Scared to love

Chloë's POV

I get on my motorcycle after a day that was way too long. I go home quickly and see the guys sitting in the kitchen. Jake looks frustrated and sits with his hands in his hair. "Is there really no girl?", I hear Matthew ask. "Hey guys", I say when I enter the kitchen. "You're late today", Dakota remarks. "Yeah thank the professor for that. They went half an hour over time, talking about something that seemed important, just to announce that we don't need to remember it when they were finally ready", I let out a frustrated sigh. "What's for dinner?", I ask. "Can we order pizza?", Jake asks. "What are you stressing about?", I ask him. "I'm not stressed", he denies. "You only want pizza when you're stressed", I remark. "Wait that's actually true", Matthew says after thinking for a second. "I'll order some", Dakota says. "Yeah thanks Dakota", I reply.

"Come on you, spit it out, what's wrong?", I ask Jake. "Do you remember that competition?", he asks me. "The promotion one? Yeah why?" "I won and the client want to go have dinner with me and asked if I have a girlfriend because otherwise he would introduce his daughter to me, but I have no interest in meeting her so I lied about having a girlfriend. Now I have to find a girl that wants to pretend to be my girlfriend for the evening or a good excuse why I couldn't bring her", he explains. "When's the dinner?", I ask him. "This Friday", he replies. "I don't have to work Friday night, I can go with you if you want me to", I suggest. "Wait really? You'd do that for me?", he asks. "Yeah why not?", I shrug. "See this is why I call you an angel", he says while hugging me. "Okay now calm down, it's just a dinner", I reply. "Pizza's should be here in about ten minutes", Dakota dryly announces.

"Hey uh Chloë?", Jake says. "Yeah what's up?", I answer. "Do you remember when you said yesterday that it's just a dinner?", he starts. "Yeah why?", I slowly ask. "Well uh, I was talking to Harper today in the breakroom and we were talking about you", he says. "Who's Harper?", I ask. "She's one of my co-workers, but she's like a sister", he replies. "Okay so what does she have to do with me and the dinner?" "Well we were talking about how I lied and how you suggested to go with me and she wanted to see you so I was showing her some pictures of you and us together. While I was showing them though, someone else came in the room and they thought I was talking about my girlfriend and he took my phone and went into the office to show the others so know my whole department thinks that you're my girlfriend", he rattles. "Oh God", I sigh, "well as long as I don't have to meet them, we'll be fine right?" "Yeah well that's the thing", he says while rubbing the back of his neck. "The uh dinner suddenly became for the whole department", he mumbles. "You're kidding right?", I ask. "I wish I was, but I'm not. I'd understand if you don't want to do it anymore, I'll just come up with a lie", he replies. "No no it's fine. Just uh, tell me what to wear and how to act and we should be fine", I say.

"What do you want me to wear Jake?", I ask him. "I don't know, what about the dress you wore at our graduation?", he suggests. "Great idea, I'll be ready soon", I reply while walking to my room. "Good, I'll wait downstairs", he responds. He had quickly freshned up a little bit after coming home from work so that he would look okay during the dinner and now I'm just putting on the dress. I put on a pair of heels and take my bag before walking downstairs. Jake is waiting at the stairs for me and while I'm walking down, he looks up at me in awe. "God, you look beautiful", he says when I stand next to him. "Thanks, you don't look too bad yourself, but maybe we should get going", I reply. "Dakota, Matthew, we're leaving!", Jake yells before opening the door. "Have fun guys!", Dakota yells back. With that we leave the house and get into his car so that we can go to the restaurant where the dinner is organized.