A kind of calm settled over us for the next week. Flashes of the real Theo pierced through his facade more often than they had before, and all his PDA was getting less and less annoying. He started texting me goodnight, and I started texting him good morning. He even helped me when I got stuck on my math homework so I didn't have to run to Gyeong-Ja or Audra for help. I didn't feel the slightest bit of guilt, either, when I put off my history chapter summaries just so he and I could work on our English papers together.
But maybe it was all just the calm before the storm. William had sent Theo the details of the reservation that Madeleine had made for Saturday night, and the week flew by far too quickly. Theo and I both battled through tough games on Saturday afternoon, and then suddenly it was evening, and he was waiting for me in the common room, dressed in a tailored blazer, immaculate dress shirt, and dark jeans. Since my wardrobe didn't exactly have many fancy-French-bistro-appropriate options, Gyeong-Ja had loaned me a navy sheath dress to match my only pair of strappy heels. But since she was a good three inches shorter than me, it hit a little high on the thigh. When Theo let out a low whistle, I flapped my hand at him to stop and hastily did up my coat, mortified that I was blushing.
"You clean up good, Emdubs," he said, offering me his arm.
I accepted it gratefully, super unaccustomed to walking in heels. "So do you, Ellerby. Nice goal today, by the way."
He grinned. "It was gorgeous, wasn't it?"
"A thing of beauty," I agreed. "And a nightmare for any defender."
He opened his car door for me. "Nah. You'd have stopped that chip and run without breaking a sweat."
I couldn't help my smile as I buckled myself in.
The bistro that Madeleine had picked was exactly as chic as I'd expected, and when Theo held the door to usher me in, I was thankful that Gyeong-Ja had vetoed my jeans and shirt combo. Dark, leather booths circled the walls, and candles warmed the ambience of the low-lit, brick-walled restaurant. William and Madeleine were already seated in a booth near the back, snuggled together and perusing the same menu.
"You ready?" Theo asked, handing our jackets over to the coat check guy.
I reached for his hand. "Ready as I'll ever be."
His fingers were tight around mine as we wove between the white tablecloths.
"Lovely restaurant pick, Mads," Theo said by way of greeting. "Very posh."
"Thanks." She beamed, while William slid out to stand up. But before he could hug either of us hello, Theo had ushered me into the booth and sat down beside me.
"So, what looks good?" he asked, lifting the leather-bound menu so we could share ours the way William and Madeleine had shared theirs.
William's pleasant smile didn't falter as he took his seat again. "The escargots are phenomenal. And so is the steak tartare."
I tried not to grimace as I read down the tasting menu. At least half the dishes were things I very much didn't want to swallow—escargots, caviar, foie gras, steak tartare—and I didn't have much of a choice if the menu's strict "Saturday night - tasting menu only" was to be believed.
"All your favorites," Theo said to William with a razor-sharp smile. "Too bad there's nothing I'd enjoy."
"He's joking," William said to Madeleine, when she opened her mouth, brows furrowed. "Though his palate is definitely less cultured than ours. Should I ask if they can make you a hamburger?"
Theo grinned and snapped the menu shut. "I'll take it well done. With curly fries."
William stared at him, unimpressed, and closed their menu, too.
"I love your dress, Ellie," Madeleine said into the heavy silence.
"Thank you," I replied, "Yours is stunning."
And it was. The neckline was asymmetrical, with a red silk bow that sat perfectly on her left shoulder and cascaded down to a cinched waistline. It was the kind of dress my mother would have stuffed me into for Junior League—expensive, beautiful, and dreadfully uncomfortable.
A waiter appeared with a bottle of Perrier, and I took another peek at the menu, hoping I could convince him to bring me something fully-cooked that wasn't a snail. But before he could so much as explain the tasting menu, William had ordered it for each of us. Beside me, Theo bristled. I rested a hand on his jiggling knee.
"So, has Theo invited you to the Harvest Gala next week?" William asked, after he and Madeleine had clinked glasses with us.
"Oh, you have to come! It's going to be so much fun," Madeleine gushed.
"Ellie has better things to do than waste an evening on small talk with Mom and Dad's friends," Theo said before I could reply.
"So you didn't invite her." William raised his eyebrows. "Interesting."
Theo's leg tensed beneath my hand.
"He did," I lied, before Theo could respond. "It's just not really my scene."
William's piercing gaze remained on his brother. He smiled. "That's too bad. I'm sure Mom and Dad would've loved to meet their son's new girlfriend. Frankly, I don't really think they believe it. Mom'll probably try to set you up with someone like last year."
Theo's arm snaked around my waist and pulled me closer. "She can try. But I'm a one-woman kind of guy, now."
William's smile didn't falter as he tilted his head. "See, I'm finding that a bit hard to believe, too. I don't think I've ever seen the two of you kiss."
My shoulders tightened. I busied myself with my napkin in my lap, forcing my expression into something placid. Anything to hide my growing panic that William was already poking holes in our fake relationship before the first course.
Thankfully, steaming hot plates of escargots arrived right as Theo laughed.
"I didn't take you for a voyeur, Willy," he said. "Maybe you should think more about kissing your own girlfriend and not mine."
Madeleine paused, mid-sip of water. I bit my cheek and stared down at my plate. Nausea that had nothing to do with the snails rolled around my belly. This was going all wrong, way too fast.
"Maybe we should just—" Madeleine began diplomatically.
"I mean it," William cut over her. "Have you two ever actually kissed?"
"What kind of question is that?" Theo asked, poking at his food. "Of course we have."
William folded his arms. "Then prove it."
I stopped breathing. The escargots stared up at me from their buttery wells. I very much did not want to stare at them, but in that moment, even they were more appealing than the thought of looking at anyone else at the table.
Theo scoffed, gesturing at our plates. "We're in the middle of dinner—"
William leaned back, a satisfied, cruel smile on his face. It had the nausea rising higher in my throat. "Kiss her, Theo. Unless she's not really your girlfriend, and this is some pathetic little game you're playing."
Shit. Shit.
My stomach hollowed out and dropped through the bottom of the booth bench. He'd figured it out.
Madeleine's eyebrows shot up. She stared across at me intently, as if she was hoping to read the truth on my face. And because I was hopeless at these games of barbed words and polite insults, she probably read it plain as day. There was only one way to fix this.
Theo scoffed. "I'm not just going to kiss her because you ordered me—"
Before I could second guess myself, before I could think of a million reasons why it was a terrible idea, I seized Theo's cheek and leaned up to press my lips to his. Except I'd caught him mid-sentence, so I got more teeth than lips before I drew away.
And then I wished that I hadn't. Because Theo had frozen, lips still parted, eyes wide. When he didn't recover as quickly as I'd have liked, I forced on my sweetest smile and caressed his cheek, hoping he couldn't feel my fingers quaking.
"Maybe that's why he doesn't let me kiss him in public," I said, glancing towards William and Madeleine. "He freezes up like a deer in headlights."
For a beat, he still was, until his expression smoothed out, replaced by his trademark smirk. His arm slid around my shoulders and he pulled me towards him. "What can I say? Your kisses render me speechless."
But when I rested my head against his chest, his heart was racing, thudding beneath by ear. I blinked against my frown, freezing my smile in place as I tried and failed to process what that meant. Probably nothing. Probably that I'd just startled him. Or horrified him, given how terrible a kiss it had been. My cheeks flamed. I swallowed against the uncomfortable tightness in my throat.
William's jaw worked. He seized his fork and stabbed into an escargot. "Then I guess I was wrong."
"Obviously. Now, can we enjoy our dinner without more of an inquisition?" Theo asked. Though the easygoing arrogance of his tone was not matched by the pulse still racing against my cheek.
"Let's," Madeleine said, her eyes on her plate.
But my appetite had vanished. Something hot and electric charged the space between Theo and me now, and my lips wouldn't stop tingling. I didn't know how I was going to sit through five more courses when I was already having too difficult a time keeping the part of me that was inwardly screaming from showing on my face.
"You should try one, Ellie," William said, eyeing my full plate.
I swallowed. "No, thanks."
"Come on," William continued. "They're delicious, I pro—"
Before he could finish, Theo reached over to swap my full plate for his empty one. "If my girlfriend doesn't want to eat bugs, she doesn't have to eat bugs."
I offered him a weak, grateful smile. But the knot in my stomach didn't loosen. It stayed there all throughout dinner, growing tighter and tighter each time Theo touched me. Whether it was while he was telling a story for emphasis, or when his arm found its way around me again, I was hyperaware of every single graze of his body against mine. When dessert was served, I forced myself to eat it slowly, even though I was starving. Anything to prolong the inevitable. Anything to delay whatever awkward conversation was coming the second Theo and I were alone again.
"Do you want mine?" Madeleine offered, pushing her crème brulée towards me. "I'm far too full, I can't possibly finish it."
I had no idea how she could be full because, even though I'd barely touched my food, the plates had been so tiny that there was no way they qualified as a complete meal. I took it nonetheless, and made slow work of finishing it, too.
"This was nice," William said finally, when the waiter arrived with our bills. Though from the edge in his tone and the tightness around his eyes, I had a feeling that he meant the complete opposite.
"The company was as good as the food," Theo said, sliding a credit card into the leather bill folder.
"You should reconsider the Harvest Gala, Ellie," William said, while we waited for the waiter to run their cards. "It's quite the event. Full of girls who'd love to get their hands on your man."
It was bait. I knew it was. But with the way William was watching me, part of me suspected that it was a test, too. Because if I was a real girlfriend, I would care about all these hypothetical girls wanting to get with Theo.
I lifted my chin. "Maybe I will."
And then my stomach dropped again. William's lids had lowered as he fought a grin—the very same look of satisfaction that he'd worn right after he'd tricked me into agreeing to the double date. His eyes slid to Theo before he stood to help Madeleine out of the booth. "Sounds like a yes to me. I look forward to seeing you both there. It'll be fun."
"Just as much fun as this dinner," Theo retorted, helping me up. "Have a good evening you two."
His fingers had closed around mine, and he all but dragged me away before I could say goodbye.
"I'm sorry," I whispered, "I don't actually want to—"
"I know. You had to. He was testing you." Fishing out our coat check tickets, he added, "I'm impressed you recognized it, actually."
My smile died quickly, though. I'd barely pulled on my jacket before Theo was ushering me out the door, as if he couldn't stand to spend another second anywhere near William and Madeleine. She'd leaned up to kiss William as he helped her into her pristine, cream-colored wool coat, and it turned something in my stomach. Not from jealousy. Or even from the food. It was because of the disaster kiss hanging between me and Theo, and our imminent drive home, alone in a car together.
Neither of us said anything from the moment we closed the car doors. The silence was punctuated only by the growl of the engine, the low hum of his nearly inaudible music, and the thud of my heart as we raced back towards school. Theo kept his eyes on the road, and it was only when we pulled into his parking spot that I finally gathered the nerve to speak.
"I shouldn't have done it," I said, gulping when my voice came out more gravelly than I'd have liked.
Theo glanced over at me, somehow surprised. "Done what? The gala?"
I wanted to curl up into a ball and disappear. "No. I mean yes, that. But mostly I meant all...that." I gestured awkwardly between us. "With us."
"Ellie."
I pressed my eyes closed. I couldn't look him in the eye. Not now, not—
His fingers found my chin and gently turned my head. My eyes fluttered open.
He looked as miserable as I felt. "Don't ever apologize. It's William who should apologize for making you do that." His hand fell away to thump onto the gearshift.
That didn't make me feel any better, but I nodded as if it had. I felt like more than a bit of a fool for expecting him to say anything else. Of course he wasn't about to make some grand declaration about how it was the best kiss he'd ever had. He hadn't even been thinking about it when I'd brought it up—that wasn't what this was to him. And yet, my throat was tightening as if I was about to cry. As if some grand declaration was exactly what I'd wanted him to say, and he hadn't.
I reached for my door handle.
"Wait."
I hesitated, fingers curled around the latch.
"Just..." Theo sighed when I looked over at him. His eyes searched mine. "That's not at all how I pictured our first kiss."
The breath caught in my throat. "Same," I somehow managed, through the pounding of my heart.
He smiled, a lopsided, gentle thing. "Good." I stopped breathing when his eyes trailed down to my lips. But rather than lean in and close the tense, charged space between us, he said, "We should probably head in before we miss curfew."
When he turned away to climb out, an icy wave of disappointment washed over me. I shoved open the door, welcoming the bite of the cool November night and hoping it would knock me back to my senses.
Because no matter what Theo Ellerby said, no matter how his smiles and touches and words made me feel, none of it was real. And it was getting far too easy to forget that.
**A/N: I feel like the world's biggest jerk for teasing this and then promptly forgetting it was Wednesday until I got all the way home from work! Sorry readers!! Though I hope this chapter made up for it... 😉
As always, if you enjoyed it, please take a moment to vote and comment!!**