The party was already a little too loud for Kid’s liking, the music slightly off-beat, the decorations uneven, and the food table arranged with horrifying asymmetry. But you had managed to convince him to stay, tugging him by the sleeve whenever he started muttering about leaving. With Maka, Soul, Black☆Star, Tsubaki, and the Thompson sisters all around, there was no way either of you were escaping without being roped into something dumb.

And of course, it was Patty who shouted it first. “TRUTH OR DARE! But boring truths are lame, so let’s just do dares!”

Groans, laughs, and protests filled the room, but one by one everyone started joining in. You and Kid ended up sitting side by side on the carpet, both pretending not to notice how close your knees brushed against each other.

When the bottle spun around and stopped in front of you two, Patty’s eyes lit up with devilish glee. “Ooooh, perfect! You two get—” She paused dramatically, grinning like a cat, “—seven minutes in heaven!”

Your jaw dropped. “Wait, what?! Patty, that’s—”

But the room was already howling with laughter and teasing, Liz shaking her head with an exasperated smile, Black☆Star yelling something about “finally some entertainment,” and Maka giving you both a good luck look that did not help. Kid looked like he’d been struck by lightning, eyes wide, face going pink all the way to the tips of his ears.

“This is utterly ridiculous,” he muttered under his breath, but when everyone started chanting, you and Kid were gently shoved into the nearest closet. The door shut with a click, and suddenly you were both standing in the dark, shoulder to shoulder, close enough to hear each other’s uneven breaths.

For a moment, neither of you spoke. The muffled laughter outside filled the silence until you finally whispered, trying not to laugh, “Well… this is awkward.” Kid let out a sharp sigh, one hand covering his face. “Of all the childish, absurd games… how did we get trapped in this?”

“Because Patty’s a menace,” you said, grinning even though he couldn’t see it. “But hey, at least it’s just me in here and not Black☆Star. Imagine how much worse that would be.” Kid’s lips twitched at that, a reluctant laugh escaping before he could stop it. “That would be chaos. He’d probably break the door down trying to prove something.”

The sound of his laugh made your chest feel weirdly light, and the dark didn’t feel so suffocating anymore. The minutes ticked by with you teasing him about the absurdity of the situation and Kid groaning dramatically about how unfair the world was. At one point, you accidentally bumped into him in the cramped space, and he immediately stiffened, his voice faltering when he asked, “Are you… alright?”

You smiled, knowing he couldn’t see the expression but feeling brave enough to answer honestly. “Yeah. More than alright, actually. It’s not so bad being stuck in here with you.”

Kid went quiet at that, and you could almost hear his thoughts spinning faster than the ticking clock outside. “...I suppose,” he admitted softly, his tone warmer than before. “It isn’t as terrible as I imagined.”