This Time It's Real

by Ann Liang

If Caz’s career continues on its current trajectory, if he grows more and more famous, picks up more sponsorships and endorsement opportunities and hit dramas left and right, it won’t just be him advertising a cute little drink. It’ll be his face on lit-up billboards; his smile on subways; his dark, scorching gaze every time I turn on the TV, remembering how it felt when he used that gaze on me. He will be everywhere, haunting every cursed corner of the country, and I will be left reeling in his wake.

@huachengseye: ok either they’re REALLY committed to this publicity stunt or they’re REALLY in love w each other and just dgaf

“You,” he says quietly. “I want you, Eliza.” The words hang in the misty gray air, and I’m glad he can’t see my face. You already have me, I’m tempted to tell him. More than I was ever planning to give.

shut UPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP

“You,” he says quietly. “I want you, Eliza.” The words hang in the misty gray air, and I’m glad he can’t see my face. You already have me, I’m tempted to tell him. More than I was ever planning to give.

shut UPPPPPPP

“I—” “But not as part of a secret arrangement,” he continues, talking faster, like he has to get this off his chest and he’s not sure if he’ll have the chance to do so again. “Not for show. Not for ‘a strategic, mutually beneficial and romantically oriented alliance to help further our respective careers’—” “You—you memorized that?” “Of course I did. Even though I still feel like we could’ve used a better name.” Without missing a beat, he goes on. “I don’t want to act like we met while you were apartment hunting and hit it off, when the first time we really met, you were sitting two seats in front of me in English class and the teacher was reading out one of your essays and I just thought—I’ve never known anyone who can write like that befor...

“I don’t want to wait for an excuse to kiss you only when there’s a literal crisis going on and when half our school is standing around to watch. I don’t want our whole relationship to be built around a lie. And I know that’s asking for a lot, because you have your readers and their expectations and there’s already enough scrutiny but … I just want—” He sucks in a breath, and he might have once claimed to never b...

“I just—I don’t understand why you’re telling me this,” I blurt out. “Why now? Since when did you even—” And he actually laughs, though there’s no humor in it. “Well, you haven’t exactly made it easy for me.” “What’s that supposed to mean?” “Eliza,” he says, shaking his head. “I’m usually pretty good with this stuff, but when it comes to you—one second you’re saying things that sound so sincere, like you might really like me, and you’re making me those paper cranes … And the next you’re telling me that you’re only doing this for your internship, that every sincere-sounding thing that comes out of your mouth is just flowery bullshit, and you’re planning out our every single interaction three weeks in advance. If you hadn’t kissed me back like that … I still wouldn’t know.”

“Besides,” he goes on, voice low, “a lot of people might like me for my—reputation. But that’s the side I show to them on purpose to make them like me. Nobody’s ever gotten to know me as well as you have. I wasn’t sure … I didn’t know if those other parts of me were worth wanting too.” And my heart shatters. But my resolve doesn’t.

This is the closest I have ever gotten to voicing the truth: that I’m afraid. That for a long time now, between maybe the third and fourth move, the fourth or fifth friend I lost along the way, I’ve suspected that there’s something fundamentally unlovable about me. Something that makes it easy for people to forget me the second I leave, to drift out of touch no matter how hard I try to keep them in my life.

“I do like him,” Emily says slowly. Then she looks up at me, and I’m struck by two things: First, how tall she’s grown without my realizing, her head now almost level with my nose. And second, that fierce, protective look in her eyes, like our positions have been switched and she’s the older sibling who’d tear down the world for me. “But if he was mean to you, I’ll stop liking him immediately. I won’t even invite him to my next birthday party.” I choke out a small laugh, but the sound’s tinged by sadness. “No, no. It’s not that. If anything …” If anything, I’m the one who wronged him. “Well, either way,” Emily continues, leaning back against the wall, “the main reason I liked him was because of how you act when you’re together.” This surprises me. “What … what am I like around him?” “Happy,” she says simply.

Maybe I’ll miss him and hate him and curse his name.

Where else could I go? Where else, but to him?

I want to be with you,” I say, and my voice softens on its own, like the words are too sacred to be spoken aloud in this dim, cramped room of bleach and feather dusters and tangible longing. I move forward, tilt my head up. The excruciating distance between us narrows down from three inches to two to one. “For real, this time.”

The seconds that follow are some of the most terrifying ones in my life. Maybe I’ll always be scared. Maybe the fear of getting hurt, of being left alone, will never truly go away. But even if it’s my default setting, I can fight it. So many beautiful things lie on the other side of fear. Like love. Like this. Caz stares down at me for forever, the look in his eyes asking and answering everything. Then he brings his fingertips slowly to my jaw, as if he’s not entirely convinced I exist. “Really?” “Really.” I inhale. It seems impossible that half an hour ago I felt like I would die, and now here I am, more alive than I ever thought I could be. “Hey, your face isn’t injured or anything, right?” He stills, confused. “No, why—” “Good,” I tell him, smiling, and I press my lips to his.

“Caz, I’d love to be inconvenienced by you. I wouldn’t mind being inconvenienced by you for the rest of my life.”

“Are you happy?” I ask Caz, tilting my head to properly look at him, to study the familiar curve of his jaw, the deep dimples in his cheeks when he smiles and pulls me closer. The city rises up behind him, and if someone were to assign me an essay about home again, I know exactly what I’d write. “I am,” he says softly. “Are you?” I breathe in the sweet scent of magnolias from the gardens, feel the spring air on my skin, the scratch of his jacket against my neck. His presence beside me, warm. Whole. My heart threatens to overflow. “I’m so unbelievably happy right now,” I tell him. And I mean every word.