The proposal
"Be my girlfriend. I'll give you fifty thousand baht."
Nalin choked on her own spit.
"Excuse me?" She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, mortified, while Arisa stood in the doorway looking entirely too pleased with herself. "Did you seriously just say that with a straight face?"
"There's nothing straight about this at all, actually." Arisa grinned. "That's kind of the point."
"Arisa." Nalin set down the mop she'd been using — badly — and crossed her arms. "I have known you since we were seven years old. I have seen you cry over a broken Barbie doll. I once watched you eat an entire ant by accident because you dared yourself. You do not get to walk in here and propose to me like it's a business meeting."
"It kind of is a business meeting." Arisa stepped further into the room, entirely unbothered. "I even prepared a pitch."
"A pitch."
"Slide one." Arisa held up one finger. "You get fifty thousand baht a month."
"There's slide two?"
"Slide two." Another finger. "I stop having a panic attack every time my father mentions the word 'wedding.'"
Nalin opened her mouth, closed it again, and finally just stared. "You want to explain slide two properly, or are we doing this whole presentation in interpretive finger-counting?"
Arisa's grin faltered, just slightly, and for a second the performance cracked. "My father is arranging my marriage. To a man. A very nice boring man named Tenzin who talks about golf the way other people talk about their children."
"Okay."
"And I can't marry him, P'Nalin, because I have never in my life wanted to kiss a man, and I am fairly sure that's a requirement for marriage, generally speaking."
The room went quiet. Nalin blinked.
"You're..."
"Devastatingly so." Arisa pressed a hand to her chest like she'd been shot. "I've known since I was fourteen and cried after watching a girl-group music video for reasons I did not understand at the time."
Despite herself, Nalin snorted. "Which video?"
"That is not relevant to slide two."
"It's extremely relevant. I need to know what turned Arisa Suthiwong into..."
"BLACKPINK," Arisa admitted, deadpan. "Specifically Jennie. I have never recovered."
Nalin burst out laughing before she could stop herself, and Arisa's whole face lit up like she'd won something.
"Okay, see, this is exactly why it has to be you," Arisa said, pointing at her triumphantly. "You're the only person who can make me laugh in the middle of a crisis."
"This is not funny, Arisa. Your father is going to lose his mind."
"Which is why I need a girlfriend. A fake one. For three months. Long enough that he cancels the wedding, long enough that I figure out how to actually tell him the truth without him disowning me on the spot." Arisa's voice dropped, and just like that the joking fell away entirely. "I need him to see it's serious. Not some phase. And he'll never believe it's serious if I show up with some stranger."
"So you want a fake girlfriend he already trusts."
"I want you." Arisa said it so plainly that Nalin's stomach did something embarrassing and involuntary. "You've been in this house our whole lives. He respects your mother. He respects you. If I tell him I'm with someone this family already knows and loves, he can't just wave it off."
"'Loves' is a strong word for a woman who has cleaned his toilets since I was twelve."
"He loves your mother's cooking. That's basically the same thing."
"It is not remotely the same thing."
"Fine, he tolerates you with deep respect. Better?"
"Marginally." Nalin sat down on the arm of the sofa, rubbing her temples. "Arisa, do you understand what you're asking? I would have to lie to your father's face. Constantly. For three months. What happens when he asks how we fell in love? What am I supposed to say — 'oh, one day she cried about BLACKPINK and I simply could not resist'?"
"That's actually a great origin story, I think we should use it."
"Arisa."
"Fine, fine." Arisa held up her hands in surrender, then, without warning, dropped down onto the sofa cushion right beside her, far closer than strictly necessary. Nalin could smell her perfume — something expensive, something that had no business smelling that good. "We say we met at university. We kept it quiet because I wasn't ready. It's simple. You just have to be near me sometimes. Hold my hand. Look at me like you don't want to throw my shoes into the river."
"I have wanted to throw your shoes into the river since we were nine."
"See, this is going great already, we have chemistry."
Nalin turned her head to glare at her, and made the tactical error of not accounting for how close Arisa actually was. Their faces were suddenly inches apart, and whatever scathing comment Nalin had prepared evaporated somewhere in her throat.
Arisa didn't move back either.
"...Right," Nalin managed, voice suddenly not quite as steady as she wanted it to be. "Chemistry."
"Told you." Arisa's voice had gone soft, almost teasing, but her eyes had stopped laughing. "So is that a yes?"
"I need the money for my mother's treatment," Nalin said quietly, the humor draining out of the room in an instant. "You know that. You're using that."
"I'm not using it against you. I'm telling you it's true, and I'm telling you I need you, and both of those things can exist at the same time without either of us being terrible people." Arisa reached over and took her hand, lacing their fingers together with an ease that felt far too practiced for someone who claimed to be panicking. "Please, P'Nalin. Three months. That's all I'm asking."
Nalin looked down at their joined hands. Eighteen years of history sat behind that gesture — but this, whatever this new thing crackling underneath it was, felt entirely unfamiliar.
"Fine," she said. "Three months. But if your father asks me one single question about golf, I am telling him the truth on the spot."
Arisa laughed — a real one, bright and relieved — and before Nalin could brace herself, pulled her into a hug so suddenly it knocked the air out of her lungs.
"Thank you," Arisa murmured against her shoulder. "You have no idea what this means to me."
"You owe me so much more than fifty thousand baht for this."
"I'll buy you a Jennie autograph."
"Arisa, I swear to—"
Nalin's phone buzzed sharply against the coffee table, cutting her off. She pulled back to check it, frowning — a text from an unknown number, sent to her personal line that almost no one had.
"Congratulations on the new girlfriend. Does Khun Anucha know yet? I'd love to be there when you tell him. — T."
Nalin's stomach dropped. "Arisa. Who is T?”
