The Pretend Girlfriend (19 page)

"How did you get a table?" she said.

He shrugged. "Maybe I've been waiting a while. Maybe I come here to work because I like the area."

That was really sweet. So sweet that she hardly entertained the thought that he might be acting. It must have shown on her face, because he immediately backpedaled.

"Or maybe I just paid the person sitting here before me to go." Aiden gave her a closed-lip smile and glanced out the window.

"Sure," Gwen said, taking a more measured sip from her cup this time. The latte tasted so good when it wasn't scalding her mouth.

"How I got the table doesn't matter. Will you tell me what this is all about?" he said.

She told him about the early morning call, about the car, going into Manhattan, about Henry's counter offer and how she'd declined it (this sounded better to her than saying that she'd thrown a pen at him and stormed out).

Aiden sat back in his chair. Reaching up, he tugged at his tie as though it had been slowly tightening around his throat this whole time. All that amusement from earlier disappeared, replaced by a thoughtful expression that made him appear older than his years.

"Why did you do that?" he said.

"What do you mean?" Gwen replied.
What sort of question is that?
Gwen wondered.
It's like he's genuinely shocked and confused as to why I threw the offer back in Henry's face. Why I
declined
it, I mean.

"I mean, you could have gotten out of this whole thing. And with probably a whole lot more money than I'm paying you, if I know my father. Why didn't you take it?"

That got her back up. Tension knots formed in her shoulders. "Are you saying that I should have?" Gwen said, giving him an icy look that just reflected off his placid exterior.

"No. I'm saying that I don't understand why you didn't."

Does he think I'm faking this or something?
Gwen thought. Her anger changed into frustration with a teaspoon of despair.

"You know why I did it," she said. Reaching out, she put her hand over his. He started to flinch, but stopped. She could see that shield coming up to cover his feelings even more than they already were.

"No, I don't. If this is about you and me, I thought I made myself clear how I feel," Aiden said. Despite his tone, he didn't take his hand out from under hers.

"I don't believe you," Gwen replied, her voice getting a little shaky.
This is what happens when I don't get enough sleep!
she thought. But it was too late to stop now. "If I did believe you about that, I would have signed Henry's contract and never seen you again."

This time, Aiden did pull his hand away. The portion of the table where it had sat still felt warm. He stood up, taking a deep breath and licking his lips. "He's going to step up his efforts now. I need to go and think about the best way to proceed."

He started to walk away, but Gwen snagged him by the wrist and got up as well. He wasn't getting away that easily. She could see the chink in his armor, could tell that she'd widened it and that the real Aiden was behind it.

"Stop lying to yourself," Gwen said. They stood close to each other, Gwen looking up into his eyes, Aiden looking down into hers. She saw him, then, the real Aiden. Before he could retreat behind his armor again, she grabbed the back of his head and pulled him down into a kiss.

It was hot, like all the heat in her body rushed up to her lips. Aiden's arms slipped around her back and pulled her hard against him. Her knees weakened, but he held her up.

And then she felt cold. Cold because he stepped back from her, letting his hands fall away from her body. Heat flushed his cheeks, too, and he struggled to regain control.

"Aiden..." Gwen said, reaching for him.

He looked at her hand, then backed away. He nearly knocked over a stand of bags of medium roast coffee. "I can't," he said.

She watched him push his way out to the street and disappear in the crowd. A middle aged guy in a suit with a copy of the Wall Street Journal tucked under his arm had taken her table, but she didn't care anymore.

Who are you, Aiden Manning?
Gwen wondered.

I
f there was one thing Gwen thought she could count on to take her mind off Aiden, it was school. She arrived back at her apartment still hungry, but determined not to think about this whole predicament for now.

Another slice of peanut butter toast would have gone a long way to solving her hunger problem at least, but just looking at the loaf of bread brought back that hot sensation of embarrassment from arriving at Starbucks with her last slice still in hand.

So, bowl of Cheerios clutched close, she went back to her room. She sat down at her desk with determination, determinedly opened her laptop, and forcefully double-clicked the Microsoft Word icon on her desktop screen.

All that determination drained from her as she stared at the blank white screen in front of her. The cursor blinked mockingly, daring her to even attempt to start typing.

It was all well and good to decide to get to work, but when Gwen got down to it, like many people, she discovered that the desire to work and willpower to actually start were two different, possibly mutually exclusive, things.

She chewed on her bottom lip, her eyes glassing over as she poised her fingers over the keyboard, waiting for inspiration to strike.

Her normal routine (aside from procrastination, of course) was to plot a paper out at least a week in advance. Following a plan worked out better than striking off into the ether without a map, she always found.

And the paper was actually due in two days. Hard copy handed to the professor, electronic copy submitted to see if she'd bought the essay off the internet.

"Aha!" she said, thinking she'd found that elusive starting line.

Her fingers started tapping away, confidently at first, but flagging like a sprinter running out of breath not long thereafter. The cursor blinked at the end of the incomplete sentence.

It read: "What's wrong, can't you write a simple essay without thinking about Aid"

And that's where she stopped. Leaning back in her chair, she sighed. It was rather ironic, she realized, this inability to write. The big reason (or the thing she told herself was the big reason, in any case) that she'd accepted Aiden's offer was that doing so would allow her to stay here at school so she could finish her degree. And now there she sat, unable to concentrate on school from thinking about a guy who was about as open and readable as a book written in Swahili.

"Coffee. Coffee's the answer," she muttered, unable to bear the mocking she perceived in the cursor's unrelenting blinking.

So, getting up, she went for the kitchen. Coffee actually wasn't the best answer. She already felt that strange combination of alertness and exhaustion that came from being over-caffeinated on too little sleep. But at least it would keep her (shaky) hands busy for a few minutes while she prepared it.

And it would give her a few more precious moments of procrastination! That thought put a bit of a spring in her step. There was just something so satisfying in procrastinating, in giving yourself permission to put off a task until the last possible moment.

Gwen started washing out the coffee pot, using far too much dish soap. The lavender scent of it filled the air.

She'd just finished drying it when someone knocked at the door.

It had to be either Beatrice or Aiden, she knew. Though Beatrice should be on campus at this time, so that left Aiden. Hopefully he was here to explain that little freak-out at Starbucks.

They knocked again.

"Coming!" Gwen said, annoyed. She rubbed her hands against her pants, trying to get rid of the clamminess from sticking them in hot, soapy water. It would be just the thing for Aiden to notice about her. He already knew that she wore glasses sometimes, and that her parents called her Gwenny. No need to let him think she had granny hands.

A third round of knocking started just when she unlocked the door and pulled it open.

Rather than Aiden or Beatrice, a man in a dark suit, his hair slicked back, stuck a microphone in her face. His spray tan made him look orange, and his fake smile almost blinded her with the radiance of his artificially whitened teeth.

Behind him stood another man, a camera resting on his shoulder. A little red light blinked beneath the lens.
That means it's recording, doesn't it?
Gwen thought.

"Hi! I'm Rick Sanchez..." he started.

Gwen tried shutting the door. Rick stuck his foot beneath the jamb, that smile never leaving his face. She recognized him as the host from one of those celebrity gossip shows. Beatrice would probably know him better; she tended to follow that type of thing a lot more.

"Gwen, my viewers just want to know how things are going between you and Aiden Manning. Care to give us a sound bite?" Rick said. He thrust the microphone into the gap between door and frame. The movement wafted some of his cologne Gwen's way, tickling at her nose.

That was just what she needed, to sneeze all over a camera crew. And she could spare a hand to cover her face, either. Both hands did their best to shut the door in Rick's smug face.

Through some Herculean effort (and no small amount of wriggling her nose to get rid of the tickle) she suppressed her natural urge.

"No comment," she said. That's what people were always saying in movies and shows when they didn't want an interview, wasn't it? Of course, now that she thought about it, the people saying that were usually guilty of something or other, or trying to hide something.

But Rick was persistent. He kept his toes stuck beneath the door, and that microphone didn't tremble at all. "Are you sure? Maybe just a few words on the rumor?"

That gave Gwen pause. She stopped trying to throw all her weight against the door in the hopes that it might just slide right on over Rick's stupid foot. "What rumor?"

Rick's smile widened. Did one of his teeth actually glint? He looked like a greasy shark ready to swallow up an unsuspecting and adorable seal.

"Well, we got an interesting tip in an email. It said this whole thing between you and Aiden is nothing but a few signatures on some contract. Is that true? And if it is, why would someone like Aiden Manning need to buy himself a girlfriend? What's your take on all this, Gwen?"

I really need to start looking through the peephole
, Gwen thought. An awful stew of feelings stirred in her stomach and tried to rise up her throat. This was Henry stepping up his game, she knew. Whatever else you said about the man, he worked quickly.

And it was clear that Rick wasn't leaving without getting something out of her. Especially not with that shiny (but now scuffed) shoe of his stuck almost halfway beneath her door.

Okay, okay, just be cool, she told herself. And she was grateful that she'd taken the time to make herself look presentable earlier. It wasn't much of a silver lining. A razor's edge of one, really. But you had to take them where you could get them.

Gwen started to smile, but kept it a closed-lip one. Her teeth were in pretty good shape, but virgin snow would look discolored next to Rick's chompers.

"Okay, um, what's between Aiden and me is real. That's all, thank you..."

She started closing the door again, but Rick didn't remove his foot. "And what is it between you and Aiden? Is it a legal document?"

"There's going to be a legal document between us if you don't take your foot out of my apartment. This is trespassing, you know," Gwen said, getting flustered again.

"Thank you, Gwen. I think that we can work with what I have," Rick said. He reached into his jacket and pulled out a card. "If you're interested in coming to the studio for an interview..." he said, pulling his foot back finally.

Gwen seized the opportunity. She shut the door hard enough that the wall shook. Ever tenacious, Rick slipped the card through beneath the door. Gwen tore it up and tossed it into the trash.

On the bright side, she didn't need coffee anymore. Adrenaline pounded through her body, leaving her arms and legs shaky and her throat dry.

Henry was a risk taker, it seemed. He'd at the very least suggested the truth. Trying to scare her off, she knew. But it could also backfire. After all, he'd not come out and revealed the whole truth. It would damage the image of his company, and the last thing Henry Manning would ever allow was someone to hurt his business.

What was going to happen next? Would she show up for a lecture only to find a camera crew waiting outside the lecture hall?

Worse, would her classmates start to ask her about all this? It was pretty clever on Henry's part, she had to admit. Rumors spread faster than wildfire. He was getting help from the public, now.

She wondered what Aiden would make of it. Of course, if interviewed himself, he'd tell them it was real.

She went back to her desk, pushed the laptop aside, and rested her forehead against the cool surface. Was it real to him, though? Or was it really just a contract with a few signatures for him?

Is all this worth it?
Gwen thought.
Or am I the one who can't tell fantasy from reality?
She kept sticking her neck out for Aiden, and so far for pretty much nothing in return but more trouble.

The best thing to do right then was just to get to work. To try and make all this effort worth it by following through on her school obligations.

With that in mind, she fired up Internet Explorer and did her best to ignore the open Word document. She had new emails.

One was from The Office of Henry Manning. It was a brief message, telling her that she could expect a lot more pressure now. And also to remind her that she could end it all quickly and easily, and that her life would go back to normal. And also that the cash settlement was off the table.

That was a crock, she knew. Even if she terminated the agreement right then, normal was no longer possible. People knew, now.

Her cell started buzzing against the desk. Gwen picked it up, and almost put it back down. Her call display read Mom. She contemplated not answering, but did.