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“alright everybody, place your phones in this pillowcase!” chad shouted, showing off the pillowcase dangling from his hands. as a demonstration, he took the pillowcase and dropped his own phone into it.
mindy gathered a few phones from the people standing closest to her. “we’re going to be playing 7 minutes in heaven!” she smirked, taking a couple more phones. tara looked at them, confused. she’d never played 7 minutes in heaven before. she hadn’t even been to a freeman party before tonight. this looked like a tradition for them.
she turned to amber anxiously. “7 minutes in heaven? like… making out with whoever is picked?” she whispered. amber looked at her, slightly amused but kindly. she nodded and took out her phone. “you gonna play? ‘cause you know, you don’t have to if you don’t want to. but i’m gonna play.” amber waved her phone around a bit, secretly hoping to sway tara into choosing to play.
tara took a deep breath and smiled. she took out her phone and handed it to amber. “yeah, i’ll play. why not? it’s a party!” she exclaimed, trying to shove away her anxieties and have a good time. everyone else was, after all.
amber took both phones to chad and mindy and dropped them in. mindy exchanged a knowing look with amber as she returned to tara.
chad grabbed the last participants phone and put it into the pillowcase. he then shook up the phones softly, randomizing the results and building up excitement. the partygoers looked at him intently as he slowed down. he reached his hand into the pillowcase and pulled out two phones. he showed the crowd the cases and watched them try and deduce who it was.
“looks like… mindy and frances!” chad grinned, looking at mindy mischievously. she rolled her eyes, but was clearly very happy about this. luck of the draw, definitely.
“we were already planning on it but you know. this works too,” mindy said, grabbing frances’s hand and leading her into the bathroom. amber nudged tara’s arm playfully, clearly enjoying the party, even though she was the host.
“psa for anyone anxious about being picked…” chad suddenly spoke up, “…you don’t have to make out with anybody you don’t want to! the 7 minutes might just be awkward but it’s your choice.” he reassured the crowd. a few people nodded, noticeably relaxing themselves. tara herself was soothed by this information, honestly feeling a little nervous about her result. she didn’t know most of the people there—she didn’t even know if she liked guys .
the 7 minutes passed and mindy and frances exited the bathroom, mindy being strikingly giddy. frances shyly looked away from the room full of people, seemingly embarrassed by the faint smudged lipstick marks on mindy’s face, courtesy of frances herself.
chad picked a few more people. in fact, he picked the phones of a ton of people. there were significantly less phones in the pillowcase than there had been when they started. it made tara’s stomach turn in anticipation. she just wanted to be picked before she possibly changed her mind on participating in the game.
suddenly, chad pulled out two phones. and tara recognized one of them immediately. it sported a clear phone case with two overlapping movie tickets stuffed inside, a smiley face sticker slapped on the corner of the case, and a mini polaroid photo of… her and amber hanging out. it was tara’s phone.
tara braced herself for whoever she’d be paired with. she caught a glimpse of the other phone and took a deep breath.
until she realized that the other phone belonged to amber.
her phone case was also clear, and it had a stab movie ticket in it, as well as a few knife stickers and various other things relating to that on the case. it so very much screamed amber, which always made tara’s heartbeat quicken and face heat just a little bit. it was so endearing and tara loved it. but she wasn’t exactly sure what that meant.
if tara thought she was anxious before, she hadn’t prepared herself for this outcome at all. it hadn’t even crossed her mind. she was infinitely more worried now. butterflies exploded in her stomach like fireworks and her ears were burning. she looked at amber meekly. amber was simply smiling. a genuine one, too—not playful, not a sly smirk…
amber looked genuinely happy that she had ended up with tara. she held eye contact with mindy, switching between her and the phones. tara quickly noticed that mindy was the one carrying the sly smile. toward amber’s direction.
before tara could say anything about it though, amber delicately grabbed tara’s arm and led her into the bathroom. she did it with such confidence and poise. tara’s mind was racing. everything about it seemed fake. like she was dreaming or something. she’d been questioning her feelings for a while, but this seemed to really put everything into perspective for her now.
she had so many chances to do things like this with wes and she never felt anything close to what she was feeling toward the simple possibility of doing those things with amber. everything suddenly made sense. it just clicked inside of her head.
she liked amber.
there was no other explanation for it.
amber let go of tara’s arm and locked the door to the bathroom. tara found a spot to sit down on the tile and made herself feel at home, holding her knees close to her chest. amber then looked back at tara, still carrying a small smile on her face. it felt like temperatures were rising. amber’s smile was so fucking beautiful.
“so, uh,” amber began, “we got picked, huh?” she stumbled over her words, finding a place to sit down criss-cross near tara.
tara nodded. “yeah. totally weird. but i mean like, good, because who else would i want to do it with, right?” tara replied. she immediately felt a wave of embarrassment wash over her as she buried her face into her knees. amber chuckled.
“we don’t have to if you don’t want to, tara. chad said so himself.” she gave tara a reassuring look. tara avoided amber’s eyes, but she could feel the softness of amber’s expression. it was impossible not to smile at the thought of it. amber always made her so happy before, but she wasn’t sure why. she would pretty much only wake up because she was excited to see amber and hang out with amber. how did she not realize it sooner?
tara forced herself out of her thoughts and locked eyes with amber. the room filled with silence, but it didn’t make tara uncomfortable. she barely noticed it. her heart was louder than anything else could have been.
amber suddenly broke the silence: “did you know that tuberculosis was believed to be caused by dead people going all vampire on the lives of their relatives?”
tara scoffed. sometimes, when there was too much silence between the two of them, amber would recite a fact about the medicinal process and how it’s affected the film genre. it was rare, since amber was typically very calm and collected and could handle silence very well. in fact, she was often the reason why there was silence. not in a bad way; amber had a way of making it feel natural and comfortable.
it was one of the many things that tara really admired about amber. before her, tara hated silence. she’d keep the tv or radio on and listen to the white noise for hours. it was better than having nothing to hear.
but amber helped her realize it wasn’t a bad thing. it didn’t mean you here inherently alone, or unhappy, or anything like that. it was just something that happened. and it could mean something good. it could mean nothing. it was just silence—it didn’t dictate anything .
“don’t think i’ve heard that one before.” tara smiled. “7 minutes is a long time for just facts, though…” she teased.
amber shifted her position; she kept her knees close to her chest and wrapped her arms around them. “i mean, it’s better than us like… awkwardly making out, right?” amber chuckled forcefully. tara did, too, seeming slightly flustered by the idea of making out with amber.
“oh yeah. that’d be so weird. can you imagine that? yikes.” she waved her hands around for emphasis. “we’d probably never do something like that. i haven’t even had my first kiss yet.”
“really? you never kissed wes?” amber looked at her. she’d assumed that her and wes were super connected, like some kind of soul bond or something like that. even if it were platonic (which tara revealed it was, at least on her end; she’d gotten confused). after all, they’d known each other forever because sam babysat the both of them in elementary school. but it was definitely very apparent now that tara just didn’t know what to do with his confession.
tara nodded sheepishly. “i didn’t really like the idea of doing that with him.”
amber bit her lip. she hadn’t had her first kiss yet either. the difference between the both of them was that amber hadn’t dated anybody, but it was still comforting to know that tara hadn’t either. amber didn’t think she could voice that thought aloud, though—but her brain moved far slower than her mouth apparently, because she had already blurred it out before she could consider it being even slightly weird to hear.
“i haven’t either, so if we did kiss, it wouldn’t be… completely weird,” amber said blankly.
tara immediately looked at her, shocked by the words that had just left amber’s mouth. she was speechless. tara took a deep breath and focused on amber’s eyes.
“i wouldn’t be opposed to it.”
“to kissing someone?”
“to kissing you.”
they stared at each other. tara noticed amber’s gaze quickly flitting to tara’s lips. tara was no better herself; she looked at amber’s and suddenly, she couldn’t look away. this was really happening. she didn’t want to stop it either. she’d been secretly wanting this for a while, tara knew that much now.
amber abruptly leaned in, locking lips with tara. it felt right. tara didn’t want to break away at all. she cupped amber’s face with one of her hands instinctively, the other burying itself deep inside amber’s long black hair.
tara, despite what she felt, briefly pulled away. “wait, but… is this going to be weird later?” she asked, suddenly feeling like maybe making out with amber wasn’t as right as she wanted it to be.
“tara, we’re making out right now. i don’t think this is just some weird friend thing,” amber replied.
tara nodded and the both of them dove right back in to where they left off. they kept kissing back and forth for what felt like forever. neither of them ever wanted to leave this spot, to leave each other , because now they felt the holes inside of their hearts filled. everything melted away just for this bit of time.
them finally being together like this made tara hopeful. maybe somebody could be there for her now. neither of them really had a track record for people staying with them, but perhaps now could be different.
tara shrugged her thoughts aside and got lost in the softness of amber’s lips.
everything could be okay.