Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 82949 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 415(@200wpm)___ 332(@250wpm)___ 276(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 82949 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 415(@200wpm)___ 332(@250wpm)___ 276(@300wpm)
Cooper inches to the shell of my ear as the crowd of people near the bonfire gets closer and closer. “Tonight, we let it all out.”
I chuckle, leaning up on my tippy toes. “Fine.” I don’t know what he means by tonight, though. If there is anything that Cooper knows how to do, it is having fun.
People scatter around the blazing fire, some seated, others standing, and I’m pretty sure I just saw Jessica Pierce nosedive between waves after taking a line of coke. I follow Cooper down onto the spot beside him, taking the red Solo cup of whatever it is inside.
“You know, I could totally get used to you being out…” Cooper smirks from behind his cup, and I have to fight with myself not to punch him in the throat.
“Why?” Rolling my eyes, I follow his line of sight to the new boy who just joined school this week. “What’s his name?”
“I don’t know.” Cooper swipes the sand off the wooden chair. “But I want to find out. Don’t get into trouble.”
I take another sip of my drink and cluck my tongue beneath my breath. Cooper. If only we all had half of his determination.
“Shiloh!” I hear a loud screech sound off behind me and I flinch, turning to see one of Cooper’s friends from school. I think her name is Greta. It could be Beatrice. Bea? Shit. I’m bad at names. This is why I never come to these things.
“Hey.” I wave at her as she stumbles down onto the spot beside me, her eyes narrowing when she hooks her arm around my neck.
“Do you want to know a secret?” She taps the tip of my nose with her finger, and I have to stop myself from swiping her away. Whatever her name is, she’s annoying.
“No?” I lose my train of thought as my eyes drift around the group of people. “It’s a secret, so you shouldn’t be telling me.” People who go around gossiping and spreading other people’s secrets annoy me. The music changes to an old Korn song just as I catch movement in the corner of my eye.
“What do you think?” She claps loudly, and I jolt, turning to stare at her.
“About what?”
“God, Sh—” She squints one eye as if trying to remember the alphabet.
Now I don’t feel so bad about not remembering her name when she so clearly doesn’t exactly remember mine. Even though she just called it not long ago.
“The Game!” she squealed excitedly.
“The Game?” I entertain her garbage chatting. Where the hell did Cooper go, and why did he think that he could leave me here unattended?
She taps my thigh with hers. “That’s why you’re here, silly! It’s why we’re all here!” She slowly manages to stand on wobbly feet, brushing against my shoulder to keep herself upright as she tosses her shirt onto the sand at her feet.
I pick up her discarded shirt on my way up, but it’s too late, she’s already removing her jean shorts. “Okay, I don’t know your name, but you’re going to need to stop undressing if you want to not be plastered all over Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok in the morning—” This is why I stay home and never go anywhere because this is exactly the kind of place that Cooper goes.
Before I can stop her, she’s running off toward the water. “Jesus.” Falling back onto my chair, hands covering my eyes, I tilt up to look at my annoying best friend. “This is your fault.”
He rounds my chair, handing me a full cup of whatever alcohol it is. “She’s always like that. You’ll get used to her.”
“I doubt it.” I swallow the beer and wince when it hits my tastebuds. Not beer. Swiping my lips with my thumb, I turn to face Cooper. “She mentioned something about a game?”
He’s halfway reaching down to grab a stray stick when he flinches slightly, his eyes drifting up to mine before smiling me off. If you didn’t know Cooper, you wouldn’t have picked it up. I do know him. And that flinch meant he is hiding something, but because I know him, I know pressing him won’t do much good. When we were five years old, I found out that he had a treehouse built into the backyard of his house. I’d known him all my life but never knew about this—treehouse. He didn’t invite me in until I was ten, and it was only because he needed help with what he was doing. Helping his mom with bagging up weed.
“You’re not playing, so you don’t have to know.” He tosses the stick he was using to shove the burning coal around into the fire. “And it’s not on tonight.”
“What is it?” I ask, dipping my tone to sound disinterested. I know it didn’t work the second his eye twitched in the corner. He stands and swipes the back of his pants with his hands, flashing me a smirk.