The Other Fish in the Sea (21 page)

“Bridget! That’s so messed up and mean! Remember Tristan said she can’t eat it anymore!” Julia accused in genuine surprise. Huh. I kind of thought my cousin would throw me under the bus too if given the chance, but, apparently I’ve misjudged her. Sorry, Julia.

“Dares are
supposed
to be things that people don’t want to do…besides, Camie, if you’re
scared
you can always drink, but if you do have the guts to eat it, it has to be a
full
piece, not some wimpy little nibble,” Bridget informed me spitefully.

“Come on, Baby, you got this,” Tristan said with a wink while looking at me from my lap. I started to feel fluttery about it, but it was because of his eyes, not the licorice.

Everyone who knew about how licorice previously affected me and didn’t know it’s now become a freaking aphrodisiac, started whispering and glaring at Bridget when she tossed a piece at me from across the tent. I hesitantly put it in my mouth and slowly started chewing it, and I think Bridget and a couple of other people thought I was going to spit it out or vomit or something when I shivered, but that was only because I happened to glance down at Tristan watching me when I was about three quarters of the way done with it. After that, I couldn’t look away and I was holding it together pretty well if I do say so myself, even though his eyes were like sapphires making my body twitch with all the electricity zinging through it. However, watching me eat it was too much for Superman and I ended up flat on my back faster than a speeding bullet with his lips on mine and not even
remotely
in the platonic way Pete had his on Jill.

“What the hell just happened? There was no fighting or anything!” I think that was Melissa. Like I said, being coherent during kissing is getting better so I can
kind
of
hear what people are saying, but I really have to focus and even then, it’s like trying to hear in a wind tunnel.

“Is anyone else hearing that song ‘Sex and Candy’ right now?” I
think
that might’ve been Brandon, but again, I’m not sure.

“Yeah, they’re sick and twisted…good song, though. Marcy Playground, right?” Definitely Jeff.

“Seriously, you guys, what is that?”

Tristan wrenched his mouth away from mine and breathing heavy he answered, “
That
was sadomasochistic foreplay at its finest…and I was hearing ‘Candy’ by Iggy Pop and Kate Pierson.”
 
Ha! I was too! How funny is that?

“Are you saying you
enjoyed
that?” Bridget asked me in a kind of disappointed shock when Tristan and I began to right ourselves again.

“
Immensely.
So much so that I’m really hoping gum comes in licorice flavor.”

“I’m on it, Baby! I’ll start asking around and looking for it the
second
we get back to civilization!” Tristan promised with exuberance. He’s mostly joking but I really wouldn’t be surprised to see a licorice flavored gum search in the history of his computer.

“Red n—”

“Not black, I know…jet fuel…got it.” Not surprised at all.

So the game went on and then something we
weren’t
expecting happened…

“Jillian, truth or dare?” Dylan asked her.
 

“Dare.”
 

“Kiss Jeremy. Oh! A
real
kiss…be specific, right?”

Jillian didn’t even think twice. She drank—quite a bit more than was necessary to get her point across, too. Frustration was clearly evident on Jeremy’s face and I got the feeling this wouldn’t be the last we heard from him. It should’ve been, though, the foolish twit.

Sometime later we were in the middle of another person’s turn when out of the blue, we heard John Cleese—an English actor who did a lot with Monty Python back in the day—say the following;

“Excuse me, sir, but I’m afraid someone is endeavoring to contact you telephonically. Shall I tell them to fuck off?”

It’s one of the funniest freaking ringtones I’ve ever heard in my entire life and it happens to be Jillian’s default text message ringtone. Almost everyone was laughing when they heard it, but knowing it was hers, I was watching her face. She glanced down at her phone that was sitting right in front of her and this time, I not only saw her grind her teeth, I heard her do it. Pete, having been able to read the text from where he’s sitting next to her, had a mixed look of amusement and sympathy on his face when he looked over at Jeremy. I’m totally hearing Mr. T say, “I pity the fool.”

Jeff leaned over the laps of Kate and Pete to read the text and then stared in shock at Jeremy and back at Jillian again. But when she handed Pete her iPod and stood up, Jeff quickly recollected himself and began giving a little more than half of us a very whispered play by play, like a sports commentator using his bottle as a microphone. Everyone else out of earshot was laughing and goading Jeremy and Jillian on, though. Poor Jeremy, he really has no idea what a heap load of trouble he’s in because my sister has mastered how to control her facial expressions and doesn’t “appear” to be upset in the slightest.

“Okay folks, what we have here is surely a never been seen before event. It looks like Satan herself has been called out by a—hey, how old is that walking corpse?”

“Almost fifteen,” Derek whispered from the other side of Pete.

“Shit, he’s too young to die…oh well…So weighing in at almost fifteen years old, we have Jeremy, the dumb yet brave soul who’s just sent a text that will no doubt send him to meet his maker. A little advice for those of you watching at home, Hell doesn’t have a text plan and this should go without saying, but never-ever under any circumstances call Lucifer a chicken. One, it’ll be the last thing you do, and two, that’s
my
nickname, goddamn it…”

“Well, are you just gonna sit there? If you
really
want me to kiss you then you should at least be a gentleman and stand up,” Jillian told him. She said that mind you looking like a sweet, innocent girl in the blush of her youth. Hell, she’s even smiling. However, I can totally tell that she’s seething underneath her wholly convincing veneer.
 

“The Evil One just threw down the gauntlet with a perfectly executed
Matrix
come on gesture of the hand and— Oh, I think Dumb Yet Brave just made a fatal mistake in getting up…” Jeremy actually had the stupidity to smile in self-satisfaction when he got up from where he was sitting across the tent and slowly start forward. This was also the point when Tristan started mimicking the sound of the theme song to
The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly
and I had to bite my bottom lip to keep from laughing out loud. “He’s given her solid footing and now he’s forced to square off face-to-face with the devil in sheep’s clothing…the clothing being long, blonde hair, a pretty cute ass and a size…eh, thirty-two?—hey Trist, little help…”

Tristan looked at me for permission to visually size my sister up and I gave it to him with a shrug of my shoulders. I mean why not? I’m interested to see how accurate he is. He looked at her appraisingly for
maybe
three seconds and then answered Jeff using sign language, following it up with a confident look and a “trust me nod” when Jeff cocked one of his brows in question. When Jeff looked at me for verification, I rolled my eyes and nodded. Tristan was dead on.
 

“Damn. Okay, so The Princess of Darkness has a decent rack to go with the cute a—Uh, wait!
What’s this?
Is she
really
gonna ki—OOOHHH! That
had
to hurt. Oh and look at that, folks, Mephistopheles drew wicked-awesome first blood and it looks like Dumb Yet Brave is outta the game. Again, folks, you’ve been witness to one of the most seldom seen events in history...I’m Chicken Larson saying good night, sleep tight and don’t let the boogie man or a suicide blonde getchya.”
 

Oh my God, that was the funniest thing
ever
and I’m cracking up just as much as Tristan is. And just so you know, Mephistopheles was the devil in the story of Faust and “Suicide Blonde” is the name of an INXS song…very impressive, Jeff!

So yeah, she kissed him all right. Jillian got as close to Jeremy as she could and it totally looked like she was really gonna kiss him, but the second he put his hand behind her head and leaned in, which I believe pushed her right over the edge of anger to plunge her into rage, she drew back with catlike speed and without warning, punched him right in the kisser, splitting his bottom lip. I really think that if he hadn’t put his hand on the back of her head in that domineering manner, she wouldn’t have drawn blood. She still would’ve hit him, of course, but he might’ve gotten away with just a punch in the gut or something.

“
OW, FUCK!
Why the hell did you punch me?! If you didn’t wanna kiss me, all you had to do was say no! Jesus!” Jeremy said, astonished and wiping blood from his lip. He’s actually handling this pretty well but I really doubt he’ll ever try to kiss my little sister again.

“You were warned and I did say no,” she replied coldly yet simply and turned to sit back down like nothing had happened.

“His blood or yours?” Pete asked with a chuckle when Jillian sat back down next to him and he noticed the blood on her knuckle.
She looked at it like “huh.” Then she poured her boozy drink over her hand to wash the blood away, revealing a tear in her skin that welled up with more blood. “Mine. I grazed a tooth.”

“Pouring liquor on it isn’t the best way to clean it,” Pete said, handing over Jill’s iPod to her and returning his focus back to the game.

“’Tis just a flesh wound,” she ground out between her teeth. The flesh wound thing
is
actually a line from
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
and it was damned funny in the movie, but the way she said it, it wasn’t funny. She meant it to say, “End of discussion.”

“A band-aid would be good too,” he continued, ignoring her dismissal and without looking at her.
 

If he had been, Pete would’ve seen Jillian narrow her eyes at him like she wanted to punch him in the face, too, when she bit out, “It’s
fine.
”

We moved on.

“Truth,” Kate chose when I asked.

“Jeff has been magically transformed into an animal and the only way to restore him is to mate with him. Here's the question…which animal would cause you the least psychological damage?”
 

“Now
that’s
a fuckin’ question! Nice one, Baby!” He sounds so pleased and proud.
 

Kate took one look at Jeff and said, “Even though the idea of having sex with
any
non-human animal wigs me out completely, I love you and I’d wish you were a pig.”

Tristan started clapping and devoutly declared, “Now that’s true love…”

“Aw, Katy…you’re the fuckin’ best girlfriend in the world!” Jeff said and gave her a big kiss. I’m kind of at a loss, though.

“Um, why is being a pig so great?” I asked. Really, Jeff’s thrilled and there’s Tristan’s clapping and comment to consider too...I just don’t get it.

“Pigs have the longest orgasms in the animal kingdom...one was documented at thirty-seven minutes,” Kate told me with a wink to Jeff who was wiping fake tears of joy from his eyes.

I looked at Tristan and decided to mess with him a little so I leaned down to mumble against his lips, “You have to make a choice you know…submarine or pig? You can’t be both.”
 

The look of realization that crossed his face was priceless. “Shit…I never thought about that. I’ll fuckin’ find a way to be both, goddamn it.”

 
“Truth.” It was Brandon being asked.

“What’s the most daring place you’ve ever had sex?”

Now
Brandon’s
reaction was
very
interesting. He opened his mouth to speak, hesitated for a split second and then drank.

“What the fuck was that?” Derek asked in surprise.
 

“That was me opting out of answering, what the fuck did it look like?”

“Like you thought about what you were gonna say before you said it…and
then
opted out of answering. Why wouldn’t you answer that...not like you have anything to hide, right? Or
do
you?”

“Nope, so let’s just say I thought about the answer and got
really
fuckin’ thirsty and fuckin’ leave it at that,” Brandon said with a steely edge, putting a
very
definite end to any further discussion on this topic.

And then about thirty minutes later, I thought blood was gonna be let again…

Jillian, who’s already in an f-ing foul mood because of him, was dared by Dumb Yet Brave to sit and get cozy in Pete’s lap for the next fifteen minutes. I’m guessing he was trying to embarrass her or something for punching him instead of kissing him, but it was Pete, who knows he’s already on her hit list, who looked distinctly uncomfortable. The expression on his face could’ve been read to say, “Wait, don’t I get a say in this?”
 
So I’m sure you can imagine how Jill’s merciless temper was ignited further by some snide snickering on the other side of the tent. With a mutinous expression and actions to match, she accepted the dare. Poor Pete held his hands out next to him like he was afraid to touch her or like he was asking, “What the fuck am I supposed to do now?” Tristan and Jeff shrugged their shoulders in response so he then, very tentatively, rested his hands on his knees. I really felt kind of bad for him, but payback’s a bitch just like he said and the heckler across the tent was about to find that out far better than Pete was…

“Truth or dare, Bridget?” Jill asked with icy civility.

Oooh…

“Truth.” This could go either way, and even though I really abhor Bridget, I’m kind of feeling bad for her now, too.

Yeah okay, I’m totally lying. Sue me.

“When you cheated on Curtis, did you spit or swallow?”

Oh, holy shit, Batman!
Yeah, leave it to my bloodthirsty little sister to not mince words when she knocks the cruel off their pedestal.

There was a chorus of oohs from most and laughter from Jeff, Tristan, Brandon, and Derek. Even “Lonely (not gay) Uncomfortable Pete” couldn’t hide his amusement at Jillian’s sanguinary and barbarous query. He tried to stifle his initial reaction, but ended up bowing his head behind Jillian’s and laughing silently. You could tell he was laughing, though, because his body was shaking like he was holding it in. Bridget’s face, however, was a puce-colored collage of shock, humiliation, frustration and anger.