Page 33 of Well, That Was Unexpected

“If you ever need help pulling heads out of asses, I’m your guy.” Oh my god, what are these words falling out of my mouth? “Sorry, that sounded a lot better in my head.”

“I got the gist,” she says, laughing.

My phone buzzes with a reminder that the interviews are starting soon. My stomach clenches at the thought of the interviews. “We should get going. The longer we make the reporters wait, the sharper their questions get.”

Sharlot pales slightly, but she stands up and starts walking next to me. “I won’t lie, I’m really nervous about these interviews.”

“Tell me about it. I’m not looking forward to them.”

“I still feel so out of place here, like I’m totally going to make a mess of everything. Which I already have, which is the very reason I’m here. It’s all so complicated. I’m having a hard time trying to keep all the lies straight in my head.”

“All the lies?” My heart starts thudding against my rib cage like it’s trying to make a break for it. She’s only got the one lie to worry about—the one about us supposedly being in a long-term, long-distance relationship. She can’t possibly know about the other lie—the one where I wasn’t the one she’d been messaging so frequently for over a week.

“Oh. Yeah. I meant the one about us dating.”

“Right.” I’m too scared to ask what other lies there are that she might be referring to, so I quickly say, “That’s okay, I think it’s a totally believable lie. Especially with all the different video call apps we’ve got now. Distance isn’t a problem like it used tobe.”

“But how long will we have to pretend to be a couple?”

There’s a tinge of desperation in her voice that kind of smarts a little. Hard not to take it personally, especially when I consider that she’d been so sweet and warm over ShareIt. Come to think of it, Sharlot was all eager on ShareIt and then became cold and reserved after we met. Which can only mean one thing: She finds the real-life me repulsive.

Ouch.

Like I said, hard not to take it personally.

I give a small shake of the head, trying to clear my thoughts. So she doesn’t like me that way, so what? I don’t even like her on a deeper level aside from her looks.

“Things will die down once the event’s over and the app’s launched. For now, let’s go over the Eighth-Aunt-approved answers again. So let’s see, how did we meet? I know we told them we met on Hardworking Teens, but we’ll probably need more details than that. Like, what got us to start talking, when was the first time we actually met in person, that sort of thing.”

She groans. “We’ve been over this a million times with your aunt, and honestly? All the stuff she came up with sounded really cliché and dumb. Can’t we just say the truth? That you messaged me online and we started chatting?”

I wince. I’m dying, literallydyingto tell her that I did no such thing, that Papa and Eleanor were behind it. It’s just such a creepy thing to do, messaging pretty girls randomly on some app. “Um, talk about cliché…”

She shrugs. “Okay…so, how else would we meet, given you’re based in Jakarta and I’m based in LA?”

“How about we met when I was in LA last year?”

“You were in LA last year?”

I try to think of where I was last year, and with each passing moment as I go through the numerous places I spent last year, Sharlot’s eyebrows rise until they practically disappear into her hair.

“Why are you taking so long to answer?”

“I’m trying to remember if I went to LA last year or not.”

“Just how many places did you go to last year?” she cries.

“I don’t know. Seven? Maybe nine? Do you know how many places you travel to each year?”

“Yeah, the normal number: zero!”

“Oh. Right. Um.” The memory hits me: Eighth Aunt rushing us down Melrose Avenue because she had an appointment at Dior to look at some special-edition handbag they’d reserved just for her. “Yes!” I say quickly, eager to get this conversation over with. “I did go to LA last year.”

She quirks the corner of her mouth up at me. “Took you long enough to remember. Must be hard to travel so much that you can’t even remember where you went a year ago.”

I sigh. I’m noticing that I do that a lot when I’m with Sharlot. “So anyway, we met while I was in LA—”

“I saved your ass from kids who were beating the shit out of you for being so clueless.”

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