Page 34 of How to Ruin a Wedding

“Of course I know; my soul did. It’s a prerequisite to dating me.”

“Anders,” Bethany calls, “come grab the good plates. I can’t reach them.”

Anders kisses the side of my head before helping, and sirens go off in my skull. I need to keep my head straight.It’s pretend; it’s just for show; keep it together.I’d be an idiot to romanticize anything done within the confines of my time here. Any relationship-esque actions taken by Anders are strictly to keep up our ruse—he’s probably not giving any of it a second thought.

Given what happened to him and his first love, his perspective on his sister’s relationship, and his parents, I can’t help but wonder if his affection is so easy to display because there is no pressure on it?

I thought I believed in love—but maybe not as heavily as I used to. Maybe it’s less this grand, all-consuming thing, and more something smaller now. Or some people simply go through life without a lasting version of it, and I might be one of them.

I doubt he’d be interested, but he’d do amazingly as a wedding wrecker, a pretend boyfriend, an actor, all of the above.

My mouth opens to offer help, when I catch sight of a gold frame surrounding a young boy holding a clear bag with a goldfish swimming within. I walk over to it and grin at Anders’s smile, spotted with missing teeth.

Beside that is a younger Bethany holding an even smaller Anders by the leg and a Valerie on her back, nearly choking her in her tiny arms.

“Cute,” I can’t help but say.

A hand settles at the small of my back, its warmth pressing into the inch of skin my raised shirt reveals. “Ready to eat?” Anders whispers to me, his lips brushing my ear.

Surely he doesn’t mean to ask the question as gravelly as he does, eliciting more heat throughout my body. But I burn up all the same, clear my throat, and remind myself it’s an act, and I’m not an amateur.

I chew on my lip and tell myself to tighten the hell up as Anders leads me to a long mahogany table, pulls out a chair, and takes the onebeside me. Valerie takes the spot across from me, Olive facing Anders, and Bethany at the head.

“This is so lovely.” I gesture to the table, the Italian takeout still in its to-go boxes, and what Ithinkis meat loaf, or lasagna, or casserole that must be Bethany’s doing, along with burnt pieces of bread and a salad covered in Parmesan shreds. “Thank you for having me.”

“Thank you for coming,” Bethany says, waving a hand. “Go on, fill your plate. Since you’re vegetarian, I made shepherd’s pie—mushroom for the beef.” She looks over at the burnt dish and sighs. “But if you want to eat some pasta, I can’t blame you.”

“That’s shepherd’s pie?” Valerie starts filling her plate with calamari, stealing the tongs from Olive. “I thought that was a gathering of the neighbor’s three-day-old bird food.”

I lean over, grab the ladle, and fill my plate with the homemade dish, ignoring the bread. I take a forkful and raise it to my mouth, when Valerie holds out a hand.

“Oh my God,” Valerie says. “Do you have a death wish?”

Even Bethany winces. “This is a big moment for me, for us, for Anders. We’ve only met one girl before, so I felt it was right to make a meal, but my hands are meant for gardening, riding horses, and pressing the buttons on a microwave. You really don’t have to.”

Guilt pries its way into my side at that. Even though Anders asked me to do this, being here and lying to these people feels a little too ... personal.

Maybe my other jobs felt more clinical because of my lack of connection to clients, and I’ve only pretended to be a fake girlfriend once. But Anders’s family thinks I will be a staple in his life, and Bethany made a meal for my diet, and Olive keeps looking at me with wide, curious eyes, making my chest tighten.

“You cooked it, so I’ll eat it.” I place the forkful in my mouth and swallow it down. It tastes like charcoal, rubber, and salty potatoes. I don’t flinch as I take another bite, this time strategically mixing it with the salad.

“Olive, close your eyes. I think we might be witnessing a death,” Valerie whispers.

“Awesome,” Olive says.

“It’s really not that bad,” I say. “Trust me, I’ve had worse.” Or, often enough, nothing at all.

Anders puts a hand on my knee, and when I face him, his eyes are warm and soft, with just the slightest touch of heat glistening in them, so the skin behind my ears begins to warm.

“Well,” Bethany says, with a wide smile, “your parents raised you very polite.”

At that, Anders squeezes my thigh. The touch isn’t fake this time but for comfort. I squeeze him back:I’m okay.

“So, Valerie,” I begin as everyone starts digging into their own plates—Anders, too, is eating the burnt pie—“how is the wedding planning? Anders says you’ll be walking down the aisle in three months.”

She frowns, pointing her knife toward Anders. “I’m sure that’s not all he said. Usually, any conversation that starts with ‘wedding’ ends with ‘don’t get married, you idiot.’”

“I havenevercalled you that,” Anders says, aghast.