I Spun the Bottle

I Spun the Bottle: Chapter Eleven

Song for this chapter: “It Will Rain” by Bruno Mars

All three of us in the room didn’t move, or even let out a breath of air. My brother’s face was tense, frozen, and completely rigid, but I didn’t know why. It was an expression that I’ve never seen him use before, even when he was angry at something. We silently dared each other to shatter the silence first, and I took that dare head-on.

“Landon,” I started, my voice strained when his familiar blue eyes darted to me. “Uhm, hi.”

This started a series of emotions to flit across his face, too fast for me to make out any in particular, until he finally settled on irritation. “Hi? Lyn, this isn’t the best time to say hi.”

Landon closed the distance between us, and took my face into his right palm. His fingertips brushing pass a new forming scab on my cheek from when I fell on the sand at the beach. He clucked his tongue, and muttered a few words under his breath. “What happened to your face? It’s scratched. Did he do this? Huh?” Landon shot a look at David, but I couldn’t tell what kind.

I pushed his hand away from my face, giving him a look. “No, he didn’t do this to me. I’m just a klutz, and stop staring at him.” I added, when Landon didn’t turn back to me.

“You little punk. Who the hell do you think you are? Where did you take my sister? What did you do to her? Did you touch hurt her?” David was bombarded with dozens of questions, and I just sat there helpless, waiting for Landon to get over his tirade.

David didn’t seem fazed by my older brother; in fact, he seemed to almost be enjoying it. When Landon finally shut up after his—I don’t know how many—questions, David glanced at me and winked. I let out a sigh, seeing a muscle in Landon’s jaw bulged as he clenched his teeth together.

“You know what? Skip all the other questions; I want to know who the hell you are.” He growled, stepping closer to David. As Landon did that, one of his legs accidently brushed against my swollen ankle.

I let out a hiss of pain, feeling the surge of electricity run through my ankle again. This made Landon turn around to inspect me. His eyes scanned me, looking for anything out of place, and his eyes landed on my right ankle.

“Holy shit, Lyn!” He bellowed, bending down to take a hold of my foot gingerly. “What happened?”

I grinned sheepishly and simply said. “I fell.”

His face dropped. “You fell? How do you fall and do this to your foot? Look at it! It’s the size of a freaking watermelon!”

“Nice analogy,” I muttered, frowning.

“Can you walk?” My brother said, ignoring my comment.

I opened my mouth to answer, but David beat me to it. “No, she can’t walk. I offered to take her to the hospital last night, but she said no.”

Landon’s blue eyes snapped back to David, staring at him. “Well then you should have dragged her there! I mean have you seen it? It’s bigger than a hippo!”

I frowned again at his terrible analogy. It definitely was not big enough to be a hippo, or even a watermelon.

“I wasn’t about to make her do something she didn’t want to do.” David replied smoothly, but that made me think about how he tried to bargain me to kiss him last night.

I smiled wryly. “Right, so can you drop it Landon? I’ll get Mom to take me to the doctor later, okay?”

He grunted in response, still not happy. “Fine, but that doesn’t explain why he’s here. Actually that doesn’t explain anything. Can someone tell me what the hell’s going on here?”

I sighed and began my explanation, only stopping when I needed to take a deep breath. I gave Landon the short version of what happened last night, leaving out the blackmail, the game, the cops, and the almost bargained kiss. Landon’s face filled with emotion as I neared the end of my one night adventure.

Once I finished, I took another deep breath and waited patiently for his reaction. Typically, Landon didn’t seem to be the kind of brother that would be this over protective, and it made me wonder why he was acting like this. I mean, sure I drank some alcohol, ran away from the law, and stayed at David’s house overnight, but I kept most of those parts out of my explanation I gave him, and yet he was still acting as if I had one of my limps chopped off. I winced to myself, realizing that I did injure my ankle.

“So, you just suddenly decided that you wanted to sneak out of the house and go to a high school party? Was there alcohol? Oh heck why do I have to even ask, of course there was.” Landon scolded me, gently pulling his hands away from my injured foot.

I bit my lip, feeling the first actual lie come out my lips. “Yeah, I- I mean…I never went to one be-before and Taylor invited me. So, I said…yes.” I squirmed uncomfortably under his stare.

I was a terrible liar.

I turned my gaze over to David, who was clearly trying not laugh at my obvious lie. When I shot him a glare, it only worsened. I rolled my eyes, and went back to watching my brother. He seemed like he was having a hard time believing me, but I couldn’t blame him. If I listened to my own lie, I wouldn’t have believed me either.

Suddenly, Landon stood up and gave me a meaningful look. “I guess I understand,” he sighed.

“You do?” I asked, a dubious look crossing my face.

“Yeah, you are sort of a goodie two shoes, especially for a junior, so I guess I don’t blame you.”

I stared at him flatly. Even Landon, my own brother, thought I was a goodie two shoes? I was beginning to hate the feeling of being a goodie two shoes and nerd. It didn’t bother me much before, but for some reason it was really get on my nerves.

“Thanks,” I mumbled, sarcastically under my breath.

“See? Even your brother admits it, Lyn.” David flashed his famous smile at me again, and it took everything I had to not retaliate with a glare.

“Seriously, who are you?” Landon demanded.

David shrugged. “My name’s David, one of Lyn’s friends. Who are you?”

I scoffed, David was not my friend. He was hardly on the lists of acquaintance, but I didn’t dare say that with my brother in the room.

“Landon, Lyn’s older brother.” Landon answered, keeping his eyes steady on him.

“Well, it’s nice to meet you, Landon, but I better get going. Can’t let my girl be waiting now, if you know what I mean.” He winked at Landon before heading to the window from where we first entered.

“Wait,” I said, causing David to pause and turn to me.

“What?”

“Do you have Jace’s number? I need to return his shirt to him.” I said, pulling at the flannel on my torso.

“Yep, I’ll text it you later.”

“We don’t have each other’s numbers.” I replied, raising a brow at him.

He shrugged, a sly grin playing on his lips. “I have yours. Let’s just say, you’re a deep sleeper.”

I felt blood rush to my face as I glared at David. My brother seemed shocked, staring back and forth between me and David, his mouth gaped open. He was definitely getting the wrong idea.

I grabbed one of my pillows on my bed, and aimed for David, but before the plush pillow even left my hands, David had already ducked through the window, his body disappearing out of sight. The pillow landed with a soft thud, and finally everything became quiet.

I sighed, getting comfortable on my bed, staring up at the ceiling. I had almost completely forgotten that my brother was still in my room until he brought me out of my dazed mood.

“Lyn?”

I jumped, slightly startled. “Yeah?”

“Did you guys…you know…” he trailed off, keeping his eyes off of me.

“No!” I interjected, throwing my hands up at his ridiculous words. “T-that w-would jus—no! I didn’t. Okay?”

“Okay, okay, calm down.” He shushed me, a relieved sigh leaving his now relaxed lips.

I grumbled a few words. “I can’t believe you thought I’d do such a thing.”

“Sorry,” he apologized quickly and then said. “Do you want me to wake Mom up? I’m sure she’s going to throw a fit when she sees you.”

I grimaced, realizing that I haven’t even made up a cover story for this whole situation yet.

“Do you know if you can take me to the doctor’s instead?”

“I would, but my car’s still at the shop.”

“Oh,” I sighed, feeling defeated. It seemed like there was no way to get around this anymore.

“Well, I could borrow Mom’s car and tell her that I’m taking you out for breakfast since I forgot about dinner last night.” He suggested.

“Really?” I said, my eyes glinting with hope again.

“Yeah,” he reassured me, standing up from my bed. “I’m going to tell Mom. Go change and we’ll leave, ‘kay?”

I nodded, as Landon exited out of my room. Grabbing onto the side of my dresser, I pulled myself up from my bed. I opened up one of the drawers and picked the first t-shirt my fingers found. Giving a cursory glance at the clothing, I nodded approvingly before pulling off Jace’s flannel, and putting my shirt in its place.

After making sure my shirt was in its proper place, I opened up the bottom drawer, pulling out a black pair of sweatpants. It was harder for me trying to get the black, leather miniskirt than off than the shirt. After five painful minutes, I threw the stupid piece of cloth against my wall, utterly annoyed. That was seriously going to be the last time I wear anything remotely like that.

Carefully, I slipped into the black sweatpants, making sure I didn’t strain my ankle in the process. When they were finally on, I let out a relaxed breath of air. I was finally in my own comfortable clothes. My fingers brushed over Jace’s blackish-grey flannel and I couldn’t help but let a small grin form across my lips.

Jace was really sweet. He lent me his shirt, even though he was cold. Well, actually I couldn’t tell if he was cold, but it was still nice of him. I folded the flannel neatly and made a mental note to wash it before I gave it back to him. I held the fabric up to my face, letting the faint smell of Jace’s cologne fill up my nostrils. It took me about three seconds to realize that I probably looked like a creeper by sniffing clothes.

My face now flaming, I shoved the button-up shirt away from me. I was acting so strange. Shaking my head, I blamed it on the fact that I was low on sleep.

A knock came from my door with a voice from my Landon following in its tracks. “Lyn, are you ready to go?”

“Yeah, you can come in if you want.”

A moment later, my brother’s head popped into view. “Mom said it’s okay. Do you need help?” He added when I tried to limp towards him.

I smiled cheekily. “I think so.”

Without another word, my brother let me grab a hold of his right arm. I steadied myself before continuing to the door.

We made it out of the house and headed got to my mom’s car. I noticed David’s car was still parked on the curb of my house, but he was nowhere in sight. I let my eyes shift to Taylor’s house. He was probably in there.

I felt a strange, tingling sensation fill my insides, starting from the core of my stomach. The feeling was strange and unfamiliar. It was dark, and not very pleasant.

I didn’t like this new feeling at all.