Page 78 of The Match Faker
“Fuck.You,” she shouts, coming at me with both arms outstretched. “You.” She pushes me back. Once, twice, again. “Lied.” Until the back of my knees hit my bed and she pushes me down. “To me.”
Her tears spill over now.
“You pretended to be someone you weren’t. Do you know how fucked up that is? You’re a fucking liar. A fake.”
“I’m the liar? I’m the fake?” I snarl.
I stand, loom over her, but she doesn’t back down. We’re chest to chest, nose to nose. I hold my breath because the scent of her perfume will just confuse me.
“You’ve spent your whole life trying to convince everyone that you’re the perfect girlfriend, the perfect sister.” After years of arguing with my dad, I’ve gotten too good at the kind of retorts that cut to the bone. “Everything about you is fake.”
It isn’t until that last part is out that I register the pain on her face.
She turns away, dashing at her tears with the heel of her hand. “At least I don’t live my life as if it’s a joke,” she says quietly. “Playacting as some Peter Pan man-child.”
Back turned, she shuffles to her bags and picks them up. She takes a beat, her shoulders by her ears and fuck if I want to go to her, apologize. Fucking beg her not to go, not to choose him.
Choose me.
She faces me again, her face void of emotion. “And sex, by the way, is transactional by its very nature. Remember that the nexttime you judge me for the sexual partners I choose. Not all of us have the luxury of running to our daddy when we want to buy a fucking bar.”
She opens the door, pauses at the threshold.
“That’s why I did matchmaking in the first place. To find the person I wanted, not the one I needed.”
My heart stutters, because I wanted her to want me. I thought she did, maybe she could.
“That’s why I need to make things work with the r—” She stops herself. “The other Nick. He’s my perfect match.” She puts her hand on my chest, and my heart beats hard against her palm.
“I’m sorry,” I say, fast and breathless.
“Do yourself a favor, Nick,” she says, her words ghosting across my throat. “Save for retirement.”
Wow. Low fucking blow.
Then she’s gone.
Dad calls,because of course he does. This man has a sixth sense for the absolute worst time to pick up the phone. I let it ring, watching clouds collect above the skylight until there is nothing but steel gray above me, low and dismal and cold. Just as the snow begins, he calls again. Now the cloud cover and snow have turned the sky so dark I can’t tell what time it is. If I blow through my opening shift, Rocco will come get me, so I stay where I am. Don’t bother checking the clock. When Dad calls a third and fourth time in quick succession, my gut twists. I can’t put this off any longer. Part of me hoped if I never picked up again, he’d just forget. About my request, about me.
“Hey,” I say.
“Where were you?” he asks.
My mind is as blank as the sky above me. “I...” Why did I say that to her? What the fuck is wrong with me? “I was here.”
Dad’s pause is whatMerriam-Webstermight call pregnant. “Why didn’t you answer before?” At his core, Dad is a businessman. He doesn’t like to feel his time is wasted.
She’s right, though. I am fake. I lied to my family to get access to my father’s money. “I’m a fraud,” I say.
Dad stutters, laughs uncomfortably.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “Dad, I…”
“Listen,” he cuts in. “I called to let you know that we can do a transfer of funds, in three installments?—”
“No.” Panic washes like cold water over my body. This cannot happen. I cannot do this. “Dad, no. I don’t want the money.”
He says my name, exasperated now.