Page 90 of The Match Faker

“What’s wrong?” Jade stops her butt wiggling when she notices the tears that have started to leak from my eyes.

“Nothing.” I sniffle and wipe at my cheeks. “Nick is an excellent uncle,” I say, my throat waterlogged. “That’s all.”

Because Jade is Jade, she doesn’t bat an eye at my non sequitur statement. She cups my cheeks, looking into my eyes like a mother looks at her newborn baby. “Sure, he is, honey,” she says, her voice kind and sweet just like her. “And that’s exactly why you’re such a dumb bitch.”

“Wh—Excuse me?” I sit up to hit her with my pillow. “Language,” I say primly even though swearing has never been prohibited. “Plus, still rude.”

She cackles, lying on her side, hugging the pillow I smacked her with. “Rude. But true.”

“I am notdumb.”

“Yes, you are.”

“Am not.” I cross my arms and lift my chin, not really that offended but unwilling to admit it.

“You’ve never cared that a guy is a goodunclebefore, Jasmine,” she says dryly.

“So?” I flatten and straighten the bedspread around us. “It’s a good quality to have.”

“One worth crying over?” She grips my forearms in her hands, suddenly serious.

“Don’t.” I pull away. “I know what you’re trying to do.”

“Make you happy?”

“It’s not that simple,” I almost yell.

“Except itisthat simple,” shedoesyell. “You like him. He likes you. Yet here you sit, crying into your pillow and calling in sad to work. What’s the problem?”

“He’s not my perfect match!” I yell back.

Jade’s face falls. She wraps her arms around me in a tight hug, squeezing hard, and not releasing me even when the hug is clearly over. She rests her chin on my shoulder.

“I’m sorry, Jasmine,” she says quietly in my ear, “that our parents’ problems made you feel like you had to be perfect to be loved.”

She squeezes again before climbing off the bed. “You don’t have to hold yourself to such a high standard. It’s an impossible standard, really.” She looks at the floor instead of me. Probably because she knows I’ve already started to cry and don’t want her to see. “I feel responsible. You’re the best big sister and I know that part of that is because you’ve done everything in your power to ensure life is perfect for me.” Now she meets my eyes. She’s crying, too. “I should have told you a long time ago that I don’t need you to sacrifice everything for me. You’re allowed to put yourself, your needs, first.”

Moments ago, I wanted to be alone. Now, as Jade turns to leave, I’ve never felt lonelier.

“What if I make the wrong choice?” I ask. She turns back to me. “What if I fuck it up? Or I hurt him more than I already have? Or he hurts me more than he already has?”

She frowns like that’s the most absurd thing she’s ever heard. “That could happen.” She shrugs. “And I don’t know what will happen. But I know you won’t be alone.”

I tumble off the bed in my hurry to get to her, squeezing her tight to me, her short, spiky hair prickling my chin, the smell of sleep—a concentrated eau de Jade—still clinging. “I love you,” I mumble.

“Love you.”

Jade leaves me for the bathroom, the whine of the pipes battling for sound supremacy with her off-key rendition of a Tragically Hip song that immediately takes me back to Moonbar, to Nick and his T-shirts.

I hurt him by choosing another Nick, leaving, and even if he doesn’t blame me for it, I’ve contributed to the loss of his bar. His dream.

He was selfish when he decided not to tell me who he was, but so was I. In the end, all of this is my fault. My pride, my need for perceived perfection in the eyes of people I don’t actually like, brought us here. If I’d just accepted the out Butch and Anaïs offered me, if I didn’t need to save face in front of a guy that I didn’t really love, I never would have joined Core Cupid. And yet, I can’t make myself completely regret it, any of it.

All of those stupid, prideful decisions brought me to Nick—the other Nick, the one I wasn’t supposed to meet.

Those decisions hurt him, his heart and his dreams, but if I hadn’t made them, I wouldn’t be able to trust myself now, to know all of it was the right decision.

Core Cupid might have a near perfect algorithm, but it didn’t have my perfect match.