Fake Date, Real Trouble
💔 Part 3: Rules Don’t Protect You
It happened on a Thursday. The kind of day that feels off from the start.
Miles didn’t wait for me outside first period like usual.
He didn’t text me.
He didn’t even look at me in the hall.
I stared at my phone during lunch, my untouched salad wilting beside me.
Me:
You okay?
No reply.
Me again (10 minutes later):
If this is about the sweater I shrunk in the wash, I’ll buy you a new one. Or a yacht. Whichever.
Still nothing.
When I finally found him after school, he was leaning against his locker, talking to Olivia. Smiling.
Smiling.
Something inside me twisted.
I walked up like I didn’t notice, didn’t care, didn’t feel the phantom bruise of hope cracking in my ribs.
“Hey.” I kept my voice steady.
He looked at me. Then back at her. “Hey.”
No warmth. No grin. No inside joke. Just… cold air between us.
“You forgot we were going to the bookstore after class.”
“Did I?” he asked flatly. “Maybe I figured fake couples don’t need real plans.”
Ouch.
Olivia smirked and walked away like she’d just won something.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked, too stunned to mask it.
He crossed his arms. “You said no real feelings, Callie. But maybe you forgot your own rules.”
I stared at him.
“You think I’m catching feelings?”
“Aren’t you?”
The way he said it—sharp, defensive, like he was the one who got hurt—it knocked the breath out of me.
“I thought you were different,” he muttered. “But maybe this was just a game to you.”
I wanted to scream. To shake him. To say no, you’re wrong, because I don’t do games—not anymore, not after what I’ve been through.
But instead, I just stood there, jaw clenched, every inch of me frozen in the silence between us.
“Fine,” I said. “If that’s what you think.”
And I walked away.
Part 5: The Fall-Out
The Friday night party wasn’t my scene.
It was loud, crowded, and smelled like regret and cheap cologne.
But Taylor begged me to come, and I needed a distraction. Something to shut off the loop of Miles’s words echoing in my head.
So I went.
And, naturally, disaster followed.
It started with Ben.
Remember Ben? The emotionally constipated guy I pretended not to like anymore?
He cornered me near the pool, smelling like whiskey and ego.
“Didn’t think I’d see you here,” he slurred.
“And yet, here you are. Defying my dreams.”
“Funny.” He stepped closer. “You look good. Better than you did when you were chasing me.”
“That must be your drunk goggles talking.”
He grabbed my wrist—not painfully, but firmly. “Come on, Callie. I know you want this.”
“Let. Me. Go.”
That’s when his grip tightened.
That’s when I realized I was alone on the side of the house, and no one could hear me over the music.
That’s when panic—sharp, cold, blinding—shot through me.
“You touched enough.”
Ben disappeared into the shadows like a bad decision finally realized, leaving me alone with Miles.
His chest rose and fell like he’d just sprinted a mile—but it wasn’t adrenaline. It was anger. And something else. Something deeper.
I waited for him to say something. A joke. A question. Anything.
Instead, he stepped back.
“I shouldn’t have come,” he said, voice tight.
“Miles—”
“This was a mistake.”
He turned like he was going to leave again, just like he had yesterday, but I grabbed his arm—just long enough to stop him. Just long enough to feel his muscles tense under my hand.
“Why are you doing this?” I asked. “Why are you pushing me away like I broke some unspoken contract?”
He didn’t look at me.
“Because you didn’t just lie to Olivia, Callie. You lied to me too.”
My breath hitched. “How?”
“You said this was fake. You said it didn’t matter. But you look at me like I matter.”
And that—that—made something ache deep in my chest. Because he was right. I had started looking at him like he mattered. Like he was safe. Like he was mine.
But I wouldn’t admit that. Not now. Not when he was still so quick to run.
“You know what?” I said, voice sharpening. “If you want to go back to Olivia, go ahead.”
He finally looked at me—eyes burning, jaw tight.
“It’s not about her—”
“It never is, is it?” I snapped. “But somehow she’s always in the picture. Always hovering. I won’t be someone’s distraction, Miles. Not again.”
“You’re not—”
“Then what am I? Because if I’m nothing, say it. Let’s call it. Say we’re done. Say it to my face.”
Silence.
And then he said the worst thing possible.
“We should pretend we broke up.”
Just pretend.
Like it was all still a game. Like I wasn’t bleeding under the rules we both agreed on.
I nodded, jaw trembling.
“Fine. Tell whoever you need to. But make it believable.”
I stepped back, dusting off invisible dirt from my skirt like I was cleaning the memory of him off me.
“You’re free now. Date her. Date anyone.”
My voice was calm. Royal. Controlled.
And that was the scariest part.
Later That Night
I stared at the ceiling, the stars on my bedroom wall blinking faintly from an old projector I’d had since I was ten.
I should’ve been humiliated.
Everyone would know soon. That Miles Carter broke up with me. That it was all fake.
But that wasn’t what made my stomach turn.
It was the thought of him laughing with Olivia. His hand on her back. Her lips where mine never quite reached.
It wasn’t public embarrassment I feared.
It was that I didn’t want him to belong to her again.
And that terrified me more than anything.
🌧️ Part 6: The Truth Between Us
I avoided him for three days.
Not out of pride. Not even revenge.
But because facing Miles now meant confronting something I wasn’t ready to name.
People whispered, of course. “She faked the whole thing.” “He dumped her.” “Olivia’s back.”
I let it happen.
I walked through the halls with my chin held high, eyes steady, smile rehearsed.
But every time someone asked, “You okay?” I felt like I was splintering all over again.
Because they didn’t care.
Not really.
They just asked to fill the silence. Not to wait for an answer.
Except Miles.
He was the only one who ever asked and meant it. The only one who saw through the armor and said, “You’ve been through something,” not like it was gossip, but like it was gravity.
He saw me.
That’s what made it worse.
Because once you’ve been seen, going back to being invisible feels like drowning.
Then it happened finally, and my heart dropped once again. It happened in the music room after school—the one no one used except the drama club and the lost kids who needed somewhere to hide.
He found me there, alone, sitting at the piano even though I didn’t know how to play.
He didn’t knock. Didn’t say my name. Just walked in like he’d always belonged in the mess I called mine.
“I was wrong,” he said quietly.
I didn’t look up.
“About what?” I asked, even though I already knew.
“About pretending.”
He walked closer. Not fast. Just enough to not feel like a threat.
“When I said we should break up… I wasn’t angry. I was scared. Scared because you made it feel real. Scared because you made me feel real.”
I turned, finally meeting his eyes.
“Then why Olivia? Why smile at her like nothing happened between us?”
He sighed. “Because she was easy. Familiar. A way to prove I didn’t feel anything.”
“And did it work?”
“No,” he whispered. “It made me feel worse. Because the only person I wanted to talk to about how much it hurt… was you.”
That cracked something in me. A dam behind my ribcage.
“You were different, Miles,” I said, voice shaking. “Everyone else asks, ‘How are you?’ like it’s a formality. But you looked at me and saw it. The grief. The wreckage. And you didn’t flinch.”
He stepped closer.
“You made me want to be honest,” I said. “Even when it hurt.”
“So let’s be honest now,” he said. “Do you still want this?”
I didn’t answer right away.
Because it wasn’t just about want.
It was about trust. About letting someone see the ruined, hidden places and not running from it.
“Yes,” I finally whispered. “But not if we’re pretending.”
His fingers brushed mine.
“Then let’s forget the rules.”
He leaned in, slow—like I was something fragile and precious all at once.
And when he kissed me, it wasn’t fireworks.
It was warmth. Familiar. Steady. Real.
Like coming home to something I didn’t know I’d lost.
We didn’t tell everyone. Not right away.
Let them whisper. Let them guess.
We had nothing to prove anymore.
Because some things don’t need labels. Some people don’t need perfect stories.
Just one person willing to say, “I see you. All of you.”
And stay anyway.
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