Page 39 of Loving You

“I think we should use the summer kickoff festival to make our relationship … official.”

“That’s very public,” she says quietly.

“Yeah, well, it beats having all these people ask me about us separately. This way, we can get it all out of the way and no more questions.”

She smiles. “Are people asking you questions about us?”

“So far just Luca, but gossip spreads fast in a small town. I have no doubts that our lunch yesterday will have raised questions.”

She nods.

“Maybe. No one in my family asked me about it.”

“Have you seen them since we had lunch?”

“No, but I’ve texted with my grandmother and I’ve dropped coffee off for my brother and his wife. Not one word about me hanging out with you.”

I sigh. “Fine, so this will be for me.”

“Okay,” she says as if it’s that easy.

I stand quickly and plop myself right next to her. She leans away from me.

“That. Right there. You can’t do that when we are together,” I tell her. “Not in public anyway.”

She scoffs. “I know I can’t. You didn’t see me pulling away at the bar, did you?”

“No.”

She’s right. She didn’t. In fact, it sort of felt natural with her.

“You need to stop overthinking this. I get the vibe that you’ve been obsessing over this plan of ours since we agreed to it. Which reminds me, thank you. I know you were seconds away from calling the whole thing off before … well, you were there.”

I nod.

“I am obsessing. It’s just weird. This was not how I imagined my summer.”

“Nor did I, but it’s going to be fine. It’s not forever, and the time is going to pass quickly. It always does.”

Her voice softens at her last few words, which makes me think she has a double meaning, but right now, her feelings are not my concern. My concern is how we pull this off without anyone ever finding out that we lied.

And in my mind, there is only one way to do this.

“Okay. We don’t go anywhere in town without the other,” I say. “If your family needs you, I’m there. If my family needs me, you’re there. We attend every single event together. We makeplans with other couples together. We eat together. Whatever it is, we do it together.”

“That seems excessive. What if I want to go have coffee or lunch with the girls?”

“Are you here often enough to have people you can call 'the girls’?”

“Yes.” She swats my arm. “Believe it or not, most of the people in this town have accepted me.”

“Most, not all.”

“Well, technically, now they all have. The last one decided he would just date me instead.”

Her eyebrows dance.

I just stare at her.

---