Fake Date Domination

All right, here is how it started. You are going to think I made the whole thing up.

I didn’t.

It started on a warm, slightly windy Thursday near the end of spring. Alessia texted me at noon: park? 4pm? need to ask you something important. A second message followed: please don’t be late. Then she sent a heart, all by itself.

Three messages in a row meant she was nervous. Alessia only triple-texts when she’s nervous.

Naturally, I was late.

She was already sitting on our bench by the pond, the one with the peeling green paint, and she’d pulled her knees up to her chest. Her blonde hair was loose and the wind kept blowing it across her face, and she kept tucking it back behind her ear with this small, patient movement. Over and over.

That was Alessia in a nutshell. She moves like a cat. Not the mean kind that leaves dead birds on your doorstep. The sweet, curious kind—the one that stretches in a sunny patch and gives you a slow blink, like she has a secret to share. She’s small, much smaller than me, with sharp Slavic cheekbones and big green eyes and a way of tilting her head when she listens. Everything she does looks a little like a dance, even when she’s just sitting there.

I am nothing like that: tall, curvy, and brunette. Big chest, big hips, the kind of body that takes up room. I don’t fidget. I don’t rush. People call me calm. They are probably right. I have never understood what hurrying is supposed to improve.

“You’re late,” she said, when I sat down.

“Six minutes.”

“Six minutes is late, Mia.”

“I brought you a lemonade.”

She took it. She always takes it. “You’re forgiven.”

“I wasn’t asking to be.”

She rolled her eyes at me, and I smiled, and for a minute we just sat there and drank and watched a duck try to bully another duck. For a minute it was pleasant and ordinary. Remember that part; it was the last ordinary minute we got.

Then she put her cup down on the bench between us and turned to face me, and she did the hair thing again. Tuck. Tuck.

“So,” she said.

“So.”

“The thing is, my best friend is getting married.”

“Ella?”

“Ella. In two weeks. At this little hotel in the countryside. It’s going to be beautiful.”

“Okay. And?”

“And my ex will also be there.”

I waited. She offered nothing else. She just looked at me, like that was the whole story.

“So?” I said.

She drew in a breath. Her cheeks were already pink, and she hadn’t even said it yet. I remember thinking, oh, this is going to be good.

“I’ve told him that I’ve turned lesbian!”

I stared at her.

“You did what?”

Then I laughed. There was no stopping it. It just came out of me, a real laugh, loud, from my belly. The duck flew away. A man on the next bench looked over. Alessia grabbed my arm with both hands like she could stop the sound by holding on.

“Mia! Stop it!”

“You turned lesbian?”

“Shh!”

“When? Over lunch? Was it sudden?”

“I hate you.”

“You don’t.” I wiped my eyes. “Okay. Okay. I’m done. Explain.”

She let go of my arm, but slowly. She didn’t take her hands all the way back. They rested on her knees, close to me.

“I just wanted to make sure he doesn’t try to hit on me again,” she said. “Marek. You remember Marek.”

“Guitar Marek.”

“Guitar Marek. He’s the groom’s cousin. So he’ll be there the whole weekend. And every time I see him he does this thing where he stands too close and says we should talk, and I don’t want to talk, I never want to talk to him again. So when he texted me last week and asked if I was seeing anyone, I panicked. And I said yes. And he asked who. And I said...” She covered her face. “I said it was a girl.”

“Just tell him to fuck off!”

“I can’t do that!”

“Sure you can!” I leaned back against the bench and spread my arms along the top of it. “It’s two words. Very easy. Much easier than becoming a lesbian!”

“I’m not a lesbian!” she insisted, dropping her hands. Her eyes were huge and green and very serious. “I’m just playing one!”

“Whatever!” I shrugged. “You shouldn’t change your sexuality because of this dude. Because of your ex. He doesn’t deserve that kind of commitment.”

She laughed at that, a little, but it faded fast. She looked down at her lap. Her fingers found the edge of her skirt and started folding it, unfolding it.

I watched her fingers worry the fabric. Waiting is something I am good at. Most people can’t stand silence, and if you just let it sit there long enough, they’ll fill it with the thing they actually came to say.

Alessia lasted about ten seconds.

“He wants to meet her,” she said quietly.

“Meet who?”

“My girlfriend.”

“Your imaginary girlfriend.”

“Yes.”

“At the wedding.”

“Yes.”

I looked at her. She looked at her skirt.

“Lessi.”

“Mm.”

“Look at me.”

I still have no idea where that voice came from. It wasn’t my normal voice. It was lower. Slower. Softer, somehow, but also more... certain. Like the words already knew they’d be obeyed.

And they were. Her eyes came up right away and met mine. Instantly. No hesitation at all.

My chest gave a quick, stupid jump, the way it does when you miss a stair.

“You want me to pretend,” I said.

She nodded. Very small.

“Say it.”

“I want you to pretend to be my girlfriend,” she whispered. “At the wedding. Just for the weekend. Please.”

Her cheeks were bright red now, and it had spread down her neck. Her lips were slightly parted. She was holding very still, the way you hold still when you’re waiting for someone to decide something about you.

A normal best friend would have said yes straightaway. Yes, sure, of course, anything for you.

I made her wait.

I took a sip of my lemonade. I watched the pond. I counted to five in my head, slowly, and the whole time I could feel her looking at me. Waiting for me. Hanging on whatever I’d say next.

The honest answer is that I loved making her wait. I had no idea why.

“Okay,” I said finally.

Her breath came out all at once. “Okay? Really?”

“On one condition.”

“Anything.”

“You don’t know what it is yet.”

“Anything,” she said again, and then heard herself, and went even redder. “I mean. Within reason.”

“If I’m going to be your girlfriend, I’m going to do it properly. I’m not standing in a corner holding your hand like a nervous teenager. If we do this, we do it my way.” I turned my head and looked at her. “Which means for the whole weekend, I’m in charge. You do what I say.”

She opened her mouth. Closed it. I watched her think about it.

This was the part that caught me off guard. I’d expected her to laugh. To roll her eyes, push my shoulder, say oh my God, Mia, you’re so dramatic. That’s what she’d always done when I bossed her around before.

She didn’t.

She just looked at me with those big green eyes, and swallowed, and said, “Okay.”

“Okay what?”

A pause. Then, softly: “Okay. You’re in charge.”

“Good girl.”

It slipped out. I swear it just slipped out. I’d never called anyone that in my life, not seriously, not like that. I almost laughed and took it back.

But then I saw her face.

She didn’t flinch. She didn’t laugh. She ducked her head, like the words had touched her somewhere, and a small helpless smile pulled at the corner of her mouth, and she tucked her hair behind her ear again. Tuck. Tuck. Except this time her fingers were trembling a little.

I left the words where they were.

“Thank you,” she said. “Really. You’re saving my life.”

“I know.”

“I’ll owe you.”

“You will.” I stood up and held my hand out to her. “Come on. I’ll walk you home.”

She looked at my hand for a second. Then she took it, and I pulled her up off the bench, and she was so light that she stumbled a little and caught herself against my chest. For a moment we were very close. I could smell her shampoo, something with vanilla in it. Her hand was warm and small in mine.

She didn’t let go right away. Neither did I.

“Practice,” I said.

“Practice,” she agreed, a little breathless.

We left the park holding hands. I kept my pace slow, and she adjusted to it without being told.

Here is the thing you need to know. I’m straight. I’ve always been straight. I’ve had boyfriends, I’ve had crushes on actors, I’ve never once looked at a girl and felt anything other than nice dress. So I didn’t know what to make of the warm, buzzing feeling under my skin as we walked. I didn’t know why my heart was going so fast. I didn’t know why I kept replaying the way she’d said okay, you’re in charge, so quietly, like she meant it.

I told myself it was just a game. A favor. Two weeks, one wedding, and then everything would go back to normal.

I believed it, too. Completely.

For about two weeks.