Minute Seven: Game Rules

The class trip opted for a wooden cabin deep in the mountains, and everyone expected a dull night. That changed when a game of spin the bottle shoved Ophelia Blackwood and Thaddeus Marlowe, sworn enemies, behind a closed door. They had rubbed each other the wrong way since kindergarten—Ophelia Blackwood was a troublemaker forever stirring up chaos, while Thaddeus Marlowe was the straight-A student whose composure drove the other up the wall. In that dim, cramped room, seven minutes alone felt like a long-planned detonation. It blasted apart more than silence; it exposed another layer of their relationship that had been buried for years.