by Ellie Danes
“There’s a big dinner and mixer type of thing at the school. I’m assuming it’s going to be catered, because I doubt anyone will want to eat cafeteria food, no matter how nostalgic they were feeling,” I explained.
“What are the other events?”
I shrugged. “It’s like a kind of homecoming weekend thing--themed events with dress-up stuff and a fair of some kind.”
“Sounds like fun--and then at the end of the whole deal, there’s a dance?”
I nodded and started helping myself to eggs and bacon.
“It’s supposed to be like a callback to prom, I guess,” I said. I’d bought an expensive dress for the occasion, and it only just then it occurred to me that I had no idea what Weston would wear. “We need to get you a suit or a tux or something.”
“I know where I can get one--I’m set,” Weston said.
“So we need to figure out what our back story is going to be. How we met, all that kind of stuff,” I pointed out.
“Well, the important thing to come up with first is how long have we been dating?” Weston sat down across from me and started serving himself coffee and juice and pancakes.
“That’s a good question.” I ate a forkful of eggs--still somehow perfect, enough so that I had to wonder just how Weston had managed it--and thought about that for a moment. “I feel like longer than about two years would be weird, but shorter than six months would, too.”
“Yeah, I feel like you wouldn’t invite a boyfriend you’d been dating for a few months to your reunion,” Weston agreed. “Why would longer than two years be weird?”
“Because showing up with a boyfriend that long-term would be a question of why no one ever heard about you,” I pointed out.
“Oh, right,” Weston said, nodding after a second. “I guess I’m not on your social media page. So why not say like...a year? Wouldn’t that be long enough to be an established relationship?”
“I guess. It’ll still open up some questions about why nobody knows about it, but not as many,” I agreed.
“So, we’ve been dating for a year, getting kind of serious--which will definitely also give everyone the idea that you’re successful in all parts of your life,” Weston goes on with a little playful grin at me.
“That is the point,” I told him.
“How would you have met someone? Do you do online dating?”
I shook my head, dismissing the idea completely. “I don’t want it to be some boring story about meeting someone through Tinder or something.”
“Or is it actually that you don’t want people thinking that you were scanning Tinder for hookups a year ago?” Weston raised an eyebrow at me and I felt my cheeks heating up with a blush.
“If you’re going to be my fake boyfriend, we might as well have a good story,” I pointed out. “That’s half the fun of a sham relationship.”
“I could be a big donor to your agency,” Weston suggested, just as I took a sip of juice.
“No,” I said, once I’d cleared out my mouth and throat. “No, that would never work.”
Weston raised both eyebrows at me.
“Why not?” He almost sounded offended.
I gestured up and down along the shape of him.
“Tell me how many people would believe that a tattooed guy with shaggy hair and looks like a bad-boy is a super donor for an adoption agency,” I pointed out.
Weston chuckled. “Hey, guys can be wealthy and have diverse interests—I mean, I am.”
I rolled my eyes and looked at him. “They can, but they usually don’t,” I countered.
“Don’t judge a book by its cover, Ashley. Besides, what did you have in mind?”
I thought about it for a few seconds, realizing--too late, again--that I hadn’t actually put all that much thought into my plot to have a fake boyfriend at my reunion.
“I definitely think it should be through work,” I said slowly.
“You’re not going to be my boss--that’s just too rom-com,” Weston told me.
“No, I wouldn’t want to be your boss anyway--that would sound incredibly unprofessional,” I agreed.
“So, what’s something that could have brought us together, but where you’re not my boss?”
I thought about it as I ate some bacon and some fruit. “You could have been someone working with the agency on an event.”
“Like one of your banquets or donor drives or something?” he asked.
“Yeah--like we have a bunch of events throughout the year to get donors to give money,” I explained.
“Like any non-profit,” Weston agreed.
“You could be an independent contractor or something--someone doing something to help make one of the events happen,” I said.
“Maybe I own the restaurant that donated all of the food,” Weston offered, “or maybe I can downplay it and just be the chef. I mean, I do cook really well.”
I snorted. “Just because you had a chef buddy and know how to make an awesome breakfast doesn’t mean that you could pretend to be a chef professionally for a whole weekend. Besides, how would you have worked with the agency as a chef?”
“I mean a chef-caterer, or I work in one of those nice restaurants that donate meals for causes.” Weston explained.
“Go on,” I said, curious in spite of my initial rejection.
“Maybe I’m a chef in charge that your agency used for some big banquet type event or dinner for donors,” Weston suggested.
“And we met because I was in charge of that event,” I added.
“Over the course of a few weeks I seduced you with my delicious food and exceptional professionalism, and after the event was over, we started dating,” Weston finished.
I set my fork down, considering that as our cover.
“That actually works,” I said. “I mean, it’s a little cheesy but still in the realm of possibility. It’s something that people could actually believe.”
“And it plays to your strengths as someone whose life revolves around her work,” Weston said.
I scowled at him, torn between feeling offended that he’d pegged me so accurately and amused that he was confident enough to make the comment--I had, after all, admitted I didn’t have much of a social life. “You’re going to make about a million jokes about me being a workaholic this weekend, aren’t you?”
Weston grinned slowly. “A million and one,” he said. “And what kind of long-standing relationship would we have if I wasn’t able to do that?”
“Fair enough,” I said. “But only if I can make playful digs about...food. Or something.”
Weston snorted. “Maybe let me take the lead in the playful digs.”
“Whatever. We’ll make it work,” I said.
“And maybe instead of calling me Weston, you can call me Stone, if you really feel the need to make this overly fake.”
I rolled my eyes at the idea, but finally accepted it. “Fine.”
“So, what do we do now?” I asked. For someone who’d actually had a plan to bring a fake boyfriend to an event, I hadn’t really considered the logistics of it that much.
“We should figure out as much as we can about each other--or at least I should figure out as much as I can about you, and you should figure out as much as you can about my cover story,” Weston said.
“That sounds good,” I said. “How are we going to do that?” It would be like studying for a test--something I’d thought was long behind me.
“If you feel up to clearing up the breakfast mess I made, I’ll go into town and get something decent to wear for tonight, and then we can get started,” Weston suggested.
“How much of a mess did you make?” I got up and looked at the kitchen more closely. I found, though, that Weston had been surprisingly respectful: the dishes were pre-washed and piled neatly to go into the dishwasher, except for the things he’d used to make pancakes. It wouldn’t take more than maybe twenty minutes to get everything straightened up.
“I’ll be quick--I know what I�
�m looking for,” Weston said.
“You’re sure you don’t want money for this? I mean, you’re spending money,” I pointed out. Weston shook his head and finished off his coffee, rising to his feet.
“I’m fine, and you should probably stop making assumptions based on my cooking and tattoos,” he pointed out. “I’ll be back in an hour.”
He left the kitchen and I got to work on cleaning up the breakfast dishes, thinking to myself that for two strangers, we’d already managed to fall into an odd kind of routine. It felt good--but I reminded myself that it was all fake.
We were just two people working through a deal to benefit ourselves and each other, and that was all. After the reunion was over, and Weston got the information he wanted, we would probably never even speak to each other again. I didn’t want to admit it to myself, but the fact actually made me a little sad, especially after waking up to this fantastic breakfast.
Chapter Six
Weston
I had needed a new suit, although I hadn’t really planned on getting one. I managed to find something nice that didn’t need to be custom tailored like the rest of the suits I owned.
By the time I got back to Ashley’s place about an hour later, the dishwasher was running and Ashley had managed to change into normal clothes--jeans and a tee shirt. I came into the house to find her sitting in the living room, the TV playing The Tudors, and with her laptop in front of her.
“You’re not seriously working on your vacation, are you?” I tossed my bags into the guest room and sat down in one of the chairs in the living room, not too far but not too close to the couch where Ashley sat.
“No, I was getting started on what we should know about each other,” Ashley replied, setting her computer aside.
“You were writing an outline?” I shook my head, thinking that it was no real surprise that she didn’t have much of a social life, considering how intensely she’d taken on the task of creating a fake relationship with me.
“Well, kind of like a list of things, not really an outline,” Ashley explained. “I thought about the kinds of things people tend to talk about with someone they’re introduced to as a boyfriend or girlfriend, and sort of...went from there, I guess.”
“That sounds thrilling,” I said. “Really.”
“Stop being so sarcastic! This is important to me,” Ashley said. “I think my real boyfriend would know that my favorite song to dance to is ‘Umbrella’ by Rihanna.”
“I doubt anyone’s going to quiz me on that. What I mean is that people aren’t just going to ask the questions you think are ‘normal’ for them to ask a boyfriend or girlfriend,” I pointed out. “They’re going to ask left field questions that you can’t even think of, because--and I want you to keep reminding yourself of this--people are human beings. They’re irrational and weird.”
“I know that,” Ashley said irritably.
“So, the thing to do would be to treat this as spontaneously as possible,” I explained.
“And how are we going to do that?” Ashley crossed her arms over her chest, exposing her cleavage and drawing my gaze away from her eyes.
“Make a game out of it,” I suggested. “And be honest. Not everything has to be fabricated. Besides, I’m a pretty exciting person.” If she only knew the real me, the secrets I hid, maybe she’d change her mind, or maybe she’d be a different person entirely toward me.
“Make a game out of it and be honest?” Ashley laughed. “Sure.”
I grinned at her. “Look. There is no way that you and I are going to find some method of knowing everything about each other that two people dating for a year would know,” I said. “People hold onto weird things about the people they’re dating.”
“You’re talking like I’ve never dated anyone before,” Ashley complained. “I’ve dated people.”
“See? That’s spontaneous,” I said, grinning even more. Ashley grabbed one of the cushions on the couch next to her and threw it at me, and I managed to catch it as it hurtled toward my head. “And now I also know you’ve got pretty good aim,” I added.
“So what kinds of things would you know about me, after dating me for a year?” Ashley raised one eyebrow, and the color in her cheeks looked so adorable paired with her twitching lips that told me she was trying not to mirror my own grin.
“I have no idea,” I admitted. “But I can guarantee that I probably wouldn’t know half the things that are on your list.”
“You wouldn’t know what my favorite color is?” Ashley pouted.
“I probably would--but that’s just because it’s something I’d have filed away,” I said.
“So give me an idea of what you would know,” Ashley insisted. “You keep tearing down my idea, but I don’t see how yours is any better.”
“I’d know something like--you always cry when the Cheerios commercial comes on, but you try and cover it up,” I replied.
“I do not,” Ashley countered.
“I mean, if you did, I would notice that,” I explained, rolling my eyes. “That’s the kind of thing people know about the person they’ve been dating for a year.” I thought for a few moments. “What’s the longest you’ve dated someone?”
“Nine months,” Ashley admitted. I let out a low whistle at that.
“I had a girlfriend in high school that I was with for two years,” I said. “I couldn’t tell you what her dog’s name was, but I knew she loved mint chip ice cream whenever she was on her period.”
“How is it possible that you’ve dated someone for two years and my longest relationship has been nine months?” Ashley frowned at me and I pretended to be offended at the question.
“Just because I have tattoos and look like a badass doesn’t mean I don’t have a romantic side,” I said, putting my hands across my chest and pretending to swoon. Ashley rolled her eyes again, but I saw the smile twitching at the corners of her lips.
“Fine. You win. So, we’ll play a game.”
“Let’s make it like truth or dare,” I suggested.
“Like truth or dare?” Ashley looked doubtful.
“We’ll each come up with questions for each other to answer, and then halfway through we’ll switch. For every question that one of us gets wrong about the other one, there’ll be some kind of...forfeit. Like if I don’t remember your favorite song later on, I have to tell you something embarrassing and true about myself,” I explained. “And then maybe we’ll throw in a dare.”
“A dare?” Ashley bit her lip as she looked at me. “Maybe we’ll just stick to the questions.”
“Fine,” I said. I wanted to tell her who I really was and what I really did, but I enjoyed the escape of my lifestyle and being unknown. I enjoyed people not wanting to be friends with me for money. I especially liked the idea of returning to a town I was familiar with and had visited so many times before and still remain unknown.
I thought about the real reason I was in town, for my annual visit, and then quickly blocked it out of my mind.
“Okay, so we’ll come up with things the other person should know about us--silly things, stuff that people would know after a year of dating, and then quiz each other on them,” Ashley said.
I nodded. “And if we can’t remember we have to do embarrassing things, or something like that.”
“So how do we start?” Ashley asked.
“Let’s see that list you made, and I’ll tell you what I’d remember from it,” I told her. Ashley handed me her laptop and I looked over her notes.
She’d been pretty exhaustive, and I knew right away that more than half of what she’d thought I would know about her was superficial stuff, the kind of thing that people use for online dating questionnaires and stuff like that. It was like she’d pretended I was going to interview her for a Time magazine article or maybe Cosmopolitan.
“Okay, so there are like, four things on here that I would actually care about,” I said, closing the laptop. “This needs to be natural.”
“Four? I wrote
like twenty,” Ashley protested.
“I really would not care even a little bit about the fight you had with a professor about whether you earned an A- or an A,” I pointed out.
“But that’s not superficial!”
“It’s also not anything anyone else would care about, and it would never come up in a conversation,” I countered.
“So, what are the four things, then?” Ashley huffed and I pressed my lips together, thinking about the situation for a moment.
“Hold that thought,” I said as I left the room and returned a moment later with two bottles of beer from the fridge. “We’ll start with these. You’re way too uptight for this to actually work.”
“How is drinking going to help us remember?” she asked, her voice suspicious.
“It won’t, but it’s going to make this more fun,” I reached out my beer and clinked it against hers. “Why did you take the job you’re in?”
“Because I knew someone in college who’d bounced around the foster care system her whole life, and I thought it would be great if there was some way I could help kids find real homes,” she replied.
“Very admirable,” I said. “Also, kind of a job interview response. What’s the real reason?”
Ashley looked at me for a long moment and then drank down two big gulps of her beer.
“Sarah killed herself, the week before graduation,” she said. “She’d gotten back into contact with her birth parents, I guess, and they were just as bad as they’d ever been. And I thought...I’d thought that if someone had found her a real family, she’d have been able to deal. She’d have had someone to care about her for her.”
“That’s pretty fucking heavy,” I said. I took a deep breath. I hadn’t expected something like that--and from the way Ashley spoke, she’d been pretty close to her friend Sarah.
“Yeah,” Ashley agreed. “That was a question on my list, so what are the other three?”
“Not important,” I said. “Okay, something interesting about yourself. What do you crave when it’s that time?”
Ashley almost spit out the sip of beer she had taken. “You’d want to know that?”
“I asked, didn’t I?”
