3. CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 3

“You’ve got me nervous to speak”

Nervous – The Neighbourhood

Deon

“ A re you preparing for an apocalypse?”

I spin to find Addie leaning against the counter, a confused smile on her lips. The reusable bag in my grip overflows with snacks. Granola bars. Chips. Crackers. Fruit. Cheese sticks. I don’t know what to bring to meet Nathalie, but I can’t show up empty-handed.

I did that at her apartment, and she shot me down. I need snacks on my side for this to go smoothly.

Addie raises an auburn brow.

“I’m hungry.” I shrug, snagging a few apples and adding them to my hoard.

“You hate grapes.”

Yeah, but Nathalie loves them. Ate them nearly every morning on our trip to Michigan. Which I noticed because I hate them and not because my eyes found her in every room.

“They’re for my…girlfriend,” I fumble out the last word, the feeling of it foreign on my tongue. “I’m meeting her at work, and I thought she would be hungry.”

“Oh, how nice of you,” Addie beams. “What a good boyfriend you are.”

That's me. Your average good boyfriend. Fake boyfriend.

I give Addie an awkward nod and scurry away. I don’t need to drag the conversation out and accidentally say something to incriminate myself like actually, it’s all pretend, but I haven’t stopped thinking about her since I left her apartment . As I walk toward the parking lot, a voice echoes from the end of the hallway. I walk faster, recognizing the voice and wanting to avoid him at all costs.

“Deon!” Declan yells as he jogs down the hallway. I speed up. “Slow down for a second.”

I’ve avoided my friends all morning in fear they’ll see what’s written all over my face; I have spent the last few nights thinking about Nathalie in not-so-friendly scenarios, and I need to shut those depraved thoughts down before they consume me entirely.

Worse, I’m terrified someone will bring up my engagement and drag the past back into my life. They haven’t asked any questions yet, but I fear that courtesy won’t last forever.

“You’ll need this,” he says, extending a family-size bag of gummy bears.

“What? Why?”

“She loves them.” Declan smiles softly. “It will break the ice,” I add the candy to the other snacks when Declan continues, shocking me. “She has a soft heart. Don’t take advantage of her.”

He cuts a serious look, and it strikes me how deeply he cares for Nathalie. Whatever relationship they have, it’s important to him.

I ignore the jealousy swirling in my chest.

“I would never,” I say, letting the truth creep into my words. I would never take advantage of her kindness. It’s one of the things I’m unable to banish from my thoughts. And the way she pushes her glasses up on the bridge of her nose when she’s deep in thought.

My stomach sours.

Does he truly believe I would hurt her?

“Good. Nathalie’s great!” he beams, “Maybe you two will be friends by the end of it.”

He laughs, walking out of the practice facility.

Yeah…maybe.

“Hi, Sandy.” I quickly greet the receptionist at GameChangers, the non-profit where Nathalie and Sawyer both work. Since I met them through Henry, the guys and I have been here a few times to volunteer and hang out with the kids during the after-school program.

“Nathalie told me you were coming,” she pauses, eyes roaming along my body. I refrain from shivering in discomfort. “She’s upstairs in her office.”

A ball of blonde hair bounds out of an office, and I drop my head, hoping Sawyer will simply walk past me as if I don’t exist.

“Hi, Deon,” Sawyer says, breezing past. I sigh in relief when I hear a quiet, “Wait, what?”

“There you are!” Nathalie’s head pops out of her office with a manic smile. “He’s here to talk about donating money!” she yells to Sawyer.

“I am?” I ask, confused.

Her eyes widen. “Yes,” she grits out, “you are.”

Oh. “Yep. Gonna sign a really big check.”

Sawyer smiles brightly. “Oh, Deon, that’s great! I can help with the paper—”

“I got it,” Nathalie says, “ Go enjoy your lunch with Henry.”

Sawyer nods, walking away, and I lean against the doorframe. Jeez, that was close. Maybe Nathalie was right. We do need a plan.

Nathalie pushes papers aside as I sit down across from her. She haphazardly tosses half of the items on her desk into a random drawer.

“I brought an offering.”

I slide the bag across the desk.

Her eyebrow jerks up, blue-rimmed glasses bobbling on her nose. She flings a long braid over her shoulder as she snatches the bag. Nathalie pulls the bag open, and an excited smile blossoms.

“Snacks!”

With her adorable, goofy grin, Nathalie pours the contents onto the desk, examining her plunder like a pirate. Her eyes snag on the gummy bears. I hold my breath. She releases a small squeal. “Thank you, Deon. I love these.”

A small kernel of warmth lodges beneath my breastbone. I resist the urge to rub the sensation away.

Nathalie opens the same drawer she threw everything into and pulls out two clipboards. Curiosity pricks at me. I want to know what’s stored in the drawer. It has to be a nightmare.

If the chaos of her desk is any indication, the drawer must be a treasure trove of junk.

My fingers itch to organize her mess, to place the pens back into the cup in the corner of her desk and neatly file the papers she shoved into the drawer.

Instead, I scan the piece of paper attached to the bright pink clipboard. Deon and Nathalie’s Guide to Fake Dating.

“What is this?”

Questions fill each page with a line for an answer. Some are simple, like my favorite foods and colors, but others are personal—private things I harbor no desire to share with anyone, especially not Nathalie.

There’s nothing more shameful than admitting the person you planned to spend your life with—the only person you had ever been with—deemed you unworthy.

“It’s a dating questionnaire I made.” Those bright eyes shift to mine behind her glasses. “These are things we would usually learn about each other at the beginning of the relationship, but since this is rather…unorthodox, we’re getting creative.”

I tap my pen against the clipboard.

“Are all of these questions necessary?”

The question about previous partners and sexual relationships is particularly concerning.

“Yes. Now, before we fill these out, we need a timeline. The auction is in January?” I nod. “We can break up a few weeks after the event.”

“Alright…”

“And we need to establish a social media footprint. I have your jersey, so we can take a few photos after a game.”

I lift my gaze from the chaos on her desk, and Nathalie stammers, choking on a gummy bear.

“I-I didn’t know it was yours when I bought it,” she amends, “and Maren and Sawyer never told me. I got the jersey that the teenage boy in front of me bought. ”

“You chose my jersey because a kid in front of you bought it?”

Maybe I’m hearing it wrong; that she didn’t randomly pick my jersey but purposefully selected it because it’s mine .

I remember the exact moment I saw my name on Nathalie’s back for the first time. Henry bought tickets for Sawyer, Maren, and Nathalie and sent Sawyer his jersey. When we took the field, the three of them spun around to show us their backs.

Sawyer with Henry’s name, Maren with the name of a random player to annoy Jack, and Nathalie with my name stitched along her shoulders.

I was taken aback, memories of Savannah flashing through my mind, of the photos of her wearing Brian’s jersey after we broke up, but when Nathalie spun around, and I saw her smile for the first time, only one word bobbled through my mind: breathtaking.

Nathalie smiles sheepishly.

“I didn’t know anything about football. Still don’t know that much.” Nathalie shrugs, “I trusted the kid, and I would say he picked a pretty good jersey.”

Nathalie winks, and my cheeks flame.

I return to my clipboard, focused on the questions instead of the heat creeping up my neck. “There are a hundred questions on this thing,” I mumble .

And I don’t want to answer half of them.

What is your biggest mistake?

No line on any piece of paper is long enough to tell the story, and I will ‘accidentally’ forget to answer it, along with how long ago was your last sexual partner?

“There are only seventy-five,” Nathalie replies, beginning to answer the questions she created, brows furrowing and bottom lip between her teeth as her pen flies across the page. She’s…cute when she’s focused. I shake the thought and reluctantly pick up my pen.

This might be a new form of torture.

Half an hour later, I’ve spilled almost all of my secrets, told Nathalie all my favorite things, and had to subtly adjust myself in my sweats after she released a moan while eating gummy bears. At this point, there is nobody who knows me better than this sheet of paper and my fake girlfriend who is about to read it.

“Now, I’m going to quiz you,” Nathalie says, a mischievous smile peeking out from behind her clipboard.

“I haven’t even seen your sheet, how am I supposed to know any of the answers?”

You can’t know the plays if you haven’t seen the playbook, though I have a feeling I may know more than I should.

“Consider this a baseline test.”

“You spend too much time with Maren if you’re using the words ‘baseline test.’”

“Regardless, we’ll each ask a question and guess the other's answer. If we're right,” Nathalie pauses, digging through her bag, “we get a pretzel. If we get it wrong, we have to do a push-up.”

“Those are the pretzels? ”

The pretzels I dream about. I stumbled upon a stall at the farmers market handing out free samples of these seasoned pretzels. Turns out, they’re the best pretzels I’ve ever had. Buttery and salty and seasoned to perfection. I frequented the stall weekly until, one day, it disappeared.

It was one of the worst things to ever happen to me until Maren decided she was holding them hostage. I still haven’t worked up the nerve to text her back, and I’m nearly out of my stash.

Is sharing my secrets and potentially embarrassing myself worth some seasoned pretzels? She waves the bag in her grip, and the answer comes immediately: yes.

“How did you get those?” I stare longingly at the bag. I reach my hand out to grab one, and Nathalie slaps it away.

“Maren sent me the recipe. Now, remember the rules. Answer correctly, and you get a pretzel. Answer incorrectly, and you do a push-up.”

She has the recipe?!

If only she knew what power she holds as the owner of the recipe.

“I’m a professional athlete. A push-up isn’t a punishment.”

A foreign cockiness laces my words, and as Nathalie’s eyes roam along my body, a zap of electricity crackles along my skin. I shift in my seat to hide the response to her perusal. It’s an overwhelming, addicting feeling.

“Yes, well,” she chokes out, “I am not. A push-up is a punishment to me.” She glances at her blue clipboard. “What is my favorite color?”

There are the blue-framed glasses on her face, the clipboard she’s holding, and the sea-blue water bottle sitting on the table. This is a difficult one .

“It’s blue.”

Nathalie nods, and the smile on her face is vibrant. She extends the bag of pretzels, and I take one. The flavors melt on my tongue. They’re better than I remember.

“Ask me a question.”

I scan the page, looking through the questions for something easy and surface-level. “How do I take my coffee?”

“Cold brew with light ice.”

I nod, surprised she knows the answer.

The smirk on Nathalie's face is triumphant as she snatches a pretzel and pops it into her mouth. My eyes snag on her lips, and I force myself to focus on anything else.

“Who was my first kiss?”

“How am I supposed to know that?” I grumble, sliding off of the office chair to drop to the floor. I quickly do a push-up.

“You made that look so easy,” Nathalie’s voice quiets. “Please don’t ask me many hard questions. I can only do three on a good day.”

I chuckle, selecting an easy question.

“What was the mascot of the university I played at?”

Nathalie’s eyes bulge, and she bites her lip in concentration. Like a fool, my eyes drop to her lips again. I need to get a grip.

“The—The birds?”

“ The birds? ” I fight a laugh as her face flushes. “You could have picked a type of bird.”

“Eagles?”

“Nope. Do a push-up.”

Nathalie stares.

“I’m changing the rules. You have to do all the push-ups.” She crosses her arms and signals for me to do another push-up. I mirror her posture, holding her gaze, and after a tense moment, she breaks. “Okay, fine. ” She throws her arms up in defeat. “I can’t do a single push-up. I’m weak with twig arms, and I hate working out.”

There’s a small pout on her face, and it’s the cutest thing I’ve ever seen.

I crush my lips together, fighting my smile. This is why she’s so dangerous. My heart thuds in my chest when she fixes her focus on me, like nothing else matters as much as I do, at least in this moment.

It’s lethal for my sanity.

“Just try,” I push. “It was the Longhorns, by the way.” Her nose scrunches. “It's a type of cow,” I amend.

Slowly, Nathalie rises and crouches down on the floor. She glances up, a silent plea in her eyes, and I nod, urging her on. I want to witness this.

Nathalie lowers her body, and as she begins to press up, her arms shake. I’m confident she’s going to throw in the towel and give up, but she surprises me, releasing a low grunt and propelling her body upward. As she completes the push-up, she flies to her feet with a triumphant smile.

“Look at me!” she yells, and when she holds up her arms, kissing each of her biceps, I lose my battle with laughter.

My stomach cramps as she does her victory dance, an obnoxious shimmy that draws my gaze to her jeans and the way they curve around her ass perfectly. She gently shoves my shoulder as she sits, and the laughter starts again, gaining momentum until I can barely breathe.

In group settings, she’s always been on the quieter side. She’s had her moments, like when Declan proposed to her in a dive bar, but I never exactly knew how fun she can be.

The realization is slightly jarring and incredibly concerning.

“I know, I know,” she coos, “I am impressive .” I lock eyes with her, and the smile she gives me flares that small kernel of warmth lodged in my chest. “Alright, next question. What is my preferred love language?”

I pause. There are love languages?

I glance down at the sheet and the question I missed. This is going to be a long meeting.

As I pull out of the parking lot, my phone rings.

“We need to go on a date.”

I slam on the brakes, my body ricocheting forward.

“What?” I croak out.

Nathalie sighs. “I forgot because of the questions, but we need to go on a public date.”

“Why?”

“To convince people we’re dating.” She doesn’t add the duh to the end, but I hear the implication.

“Why?”

“I know you don’t want to,” I nod my head in agreement as if she could see me, “but if we don’t go out and aren’t seen in public, people might start to question if the girlfriend you say you have is real.”

I’m not a fan of the logic in her statement.

“Look,” I start, but she cuts me off.

“I’m willing to compromise. You can plan it so it’s something you’re comfortable with. How’s Sunday? I know you have an away game on Saturday in Tampa, but Sawyer said Henry should be back in the morning. Let’s do Sunday evening. We’ll take a photo, and you can post it on your social media.”

I flounder for a response. She takes my silence as agreement.

“Perfect. Pick me up at seven. You know my address. Please give me an idea of what I should wear so I don’t under or overdress,” she pauses, and I sit at a red light, stunned into silence. “Bye, Deon.”

“Bye,” I mutter before the line goes dead.