Page 9 of The Fake Dating War

Anyway, matters were not helped when he gripped my desk like that. That was a distracting display of forearms. He towered over me, his shoulder and biceps straining his expensive button-up shirt. I bet the buttons would pop right open if I tugged on them hard enough.

If you’re not begging for it, I haven’t done my job.

“Reema, are you listening to me?”

I turn to Leo.

Since I’ve known him, he’s always kept the same closely cropped buzz-cut because he boasts it shows off his perfectly egg-shaped scalp the best. Honestly, he’s not wrong. It’s a perfect oval and is strangely aesthetically pleasing when paired with his oval face and thinner lips. The tops of both ears are pierced with barely noticeable hoops. I always tell him no one can tell when he switches between silver or gold (depending on his outfit), since the earrings are whisper thin, but he insists they do. Today he’s got the gold ones on because he’s wearing faintly orange plaid trousers, a grey cashmere sweater, and black oxford shoes without a speck of scuff on them.

He’s dragged his chair over to my desk, which is unusual in itself. Leo is my favorite person in the office, but most of our conversations are had back-to-back while the both of us work. Okay, Leo doesn’t care much about productivity, so it’s mostly for my sake that he tolerates this. He’s the only one who knows how much I need my commissions, so he doesn’t call my rude behaviorrude. He knows if I’m not multitasking at least three things at once, I’ll think I’m not working hard enough.

Today is different. I can’t focus.

My sister’s wedding is next week. Leo was supposed to come with me, pretending to be my boyfriend. But today—at almost the very last moment—he’s told me that he can’t make it.

“I’m so sorry,” he says again. “It’s my fault. You should hate me forever, and I should be punished.”

“Punished? Please, don’t talk about your kinks right now.”

“Omigod! I told you Wyatt bought joke handcuffsonetime. You can’t keep bringing it up!”

“I can bring anything up! You bailed on me!”

He groans, catching his face with his hands. “I know, I know. Seriously, I hate that I’m cancelling on you. And I wouldn’t if Wyatt hadn’t spent so much money on this surprise Jamaica anniversary trip for us. I even tried telling him no. I said Reema needs me more than we need Jamaica, but then he got this defeated look?—”

“Stop it. You’reobviouslygoing to Jamaica. I just wish—” I reach over and open my next client file up. “I just wish I had time to figure out who else to bring.”

Every day, my family tells me they are excited to meet my new man, so I can’t show up alone now. Not after I lied to them six months ago and said I was in a great relationship. So now what? Who else can I take if not Leo? Who else will pretend to be my fake-boyfriend? Shockingly, there’s no line of men waiting to commit trickery with me.

There’s not evenoneman.

My reflection on the computer screen winces. I haven’t told Leo about what happened in the cafeteria today. And… I’m going to keep it that way. That’s a thing I do. I hide my embarrassments and humiliations from the people who care for me. I force myself to pretend nothing happened in the first place, and, if I can’t do that… I keep the pain squashed inside me until it doesn’t matter anymore.

“You could’ve had a real boyfriend,” Leo mumbles, his face still burrowed in his hands. “If you put yourself out there, Reema. You’re a catch. I told you to start dating?—”

“Could I find an escort to go with me?” I ask, cutting off any incoming hurrah-hurrah pep talk about self-confidence. I don’t have time to put myself out there right now, but when I am ready, I know Leo will support me. He can save those cheerleading words for later.

“Escort?” He lifts his head and stares at me. “This isn’t a movie. Where am I going to find you an escort? Who knows which ones are legitimate on the internet? And even if we did find a man willing to go to Esha’s wedding next week”—emphasizing unnecessarily the crazy deadline I am well aware of—“you can’t afford the good ones.”

Leo doesn’t know the real depth of my money problems, but he has read between the lines. He watches me format a quote for our services so I can send it to the cold leads I’ve been nurturing.

“You don’t need an escort,” he says. “You need a proper date-date.”

“Okay. Do you know anyone free next week?”

“I’ll ask, but I don’tthinkI have anyone who would match well for you. Most of my friends are considerably younger than you.”

He smiles at the eye-roll I fire off at him.

Ah yes, the delightful age of thirty-five for a woman. Our pool dwindles as we age, unless you are a badass outlier. In contrast, the dating pool for men is as wide as an ocean and unfathomable in depth. They have access to a secret slot machine, offering more acceptable variations in age. Maybe because a man with greying hair is established and hot, but an older woman with her earned wrinkles is a four-legged cat-animal. WHAT A COUGAR.

My eyes are sore from the screen. I blink the ache away. “How can I get a date this quick?”

“The internet,” Leo answers as if it’s a magical place. “Well, more like Finder.”

“Finder? The dating app? You think I can find a date on the app you’ve been pressuring me to get this whole year, matching me with a man who will agree to go to Esha’s wedding? A man who will agree to lie to my entire family about the fact that we’ve been together for months?”

“Only one way to find out.”

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