fake-ish :: bws

Twenty

PART THREE - THE LIE

v

It was getting chaotic.

I mean, I knew it would be. But not so quick and definitely not so crazy. People were going insane about me and Brad. And nothing had actually happened yet.

We were only going out as friends and I was living my life as normal - and by that I mean, Lucas and I were still together. No, I still hadn't said anything to him about the whole situation. I was pushing it for as long as I could because, 1) who actually wants to break up with someone? And, 2) I was afraid that telling him the truth would be even worse.

So, as far as he was concerned, Brad didn't even exist. He hadn't said a word about it, so, if he was actually reading the news, he wouldn't tell me.

"You know..." Brad said, after a while. We were sitting inside an ice cream shop, with paparazzi madly taking pictures of us from the other side of the window. It was hot and I wished we could be outside in the nice breeze, but that would've been humanly impossible. "I think this is actually working for us."

I looked at him with a puzzled look. I licked my salted caramel ice cream one more time before speaking. "What is working for who?"

He turned his head from the window to me, grinning kindly. "Our fake relationship. I mean, it looks like we've gained a lot of subscribers on the band's YouTube channel since we started going out." He replied, finishing his own ice cream.

"Oh," I mumbled, nodding. I looked outside and paparazzi noticed my movements, suddenly starting to yell and throw their flashes at me, making me look away. "Well, that was expected, I suppose?" I shrugged. "It's been almost two weeks, so it should start having some results by now."

"Yeah but..." He faced down at the table, joining his hands together. "I didn't actually think it'd work out? I thought Joe was being silly, to be honest."

It was his turn to shrug and I couldn't help but look at him. He was so sweet. He always got a bit shy whenever we started talking about our "job" and, in those occasions, his voice would always come out as soft as silk, and it was adorable.

Today, he was wearing a simple white shirt and a red bandana. I liked it. It looked good on him. He had his sunglasses hanging from the collar of the shirt and he was still facing down, a silver necklace resting on his chest. His wrists, standing on the table, had lots of all kinds of bracelets, and it was so stylish. I liked it. It looked good on him.

He then lifted his head up once I didn't reply, his eyes glancing at me, and he caught me staring. A smirk immediately formed on his face and he lost his angelic, naive aura.

As adorable and cute as he was, one thing I noticed during these 2 weeks we'd spent together was that he didn't like to look vulnerable. He was, most of the time, pretty confident and outgoing, but there were certain subjects that left him off guard, which was when I could realise his honest emotions. The fake relationship was one of those subjects, and we couldn't actually avoid talking about that, so, little by little, I started to understand that layer of his.

I sort of related to that - I hated being vulnerable. But I had something in advantage, obviously. I was an actress. I was used to masking things, and emotions were my top 1. It was really rare for me to show someone exactly what I was feeling, if I didn't want to do so.

But my cheeks flushed when he caught me. Damn. I quickly looked away at my ice cream, focusing on eating it and pretending that it didn't happen.

"I can't believe I made you blush," Brad said, amazed. I could hear the smirk on his face.