It started like most nights did with him — too loud, too crowded, and full of things you pretended didn’t matter.

Dante had dragged you out to a dorm party, insisting it would “build character,” even though you’d seen the kind of trouble he called character-building. You weren’t planning to stay long. Maybe grab a drink, exchange a few snarky remarks, then ghost.

But somehow, you ended up sitting on the floor with your back against a secondhand couch, knees brushing his as a circle formed around the bottle.

“C’mon, stay,” Dante had said earlier, nudging your leg with his foot. “You bail every time the night gets good.”

“That’s because your definition of ‘good’ usually ends with someone getting kicked out.”

He grinned around the lip of his drink. “No one’s been kicked out yet.”

It was like that with him. Always toeing some line. A teasing glance here. A shoulder bump there. Long nights talking nonsense until 3 a.m., like neither of you knew what to say when it got quiet. Like something might happen if it ever did.

But it never did.

Not until now.

“Alright!” someone shouted, already tipsy. “Spin the Bottle — loser’s gotta do Seven Minutes in Heaven!”

You rolled your eyes. “We’re not in high school.”

“Which makes it worse!” someone called back.

The bottle got passed around. A few forced kisses, a lot of laughter. A couple of pairs shuffled off into the closet, only to return looking mildly disheveled or just bored.

Then the bottle was in your hands.

Dante raised a brow from across the circle, that familiar smirk playing at the corner of his mouth. “You gonna survive this without overthinking it to death?”

You scoffed. “Watch and learn.”

You spun.

And immediately regretted it.

It clattered, wobbled, slowed — and stopped. The mouth of the bottle pointed squarely at him.

The room went feral.

“NO WAY.”

“Of course it’s Dante.”

“Finally! Just kiss already!”

Your stomach flipped. Dante blinked once — like he hadn’t expected it either — then broke into a slow, crooked grin.

“Well,” he drawled, voice low but amused, “guess I should’ve put money on that.”

You opened your mouth to say something — anything to cut through the weird rush of heat crawling up your neck — but someone was already dragging you both toward the hall closet, shouting, “Timer starts when the door closes!”

Dante didn’t say anything. Just followed, casual as ever, until the door clicked shut behind the two of you.