessing Morgan didn’t have trouble getting what she wanted though.
I grab a cup and poor some diet coke into it, adding a splash of vodka. I figure it was best to not drink too much more. Emily’s eyes are on me and she nods her approval, fixing a small drink for herself also. I turn my attention back to Morgan who’s still grinning. I’m trying to figure out if she’s really this nice or if she’s just putting on a show. She could be drunk, or she could feel like she has to be nice of me because of Zane.
Before I have time to really think about it, Ben is standing next to her, his arm slung around her shoulder. My mind starts racing at the sight of him. He looked good, like he did most days. The same grin spread across his face that I had seen so many times in school. Today I hated it more than usual though; today it bothered me more than I had thought it would. This whole thing was his fault. He was the one who had started the stupid bet. He was the one who had picked me for Zane to try and seduce, he had no regard or thoughts for anyone but himself. He had made my life into a game for his pleasure, and that was something I could never forget or forgive.
“Morgan,” he says, “we’re up in beer pong.” His eyes travel to Emily and me. “Whoa, are my eyes playing tricks on me or has Emily actually graced us with her presence? And who, might I ask, is your friend?” His eyes travel up and down my body slowly, taking in my body. He licks his lips.
Stepbrother Games: The Bet Book Two Page 3