Page 1 of Choke Up

PROLOGUE

The slower the bottle spins, the faster my heart beats. My eyes move around the room, making me dizzy like I'm the bottle rather than the person who spun it. They're all laughing at me, barely hiding their sneers and snarky comments.

The bottle slows to almost stopping, and I want to kick it across the room. No, no, no. Don't do this to me. Not him. Not him. Not him.

Laughter and a chorus of oohs break out when it stops on him. Gabriel Rodgers. My body flushes with embarrassment as he wraps his hands around the bottle and takes a deep swig, more than is necessary for the game, as if to make a show out of just how much he'd rather drink the shitty whiskey than even consider kissing me. Most of the guys drink rather than kiss when their spin lands on another guy. It's expected, and they all just laugh it off. I definitely didn't expect Gabe to kiss me, but the way he hurries to drown himself in the shot, not even glancing my way, just adds insult to injury. Never mind that I've secretly had a massive crush on him since before I was old enough to know better. He's my brother's best friend, practically a member of my family. But he's playing into whatever sick game these assholes are playing, or at least not stopping it.

This is stupid.

This game is stupid. These assholes are stupid. I only agreed to come to this party because Elliot talked me into it.

Except where is he now? Off screwing his girlfriend somewhere, while I get roped into being publicly embarrassed—once again—by a bunch of people who have clearly not put the high school bullshit behind them.

He doesn't get it. He'll never get it, because he walks around like he's some kind of king. Everyone loves Elliot Hope. And why wouldn't they? He's the epitome of tall, dark and ruggedly handsome, with a wide, perfect smile that never needed braces, perfectly coiffed hair, and muscles for days. Not to mention he's an all-star athlete destined for the Baseball Hall of Fame. His high school experience has been drastically different from mine. Because despite the way everyone smiles and acts polite to me when Elliot is looking, they're all snickering and pulling embarrassing pranks when he turns his back.

He's my twin, but we're nothing alike. He got the brawn, the beauty, and the brains. I got a heart murmur, anxiety, and a deep sense that he should have eaten me in the womb.

"Third spin!" someone announces.

It gets loud for a moment, while everyone's jeers and groans. Their laughter bounces off the basement walls. For a moment, I consider taking my own swig of the disgusting liquor. But then someone, another asshole from Elliot and Gabe's baseball team, very kindly reminds everyone about the rules of the game. I knew that you spin the bottle, and the person it lands on either has to kiss you or take a drink. I assumed the person would take the drink, everyone would laugh, and then move on so I could leave. But after the bottle landed on a girl I vaguely know from my art class, I was told I had to spin again after her rejection. Surely they aren't going to make me keep going until everyone in this room is drunk and I'm drowned in my own embarrassment. Hopefully, a third spin means the torture is over.

"Whoever the third spin lands on has to spend seven minutes in heaven with Little Hope here, or they have to strip naked and jump into the pool." A hand thumps hard against my shoulder, and I cringe away from the touch, as well as the nickname that marks me as less than my brother.

Kill me now. I seriously regret following Elliot down here, only to watch him make out with his girlfriend and then disappear before I was unwittingly shuffled into my worst nightmare. The moment I saw where this was heading, I tried to stand up to leave, but was offered up as tribute instead. I let them talk me into this mess to avoid any more attention on me, secretly hoping Elliot or Gabe would save me. One of them usually does. As much as I hate it, I'm also grateful, because I seem to attract trouble no matter how much I actively try to avoid it.

My eyes cut to Gabe, pleading with him to get me out of this, but he looks away indifferently. His argument with Shayla, his on-again-off-again bitch of a girlfriend, is more interesting than my oncoming panic attack. I hate her. I thought he'd broken up with her again after she was caught blowing one of the guys on the cheerleading squad. But she's drop dead gorgeous, and apparently does something with her tongue that he really likes, because he keeps going back to her. All things I wish I didn't know but am forced to hear when I'm sitting in the backseat of my brother's Jeep on the way here.

My wicked, bruised heart rejoices at the fact that she'll be going to a different school in the fall, while Gabe, Elliot, and I are headed out of state to Huntston University. She didn't have the grades to get accepted. Although, technically, neither did I. I'm pretty sure I only got in because the baseball coach pulled strings for my brother. He's going to hate me, but I don't want to go. I'm tired of living in his shadow—not my brother's. His. Because even now, while he’s ignoring my existence and my embarrassment, I still want him.

Swallowing, I reach for the bottle and spin it hard enough that it goes completely off track, hitting Gabe in the shoe, and my stomach drops. I'm going to be sick. With a look of bored disgust, he kicks the neck of the bottle.

It spins once and lands on Shayla of all people. I stand up to leave, because fuck this, but she shrugs and says, "Alright."

Everyone either gasps or gawks, but Gabe is shaking with laughter. This seems to piss her off, because she stands up and stalks toward me. "I'm curious to see if Little Hope has a big dick like his brother.”

Something flashes in Gabe's eyes that feels like more than anger. I know he knows I don't want to do this, so I don't understand why his anger is directed toward me. I'm not interested in Shayla or any other girl here. I'm not interested in girls at all. And while I'm not out at school, my parents know, and Elliot knows. Which means Gabe likely does, too. And he must know that Elliot never would have done anything with his girl. I'm not sure if he's aware of Elliot’s dick situation, but I grew up taking baths with him and, like mine, it's pretty average. Unlike Gabe, who is rumored to be swinging more than one kind of bat around. It’s obvious that Shayla is just trying to piss him off. Gabe's smarter than letting her games work on him, so why is he mad?

Shayla pulls on my shirt, leading me to what looks like a utility room. My mind is too busy reeling with a way to get out of this without embarrassing myself further. Not because I care what any of these assholes think, but because I'm tired of looking like a weak loser in front of Gabe. Would it impress him if I turned his skanky girlfriend down? Or is just going with the flow the better move, here?

She pushes me through the door and presses her perky breasts against my chest. Horrified, I back up against the stacked washer-dryer. There isn't enough room to get away. I feel one of her hands on my ass, and I snap out of my paralysis. This is not happening. I'm not letting my first kiss be with some hateful bitch who probably had her mouth on my crush’s cock within the last hour. I'm not that desperate to taste him.

Pushing Shayla away from me, I start to stutter my excuses. "Look, no offense, but?—"

Shayla cackles like a witch from a cartoon. As soon as there's more than a foot between us, I see she has my phone in her hand. Holding it up like some kind of victory trophy, she quickly backs out of the cramped room and slams the door shut. I lunge for it, but the knob is frozen. There's no lock or key slot on this side of the door. Before I can figure out how to unlock the door, something heavy scrapes against the other side. They've either propped a chair under the door handle or done something to block it, because it won’t open.

"Hey!" I shout. "What the fuck! Let me out!"

There's laughter on the other side of the door, but no one pays attention to me. When I finally stop beating on the door and yelling, it's silent. The thump of music playing starts overhead, filtering down from where the party has moved on in the main house.

"This isn't funny!" I scream, but no one can hear me. And that bitch stole my phone, so I can't even call my brother to help. All I can do is hope he comes looking for me at some point. I'm sure Gabe will at least tell him where I am when he sees him, and then he'll have to face my brother's wrath for letting it happen in the first place.

Resigned to my fate, I find a rolled up sleeping bag to sit on and settle in to wait. At first, I think being in here is probably better than having to deal with these assholes I went to high school with. I'm looking forward to never seeing most of them again.

But the longer I'm in the room, the smaller it feels. My body is vibrating with tension and anxiety. There's not enough room in here to pace or move around. I end up digging through all the drawers and boxes, no longer caring about messing with someone else's stuff. There's nothing in here but craft supplies and basic home stuff like lightbulbs and duct tape. But at least I find something to distract myself.

With several pots of acrylic paints, I start painting a small mural on the far side of the washer-dryer setup. Typically, my art pieces are darker, and I gravitate to alternative styles of impressionism and mixed media. But since what I have is a set of pastel acrylics, and at some point, someone might find this and trace it back to me being locked in here, I keep it light and do a pretty landscape. A pebbled beach forms, leading up to a rocky cliff where a waterfall feeds into deep, blue-green water. The deeper I build and blend the colors, the more the water transforms into something more than a watery oasis. The exact shade of Gabe's eyes blossoms before me, and I become transfixed on the painting.

I'm so focused that I don't hear the chair moving, or the door unlocking. I don't notice or look up when someone enters the room. My concentration is only broken when the room descends into pitch black darkness. The paintbrush falls from my hand, and I step back, cursing as the small of my back makes contact with the corner of the countertop behind me.

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