Forfeits pt2

“So, ladies,” Kai lifted his blue eyes and looked at us with a grin, “let me remind you that the stakes have been raised for this round. The penalty will now be auntie Midea's healthy herbal drink. Anyone who fails to complete the task will have to drink the penalty. Are you ready?”

Taehee and I looked at each other and nodded. The green sludge in the jug was frightening, but the prize was too big and too tempting. It was hard to give it up so easily.

“You have to make a syllogism using the following words: ‘sea’, ‘temperature’ and ‘planet’. You have forty seconds,” Dav read out the task.

“I've got it,” my neighbour raised her hand almost immediately. I marvelled once again at her brain, which was thinking at the speed of light. “The average temperature of the planet is rising. The number of pirates on the high seas is falling. So pirates are keeping global warming in check.”

Grant furrowed his brow but nodded in agreement. Dav shrugged his shoulders and Kai said in displeasure: “Even if the words weren't all used correctly, we'll make it count.”

“Now you, Siri,” the eldest Asanor turned to me. “Doctor’, ‘stubbornness’, ‘advice’. Clock's ticking.”

I bit my lower lip, trying to string the words together.

“Twenty seconds,” Kai said with anticipation, looking at the stopwatch.

Stubbornness... stubbornness? Stubbornly, I couldn't come up with any normal ideas. Where would my logic come from if I couldn't even put words together?

“Thirty seconds.”

Grasshoppers crackled in my head and the wind blew across the steppe.

“Forty seconds, time's up!”

“I've done it!” I blurted out.

“We're all ears,” Kai leaned forward, but I could see in his cheeky, amused eyes that he was just waiting for me to lose and drink a glass of healthy herbal smoothie in shame.

But I didn't want to live up to his expectations.

“There's nothing wrong with doctors' advice,” I began in a newsreader's tone. “The autopsy showed that the patient died from the autopsy,” I paused, exhaled and took a breath. “Doctors' statistics are stubborn things,” I added, shrugging my shoulders.

Taehee burst out laughing and held out her palm for a high five. Kai, though frustrated, laughed too. Circul frowned, trying to find a syllogism in my speech.

“Okay, good count,” Kai's older twin brother smiled weakly.

Dav smiled surprisingly little, so the fact that the corners of his lips lifted just a millimetre was an achievement. I'd never heard him laugh before.

Grant grinned and clapped his hands playfully. He seemed to understand.

“I hope I don't have to remember any poems in the next task, otherwise I might drink this smoothie right now,” Kai laughed almost every five minutes, in contrast to his brother.

Once again I looked at the twins with interest, they were so similar on the outside and so strikingly different on the inside.

We drew lots and the move went to Dav.

“Name three negative traits of your character...” he read the card. “Hmm... Cruelty,” he bent the first finger. “Softness.”

I raised my eyebrows. Weren't these characteristics contradictory?

“And... well, hypocrisy,” the guy bent a third finger.

“Scored,” Grant said, picking up the die for the draw.

“Speed Tie Laces. Since it's your turn, Grant, choose an opponent,” Dav placed the forfeit card in the pile of cards already played.

“Kai?” the president's son asked predatorily, challenging his cousin to a duel.

Only me and Dav wore laced shoes. Circul decided to tie my trainers and Kai got his older brother's boots.

“Tying a basic knot?” Kai turned and met his cousin's gaze.

“Would you like a slipped reef knot?” Grant snorted.

“No, a basic knot will do.”

“Ready, set, go!” Taehee lowered her hand.

I was really rooting for Kai, wishing that Circul Junior would taste the penalty drink, but my hope died in a moment of agony. Grant completed the task quickly, but his cousin couldn't tie the laces on Dav's left boot; the latter was just mocking him, not letting him catch his foot.

Although the expression of annoyance on Kai's face was also warming. You should have seen the sour look on his face as he drained the glass.

The next round went to me.

“Pick a player and describe his clothes in non-existent colours.”

“That's no fun, let the other player describe it back,” it was obvious that Kai was eager for battles. “We'll vote for the winner afterwards.”

“Good,” I looked around the company and stopped at the smiling Circul. “Grant, your shirt is the colour of an unconscious flea.”

The guy grinned, showing his snow-white teeth.

“Your hair is the colour of a spider planning a crime,” he replied.

“The belt on your trousers is the colour of dead hope,” I continued.

“Your blouse is the colour of a suspected rat.”

“Your socks are the colour of an angry hedgehog.”

The others watched our discussion with interest, whispering bets about who would run out of imagination first.

“Your trainers are the colour of the inspiration to do nothing.”

I narrowed my eyes. He touched my trainers, he stepped on the sacred thing.

“Your underwear is the colour of a hamster's belly!”

“How do you know that?” Grant's eyes widened.

“I saw you take it to the bathroom today.”

“Okay,” the guy exhaled. “And your jeans are the colour of a dull dragonfly.”

“The strap of your watch is the colour of a sly cat that has been caught stealing.”

“Okay, okay, break,” Kai stopped us. “Enough, we can already vote.”

“I vote for Siri,” Taehee smiled warmly at me.

“I'm for Grant,” Dav said. I didn't expect that from him.

Preferences have been evenly split so far.

“Sorry mate, but I'm giving my vote to Siri. It's nothing personal,” Kai smiled and patted Grant on the shoulder.

‘I just wanted to see you wrinkle your nose at a penalty’ – I read in his blue eyes.

“I suggest we play again. Let someone ask a question about a colour that neither of us knows the answer to. The person who guesses the colour wins,” Grant stopped me from cheering.

I squeezed my eyes shut. I was clearly being played.

“Winner takes all. In this case, he won't be drinking this very healthy green smoothie,” the grin on my enemy's son's face was unbelievable.

“But I've already won. You have to drink it.”

“The loser drinks two glasses.”

“Okay, it's a deal,” I was so easily fooled into taking a gamble.

Circul smiled charmingly.

“I'll ask the question,” Kai said excitedly. “What colour is the label on Barg's favourite toy?”

“White!” I blurted out. “It's white.”

My opponent thought for a moment, then shrugged: “Let it be yellow.”

Kai brought Barg's favourite plush crocodile and showed us the label sewn onto the animal's soft back. It was orange.

“I was the closest,” Grant grinned.

“Yeah, you win,” said Kai regretfully. “It's almost yellow.”

“What? But how?” I glared angrily at the blond traitor.

“Drink, Siri,” they placed two glasses of green sludge in front of me. “Bottoms up.”

This Grant... why did I want to call him ‘Pomegranate’? Bad pomegranate, always tormenting my innocent and trembling soul.

And I, cursing myself for agreeing to the guy's proposal, wrinkled my nose, shuddered and drank both glasses. The taste would be my nightmare for a long time to come.

“And this task is for everyone. A quote that brings tears to your eyes,” Dav continued as if nothing had happened. “Siri?”

“Gooseberry tart, lilac sweet,” said I.

“Oh-oh,” Taehee and Kai replied. It was nice to know that they had also read one of my favourite series.

“And they lived a short and unhappy life, and one day died in terrible convulsions...” the girl recited.

“Where did you read that?”

“It was some fluff fanfiction story, but the author ruined the good impression with his last words,” the ambassador's daughter frowned.

Dav shared a totally unexpected quote. I didn't know he was such a romantic. ‘Our lives go on, even when love ends…’ and there was so much tender sadness in his smile after he said those words that I immediately stopped laughing.

“Even if I reach out to you, you will vanish like a dream...” Grant added in a quiet voice.

“The quotes from you are really... I feel like crying. When I decided to live as a mere mortal in a university dormitory for two weeks, there was an announcement on the door of one of the houses next to mine: ‘Dear tenants! The hot water in your house will be turned off for the week. For a fee, we can turn off the hot water in the neighbouring houses, so that you will not be so offended’. That really brings tears to my eyes,” Kai burst into laughter.

“Drink!” we were all unanimous in pointing him in the direction of the penalty drink.