All Chapters of Off-script: My Accidental Fake Boyfriend: Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

Riley’s PovIf there were to be an Olympic sport for pretending you’re fine, I would have qualified years ago.The campus festival lights flickered above me like I was walking through a beautifully edited dream sequence. Music thumped from the main stage. Glitter cannons exploded somewhere to my left. Half the theatre department was already tipsy on something that definitely wasn’t water in those plastic bottles.Backstage was worse.Costumes dragged across the floor. Props lay abandoned mid-crisis. Makeup artists hunted for faces to paint. Our director’s voice carried through two walls, sharp and already fraying at the edges.I took a slow breath. The air felt thin. Metallic.Four years on stage, and my body still reacted like this; pulse hammering, throat tight, palms cold.Tonight wasn’t just a performance. To everyone else, it was the festival’s closing act. Applause. Confetti. Photos for social media. For me? It was the first round of the biggest audition of my life.Three weeks

Riley’s PovIf everything that happened last night was a performance, I might have rated it as the worst play of the year. And the fact that I had willingly cast myself in it? Embarrassing. Mortifying. What was I even thinking—doing something like that completely sober?Despite the disaster, a stubborn part of me still hoped I had made it past the first round of the audition. That hope sat quietly beneath everything else, fragile but persistent.I pushed myself out of bed, the sheets tangled around my legs, and drifted toward the mirror as if pulled by something I couldn’t quite resist. The girl staring back at me didn’t feel like me. Her hair was a wild, matted mess—“bedhead” didn’t even begin to cover it. Smudged lipstick clung unevenly to her lips, and dark streaks from last night’s eyeliner shadowed her eyes, swollen and raw from crying. My skin looked dull, my expression hollow.It was almost safe to say last night had been the worst night of my life. And as if that thought alone

Riley’s POVDon’t get me wrong, I love my mom, but I hate dealing with her.My mom is a little bit… well, extra, and it gets really tiring. It wasn’t always like this. Not until after the incident with my dad, then the divorce. Something in her shifted after that. She became closed off, conservative, overly everything.The divorce happened when I was still in high school. I almost didn’t get to study theatre because of it. My mom was completely against it. So she set a condition, one that could have easily cost me a lot of roles if I wasn’t as good as I am.So no, don’t blame me for putting off calling her until I got home.I also knew better than to open her message and ignore it afterward, so I left it untouched until I felt ready.Except I wasn’t.Ten seconds into the video had me tossing my phone across the bed, the soft thud of it hitting the mattress barely registering. Too stunned to breathe. What did I just see? And why on earth was that video coming from my mom?“No. No. No.”

Riley’s PovI had already written an entire script in my head explaining why Cole absolutely had to meet with me. Then I wrote another one as backup, just in case he refused. Which, honestly, felt highly likely considering yesterday he had thrown “No” at me in at least twelve different variations, like it was the only word available in his vocabulary.During my very questionable research session, I’d done some digging on him and stumbled across a photo of Cole kissing another guy. The caption beneath it read:Your golden boy Cole has never been seen in an intimate relationship with a girl because he’s into guys and takes advantage of them due to his position.The whole thing felt intense.I didn’t know Cole, not really, but the rumors didn’t line up with the kiss we shared. Not after the way he kissed me back. There had been nothing uncertain about it. Nothing forced either.Still, maybe this worked in my favor.If I pitched fake dating as something that could help redirect the rumors

Riley’s PovWho would have guessed the cold genius could actually be a good actor?Because honestly, this dinner was going far better than I’d expected. I had fully prepared myself for disaster. I mean, come on. Cole was practically a stranger who treated conversation like an optional feature in life, and my mother was impossibly picky. In my head, a complete train wreck had been the closest thing to success.“You look like a promising young man,” Mom began, folding her napkin neatly onto her lap, “but I must ask… if you’re a computer engineering student, how exactly did your paths cross?”“We met at the library.”“Theatre.”Cole and I answered at the exact same time. Mom’s eyes narrowed slightly as her gaze shifted between us.“I first saw Riley at the theatre,” Cole explained smoothly. “My twin is her co-star, so I sometimes have reasons to be around there. But we officially met in the library.”What a clean save. Mom nodded slowly, though she still looked unconvinced.“And when was