Ethan
The phone call had been from the hospital. Dylan had a bad day. Nothing critical, but his doctor wanted to adjust his medication, and my mom was a wreck. I'd spent an hour on the phone with her, calming her down, promising I'd drive home on the weekend. The whiplash from the intense, fragile moment with Olivia to the stark reality of my family's situation left me feeling hollowed out. One minute, I was about to kiss the most captivating woman I'd ever met. The next, I was reminded of the secret burden I was carrying, the real reason I needed the prestige and the scholarship money that came with the presidency. It made our bet, our entire fake relationship, feel like a trivial, selfish game.
I avoided her for the rest of the week. I threw myself into my classes and made a perfunctory call to my father to update him on my 'leadership activities.' I needed to get my head straight, to remember what was at stake. My feelings for Olivia were a complication I couldn't afford.
But then Jake cornered me in the dining hall.
"You're going to a trivia night at The Taphouse tonight," he announced, sliding into the booth opposite me. "Eight o'clock. Don't be late."
"I'm not, I've got to study," I said, not looking up from my textbook.
"It's a double date," he said, his voice laced with a smug satisfaction that set my teeth on edge. "With me and Mia. And Olivia. Mia's setting it all up. She's very excited. Apparently, she has a whole Pinterest board dedicated to your 'love story'."
I groaned, letting my head fall onto my textbook with a loud thud. "You have to be kidding me."
"Nope. It's happening. Look, man, I don't know what's going on between you two, but you've been acting weird all week. You look like a ghost. And Mia says Olivia has been just as wound up. You guys need a night off. A real date."
"It's not a real date, Jake. It's a performance."
"Is it?" he asked, his voice softening. "Because it doesn't look like you're performing to me."
I had no answer for that. So, at eight o'clock, I found myself walking into The Taphouse, a popular pub just off campus. And there she was, sitting in a booth with Mia and Jake. She was wearing a soft, burgundy sweater that made her skin glow. Her hair was down, falling in soft waves around her shoulders. She looked… beautiful. And just as nervous as I felt.
Our eyes met, and the same charged energy from the media room was instantly back, crackling in the space between us. The awkwardness was a third person at the table.
"Hey," I said, sliding into the booth next to her. Our thighs brushed, and she flinched, pulling away slightly.
"Hey," she murmured, her gaze fixed on the menu in front of her.
Mia and Jake, oblivious or perhaps deliberately ignoring the tension, were in high spirits. "Alright, lovebirds," Mia said, clapping her hands together. "Team name for trivia. I was thinking 'Power Couple'."
"How about 'Team We're Just Here for the Beer'?" I suggested, trying to lighten the mood.
"I like 'The Unbeatables'," Olivia said quietly, and I couldn't tell if she was talking about trivia or the election.
We settled on 'The Unbeatables.' The first few rounds of trivia were a disaster. We were out of sync, our answers clumsy. The awkwardness was a thick fog, and Mia and Jake's cheerful attempts to get us to act like a couple only made it worse. "Ethan, you should know this, you're the history buff!" Mia would say. "Liv, help him out!"
But then came the music round. The DJ played a ten-second clip of a song, and you had to name the artist and the title. The first clip was an obscure indie rock song.
"The Lumineers, 'Ho Hey'," Olivia and I said in perfect unison.
We looked at each other, surprised. A small, genuine smile touched her lips.
"You like The Lumineers?" she asked.
"Yeah," I said. "Saw them at a festival a few years ago. They were amazing."
"Me too! I dragged Mia to that show. She complained about the mud for a week."
For the first time all night, we were just two people talking, not two rivals performing. The next clip was a 90s hip-hop track. I knew it instantly.
"Notorious B.I.G., 'Juicy'," I said.
Olivia looked at me, impressed. "Okay, I wouldn't have pegged you for a Biggie fan."
"I have hidden depths, Chen," I said with a grin.
Something shifted after that. We started working together, a real team. Her encyclopedic knowledge of literature and history combined with my random store of pop culture and sports trivia made us a formidable force. We started getting answers right, one after another. We were laughing, high-fiving, the earlier tension forgotten.
At one point, a question came up about the chemical composition of stars. She launched into a detailed, passionate explanation of nuclear fusion. She was so absorbed in her explanation, her eyes bright with intelligence, that she didn't notice the small dab of mustard on the corner of her mouth from the pretzel she was eating.
Without thinking, I reached out and gently wiped it away with my thumb. "You've got a little something," I murmured.
She froze, her words catching in her throat. My thumb lingered on her soft skin for a beat too long. The noise of the pub faded away. It was just us. The moment was intimate, simple, and more real than any of our staged PDAs.
"Thanks," she whispered, her cheeks turning a shade of pink that matched her sweater.
We ended up winning the trivia night. The prize was a fifty-dollar bar tab and bragging rights. As we collected our prize, I felt a sense of pride that was completely out of proportion to the achievement. We had won something, together.
Jake and Mia were ecstatic. "I knew it!" Mia shrieked. "You guys are an unstoppable team!"
Later, I walked her back towards her dorm. The night air was cool and crisp. The silence between us was no longer awkward, but comfortable, filled with the easy camaraderie of our shared victory.
"I had fun tonight," she said, as we stopped outside her building. "I didn't expect to."
"Me neither," I admitted. "You're a trivia shark, Chen."
"You're not so bad yourself, Brooks. For a golden retriever."
We both smiled. The wall between us was down, if only for a moment. I wanted to kiss her. I wanted to break Rule #5 into a million pieces. But the memory of my brother, of my responsibilities, held me back. It wasn't fair to her to pull her into my complicated reality.
"Well," I said, shoving my hands in my pockets. "I'll see you at the committee meeting tomorrow."
"Yeah. See you tomorrow."
She hesitated for a second, as if she wanted to say more. But then she just gave me a small, sad smile and disappeared into her dorm.
I stood there for a long time, watching the door swing shut behind her. I had genuinely enjoyed myself. I had enjoyed her company. And that was the most terrifying thing of all. Because the more I got to know the real Olivia Chen, the less our relationship felt like a bet, and the more it felt like I was gambling with the one person in the world who might actually understand me. And I was in way, way over my head.