Building Friction (Part 3)

We sat around, finishing off the bottle of Jaeger until Steph's other roommate Casey called us in to eat the spicy chicken wings he'd made. People crowded around the kitchen vying for plates full of the delicious grub. If there was ever a reason to come to a party at the white house, it was for the food above all else.

I was licking sauce off of my fingers when Geoff approached me again. "Better watch that oral display you've got going on," he commented. "You might actually make yourself attractive to those with dirty enough minds."

"Fucking enough already!" I protested. "You're too new around here to be giving me this much shit!"

"Something tells me that you could benefit from a healthy dose of shit-giving." He sucked the meat off of the wing he was working on and then burped loudly.

"Too bad whatever is telling you all this isn't giving you any instructions on proper manners." I dumped my plate in the near-by garbage can and headed toward the table to pick at a veggie platter. He followed me over and persisted with his antagonizing.

"Seriously. You come off like you're some kind of badass, but my guess is that you're a innocent little kitten under all of this false bravado." He grabbed a handful of chips and scooped some dip onto his plate.

"You seem to have an awful lot to say about shit you know nothing about," I rolled my eyes and pushed past him into the living room.Joshua was perched on the couch, packing a pipe with durka. I settled down next to him and gave him a nudge to let him know I wanted a hit when he was finished. He offered the pipe to me after taking a healthy hit.

I inhaled deeply and held the smoke in, then noticed Geoff as he sank into a recliner near-by. He nodded in my direction for the pipe. "I don't know if we want your germs on here," I coughed out the words as I exhaled a thick stream of smoke.

Joshua laughed deeply and then liberated me of the pipe. "Chlo, you are so kick-ass!" he bellowed.

Geoff laughed hard. "Oh, I'm sure you've had far dirtier things in your mouth," he quipped.

"Dude," Joshua started. "Lay the fuck off. She's been trying to avoid you. Get a fucking clue." He clicked his lighter and lowered the flame to the pipe's bowl.

"I'm aware of her lame avoidance tactics. What I want to know is what I did to become so tantalizingly avoidable. Is it because I'm saying things you don't want to hear? Perhaps hitting a little too close to home? A dose of reality is proving too much for the kick-ass Chloe to handle?" He smiled at me, his eyes gleaming. Fucker really did have some nice eyes.

Joshua started to stand, but I placed my hand on his back to stop him. "I can handle anything that's thrown at me," I started. "Let me ask YOU something, though. There are a good dozen other females that you could be bothering tonight, some of whom might be a little more receptive to your attention. So are you just a glutton for punishment chasing after the one who has absolutely zero interest?"

His lips smoothed into a coy line, his lip curved just slightly at the corner. "Why spend time on a sure thing? The harder to achieve a goal, the more worthwhile the reward."

We stared at each other silently for a couple of minutes until Joshua elbowed me and passed me the pipe again. I took another hit and decided to pass it to Geoff. He took a large hit of his own and passed the pipe back to me. The durka was working its magic. My mind began to float. Geoff's eyes were piercing. I made a decision when he took a pause to blink.

"HEY STEPH!" I yelled across the room. She was busy nuzzling the neck of her girlfriend, Cara. "Wanna play some foosball against the boys?"

"Anytime!" She yelled back and grinned. "Who we playing?"

I smirked at Geoff. "Find a partner, Mr Know-it-all. Me and Steph will play you and your choice. If we win, you don't let another smart-ass word come out of your mouth in my direction, capiche?"

"Gotcha," he allowed. "But if I win, you have to kiss me. Not some lame ass kiss, either. A mini make-out session. And I want tongue."

I narrowed my eyes. The durka was swirling its way through my system. Joshua tapped me on the leg and shook his head. "It's OK," I assured him. "How long are we talking?"

Geoff chuckled. "You want to time it? I was thinking until I was satisfied that your mouth was good for something other than self-righteous indignation over my attempts to be friendly, but I guess I'll settle for 3 minutes."

"That sounds do-able." I stood up and steadied myself. "STEPH! We're on!"

I made my way over to the foosball table and took my place next to Steph, who was eagerly awaiting the game already. Geoff called over Alex and enlisted him as his partner. They positioned themselves on the opposite side of the table from us. Geoff tossed the little white ball in the air. "You ready? Got your breath mints close by?"

"Fucking play. I want to get to the part where you're no longer allowed to talk to me." I coughed into my fist and blinked hard twice. Perhaps this wasn't the best of ideas. The durka was suddenly weighing heavily on me.

Geoff pushed the ball through its slot and the game was on. Steph was the best player who had ever graced the table and we easily made 3 successive scores. Geoff smiled like an idiot throughout it all. "I wanted you ladies to get a head start and a false sense of security."

"Gee, how sweet," Steph mocked. Her focus was always dead-on no matter how much alcohol she'd imbibed. She was the most competitive woman I'd met. With her dark hair, flawless skin and sparkling eyes, it wasn't hard to compare her to Courtney Cox's character Monica on Friends. The woman never had a night where she didn't play to win.

The next 2 goals went to us as well. We were up 5 to nothing before the guys managed to score, and sure enough, it was on me. My left hand was never as coordinated as my right, and it was the one controlling the goalie. Geoff knocked two goals in, then began to gloat.

"A wrinkle in your defense, I see," he beamed.

"I wouldn't get too cocky just yet, Happy Boy," Steph narrowed her eyes, dropped the ball in and then slammed it directly into their goal. "That makes 6 to 2 now. We're only 4 away."

"Peace and quiet, here I come," I giggled right at the moment that Geoff dropped the ball in and scored an easy goal on me. "FUCK!!"

"Don't get too happy just yet, Little Miss Swears A Lot." Alex threw his head back and roared with laughter.

As the game continued, the crowd around us grew. It seemed to be gender divided, with the females in the house on our side and the males on Alex and Geoff's side. The guys brought their score up and tied us at 8. Lilly came up behind us and gave me a nudge. "Pull the twins trick," she whispered.

Steph glanced over at me and I nodded. When she went to drop the ball in, she bent deeply at the waist, letting the front of her shirt dip forward and allowing the guys a nice view of her cleavage. Alex huffed. "I've seen those plenty of times before, Steph. I live here, you know."

Geoff didn't take his gaze off of me. "What? I don't get a peep as well?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

I took my hands off the handles in front of me and slowly dragged them up my chest, then grabbed at my assets, pushing them up so the rounded tops were visible above the neckline of my shirt. Geoff cocked his head in appreciation. "Nice," he said..... then knocked a goal in.

"Fucker! I didn't have my hands on the bars!" I yelled.

"Hey, all's fair in a battle like this, right?" He was looking sideways over at Steph. She sighed deeply and then reluctantly nodded. "You two try and show your tits to distract and it backfired on you. Deal with it."

"Fine," I said sharply. "Let's finish this shit and get it over with." I grabbed the ball from my goal and dropped it in.

The ball knocked back and forth between the little plastic men, veering dangerously close to our side until I caught it and passed to Steph, who promptly carried it over to the guys' goal and shot it in. Tied at 9, my head suddenly felt very heavy and my feet felt extremely light. I took a couple of deep breaths and tried to block out the noise of the room. People were laughing and cheering. Joshua was standing behind me and whispering that he'd be more than willing to kick Geoff's ass for me if it came down to it.

Alex dropped the ball into play and the battle for control began again. As the ball fell under Steph's power, my heart sang. It would soon be over and this guy would no longer be up in my face. I knitted my brow and fought for concentration.

"So I hear you're a writer," Geoff directed the question at me, but kept his eyes on the ball in play.

"At times," I replied. "I write online."

"Yeah, that's what Alex was telling me. I think I've seen your stuff." He arched his back and spun the bar in his right hand hard. I blocked it and kicked it back out to Steph.

"Really? I wouldn't have thought that you'd read the kind of stuff that I write," I blew at a strand of hair that had fallen over my eyes.

"Oh, it isn't. I'm not really a fan of trite, self-indulgent nonsense. But I thought I'd look into you before I came over tonight." He let out a small whoop as Alex blocked Steph's attempt at another goal.

"Trite bullshit, huh? Because it deals with actual emotions, something that I doubt you have and therefore would have great difficulty at relating to," I could feel the ire rising within me. I'd be willing to bet that he'd read one piece, if that, and was making another snap judgment as to who I was.

"Your type of writer is a dime a dozen. 'Oh, the angst!' The kind of posts that really make a person think." His eyes followed the ball, unwavering. "Come to think of it, maybe not. In fact, I think you'd be lucky to even get that dime. Probably have to settle for a nickel."

"What the fuck do you do that's so great?" My heart was racing now. This fucker didn't know Thing One about my writing or who I was and all of his claims were beginning to piss me off.

"Definitely nothing as great as chronicling the finer details of how to give a killer blow job," he said, then lined up his shot.

The room filled with that "Ooooooo" noise that occurs whenever someone has dared to utter something everyone else was thinking but no one else had the nerve to bring up. All around I saw my friends averting their gazes and turning away from me. Then I heard the clink.

He'd scored the last goal on me.

Noise crashed from all around. Steph leaned over and hugged me, then shook her head in dismay. The guys were high-fiving one another and holding up their watches and cell phones. "3 MINUTES!!" they all boomed in stereo.

Geoff held up his palms as he'd done when he'd gotten caught staring at my ass. "You WERE the one who turned this into a bet. Don't glare at me now."

I twisted my mouth up and started to open it to say something, then thought the better of it. Shaking my head, I relented. "Fine, I'll meet you outside. Side of the house where the light's broken." I turned to face the rest of the room. "And no fucking witnesses! There was no agreement to that!"

"She's correct there," Geoff conceded.

And with that, I stepped back out into the balmy night and headed towards the side of the house with this cocky stranger on my heels.