Page 33 of Fake Love

My eyes are wide. “No sex?” I ask, trying to remember how long it's been since I saw him. Definitely hasn’t been six weeks. “When did you get out of rehab?”

Maddox cringes a bit. “The day I walked into the coffee shop last month.”

“So you broke the ‘no sex’ rule within twenty-four hours?”

He nods. “Yup.”

I almost want to apologize for that night. Hell, I even remember him saying that we shouldn’t have been doing what we were. But we’re both adults here, we both made that decision.

It's not like I have a hypnotizing pussy and coerced him into it.

Trying to take my mind away from our one night together, I move the conversation back to the topic at hand.

“But that still doesn’t answer the question as to why you need a fake girlfriend?”

Does it matter why he needs one? It’s not like I will actually consider it.

Will I?

“There are two reasons,” he starts, pausing a bit before he continues. “One of them being the same reason I need someone to run my social media, to show people that I’m worth playing in San Francisco. To show my team and its fans that I’m not a man defined by my drug use. According to Ben, my skipper, people like the fact when someone is in a relationship.”

Makes sense, I guess. As much as the bachelor athlete garners attention, the athlete in a committed relationship is what keeps the attention. Fans will concentrate more on the individual’s athletic ability than their relationship status if they know he’s taken.

“Okay, and the second reason?” I ask.

I swear if he says so we can repeat our night together whenever we want, I will get the remainder of the pizza and slap it across his face.

“My mom,” he says and the second he does, all the pizza slaps go out the window.

“Your mom wants you to get a fake girlfriend?” I ask, trying to lighten up the mood a bit.

I know it's the wrong thing to do because his facial expression shifts. It was light a bit ago, but now it’s as if he was hit by a dump truck.

“No, she wants me to get a real one,” he says before pausing for a beat and then continuing. “She wants to see me with someone and have the whole package. The marriage. The kids. The house, all of it.”

“So give it to her. I’m sure in a few years you will have all that.” Without a doubt he would have that.

“She may not be here in a few years,” he says, and I know he quickly regrets letting the words out.

“What do you mean?”

Maddox sits up in the metal chair that is a little too small for his body and gives me a look of defeat.

“What I’m about to tell you, isn’t me trying to play any sort of game with you. It is the honest truth. This isn’t something that I would take lightly. Ever.”

His voice is deeper, more determined, holds more pain and I try to not get up from my own seat and go to him. All so that I can comfort him.

“Okay.” I tell him. Giving him a curt nod for him to continue.

“My troubles with cocaine started when doctors told me that my mom had tumors in her brain. I took it a little hard and I took it even harder when the tumor started to grow and she went from a stage two to a stage three. It was as if I was going through the mourning stages for someone that was still alive. I spiraled into the deepest hole imaginable. The doctors very recently told her that the tumors haven’t grown in three months and they are waiting to see if they stay that way. I was talking to her earlier today and for the first time in my life, I heard all hope in her disappear. The doctors may be optimistic but she is not. She almost broke down when she told me that she wanted to see me happy and with a wife and kids before that is taken away from her.”

The pain has really come out and coated his voice now. I can hear it with every single word that he says just how much his mom’s sickness is affecting him.

“That’s horrible.” I say, because what else do I say? ‘I’m sorry’ does not seem like a strong enough words.

He nods. “It is and I hate it. That’s why I want to do this. To make her happy. All the rebranding shit can take a back seat for all I care. Nora Bauer wants to see her baby boy happy and I want to give her that. My mind isn’t in a good headspace to get into a real relationship. Not with me just leaving rehab, with her sickness and having to concentrate on being the baseball player my team is paying me to be. If I have to pretend for her, then I will. I just need someone to help me pretend and I think you would be perfect.”

I want to say yes. I want to tell him that yes, I will be his pretend girlfriend just so that his mom will be happy. I want to, I really do, but I know that I have to think about it before I say anything concrete.

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