The first few rounds of spin the bottle are harmless — the kind of stupid fun people will brag about in Monday’s group chat but forget by next weekend.

Leah draws a dare and ends up swallowing a full spoonful of wasabi, her eyes watering as she fans her face and insists she’s fine between coughs. Macy is dared to call her ex and whisper “I still love you” before hanging up. She does it without blinking, then throws her phone into a blanket pile like it’s radioactive. Everyone loses it.

Then Jamie, predictably, gets dared to do ten pushups shirtless. He does twenty, just to prove a point, and bows for applause while someone plays a slow clap on the speaker.

I laugh along with the rest of them. I join in the cheering and the clapping, say things like “legend” and “icon” because it’s what I’m supposed to do. I pretend the game is funny. That the bottle isn’t a ticking bomb in the center of the circle. That Jaxon’s shoulder isn’t brushing mine every time he shifts, just lightly enough to make me wonder if it’s intentional.

The house is warm, firelight dancing against the windows. The music is a low throb in the background, mixed with the sharp cracks of ice against red solo cups. There are blankets and elbows and too many bodies packed into the living room, and somehow I feel colder than I should.

I keep pretending I’m fine.

Then Jamie spins.

The bottle clicks along the wood floor, wobbles, then slows. The room quiets in that slow-motion way, like everyone senses the moment before the beat drops.

It points to Jaxon.

And everything stops.

No one speaks. Even the Bluetooth speaker seems to fade out.

Jamie locks eyes with Jaxon across the circle and asks, too calmly, “Truth or dare?”

Jaxon doesn’t flinch. “Dare.”

Jamie doesn’t hesitate.

“Kiss the prettiest girl in the room.”

There’s a beat of stunned silence. A few gasps. Someone whistles under their breath.

My stomach flips. Not like butterflies — like vertigo.

Jaxon’s eyes find mine almost instantly. I feel it more than I see it. The weight of his gaze is heavy. Familiar. My pulse jumps, like my body’s trying to prepare for something it can’t name yet.

He holds my eyes.

I don’t move. I can’t.

It feels like the whole room is waiting — not for him to decide, but for me to give him permission.

I shake my head. Just a little. Barely.

The truth is, I’m not sure what I’m saying.

Maybe I’m saying don’t. Maybe I’m saying not like this. Or maybe it’s panic. Maybe it’s fear that if he does it — if he kisses me in front of everyone — I won’t know how to survive the fallout.

Whatever it is, he sees it.

And he understands.

That’s the part that hurts.

He shifts his gaze, slow and smooth, and pushes himself to his feet.

The room seems to hold its breath as he crosses the circle, not toward me, but away.

To Maddie.

She doesn’t ask questions. She just tilts her chin up slightly, smiling like she’s already won. He leans down and kisses her.

It’s long enough to prove a point, whatever point he thinks he’s making.

The room bursts into cheers and laughter, the kind that’s a little too loud, a little too performative. Someone shouts “Iconic!” while another voice yells “Reed strikes again!” I hear the rush of it around me, but it’s all background noise.

Because I’m frozen. Not jealous. Not exactly.

It’s something else.

Like my ribcage just got rearranged, and now nothing fits the way it used to.