Chapter Five: Lights, Camera, Lies

“Should we say something,” I asked. “About the photo.”

“Say what. That someone in a restaurant took a picture of two people eating dinner.” Cole set his water glass down harder than he meant to, I could tell, because he immediately reached out and steadied it like the sound had embarrassed him. “It’s a fake relationship contract, Rhea. Photos are the whole point. I don’t know why that one felt different.”

“Because he ran. Nobody runs from a good photo. They stick around for more.”

“Maybe he had somewhere to be.”

“Maybe.” I didn’t believe it, and from the look on his face, neither did he, but there wasn’t a version of this dinner where either of us said that out loud without making it worse. He picked his fork back up. I picked mine back up. We went back to performing normal, because that was still the job, whatever that photo had been.

A few minutes passed before either of us said anything real again. He told me the specials were overpriced and underwhelming, which made me laugh before I could stop myself, and I told him the wine list read like it had been written by someone trying too hard to sound like they knew wine, which made him laugh too, a real one this time, quick and surprised out of him like he hadn’t planned on it.

“You’re not what I expected,” I said.

“What did you expect?”

“Someone duller. Someone who’d sit here quoting press releases at me.”

“Give it time.”

“You’ve had two chances to quote a press release at me and you haven’t taken either one.”

“I’m saving it for when you’re not paying attention.” He said it dry, no real threat in it, and for a second the whole table felt less like a stage and more like an actual dinner between two actual people, which was somehow more unsettling than the fake version had been.

“Tell me something true,” I said. “Not for the contract. Just true.”

He considered that for longer than the question should have needed. “I hate steak.”

“You ordered me steak.”

“I ordered you what the article said you liked. I never said I was having any.” He nodded at his own plate, some pasta dish he’d barely touched, and I realized I hadn’t even noticed what he’d ordered for himself, too busy watching everything else about him instead.

“That’s not exactly a deep truth.”

“You said something true. You didn’t say something deep.” A ghost of amusement crossed his mouth. “Careful what you ask for next time.”

A woman approached the table halfway through the meal, phone already out, asking for a photo before she’d even said hello. She was shaking a little, the way fans sometimes did, like meeting me cost her something to work up to.

“You two are so good together,” she said, glancing between us like she needed to check twice to believe it. “How long have you been dating?”

“Not long,” I said, at the same moment Cole said, “Feels longer.”

The woman laughed like we’d planned that, delighted with herself for catching us finishing each other’s sentences, and snapped her photo before either of us could correct the record. Cole stood without being asked, slid an arm around my waist like he’d done it a hundred times before, and smiled for the camera in a way that looked, from where I was standing, completely real.

I leaned into it. I told myself it was because the script demanded it. I told myself that while his hand stayed warm against my hip a full five seconds after the woman had already walked away, and neither of us moved to break it first.

“You can let go,” I said, quiet, the second time that night I’d had to say it to him.

“Right.” He did, finally, and the table felt colder for it in a way I didn’t want to examine too closely.

The rest of the meal went faster than it should have. By the time the car came to take us home, the streets outside had gone quiet, most of the crowd from earlier long since packed up and gone, chasing whatever came next in whatever else was happening in the city that night. I sat on my side of the back seat. Cole sat on his. Neither of us reached for the divider between us, though I noticed us both leaving space for it anyway, like the contract had a physical shape now and we were both careful not to cross it.

“You’re good at this,” I said, into the quiet.

“At what.”

“Pretending. You’re good at it. Too good, maybe.”

He looked out the window instead of at me, and it took him a while to answer, long enough that I thought he might not.

“That’s the problem,” he said finally.

“What is.”

“Nothing.” He shook his head, like he’d said more than he meant to and was working to take it back. “Forget it.”

I didn’t forget it. I sat there turning it over the whole rest of the ride, the way his arm had felt around my waist, the five seconds too long, the way he’d said too good like it cost him something to admit it. I told myself I was only cataloguing the performance, the same way he catalogued my nervous habits, filing away useful information for the next photo, the next event, the next version of us the cameras would want to see.

I didn’t quite believe that either. Outside the window, the city went by in streaks of light, and somewhere between one red signal and the next I caught myself watching his reflection in the glass instead of the streets, the line of his jaw, the way he kept his hands still in his lap like he was used to holding himself in check. I looked away before he could catch me at it, and spent the rest of the ride staring very hard at nothing at all.

The car dropped him first. He paused at the door, one hand on the frame, like there was something else he wanted to say and couldn’t find the shape of it, and for a moment neither of us moved to end it.

“Gerald called while we were eating,” he said instead. “There’s a podcast. Live, in front of an audience. He wants us on it by the end of the week.”

“Doing what.”

“Being convincing.” Something crossed his face, quick, gone before it could become words. “Get some sleep, Rhea.”

He shut the door before I could ask him what he’d stopped himself from saying.