Page 12 of Knot Just for Show

In our drunken stupor, my sister had pointed at the television and taunted me. “That’s what you need, Mav. To be forced into actually getting toknowpeople before you decide they don’t live up to your impossibly high standards from a single glance.”

Through the haze of intoxication, I hadn’t felt the sting of her blistering read. Instead, I only heard the ring of its truth—and comedy in the degree of severity to which I get in my own way.

“No shit, I need to be shipped away to date in a goddamn blind box so I can’t be so judgy. Too bad I’d end up still single by the time they get to the reveal” I’d laughed at my own expense.

In a fit of giggles and drunken jostling, Delia and I filled out a cast member interest form on her computer and filmed what must have been the sloppiest of audition video clips before sending the whole mess to Build-A-Pack-Blind’s casting inbox—insisting on the brilliance of our liquor soaked brains before passing out on the couch for the night.

I had completely forgotten about our mischievous sibling escapades until I received an email a few weeks later informing me I had been selected to be on the upcoming season of the show.

My initial intent had been to decline the opportunity, since it had been more of a joke on a whim than anything else. When Itold Delia about being selected though, she insisted that I had to take the chance. She wasn’t afraid to drive home the fact that she had been bitten into her pack nearly three years prior and that I had been distinctly off the dating scene for almost as long.

When I had attempted to use my inability to leave the restaurant for 40 days, Delia had simply leveled her eyes at me and said, “are you telling me that you still don’t think I can handle running the place, Mav?”

Of course, both of us knew that was untrue. I didn’t have a leg to stand on. So, I signed the NDA and the cast member contract and made plans to leavePommeVertein the capable hands of my badass younger sister while I attempted to find love.

“Mavren Renard?” a young woman with a grating voice and a lucite clipboard stacked high with highlighter laden worksheets calls my name, bringing me out of my own head.

“That’s me.” I offer her a friendly smile, gathering my luggage from the sidewalk as the driver unloads my things from the back of the van.

“Hi, my name is Kimmy. I’ll be escorting you to your apartment for the first portion of the experiment. If you’ll just follow me?” She extends her hand for a quick shake before moving me along, through a long nondescript hallway to my new home-away-from-home.

“Alright Mavren, you’ll have about an hour or so to unpack and get settled before the A-Unit shows up at your room to grab some introduction footage of you in the ‘confessional lounge’,” Kimmy chirps helpfully—her eyes never leaving her complicated clipboard cipher.

“Confessional lounge?” I parrot, rubbing a hand nervously over my freshly shaven jaw. I don’t know why I did it—everyone says that I’m too baby faced without my typical shadowy stubble, and no one is going to see me anyway—but I felt compelled to do so before I left the house this morning.

“There’s a suite that we’ll be shooting most of your solo material on. Right now you’re in your own bubble apartment, but later—if you end up moving in with other men and you need to talk shit about one another on camera; you get pulled to film that kind of stuff in a more private space.” Kimmy smiles sweetly, despite how far from normal the scenarios are that she’s currently explaining.

“Uh huh,” I urge her on, my eyebrows still raised.

“After they grab that intro footage in the confessional, the D-Unit crew will catch up with you and Tim, my counterpart, and he’ll bring you and D-unit to a ‘bubble’ for your first date.” Kimmy stops dead in front of a door with a nameplate readingMavren Renard,fixed to it, and hands me a magnetic swipe card.

“There’s a gym and an indoor swimming pool and jacuzzi that you’ll have access to, you just need to dial ‘5’ on your in room phone to check with a production assistant and make sure that you’re good to go and you won’t run into another of your fellow residents before you can see or smell one another.” She winks at me, one of the only times she’s looked up from her clipboard to directly acknowledge me this entire time.

“Uh, thanks Kimmy.” I take the keycard from her, slightly overwhelmed by the bombardment of information.

“Good luck Mr. Renard, I’ll see you in a few weeks—either to get you on a plane to tropical paradise with your new pack…or to coordinate specifics for the reunion appearances.” She flashes me a professional, hollow smile and takes off as soon as I’ve confirmed my room key works.

And so it begins.

As promised, I am shuffled by Timmy and the camera crew through my introduction then herded down another maze-like series of hallways from the confessional lounge to the ‘dating bubbles’ for my very first blind rendezvous with a mystery woman—unseen and unscented.

Despite the fact that there’s no way she can see me, I’ve changed out of my traveling clothes from this morning; a simple gray sweatsuit and sneakers, in favor of a more date-worthy pair of burgundy cords and a rust orange t-shirt that allows my tattoo sleeves to remain on full display; my locs hanging loosely just over my shoulders.

Even though it’s so far removed from any kind of ‘normal’ date I’ve been on in the past, I’m still nervous as I wait in silence on my side of the partition. I bounce my knee to let loose a bit of the pent up energy, then stop myself when I notice the gentle chattering noise my water glass makes against the low table when I do.

I’m actually about to get up and start pacing when I hear a voice from the other side of the partition.

“Hello?” her tone, warm and rich, shocks me into response.

“Yes, hello?” I call back, making sure she knows someone is here.

“Hey,howareya? I’m Ursula!” Her plush alto carries her thick accent, the ‘how are you’ slurred together as if it’s a single wordwith casual ease. New York? Boston? Jersey? I’m not familiar enough to know for sure. It’s at once unexpected and endearing.

“I’m doing alright, Ursula. Nice to meet you, I’m Mavren.” I find myself smiling as I lean back into the sofa, almost forgetting for a moment that the automated gimbals in every corner of the room are trained on our every word and gesture.

“Gosh, that’s a gorgeous name!” she gushes.

“Thank you, Ursula is so pretty and so unique,” I return the compliment.

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