Chapter 90
As the sun set and the stars rose into the night sky, Connor’s house party really kicked into high gear. But one contestant lay alone in a lounger staring up at the sky. Ashley had been so worried about having her secret revealed that she had been steering clear of large crowds of people, including most of her friends. But, as she sipped her drink out by the pool, she heard the distinctive voice belonging to the one person she didn’t have to avoid, chit-chatting with Connor and some of his childhood friends. So, Ashley decided to buck up and start mingling. She stretched, got up, and walked over to introduce herself, downing her drink along the way.
“No way!” Bailey exclaimed in amazement. “All four of you are metas? How did that happen?”
The one other girl in the group giggled before answering, which surprised Ashley because the girly reaction didn’t at all match this mystery woman’s whole look; she wore a vintage 90s T-shirt with a Union Jack and Blur written across the front, black jeans, and Doc Martins and had bright makeup paired with black lipstick, all capped off with short bright blue hair. She looked like someone who would have lived in Camden in the Brit Pop era.
After laughing, the blue-haired beauty answered, “Yeah. It’s not as unlikely as you might think. Meta Eden is mostly inhabited by people who work for The Council. So, since powers are genetic, there is a much higher meta population here than elsewhere.”
“True, but we were the only four with powers in our preschool class,” a blond jock-looking dude and a Letterman Jacket added.
Connor, who had heard all this before when people were getting to know them as a group, was starting to lose interest and looked over to see Ashley approaching. “Oh, hey! I didn’t even know you were around! Get over here,” he shouted as an invitation to join the pow-wow. “Ashley, these are my friends, Topper, Buzz, and Waldo.”
He motioned at the last and only remaining unknown group member when he spoke the last name. Waldo was a scrawny, nerdy guy with glasses and brown hair, parted on the side and combed across his head with a lot of product to hold it down. He bashfully looked at his feet and limply waved as Ashley introduced herself to the crew.
The mystery woman, Topper apparently, nodded and, upon noticing Ashley’s empty drink, asked, “Hey, need a refill?”
“Sure,” Ashley smiled back at the alternative goddess bashfully.
Topper reached out, but instead of grabbing Ashley’s plastic cup to grab a refill, she just tapped the rim. Ashley marveled as she watched the cup fill back up to the brim. She took a sip and was unsurprised that it tasted exactly the same as the adult beverage she had just downed. “Woah. That’s a handy power.”
“Yeah, it’s pretty useful. I can refill any container or vessel that has had something depleted. But only once. And only if it is within range. I'd probably be Dr. Feelgood or The Pharmacist if we had been older when the nicknames took hold. But, Topper it is.” Topper shrugged as she thought aloud.
As Ashley contemplated the idea of a group of kids giving each other codenames, she turned to Waldo and, thinking about the famous children’s book, said, “Let me guess. You can fade into large groups?”
“Close,” Connor answered, knowing that his friend would be unable to articulate anything polysyllabic in the presence of such a beautiful woman, “He can find anything in his power’s radius.”
“Oh! That’s awesome!” Bailey interjected. “Can you tell me where my friend Joel is? I’ve been looking for him for a while.”
Waldo finally got the nerve up to speak and responded with a much deeper voice than expected, “Sorry. It doesn’t work on people. Only items. But if you have a picture of an item, other than clothing, that he is currently holding or carrying, I can probably tell you where he is.”
Bailey scrunched her mouth and looked toward the sky. “Hmmm, no. I don’t think there’s anything in specific.”
For her part, Ashley was staring at Buzz, visibly working through options for what his power could be. Haircuts? Maybe. But her instincts were screaming that there was a better guess out there. “Cutting things?” she blurted out, pulling attention back to the original topic.
Buzz guffawed and smiled wryly. “Nope. Not even close.”
Bailey had been hanging around Connor and his friends for the better part of half an hour and had heard this little schtick a couple of times. So, after making sure Ashley was comfortable alone in the conversation, she decided to peel off. She glanced around, looking for the best excuse to leave, while Buzz explained that he could turn any item into a rocket or missile. Bailey saw Ralph standing alone, sweating a little in the night air as if he had just stepped outside to cool off after an extended period of physical exertion. “Hey, sorry to interrupt, it was nice to meet you all,” she made sure to make eye contact with everyone, especially Ashely, to make sure noone cared that she was about to leave. Ashley gave her a little nod, answering the unspoken request. “I promised my friend a dance, and I just finally found him.”
Before anyone could stop her, not that anyone was going to try, Bailey made a beeline over to Ralph and grabbed him by the arm. “Care for a dance, handsome?”
Ralph blushed a bit and gladly followed Bailey to the dancefloor upstairs. They walked up the outside stairwell, passing through a couple of dank-smelling clouds of smoke, and then entered the house via a side door into a small foyer. The entryway was one of the only empty rooms in the house, but the powder room just off the tight area had a small line of those waiting to use the restroom. Bailey linked arms with Ralph and pulled him straight through into the large ballroom that opened out onto the upper pool. The DJ, set up in a small lifeguard shack built into the cliff's rocks, was playing bumping music, perfect for dancing. Bailey surveyed the dance floor for any of her other friends, but it was too crowded to make out any individuals beyond the first row of dancers. To her surprise, however, as she made her way to the center of the dance floor with Ralph in tow, people started staring at them and clapping. Ralph smiled and gave little head nods of appreciation in return. This confused Bailey. Why was everyone so seemingly excited to see Ralph? The music changed suddenly, answering her unasked question.
“Rooooxannnne…” The familiar Police song from the late 70s that had been turned into a tango for the 90s movie, “Moulin Rouge,” broke through the silence. Luckily, Bailey was familiar with the scene because Ralph whispered, “Follow my lead,” into her ear and then pulled her close in the classic starting pose. “You don’t have to put on the red light…” A circle formed on the dance floor as all eyes were on the couple.
As the music began, Bailey and Ralph stepped into the center of the dance floor, their eyes locked in a fierce gaze. The air was electric with anticipation as the rest of the dancers continued to part to watch the couple take center stage. Bailey, resplendent in the slinky red dress that she had changed into after a long afternoon spent swimming, her dark hair falling lightly on her shoulders, took Ralph’s hand, intertwining their fingers. It was serendipitous that Bailey was able to keep up with Ralph, the dancing savant. When she had realized that singing and dancing would open up a huge amount of available roles, Bailey had smartly signed up for an array of dancing classes, including Ballroom. She had even kept up with the hobby after honing in on voice acting and discontinuing her effort to land musical theater gigs.
Her memory of the film served her well, as Ralph was recreating the famous tango scene step for step. The crowd clapped to the beat and hooted as they hit the sexy beats. As the Tango’s dramatic rhythms pulsed through the room, Bailey and Ralph’s movements became one, their bodies moving in perfect sync. Bailey’s hips swiveled, her legs extended in a daring stride, while Ralph’s feet stamped out a passionate yet precise sequence. Their connection grew with every step.
The music swelled, and Bailey twisted and spun into Ralph’s arms, exhaling. Her body arced back in a graceful curve. Ralph’s hand pressed against her lower back, his eyes burning with an unexpected intensity as he pulled her close. Bailey would normally have recoiled at Ralph’s sensual touch, but in the context of the activity, she was actually quite amazed that the odd man was so confident in his role. As the song wound down, others joined in around them, attempting to dance the Tango. Most failed miserably.
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
Bailey whispered back to Ralph, “Thanks. That was lovely.” There was a hint of rouge in her cheeks as she flushed from the exertion, as well as a little bit of embarrassment at enjoying her time with the group’s outcast. She made a note to stop underestimating the team’s misfit. He had proven surprising so far– making it through the culling, staying above the red line on the leaderboard, winning the fan favorite vote, and now his skills as a dancer.
The confidence seemed to leave Ralph a little bit once the song ended, but he inhaled. Getting up the nerve, he leaned over to Bailey and asked over the sound of the typical dance music resuming, “Wanna maybe grab dinner sometime?”
Bailey did her best to keep smiling. She was viewing Ralph in a new light tonight, but that was a far way from wanting to date the speedo-wearing Herald known as U.F.O. Luckily for her, as if on cue, she felt a tap on her shoulder and spun around. Joel was standing there smiling.
“Hey, you,” he said casually. “Mind if I cut in?”
Bailey welcomed the interruption. “Not at all,” she agreed as she turned back to Ralph, “Hey, mind if we continue this convo later?”
Ralph had been let down easy enough to know when someone was politely declining a date, so he obliged. “No, Yeah. Have fun.”
Bailey was maybe a little too upbeat in her reply. “Thanks, Ralph. That was really amazing, really. One day, you’ll have to tell me where you learned to cut a rug like that.”
“Sure thing. Anytime,” Ralph replied. Maybe she had avoided the idea of a date, but his hope of spending quality time with his crush got his spirits back up.
As Bailey and Joel found their spot on the edge of the dance floor, she realized that he was super awkward in the role of “dance partner.” After having her feet stepped on half a dozen times through the first half of a song, she suggested they explore the mansion a little more. A suggestion that visibly relaxed Joel. He happily agreed, so they trekked up to the level above the makeshift club and wandered into a library study. Bookcases, stained a rich dark brown and filled to the max with leather-bound tomes, lined the walls, and a large oak desk that reminded Joel of the Resolute desk sat in the room’s center. Surrounding the desk was a small group of partygoers playing some version of drinking Jenga. Included in their numbers were a few familiar faces in Athena, Ken, Jax, and June, along with a handful of unknown party guests that neither Joel nor Bailey had officially met.
Ken was the first to notice Joel and Bailey enter their little party within a party. He waved them both over to join in. “Bailey. Joel. Please, come save me. I think I have gotten myself in over my head here.”
Bailey laughed and grabbed Joel’s hand to drag him toward the desk of truth-or-daring doom. Athena, feeling protective of her cover, looked at the new couple with trepidation and skepticism. She wondered if her arrangement with Joel was in danger as she surveyed the bombshell that was causing her showmance partner’s face to flush the same color as the slinky red dress that hugged her curves perfectly. Athena caught herself staring at the pair a little bit too long before deciding to try lightening the mood. “I’m the last to go this round, so you two can be next up!” Simultaneously, she pulled a chair out for Bailey and then yanked Joel away from the nerd-hot actress and onto her lap. “In fact, can you pull one for me, handsome?”
Joel’s tense mood was evident to anyone paying attention. Luckily, the gaggle of Connor’s friends was well past buzzed, and even if they weren’t, it wouldn’t matter since they didn’t even know who these people were outside of the show. Ken was blissfully ignorant of these types of social cues. June, however, was not. And she was picking up on the love triangle’s complex dynamics and reveling in the awkwardness. “Yeah, Joel,” she taunted. “Pick a good one. Your girl has been avoiding the truth and dare bricks. She’s downed quite a few shots in a row, though. Do us all a favor and pull a fun one!” Athena breathes a sigh of relief. No one seemed to have picked up on the fact that she wasn’t actually taking the shots, instead using her power to stay stone-cold sober.
Joel leaned forward, with Athena thankfully still taking up the real estate on his lap, and pulled the easiest Jenga block halfway down the tower in a row that still had three across. He turned it over and read aloud the directive that was written in marker.
“StripTease 4 Someone or Take 4 Shots.” Joel's face turned even redder as he wondered, “Can one die from embarrassment?” He hoped beyond hope that Athena wasn’t about to do this.
“Are you going to do it? Finally?” one of the drunk randos asked as he perked up a bit. He was giving off “pick me” vibes even though it should have been obvious that the man whose lap she was sitting on had a steep advantage.
“Oh, I’m gonna do it!” Athena assured the group as she stood up, swaying a bit to act as if she were actually drunk. Before she started, she took out her phone, queued up a fun song to strip dance to, and placed the device on the desk. Then, she started moving sensually to the beat around Joel, grazing his shoulders and chest as she circled the chair he was now glued to. Bailey looked on with a fake smile plastered on her face, and Athena knew it. She reveled in it. Athena wasn’t sure why Bailey’s jealousy made her feel this way, but she was having a hard time denying that her feelings were starting to intensify for her fauxmance.
Out of respect, Joel tried not to stare too intently at the beautiful woman who was circling, moving in rhythm with the music around him, but Athena lightly readjusted his chin with her fingertips, forcing him to take her all in. The music pulsed through the semi-crowded room, the beat vibrating beneath Athena's feet as she made her way through the sea of bodies. Her eyes locked onto Joel, sitting uncomfortably in his chair.
As she approached, the music swelled, the rhythm taking on a sensual, sultry quality. Athena's hips began to sway, her body moving in time with the beat. Joel's eyes never left hers, his awkward gaze increasing in intensity. Without breaking eye contact, Athena reached out and took Joel's hand, pulling him to his feet. But instead of drawing him into the dance, she pushed him back into the chair, her hands on his shoulders.
The music seemed to grow louder, the beat more insistent, as Athena began to dance. Her body moved in perfect time, her hips swiveling, her arms extending above her head. Joel's eyes were fixed on her, his face giving away his nerves, but as she connected with him, desire began to burn in his eyes.
Athena's dance was a mesmerizing spectacle, her body bending and twisting in ways that seemed impossible. Much of the crowd around them melted away, leaving only Ken, June, and Jax watching the two of them, lost in the music and the moment. Bailey had long ago extricated herself from the situation, quietly sneaking out at the song’s climax when Athena's movements became more frenzied, her body glistening with sweat. Joel's eyes never left hers; his face showed his awe and appreciation. When the music finally stopped, Athena stood before him, her chest heaving with exertion, her eyes flashing with triumph. Joel's gaze lingered on hers, the air between them crackling with tension.
Jax broke the silence, “Um, well, looks like you two are the winners of this game.” His humor being used to deflect from the highly personal moment shared between Joel and the Greek Goddess.
“Yeah. Who’s next?” Joel mindlessly asked as he gazed at Athena’s glistening body.
Jax looked over at his sister in the silence. June eyed Ken up and down before grabbing his hand and dragging him toward the room’s exit. “Come on, big boy! Let’s find somewhere a little more private.” Before Ken could object, he had already been yanked from the room.
“And then there were three,” Jax joked. “I’m gonna give you two a little privacy.” He made his way to the room’s one and only entryway while ignoring Joel's objections. He smiled and winked at his friend as he left, closing the door behind him. Joel was in for an interesting night. There was no way in hell he would be able to keep up with Athena. As he turned to find another drinking game somewhere, Jax nearly bumped into Bobby, walking past the Jenga room along with Connor and his childhood friend Topper, whom he had briefly met earlier that night. Well, briefly, aside from that story about how they met. Bobby and his little group slowed as they passed. However, before Jax could even say anything, Lizzy violently stumbled out of the powder room and into the hallway right to Jax’s left and leaned against the wall. She swayed a bit as she turned around and noticed the well-dressed young Bradley man eying him up and down.
When she spoke, her words slurred just a bit. “Hey there, Mishtur Brad-leeee.” She then chuckled a little too much at her own non-joke. “Ooooopsh. I mean Booore-Eee-alis.”
“Hey,” he nodded as she reached out to wrap her arms clumsily around his neck and shoulders, missing, and then resting a hand on his chest. “Maybe we should get you a little water.”
“Sure. I’ll be find an upstairs bedroom. Meet me in ten.” She sobered up a little to deliver the invitation. Sure, she was a little overserved. But, she didn’t want him to think she didn’t have agency over herself. And then, while Bobby, Connor, and Topper watched on, she leaned in and kissed Jack.
He expected a drunken approach and sloppy finish. But, Lizzy’s lips met his tenderly. The world fell away for Jax in that moment. It wasn’t like he hadn’t been kissed like this before. Jax had been in love, after all. But, this was Lizzy. He definitely wasn’t in love with the prissy elitist. She intrigued him, though. And right now, none of that mattered anyway. He just enjoyed the experience. And enjoyable it was.
Lizzy pulled away and opened her eyes slowly. She smiled at the onlookers and sarcastically waved before twirling around and walking away from them down the hall. She looked back over her shoulder at Jax and mouthed, “Ten minutes.”
Once Lizzy was out of view, Jax turned to Bobby and asked, “So what are you all doing?” He was having a hard time wiping the shit-eating grin from his face.
Bobby just laughed and answered the subject changing inquiry. “Connor was just about to show us his dad’s Bat Cave.”
“It’s not a Bat Cave,” Connor insisted. “It’s just my dad’s workshop.”
“His dad’s secret workshop… A secret workshop that is built into this hill… In a fashion that some might call… a cave.”
“Yeah,” Connor nervously shuffled. “But I don’t think there are any bats in it.”