Page 33 of The Match Faker
Nick assumed that I was trying to make Mitchell jealous when I pitched him this plan, and I understand why he’d think that. But as potential answers flip through my head like a train station split-flap display, making my ex jealous is truly the furthest thing from my mind. I’d prefer if he never knew another thing about my life, true or not, so I don’t want to sayI’m going to my boyfriend’s parents’ house in Muskoka.I don’t even want to tell him I’m going out of town. If I do, he’ll inevitably ask where and with whom.
“To the subway.” It isn’t a lie. Nick keeps his car parked at his boss’s house and it didn’t make sense for him to drive back into the city to pick me up, so I said I’d meet him there.
“When are you coming back?” Mitchell asks, his voice slightly strained, almost whiny, like Jade’s used to sound when I’d tell her she couldn’t watch TV while we ate dinner. For years, I did all I could to make our family like other families. Jade, who at that age didn’t understand why Mom and Dad were rarely around but that when they were, they’d let her do whatever she wanted so they wouldn’t have to parent her, would stomp her little foot and askWhy not?in the whiniest voice she could muster.
I hide my sigh behind the swish of my coat as I pull it on. “Not until Monday, Mitchell. What do you need?”
“We’re still friends? Right?” A genuine frown cuts between his brows as he regards me.
The answer is no, though I’m ready to end this conversation, so I say, “Yes.”
His shoulders relax. “Good,” he says, blowing out a relieved breath. “Cuz I wanted to talk to you about that guy you brought to my engagement party.”
Unease claws its way up my throat, but I swallow it back. “Oh?” I pat my pockets, looking for my gloves before I remember. They’re gone.
“Just like, how well do you know him?” he asks, shifting from one foot to the other. “You guys started dating pretty quickly.”
For a second all I can do is gape. He thinksIjumped into a relationship too quickly?
I almost let this get the better of me until I remember: I’m not actually dating Nick.
Mitchell doesn’t bother waiting for an answer. “You ever just get like…” He pulls a face, likeyuck. “A bad feeling?”
The expression mirrors the one he made when we went to Canada’s Wonderland and I asked him if he wanted to share a funnel cake. With a sneer, he mansplained calories to me and reminded me that funnel cakes aren’t keto. He always said he was “on keto,” but I looked up the protocols—because that’s what I do, learn about my partner’s interests—and I was almost positive it would have been scientifically impossible for him to put his body into the metabolic state of ketosis based on the amount of beer he consumed while he golfed.
I have to remind myself that Nick is myfakeboyfriend, that he pulled away from me the other night. Like there’s something wrong with me. That I hate how he hasn’t even brought it up, not once. Not to apologize or explain. He’d rather act like it never happened. I wish I could say the same. I have to remind myself of all of this. If I don’t, I might scream at my ex-boyfriend in a coat closet about how that bad feeling he’s getting is probably his instincts telling him that Nick could get me off better than heever did. Nick’s kisses have made me more wet than Mitchell’s best try.
“A bad feeling about Nick? No.” I gather my bags. Hopefully, the subway won’t be too busy and I’ll get a seat, though there’s a good chance I’ll hit an early lunch rush.
“I don’t want to overstep,” Mitchell says.
There’s no stopping the snort that escapes me.
Unfortunately, this does not deter him. “But I’m a pretty good judge of character and… I don’t know.” He sighs, his shoulders heaving with feigned concern. “It was like he was pretending to like me?” His brow is furrowed in genuine concern, like he can’t grasp the concept. Maybe I’m a better actor than Nick, because I’m also pretending to like Mitchell right now. “But people always like me,” he says, mostly to himself.
With a sigh, I shuffle past him. “I’m sorry, Mitchell. I really have to go now.”
He stops me, his finger hooked through the strap of one of my bags, jolting me backward and making me totter on my high-heeled booties.
“What the—” I clamp my mouth closed before I let an obscenity fly at work.
He grimaces. Mitchell has never been great at meaningful apologies. “Don’t you think that’s a little…”
I yank the bag from his grasp. “A little what?”
“Fake.” The word lands like a slap.
Fake. Nick is fake. My Nick.
I giggle. How absurd. How absolutely comical that my ex-boyfriend, who is more obtuse than a triangle, thinks my fake boyfriend isfake. But when he dated me, he never noticed how fucking fake I was. Fake rich, to impress our co-workers, his family and friends. Fake breasts. Fake interests, fake needs, fake perfection. Fake fucking orgasms.
My giggles stop abruptly, and I swallow to keep the sting of tears at bay. I have spent so long faking it in the hopes that if I try hard enough, I’ll be worthy. I’ll be safe. I’ll be enough.
“Nick Scott is the realest man I’ve ever met,” I say with only the slightest tremor in my voice, before I walk away.
Whatever empowerment I gained from that deflates as I step outside and am hit with a blast of frigid air. I still have to walk to the subway with all these bags. I’m halfway down the block when a man shouts behind me.
“Hey, wait up.”