Chapter 3: The Performance Begins

Adrian

I called Mason forty-seven hours and thirty-two minutes after our meeting at the coffee shop.

I'd spent two sleepless nights staring at my ceiling, weighing federal prison against deportation, fraud against survival, my conscience against my life. 

The ceiling fan had gone around and around above me, hypnotic and useless, while my mind spun in the same circles. What if we got caught? What if this destroyed me? What if going back destroyed me worse?

In the end, survival won. It had to.

Because going back to Manila wasn't just going back, it was erasure. A slow death disguised as family duty and heterosexual respectability. It was watching myself disappear piece by piece until nothing was left.

I picked up my phone before I could talk myself out of it. My hands were shaking so badly I almost dropped it twice while dialing.

Mason answered on the second ring.

"I was wondering if you'd call."

His voice was calm. Unsurprised. Like he'd known all along what my answer would be.

"I'm in," I said. My voice came out steadier than my hands felt. "What do we do first? I asked."

"We get married. On friday. Eleven AM. Bring your passport, birth certificate, and twenty-five thousand dollars in certified checks."

The line went dead.

I stared at my phone, my heart hammering so hard I could feel it in my throat, in my temples, in my fingertips.

Friday was three days away.

Three days until I committed federal fraud.

Three days until I married a stranger.

Three days until I saved my own life.

<<<<<<<<<<

Three days later. The San Francisco County Clerk's Office smelled like industrial cleaning solution and desperation.

I stood in the hallway outside the civil ceremony room, tugging at the collar of the Goodwill suit I'd bought that morning for thirty-seven dollars. 

The fabric was stiff, scratchy against my skin, and it smelled faintly of mothballs and someone else's life. The sleeves were half an inch too short, exposing my wrists when I moved.

But it was all I could afford after liquidating my savings account, every penny I'd saved over six years to scrape together Mason's first payment.

Twenty-five thousand dollars in certified checks, currently sitting in my jacket pocket like lead weights.

Mason appeared at the end of the hallway, and my breath caught in my throat.

He wore the same charcoal suit from the coffee shop, perfectly tailored, expensive, everything mine wasn't. 

But today there was a white rose pinned to his lapel, a small concession to tradition that felt almost cruel in its mockery. Like we were playing dress-up in someone else's wedding.

His face was professionally blank. The expression of a man conducting business, nothing more.

Something twisted in my chest, sharp and painful.

This was supposed to be my wedding day. The day that meant something. The day people celebrated with me. The day I'm supposed to start a life with someone I loved, someone who loved me back.

Instead, it was a transaction. A performance. A beautiful lie told to save me from an ugly truth.

"You came," Mason said, stopping in front of me.

"Did you think I wouldn't?"

"Fifty-fifty odds." His eyes scanned my suit, and something that might have been sympathy flickered across his face. "Most people get cold feet. But you clean up nice."

"You don't have to pretend when it's just us," I said quietly. The words came out more bitter than I intended.

"I'm not pretending. You do." 

He pulled an envelope from his jacket pocket, all business again. 

"Marriage license. I filed it yesterday. Listed our first meeting as eight months ago at a mutual friend's birthday party. The friend is Sara, one of our witnesses. 

If anyone asks, we bonded over Kurosawa films and Vietnamese food."

I took the envelope with numb fingers. The paper felt official. Legal. Real.

"You've done this before."

It wasn't a question.

"Seventeen times." He checked his watch, a reflex more than anything. "Though usually I have more than three days' notice." He paused, then added, "Our witnesses should be here any minute. 

Sara and Jen Martinez. They met through an arrangement five years ago, Sara needed a green card to escape a forced marriage in Taiwan, Jen was drowning in med school debt. They're still married. Still together. One of the success stories."

"Success stories," I repeated. The words tasted bitter on my tongue. "Is that what we are?"

Mason looked at me then, really looked at me. Something raw flashed in his tired eyes, there and gone so fast I almost missed it.

"We're survivors, Adrian. That's all any of us are."

Before I could figure out what to say to that, two women appeared at the end of the hallway.

One was tall and willowy with short black hair and kind eyes that crinkled at the corners. The other was petite and curvy, with colorful tattoos snaking up both arms….flowers and birds and words I couldn't read from this distance. 

They walked hand in hand with the easy, unconscious intimacy of people who'd long since stopped performing their affection.

People who were actually in love.

"Mason!" The taller woman pulled him into a hug, genuine and warm.

"Sara. Jen." He hugged her back, and I watched him transform. His shoulders relaxed. His expression softened. For the first time since we'd met, he looked almost happy. Almost human. "Thank you for doing this."

"Are you kidding? We live for these." Jen turned to me, her smile warm and completely genuine. 

"You must be Adrian. I'm Jen, this is my wife Sara. Welcome to the club nobody wants to join."

I shook their hands, my throat too tight to speak at first. "Thank you for coming."

"Of course." Sara squeezed my hand gently, and there was real compassion in her eyes. She knew. She understood. "I know how terrifying this is. But you're in good hands. Mason's the best at what he does."

A clerk appeared in the doorway, with a clipboard in his hand, looking bored already.

"Cole-Santos party?"

My stomach dropped straight through the floor.

Cole-Santos.

My new name. Hyphenated like a real couple who'd merged their lives and identities.

Like this meant something beyond paperwork and survival.

We filed into the ceremony room, and my first thought was how aggressively ugly it was.

Fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, casting everything in a sickly yellow glow that made everyone look half-dead. Plastic chairs sat in sad rows that nobody was sitting in. 

The clerk's desk was cluttered with forms and a dying succulent that looked like it had given up weeks ago.

No flowers. No music. No family crying happy tears in the front row.

Just me, Mason, two strangers, and a bored government employee who'd clearly performed this ceremony a thousand times and would forget us the second we walked out.

"IDs and marriage license," the clerk droned, not even looking up.

Mason handed over the documents with the efficiency of someone who'd done this before. She scanned them with mechanical disinterest, stamped something, and gestured vaguely at the space in front of her desk.

"Stand here. Witnesses behind them."

I moved into position. Mason stood beside me, close enough that our shoulders almost touched, close enough that I could smell his cologne, cedar and something expensive that probably cost more than my entire suit.

"Rings?" the clerk asked, still not looking at us.

Mason pulled two simple gold bands from his pocket.

My chest cracked open.

When had he bought rings? How had he known my size? I stared at them, gleaming dully in the fluorescent light, and felt something break inside me. 

He'd thought of everything. Planned for everything. This was just another transaction he'd executed perfectly seventeen times before.

As if reading my mind, he leaned close and whispered, "I estimated. We can resize later if needed."

The ceremony began.

The clerk read from a script with all the enthusiasm of someone reciting a grocery list.

"We are gathered here today to join Mason Alexander Cole and Adrian Santos in matrimony..."

My mind went blank. This was really happening..

"Marriage is a commitment made in love, kept in faith, and enriched by hope..."

Love. Faith. Hope.

Words that meant nothing here, in this ugly room, with these strangers playing at forever.

"Do you, Mason Alexander Cole, take Adrian Santos to be your lawfully wedded husband?"

"I do."

His voice was steady. Practiced. He'd said these words before. Seventeen times before. 

They meant nothing to him.

"And do you, Adrian Santos, take Mason Alexander Cole to be your lawfully wedded husband?"

My mouth was desert-dry. I tried to swallow. Couldn't. My heart was hammering so hard I thought everyone could hear it.

I forced the words out. "I do."

"Rings.”

Mason took my left hand. His fingers were warm and steady against my trembling, ice-cold ones. He slid the gold band onto my ring finger with practiced ease.

It fit perfectly. No resizing needed.

My vision blurred as I took the second ring with shaking hands. I slid it onto his finger, barely able to hold it steady, and felt the weight of what we were doing crash over me.

This was real. Legal. Binding.

"By the power vested in me by the State of California, I now pronounce you married. You may kiss.”