by C. L. Stone
Luke moved away from us and came back with a CD. He popped it into the stereo. I blushed when I recognized the song.
“What’s that?” Nathan asked next to me.
“Some Japanese rock,” I said. “Luke stole one of my CDs.”
Nathan smiled and grabbed for my hand. “Sounds good to me.”
We danced to this song, too. I thought they might laugh at my music but they bobbed heads and swayed their hips. I sensed eyes on us but was terrified to look and see if North and the others were watching. I focused on Nathan, Luke and Gabriel dancing so I wouldn’t feel so out of place.
The next song was different, a symphonic rock tune, slower in tempo. Nathan backed away from me and I watched him, confused as to why. A hand brushed my arm.
Victor stood behind me, fire eyes ignited.
I stilled, unsure. He took my hand in his and wrapped his arm around my waist. In time with the violins of the music that streamed from the stereo, Victor held me close to his body while he led me in the dance. My heart fluttered and I glanced down to try to avoid stepping on his feet.
“Look at me, Sang,” he said in his sweet baritone voice. He let go of my hand, his fingertips tracing my chin until my gaze lifted. My face was on fire, matching the burn in his eyes. The hand touching my chin dropped to my waist. My own trembling fingers pressed to his chest. He guided me through the dance steps. His fingers smoothed across my back, fingertips traced along my ribs. My heart was melting. He was graceful, handsome.
When another song started, Kota got up and crossed the room toward us. His eyes were intent on mine. Victor and Kota shared a look that I didn’t quite understand. Victor’s eyes blazed, Kota’s were determined. Victor let go of me and Kota took his place.
“Ready?” Kota asked.
A drift of his spicy scent filled my nose. I bit my lower lip.
Kota moved with precision. He put his hand to my lower waist, drew me close to him and guided me through the steps.
“One, two...” he counted under his breath. He pulled me to him, pushed me out and twirled me so the skirt flared, and then brought me back. I had no idea what I was doing, just following his lead. He spun me, dipped me. His hands clutched at my waist. It was way too intense. His green eyes swallowed me up. The quiet smile on his lips, the way he held me close at some points until my chest was pressed against his had me floating. I was on the toes of my boots to keep from tripping. My heart was going crazy.
When the song was over, I backed away, fanning a hand before anyone else could step up. “Okay guys,” I said to them, breathless. “I can’t any more... in these heels.”
They all laughed.
I wobbled my way back to the couch, and fell into the seat between Silas and North. The others left the music on but moved to the bean bag chairs and grabbed Xbox controllers.
“Here,” North said, patting his leg. “Put your foot up here.”
He dropped a hand on my knee and brought my leg up until it was hooked over his. He unzipped the boot and tugged it off. Surprisingly, this didn’t bother me in the slightest. Gabriel had dressed me, North was undressing me. Sort of. He was removing my shoes. Was I finally getting used to their touches and the way they did things for me?
While he was doing it, I was leaning against Silas. His stomach growled. I laughed. “Why didn’t you tell me you were hungry?” I asked him.
“You were busy,” Silas said.
“Should we get started?” North asked. He finished taking off my boots, leaving the socks on. He pushed my legs off of his knee and stood up.
“I thought I was cooking.”
“You are,” Silas said, standing and reaching back for me. My hand disappeared into his and he pulled me to my feet. “We’re helping.”
I slipped across the carpet in the socks as I followed them into Kota’s kitchen. North opened the fridge, checking the contents. “We’ve got two pounds of ground beef. So I guess grilling burgers is out. That’s not enough for all of us.”
I stepped up next to him to inspect the fridge. As I did so, I pressed my cheek against his arm to look inside.
North shifted and his fingers closed around my shoulder and pulled me in tighter next to him. “Have an idea?”
I glanced at the contents, spotting bacon and onions. “Hmm... could make a big pot of cowboy stew.”
“What’s that?”
I snagged bacon and onions and the ground beef from the fridge. I dropped them on the counter and looked around at the cabinets to try to guess where the pots were.
“What can I do?” Silas asked, his hands stuffed in his pockets as he leaned against the archway. His broad shoulders bulked against the baseball jersey he was wearing.
“Can you cut an onion?”
He smirked. “I think I can handle that.”
Within a few minutes, I had bacon sizzling at the bottom of a big pot. Silas chopped onions next to me on the counter and I was directing North to grab other ingredients.
When the bacon was finished cooking, I scooped it out onto a plate.
“Want me to drain the fat?” North offered. He hovered over me, watching as I worked.
“Nope,” I said. I motioned to Silas to bring his cut onion over and he dumped it in.
“Fat’s not healthy,” North said.
“Your brain is made of fat,” I replied. “You need fat for your brain.”
North smirked, rolling his eyes.
Silas laughed, and massaged my neck and scalp with one hand. “She’s right. She cooks and she’s smart. Let’s keep her.” His big hands were rough and not as precise as Kota’s or as soothing as Gabriel’s, but I enjoyed it.
As I cooked, Silas and North asked what I needed, and found things for me quickly. When I was almost done, I added barbeque sauce to the mix.
“How much are you adding?” North asked. “Are you measuring?”
“Not really,” I said.
“How do you know when it’s enough?”
“When it tastes good.” I stirred the sauce into the mixture of ground beef, bacon and beans. “There. Let it stew for a while. It’ll taste better if you let it sit.”
North gripped my hand over the spoon and brought it to his mouth, holding my hand as he took a bite. He let go and licked at his lips. “It’s simple, but it’s good.”
“What are we having?” Erica asked as she came into the kitchen.
“Cowboy stew,” Silas replied. “Sang’s recipe.”
Erica beamed. “We’re going to have to get together and swap recipes.”
I blushed. “I wasn’t sure what else to make. There’s so many people here.”
Erica waved me off. “Sometimes I just order pizza for them or we grill out. We’re flexible.” She bent over the pot, smelling deeply. “I think I’ll make cookies.”
“Should we help?” Silas asked.
“Nope. You’ve made dinner,” she said. “I’ll take care of dessert. You three go have fun.”
We tried to insist we could help or at least clean up, but she wouldn’t allow us to remain in her kitchen.
Back in the living room, North and Silas went back to the couch. The others were playing some car race game on the big screen.
Luke was sitting alone in one of the double bean bag chairs. He waved me over to him. I slipped into the chair beside him. With the way the bean bag chairs worked, we were tilted in together, our hips touching. It felt intimate.
Luke swept a finger across my cheek and brushed a lock of hair from my face. “So how do you like it?”
I blinked at him, confused.
“I mean the chairs,” he said. “The ones we got.”
I’d only been sitting down for a minute, but it was cozy. “It’s comfortable. I bet I could curl up in one and take a nap.”
“That’s perfect. We’ll keep them.”
I laughed, dropping my fingers across my mouth. “Would you have kept them if I said I didn’t like them?”
“Nope.”
“Is my o
pinion that important?”
“Yes.”
“But...” I hesitated, remembering what Gabriel had said about girls sometimes dissing themselves, but this was different. “I mean, what if you like them? You bought them so you should feel comfortable in them and not worry about my opinion.”
“All our opinions matter,” he said. “You’re one of us now.”
“Sang!” Gabriel’s voice cut through the chatter and the game music. “Come race the cars.”
A controller was tossed at us. I was teamed up with Nathan for the game, racing against Victor and Gabriel.
Nathan took one look at me and mouthed the word: cheat.
Easier said than done. Swimming cheating was one thing. How was I going to cheat now?
To start, I climbed away from Luke. Victor’s chair was closer to the screen, and I plopped down next to him. Victor beamed. He leaned into me, his side pressed to mine. My arm, because of the way I had to hold the controller, was neatly tucked under his.
The game started and I had plenty of trouble trying to figure out the right controls. As it was, I was dead last from the start. Nathan wasn’t doing too badly.
I tried bumping my car into Gabriel’s, and taking dangerous cuts across the street just to block Victor, but it wasn’t helping. Every move I made just pushed me further behind.
Out of desperation, I nudged my elbow into Victor, hoping to distract him.
“Hey, hey,” he said in a low voice. He started nudging me back.
Well, if he’s going to do it...
I moved my hand from the controller, poking him in the stomach. His muscles flexed out of reaction. He laughed, nudging me over with his elbow and practically leaning over me, trapping my arm against my body.
He managed to take the lead in the game. I went for curling my fingers and tickling.
“Sang!” he called out, cracking up. He kept leaning on me, but I had given up trying to beat any of them so I left the controller in my lap.
My hands sought out his sides and I brushed my fingertips against his red polo shirt. “Yes, Victor?”
He grunted and dropped his controller, reaching for my hands and drawing them together until they were over my head. I struggled, but he took both wrists in one hand and his other moved over my stomach and he started to tickle.
“No!” I squealed, laughing and trying to twist and pull away from him. It didn’t help. His fingers found my sides and he traced delicately along my stomach. I was howling with laughter and near tears. In order to find any relief, I was pressing myself close to him to trap his arm between us. His breath fell against my ear as he giggled.
“Hell yeah!” Nathan shouted, dropping the controller in his beanbag chair. He pumped his fist in the air. His car spun on the screen, declared the winner.
“God damn it,” Gabriel said. He glared over at us. “What the hell are you guys doing?”
“She’s cheating,” Victor said breathlessly through his laughter. He let me go, but I was still in a fit of sniggering.
“That’s my Sang,” Nathan said. He leaned over in his bean bag with his hand up in the air. I slapped my palm against his for a loud high five.
“That’s it,” Gabriel said. “She’s on my team now.”
“Fine,” Nathan said. “Then I get Kota.”
“I’ll play,” Kota said. He was sitting cross-legged on the floor. He patted his palm to the spot next to him. “Sit next to me, Sang.”
“Watch out,” Nathan said as I pulled myself out of Victor’s chair. “She’ll get you. She fights dirty.”
I crossed the floor and sank to my knees next to Kota, sitting on my heels. I tried to give Kota my most innocent smile.
“She won’t cheat around me,” he said, his eyes narrowing at me but there was a slight curl to his lip. “She wouldn’t dare.”
“You get him, Sang,” Gabriel ordered.
I bit my lower lip a little and grasped the controller.
When the game started, I did nothing but play, since I knew more about how the controls worked this time and I wanted to try to win. Unlike swimming where the boys were stronger and faster, video games kept us on an even field.
For a while, I was in the lead. I took a lot of risks, cutting corners with my car and driving on the wrong side of the road for extra speed bonuses. No matter how fast I was going, though, Kota was always right behind me. He was the hunter, I was the hunted.
I leaned into him, nudging my elbow into his ribs, hoping to gain a stronger lead. It made me uncomfortable that he was so close.
“Stop it,” he growled at me. A smirk tilted the side of his mouth.
In the middle of the second lap, Kota’s car dashed around mine, claiming first place. I thought I could retake the lead by nipping his bumper and cutting around on the opposite side of the road and then take off. He seemed to anticipate this and instead of simply trying to move faster or work around me, he half slammed his car into mine, causing me to spin out of control. My car crashed into a tree and he took off.
“Huh,” I groaned at him.
He grinned but kept his eyes on the screen.
I was already far enough behind now that I wasn’t going to catch up. I poked Kota in the ribs, trying to tickle him.
“Sang,” he said in a warning voice. No matter how lightly I traced against his stomach, he wasn’t stopping. Just grinning.
“Do it,” Gabriel said. “Get him.”
I wasn’t sure exactly what I was supposed to do. Tickling wasn’t working. Gabriel’s car was right behind Kota’s. Out of desperation, I yanked the controller from Kota’s hands, tossing it behind me quickly so it rolled across the carpet. I innocently returned to the game, pretending to be totally focused on it.
Silas and North hooted with laughter.
“Oh that’s it,” Kota said. He grabbed me around the waist and pushed me to the ground until I was on my stomach. I squealed, laughing and trying to wriggle free. He sat square on my butt, pressing my hips to the floor. He snatched my controller and tossed it away. Silas caught it, and took over my car, turning it the opposite way along the road, and purposefully smashing it into trees.
North flung Kota’s controller back to him. Kota kept me pinned to the ground as he resumed the race. I tried wriggling underneath him, but as I squirmed, he briefly sunk his full weight into me and it sparked a slight sting to my still healing tailbone. I laughed, giving up and watching the rest of the race with my head propped up in my hand.
“Ugh,” Gabriel shouted as Kota took the lead again.
“You have to get him now,” I said from the floor.
“Are you kidding? He’ll kick my ass.”
“I have to do everything,” I said, and I half twisted from the floor, reaching back to poke Kota square in the stomach.
“You’re already in trouble, missy,” Kota said, wriggling on top of me.
My poking seemed to be getting to him. I kept doing it, aiming for different spots.
He tried ignoring it but when the race was almost over, he let go of the controller long enough to reach around and land a deafening slap on my thigh.
I squealed, crying out. The guys laughed. Kota won the race.
“All right, enough,” Victor said. He got up to stand by my side. He nudged Kota with his leg. “Come on, you can’t sit on her like that.”
“She started it,” Kota said. He popped me on the leg again. I squealed again, laughing. Kota hovered over me, standing.
Victor bent over to take my hands in his and assisted me up until I was standing next to him. “Did he hurt you?”
I smiled, blushing. “No, I’m fine.” I squeezed his hand gently, trying to convince him that I was being honest.
Victor dropped a hand on my hip and lured me around so he could take a look at my leg. “She’s got a big red handprint on her now.”
“I didn’t get her that bad,” Kota insisted. “She’s not hurt. Look at her, she’s laughing.”
Gabriel stretched from his chair
and poked at Kota’s knee. “You leave a bruise on my model, you’re gonna get it.”
“What’s wrong with you guys?” Kota said, losing his smile. “We’re playing.”
“Well don’t play so rough,” Victor murmured.
The air stilled around us. I glanced between Victor and Kota, not understanding the harsh stare falling between them.
“What the hell, guys?” Nathan stood up next to Kota. “We just spent two hours flinging her across the pool and now you’re all worked up over this? We’re just playing around. She’s having fun.”
“I’m fine guys,” I said softly. I wasn’t sure what was happening, but I maybe I’d taken cheating too far. “Really. Let’s just play another game.”
The silent communication zinged between all of them and I simply couldn’t keep up. I had never seen them so worked up between each other. Was it my fault? Why did I have to take things so far with Kota?
“Hey,” North bellowed. He stood up, stepping between Victor and Kota. “That’s it. Game over. Sang, in the kitchen with me. Everyone else straighten up and pick out a DVD. We’re going to eat and we’re going to watch a movie.” North snagged my hand. He guided me away from the others. I heard some grunting, but everyone broke away to rearrange things.
North just gave orders to Kota! How did that happen?
North held on to my hand until we were in the kitchen again. He let go when we were within view of Erica, who was bent over the counter pouring no-bake chocolate cookies out onto waxed paper. “How’s it going in there, guys?”
“The boys are hungry,” he said. He crossed to the pot of cowboy stew and gave it a stir. “Is this done?” he asked me.
I nodded, feeling shy again. I wasn’t sure where to move or what to do. My mind was whirling as to what had just happened. Were they still mad? And why did North let go of my hand in front of Erica? Why did it feel like he was hiding it? They didn’t do that at school.
Erica stopped her cookie making and put the pan in the sink. She dug in a cupboard for some plastic spoons and bowls. She handed them to me. “Here,” she said. “I let the boys eat in the living room when they’re all here. Should we have anything else?”