“I’m aware. But now I’m bored. Let’s play a game.” She sits up, and my cock does too.
So fucking stupid. That’s me. So fucking stupid, sitting in a hot tub with my baby sister’s best friend, my daughter’s pseudo babysitter, with my cock hard as a rock.
But do I leave?
Hell no.
Instead, I encourage her.
“What’s that game you played with Wren on her twenty-first?” I ask about the one time I saw my little sister drunk.
“Never Have I Ever?” she answers, and I nod, remembering the night.
It was the first night I remember actuallyseeingHallie, after all. It’s burned into my memories. We took Wren down to The Mill, before Colt bought it, for her twenty-first birthday. Madden and I were supposed to be DDs, but he ended up getting smashed as badly as the girls that night. Hallie decided they’d play a drinking game, which was very clearly framed to get Wren hammered quickly, with Hallie, Nat, and Madden saying things they knew Wren had, in fact, done. I’d sat back and watched with entertainment before driving everyone back home.
“You want to play Never Have I Ever with me? I know too much about you.”
“Excuse me?” I ask, confused.
“If you play Never Have I Ever, you’ll be hammered in no time.”
Stupid and stubborn. That’s me, apparently.
“Try me,” I say with a smile. “I’ve got a full six-pack in the fridge.” She crosses her arms on her chest, which, to my utter delight and dismay, presses her tits together, raising them a bit. I’m so distracted by the move, I almost miss the fact that she started the game already.
“Never have I ever played hooky from school,” she says, a playful tilt to her lips, probably remembering the time I did just that and got grounded for a week. I glare but roll my eyes and take a sip of my beer, happy to do it to get more of that courage into my veins.
“My turn?” She nods, and I narrow my eyes at her. “Never have I ever gotten high.” She lifts an eyebrow and doesn’t take a drink.
“Really?” I ask in shock, and she beams before she shrugs. “Not even with Madden?”
“Hell no. That’s the kind of thing you do for the first time with someone responsible. Not Madden.”
I let out a laugh, and some of the tension leaves my shoulders. We go back and forth like that for a few rounds, in which she tells me she once won $200 on a lottery ticket, and I tell her I’ve never borrowed anyone’s toothbrush before.
This goes on for a while longer, each of us taking a handful of drinks and laughing. I hop out into the freezing cold and grab another drink for both of us. When I step back in, I hiss, my feet tingling with pins and needles as they sink into the hot water, and move to my side of the hot tub once more.
“Can you move closer so I don’t feel like I’m shouting?” she asks. I hesitate, not sitting, but staring at her. “I won’t bite, promise.” After a moment of hesitation, I realize that common sense has long fled, and I nod, moving so we’re on the same side of the hot tub. From this angle, I can see through the water and to the ties that sit perfectly on her hips. My fingers itch to tug on them, to loosen them and get a better glimpse of the faded tan lines, but then I remind myself to focus. Despite the attraction, I’m having fun here.
In fact, it’s the most fun I’ve had, the most carefree I’ve felt in a long time.
Probably since last February.
“Okay, whose turn is it next?” I ask once I settle in, the silence stretching between us uncomfortably. She shakes her head a tiny bit, as if she’d been lost in her head, then shifts, crossing one leg over the other. As she does, her feet graze along the back of my calf, stopping at the back of my knee, and a red flush that has nothing to do with the cold or the warm weather blooms over her cheeks.
“Sorry! I—” she says.
I roll my eyes, and it’s probably the now two beers in my system, but I reach under the water, gripping her ankle andtugging her along the seat of the hot tub until she’s at my side, legs draped over mine. This close, the golden flecks in her grass-green eyes are startling as she looks up at me, her full pink lips parted. Quiet breaths pass between us as we sit like that for a moment before I speak.
“Your turn,” I say eventually, my voice gravelly, and she licks her lips, her eyes a bit hazy before she speaks.
“Never have I ever regretted a haircut,” she murmurs, and I let out a low laugh.
“Unfair,” I say, knowing she’s talking about the time when I was twenty, and Maddon convinced me to shave my head over winter break. At the time, my hair was longer than it is now, and we didn’t just buzz it, but we took one of Wren’s close-shave razors and made mebald. It looked absolutely horrific, and I’ve never had short hair since.
She reaches up, brushing hair across my forehead, her fingernails scraping at my scalp as she pushes the unruly locks back. I hold my breath through the entire move.
“Never do that again, yeah?” she asks, fingers still in my hair as she takes another sip of her drink. I don’t know if it’s just to drink or because of the question, but I’m finding I don’t even care anymore. “Your hair looks so much better this way.”
