James Games (7 page)

Behind me, Iris and Mags shrivel into little balls of terror. I try to act cool by leaning on the door frame with my elbow out, only to miss and smack my cheek on the frame. I hastily rearrange myself. Sigrid is staring at me with a smile I don’t like at all. It’s the smile that cats have right before they eat the cute baby chipmunk under your porch. Behind her, Ellie is texting, and another girl—a junior named Amber, I think—is doing her best to mimic Sigrid’s stance in every way.

“Could we have a word?”

You know when you put too much powdered sugar in your coffee and it all condenses into the last sip with a sweetness that makes you want to barf? That’s what Sigrid’s voice sounds like.

Iris gets up from the bed and I can tell she’s about to defend me. But if I’m going down, I refuse to take my friends with me. I step into the hallway and shut the door. “Of course, milady. What can I do you for?”

Amber’s eyes narrow as she tries to decide whether or not I’m making fun of them, but Sigrid is unruffled. “You had to realize there was no way I was ever going to let you get away with the things you said to me at the initiation ceremony.”

“I guess not,” I admit. “That wouldn’t be very evil overlord-ish of you.”

“How dare you,” Amber snaps, and I’m nearly blinded by her bleached teeth, but Sigrid holds up a hand.

“In Phi Delta Chi, we operate on a system of respect,” says Sigrid with the calm of an axe murderer who has her victim in a bunker three miles underground. I almost expect her to follow it up with ‘no one’s around to hear you scream.’ “You have shown disrespect. If I left that unpunished, our system would fall apart. Do you follow?”

“Like a duckling after its mother into a busy intersection.”

“You’ve got a lot of confidence,” Sigrid smiles. “I knew a girl like you once. The most valuable lesson I ever taught her was that a little shame goes a long way. I think the same lesson would help you immensely. So you’ll be attending our first party naked.”

Amber sniggers and tries to high-five Ellie, who is too busy chewing gum and texting to notice. She slowly lets her hand fall. Sigrid watches me carefully, waiting for my freak-out.

“Can I wear shoes?” I ask.

Her eyebrow arches. “Excuse me?”

“If you don’t go naked, we’ll kick you out of the sorority,” Amber breaks in. “And you have to stay for at least three hours.”

“Yeah, okay, fine, but can I wear shoes? I don’t want to step on a broken beer bottle or something. That would suck.”

“Yes, you can wear shoes.” Sigrid’s face darkens. I’m not reacting like she expected. I backtrack, playing along.

“But, oh no, wait, isn’t the first party the ‘dress modestly’ challenge? This way I’ll be off to a terrible start in the Games.”

The cat smile is back. “I know.”

“Gosh darn it. Fiddlesticks. Your cruelty knows no bounds.” I throw my hand dramatically to my forehead.

“If you tell anyone, including Brooklyn, that I had anything to do with this, I’ll personally make sure you’re expelled.” Sigrid jabs me in the chest. “If I approach you at the party, you act like I knew nothing.”

“Aye aye, captain.”

“Oh, and Fiona?” She hooks her finger into the neck of my shirt and pulls me close. Her eyes are cold and quietly furious. They’re definitely the eyes of someone capable of abandoning a naked girl in the desert. A thrill of fear runs through me, though I do my best to keep it off my face.

“Stay away from James Reid,” she says sweetly.

She lets me go with a little push, so that I stumble into the wall. Then she cocks her head at her cronies, turns with a flick of her hair, and leaves me alone in the hallway with James’s name ringing in my skull.

~7~

“I can’t believe you’re doing this,” Mags moans, her knuckles white on the wheel. It’s Friday night. I adjust the bathrobe’s tie around my waist. Underneath it, I’m as naked as the day I was born. Minus the placenta.

“Just drop out of Phi Delta Chi, you giant dumbass,” Iris hisses from the backseat. “There’s a million of them at this school. Pick another one that doesn’t have any bloodthirsty upperclassmen forcing you to go naked to parties.”

“That’s exactly what she wants!” I protest. “She told me to go naked hoping that I would wimp out and drop out. Well, fuck that. If she wants to see my glorious naked ass, she’s going to. Besides, this is what we wanted anyway, right? I couldn’t lose this challenge any more spectacularly than this.”

“You were supposed to show cleavage, not your nipples.” Iris sinks lower in her seat.

“My nipples are fabulous and everyone should see them.” I shake my hair out. My heart is pounding, but that’s a tidbit I keep to myself. If I’m going to pull this off, I can’t let my confidence crack. “I’ll lose the challenge. Sigrid will be satisfied. Everyone will know I don’t give two shits about impressing James Reid. That’s like, three birds with one very naked stone.”

“I just hope there’s a lot of alcohol,” Iris mutters as Mags pulls up outside the frat house. I take a deep breath, shed my bathrobe, and step out of the car, flanked on either side by a furiously blushing Mags and an Iris whose hand keeps returning to her forehead.

It’s a frat house off campus and the lawn is dotted with hot guys holding beer cans. As I walk by, several of these beer cans drop to the grass, along with their jaws.

“Hello, boys,” I say, waggling my fingers at them as I stride past in my stripper heels. Found these things at Goodwill for ten bucks and practiced walking in them for hours. After all, if you’re going to walk into a party wearing nothing but a pair of high heels, you’ve got to make sure you don’t stumble.

“What the fuck did you give me, dude?” A red-eyed lax bro grabs his friend’s lapels. “I’m hallucinating hot naked chicks.”

“Oh God oh God oh God,” Mags whimpers, as a very choice specimen of manliness trips over himself on the front porch and faceplants in someone’s spilled beer. She hides her face in her hands. “This was a bad idea.”

Iris smoothes the front of her fitted, high-necked black dress. “We just need to get drunk as quickly as possible.”

“Are you kidding? This was a great idea,” I laugh, enjoying the evening breeze on places it doesn’t usually get to reach. Turns out walking into a crowded place naked with your head held high is the biggest confidence booster there is. “I’m never wearing clothes again. They’re a terrible invention. I was born to be naked. Ready?”

We’ve reached the front door. Both of them hesitate, so I link arms with my girls and stride straight in.

For the first ten seconds, the typical party scene continues spinning on. A couple making out on the couch, music in the air, a lively game of beer pong taking place in the kitchen. Then a few people glance toward the door to see who just walked in. And gradually, everything stills. Even the music goes quiet. A ping-pong ball bounces off a guy’s forehead and he doesn’t even blink.

“Evening, ladies and gentlemen. Anyone want to direct me to the drinks? Oh, lovely,” I say, locating a cooler against the wall and retrieving a Bud Light. “Excellent weather we’re having, isn’t it? Perfect for nudity.”

I spot Brooklyn across the room, a glass frozen in her fist. She whispers something to Sigrid, whose wide-eyed moment of surprise that I actually went through with it gives way to a cool, false mask of indignance. She surges over, her skin growing as livid as her hair as she sees that I’m smiling. Her sheer top and high-waisted Prada skirt run the risk of catching on fire. She grabs my arm, her polished fingernails digging into my bare skin. I’m one shaved head away from being a carbon copy of the girl she left in the desert. But I expected the fire-breather to come after me the moment I stepped into her den.

“What. Are. You. Wearing,” she grits out loud enough so that everyone can hear.

I’ll play her game. “Nothing! I figured this was the safest way to avoid showing up in the same outfit as someone else. Well, I guess one could say I’m wearing my birthday suit. But I don’t want people to think it’s my birthday. That’s not until February.” I pat her arm. “By the way, you shouldn’t speak through your teeth like that. Makes it awfully hard to understand you.”

Behind me, Iris knocks back two shots in quick succession. Poor girl. After a year with me as her roommate, she’ll be driven to alcoholism. Mags is hovering nearby with her hands up, like she’s at the scene of a shooting.

“You were instructed to dress modestly.” Still speaking loudly through her teeth. Bad habit.

“Oh no!” I clap my hand to my chest in an excellent approximation of horror, narrowly avoiding slapping myself in the tit. “I thought you said dress as sexy as possible, and I always feel sexiest when I’m like this, so that’s what I did! But I was wrong! Woe is me! You have to let me go home and don my nun habit.”

Broadway, here I come. I could totally star alongside Daniel Radcliffe in that naked horse play. Equus or something. As Iris chokes on her third shot, a smirk spreads over Sigrid’s face. “As punishment for not following directions, you won’t be allowed to put anything on all night.”

“Please, show mercy. Oh, the gods are cruel. Is that Kahlua over there?”

I waltz away as Sigrid glowers after me. Slowly, the party returns to its normal tempo, although stares still shoot toward me every few seconds. As they should. I consider the day a waste unless at least five longing looks are directed toward me before breakfast.

The gorgeous guy who face-planted outside approaches me as I pour myself a glass of Kahlua. “You’re naked,” he observes with the eloquence of a drunk athlete.

“Sure am, genius.” I glance down at my splendidly nude self and toss back half the glass before holding it out again. “Top me off, would you?”

Soon, I’m seated on the counter, the marble cool against my bare ass as I hold court with at least six boys. Iris and Mags hover nearby, unsure if they should be protecting me or not, but I don’t need protection.

“—And that’s when I joined the nudist colony,” I continue, my legs swinging. “Refill this, be a dear, would you, Damien? Anyway, after running away from home at the age of three and traveling the wilderness for years, you can imagine I was a little nervous to be around human beings again. But they soon realized how fantastic I looked naked, and it wasn’t long until they made me their queen.”

“You do look fantastic naked,” declares a boy who looks like he walked straight off the cover of Playgirl.

“You’re drooling, Calem, you should take care of that.”

“I’ll make you my queen,” offers a brown-eyed hunk. I study him. I could work with him.

“I have your drink!” Damien rushes back over, nearly spilling it.

“Why don’t you keep that, darling. I have to convene with my handmaiden,” I say. Iris has been sulking near the cooler and beckoning me—oddly enough, with her middle finger—for the last ten minutes. I slide out of my circle of boys and trip lightly over to her.

“You are loving this,” she growls as I loop an arm around her shoulders.

“As a matter of fact, I am. Damien just invited me to the Bahamas with him for winter break. His family has a house there. Can you believe that?”

“What I can believe is that Sigrid is about to skin you alive.” Iris jerks her chin in the direction of the fire-breather, whose eyes are like windows into hell itself. She is not enjoying the fact that I am enjoying myself.

“I’ve been basking in her glare for the last hour. Do you think I’m getting a tan?” I gesture down at myself. “At least I won’t have to worry about any tan lines.”

“Fiona, isn’t it?”

Iris’s back suddenly goes ramrod-straight. I turn and Brooklyn is next to me, a slightly weary smile on her lips. She’s absolutely stunning in a long silver gown, her hair gathered into a knot at her crown. “Let me guess. Everything’s in the laundry?”

“Oh yeah. All the machines are always filled on Sundays and I figured this would be my best chance to get it all done,” I say brightly. She really doesn’t know about Sigrid after all.

“Be careful, Fiona.” Brooklyn shakes her head. “There’s nothing wrong with going a little crazy your first few weeks at school—a lot of girls do—but you don’t want to get yourself in any dangerous situations. You’ll have to keep an eye on her.”

She nods at Iris, who turns pale and stammers, “Right. Yes. Okay.”

“How’s your sister doing?” Brooklyn smiles. “She and I are good friends, you know.”

“Oh, she’s great! We talk all the time. Every day,” Iris babbles. I choke on my drink, remembering how quickly Iris hung up on Daisy.

“We were all very proud of her when she graduated early for that senator internship. She’s a smart girl, your sister. You’ve got a lot to live up to.”

“Don’t I know it,” says Iris quietly. I glance at her, but just then, Amber rushes over. She definitely went overboard on the modesty thing—she looks like she raided my Aunt Caroline’s closet. But Aunt Caroline has probably never worn such an expression of excitement and panic in her life.

“He’s coming! Brookie, he’s coming to this party! I just got a text from Sarah who heard from Chelsea that he was stopping by!”

Exasperation flashes across Brooklyn’s face before she regains her composure. “Ah. Sigrid must be beside herself.”

“Who’s ‘he’?” I ask, though I have a sinking feeling I already know the answer.

Amber takes a good few seconds to giggle meanly at my nakedness before answering. “James Reid. Duh.”

There’s a heartbeat of silence, and then Iris grabs my arm and drags me into the kitchen.

“You have to leave the party.” She gives me a little shake. In the living room, an excited hum rises as the truth spreads. “Now. Before he gets here.”

“But Sigrid said I had to stay at least three hours! And I’m having so much fun.” I shake free and pop open the fridge, suddenly hungry. “Do you think they have pickles, I’m craving a pickle—ew, that tuna salad has been in here at least a week.”

“Fiona!” Iris slams the fridge shut, nearly taking off my hand, and puts her hands on my shoulders. She’s genuinely concerned about me. It’s kind of cute. “How much do you trust this guy not to make it obvious that you two have slept together?”