Final Play (Fake Boyfriend 6)

“Hear that?” I smirk at Soren. “You get to kiss my whatever.”

He doesn’t reply. His face pulls a weird expression I can’t decipher. Kinda like he’s freaking out?

“Not what I meant,” the director cuts in. “This isn’t that type of shoot.”

I snicker.

We run it again. And then again.

It’s the only thing I hate about music video shoots—long days doing the same thing over and over again for hours of footage that’ll be edited into three minutes of awesome.

Soren shifts from his playful self to his professional and serious self, but it’s not a gradual thing. It’s like a switch flip. I think he’s over it already, and we’re only about halfway through the day.

We change scenes and change wardrobe countless times, and his mood doesn’t seem to improve.

He doesn’t seem angry, just … flat.

Finally, we end with a scene at a night club on a dance floor where we’re finally allowed to kiss.

The storyboard had Harley watching us with longing in his eyes, but because we don’t have to interact, we agreed to film on separate days.

It’s easier that way.

I doubt this scene will make the final cut. While a few videos might have brief LGBTQ representation, this is still open to censorship.

When we’re finally directed to kiss, it’s damn explosive. We’ve spent the last few hours being unable to close that small distance between us. Now we’re allowed, there’s no holding back the eruption of passion in every second that passes with our mouths pressed together.

This is where I belong.

The director calls cut, and Soren tries to pull away, but I don’t let him. I don’t care we’re in a room full of producers, extras, and crew for the video. I’m not ready for it to end.

That is, until the director says the words I’ve been wanting to hear all day. “That’s a wrap.”

I pull back. “Let’s go home.”

Soren smiles wide—a smile that always turns my insides upside down.

He takes my hand, and we move to walk off set and toward wardrobe to exchange our video outfits for our civilian clothes, but my feet pause at the sight of someone I shouldn’t be seeing.

We agreed he wasn’t going to be here.

Harley folds his arms and sticks out his chin.

In a move to keep civility, I approach my ex-boyfriend. We have to work together for the foreseeable future. We’ve agreed to play nice, but we also agreed he wouldn’t be here for my filming, so …

“I thought you weren’t on the schedule today?” I say, directing blame on someone else fucking up instead of accusing him of breaking our deal.

Harley hangs his head. “I wasn’t. They called me in for reshoots. Said you’d be done by now.”

“Oh. Uh, yeah, we ran a little overtime.” Or a lot.

“I can see why. You two look great together.”

“I didn’t know you were here—”

“It’s okay,” Harley says. “These things always take longer than they expect.”

“I mean, I wouldn’t have, uh, been so …”

“Enthusiastic?” Harley finishes for me.

“Uh, yeah, that. If I knew you were here, I would’ve—”

“It’s been a year. I’m over it.” He shrugs but doesn’t give me eye contact, and I know him too well not to see that he’s hiding his pain behind his casual demeanor.

When we recorded the song together, I admitted to him that I never loved him the way I thought I did. It took getting together with Soren to realize what Harley and I had, while real, was still very much a relationship of convenience.

He didn’t agree with that assessment, and we’ve barely spoken since. When we have, it’s only been about the song.

We fall silent, and yep, this is exactly what I expected would happen when we’d see each other again. We’ve both been busy, and with the label cutting this song from the album, I thought we wouldn’t have to deal with being in the same place at the same time unless it was for some music awards or whatever.

Harley’s gaze goes to Soren. “Good to see you again, hockey player.”

As polite as that is, it’s also totally fake. Soren replies with a “You too” which is just as fake as Harley’s.

“We need to get out of here,” I say. “Good luck with your shoot.”

The director steps in. “Oh, you’re all good to go home. We got the shot during the last take.”

Harley cocks his head. “You did?”

“Plenty of emotion as you watched these two on the dance floor.”

Just how long was Harley standing here?

Harley looks horrified. “You were filming me … that … the …”

“Relax. It was great. Trust me.”

Mine and Soren’s gazes ping-pong between the director and Harley.

“We’ll, uh, leave you to deal with this,” I say, and Soren and I head for wardrobe to the sounds of Harley protesting the background and lighting isn’t right and they need to reshoot.

I feel a little guilty for the way things ended between us, because essentially it was neither of our faults.