Olivia
The trivia night had unsettled me. It had been… fun. Genuine, unscripted fun. Winning with Ethan, working with him, seeing him in a relaxed, unguarded state—it felt good. Too good. It was a breach of the emotional firewall I had so carefully tried to construct around our "arrangement."
The day after our victory, I found it impossible to focus. Every time I looked at my campaign plans or the festival budget, my mind would drift back to the pub, to the easy laughter, to the warmth of his thumb against my skin. It was an unacceptable lapse in discipline.
That night, I was determined to get back on track. I was in my room, buried under a mountain of research for my constitutional law class, when my phone buzzed. It was a text from an unknown number, but I knew who it was from.
Ethan: Stuck on the vendor contracts. The insurance clauses are a nightmare. You up?
It was a legitimate work question, falling squarely within the bounds of Rule #3. But it was also 11 PM. A late-night text. A small, subtle bending of our own rules.
I should have ignored it. I should have told him we'd deal with it in the morning. But the thought of him, alone, wrestling with a legal document, was a surprisingly compelling image. He was asking for my help, in my area of expertise.
Me: Send it over. I'll take a look.
He emailed me the contract, and a minute later, my phone buzzed again.
Ethan: You're a lifesaver, Chen. I owe you.
Me: Just get the budget approved. That's payment enough.
I opened the document on my laptop. He was right; the legal jargon was a mess. I started making comments and revisions, my fingers flying across the keyboard. It felt good to be back on solid ground, dealing with facts and clauses instead of confusing emotions.
After I sent the revised document back, I expected that to be the end of it. But my phone buzzed again.
Ethan: Wow. You're like a legal superhero. Did you just know all that?
Me: I'm a political science major, Brooks. And my father is a lawyer. I grew up proofreading his briefs.
Ethan: A lawyer's daughter. That explains so much. The love of rules, the killer instinct in a debate…
I smiled. He was teasing me, but it felt affectionate, not mocking.
Me: Is that a compliment or an insult?
Ethan: Definitely a compliment. You're formidable, Olivia Chen.
He'd used my full name. It sent a ridiculous little thrill through me. We were breaking Rule #3, and I found that I didn't care.
Me: And you? What's your excuse? Where does the son of a corporate titan learn about indie rock and 90s hip-hop?
There was a long pause before he replied. I thought maybe I had pushed too far, gotten too personal.
Ethan: My mom. She was a music journalist before she married my dad. She used to play everything in the house. Said it was a proper education.
This was new. A piece of his life that wasn't in the public record. I tried to picture a younger Ethan, listening to Biggie Smalls with his mom. The image was unexpectedly sweet.
Me: She sounds cool.
Ethan: She is. She's the best part of my family.
The subtext was clear: the rest of my family is not so great.
We kept texting for another hour. We talked about music, about our favorite professors, about how ridiculous the Dean's new campus-wide "Go Green" initiative was. We didn't talk about the campaign, or the festival, or the bet. We were just… talking. It was the longest, most honest conversation we had ever had.
I learned that his favorite movie was Good Will Hunting, that he was terrified of spiders, and that he'd spent a summer building houses in Costa Rica, a fact he'd never mentioned to anyone. He learned that I was a secret fantasy football fanatic and that I had a debilitating weakness for bad reality television.
With every text, another layer of his "charming rogue" persona peeled away, revealing someone more thoughtful, more complex, and more vulnerable than I had ever imagined. He wasn't just the guy who wanted to put a zip line across the quad; he was the guy who knew all the words to "Ho Hey" because it reminded him of his mom.
As it got later, the conversation slowed, the pauses between texts growing longer. I was curled up in my bed, the glow of my phone illuminating my face. I felt a strange sense of intimacy, of being in a small, private bubble with him, separate from the rest of the world.
Ethan: It's late. I should probably let you sleep. The superhero of contracts needs her rest.
Me: You're not so bad yourself, Brooks. For a guy who wanted to cut the petting zoo.
Ethan: Hey, I've seen the error of my ways. The petting zoo is sacred.
I smiled, my fingers hovering over the keyboard.
Me: Goodnight, Ethan.
I'd used his first name. It was the first time. It felt both strange and perfectly natural.
He replied almost immediately.
Ethan: Goodnight, Olivia.
I turned off my phone and lay in the darkness, my heart pounding. We had shattered Rule #3. We had ventured deep into personal territory. And as I drifted off to sleep, I was forced to admit a terrifying truth: I liked the real Ethan Brooks. I liked him a lot. And our fake relationship was starting to feel less like a strategic partnership and more like the most real connection I had in my life.