A Cupid's Guide To Fake Dating

Chapter 1

Austin and I continued to stare at each other; the tension from earlier clearly still wearing on us. He was pissed, good. I was too.

‘I want out.’

His brows rose up in a very animated way. ‘What?’

‘I said-’

Then he raised a hand to cut me off. ‘I heard you Pierce. I was just trying to confirm if you were just stupid or I heard wrongly.’

‘I’m serious!’

‘So am I.’

We were really heading towards a bad start. Austin and I had nothing in common and yet we decided to carry on with this awful sham. It wasn’t working and he knew that. So why was he looking so angry about it?

‘Listen Pierce. We made a deal. There’s no turning back now.’ His eyes lit up mischievously. ‘Have you forgotten I still got something on you, huh cupid?’

Damn it! Just how on earth did I get myself involved with this jerk you might ask. 

Well, it all started a few weeks ago when I, Cupid, misplaced a journal only for it to end up in the wrong hands of Austin Garcia.

Looking back, I really shouldn’t have agreed to this deal and now I was stuck with this overbearing asshole.

Just great.

***

A few weeks earlier

AS A NORMAL GIRL with a normal life, I had a few secrets that nobody knew about me. Okay, that was a silly way to start a story but at least one has to start somewhere, right?

My family was one of the rich ones in the neighbourhood. I never really looked at my family history but apparently before my grandfather had died, he had stocked up a large amount of riches which he passed down to his daughter who happened to be my mom. And so, well, here I was.

Unlike most rich people who had fancy rooms and all that stuff, I preferred the closet bedroom I had and the worn out couch in my room. Mom wanted to throw out the couch once; it was still perfectly good then. However, I stole it when she wasn't aware and that's how I got a couch in my room. There was a small wardrobe, with little clothes, not that I needed many, a lamppost, some graffiti rock posters on the wall and bam! That was pretty much everything.

Mom saw my room once and she freaked out. She clearly thought I slept every night under the comfort of an overstuffed bed with pillows and fancy covers. She was so wrong.

Anyway, like I said, I had a secret that no one knows of, and I was determined to keep that secret until I was gone six feet under. (I was totally joking about that last part) Too bad it got into the wrong hands.

From that day onward, my life was never the same. Enough of that though, let me tell you how it really happened. It was like any other day when the stupid alarm woke me up for school on a normal day, normal time and normal year.

‘Good morning house!’ I announced skipping down the stairs in twos as I made my way into the kitchen. My bare foot was cold against the marbled floor, my sweater was itchy and my black jeans seemed tighter than usual. But that didn’t stop me from smiling giddily at my mom. If she saw I was in some cloth distress, she would force me to wear a gown and I hated wearing gowns.

‘Morning sweetie,’ Mom said from the dining table, eating her breakfast as she scrolled through her phone. She was probably looking at her daily fashion news. My mom was your thirty-five year old lady with brown hair, dark amber eyes and a small statue. People say I took after her but apart from the hair and eyes, I begged to differ. I was pretty average when it came to my looks. Not too ugly, not too beautiful, just in-between.

And, while my mom saw the world in glitters and fairy dust and fashion books and parties, I saw it in boy bands, hard rock and graffiti.

I turned to face the other silver haired individual in the kitchen. ‘Morning Raymond.’

Raymond smiled at me over his shoulder as he flipped over what I guessed was a perfect round batter. Raymond was our second dad. First and real dad abandoned us when I was five. He never gave an explanation about his sudden disappearance and frankly over the years I didn’t care about him anymore; whether he was alive or not. Besides, I was already too used to Raymond, even though I never once called him dad; and also because mom seemed to love him a lot. He didn't come from a wealthy background like real dad did but he was pretty good as a dad. He cooked, he cleaned and he joked- something real dad never did.

‘Pancakes?’ I inquired, taking a chair and setting my school bag on the table.

‘You said they were your favourite.’ Raymond said as he placed a plate in front of me and then handed me a glass of orange juice.

‘Thanks.’ I said, sipping out of it.

‘Elena,’ Mom called from where she was seated. ‘Mind telling me why Lay left so early and without you today?’

Lucas 'Lay' Pierce (funny name, wasn't it?)was my older brother who, unlike me and Mum, saw the world in his own different light.

I took a bite out of my pancake and smiled weakly at Mom. Lay had a habit of always going places without me, so it was quite normal for me.

I shook my head. ‘No Mom, I don’t know.’

‘Hmm,’ Mom didn’t ask any further questions for which I was grateful for. ‘By the way, your seventeenth birthday is coming up, isn’t it?’

Oh dear God. Why did I have a bad feeling about what was coming next?

'Here,' she motioned for me to come over with her manicured finger and pointed to something on her phone screen. I swallow the urge not to roll my eyes again at the bright blue regal gown I was sure no one in this era wore anymore. 'What do you think?'

It's terrible!

 Alright, Elena. You know how it goes. 'I think it's wonderful.' I said through gritted teeth.

Across the dining table, Raymond let out a low cough earning a glare from me, not that he saw it anyways.

'I knew you would love it!' Mum's voice was excited. She swiped through her phone and pointed at another gown. 'I was thinking of hosting your birthday party along with my host party.' Then she was totally clueless to the shocked face I made.

'What?' I gaped. 'Did your fashion magazine tell you to do that?' Because she always, always, linked everything to it.

'I told her it was a bad idea,' Raymond said from his cooking space. His grey eyes look sympathetic.

'A very bad idea,' I repeated. The last time Mum hosted a party, she had me dressed up like some Barbie doll. I almost died from how tight the corset was. The whole ordeal was more work than it's worth. You wouldn't think it'd take that long to just 'get ready' for a party, but apparently to my mom that's the minimum. Now it seems there's going to be a repetition. 

'Mum, I am not letting you plan my birthday party. I don't even want one!'

'Why honey? This will even be a good opportunity.'

'For what?' I really didn't want to know what the reason was.

'I'm inviting a few of my friends over and they have such lovely sons. I plan on finding you a boyfriend then.'

I almost choked on my spit. There she was again; going on about having boyfriends. Didn’t she ever quit? This wasn’t the first time she’d said something like this. When I recovered, I stared at my Mother in complete awe. Raymond watched us with a somewhat embarrassed look. Mostly directed at her though. 

'Um, Lisa. Don't you think that is a decision meant for Elena to make by herself?'

Mom turned to Raymond with a stern expression, her phone on the table with her lips ready to argue. 'Raymond, would you just look at your daughter? She is finally blossoming into a young debutante and she hasn't even had a man in her life yet!' With arms extended out, she pointed towards me which brought a soft grin on his lip. He probably saw a girl with short brown hair wearing a baggy lemon sweater. As if to worsen the case, a loud burp escaped my mouth and Raymond burst out with laughter.

'Yeah, I totally see the blossoming debutante in her.'

Mom frowned as Raymond continued laughing.

I gave a sheepish chuckle. 'Sorry,'

'You know why I never worry about Lay?' She asked, standing up from where she was seated. She stood by me, placing a hand on my shoulder.

'Cause he's Lay.' Raymond replied with his causal trademark tone.

'No, he has his own case and I'll blame puberty. But look at Elena! She's a girl and she decides to keep behaving like a boy,' then she motioned to my chest and I suddenly had no idea whether to be offended by the next thing she said or to be embarrassed. 'If not for these features, I would totally think my daughter is a rugged boy.'

Oh my God!

Crazy mother obsessed over glitters or otherwise, this wasn't what I wanted to hear this early morning.

Sighing, I shrug off her hand and reach for my bag. 'I'm off to school.' Gulping down orange juice in my cup, I dart out of the kitchen and made it to the front door. I opened it and before I slammed it behind me, I heard Raymond begin to reprimand Mum for what she said.

Once outside, I wore my black boots and breathed in deeply, taking the annoyance off my back. Last thing I needed was jinxing my Monday morning. I walked down the stairs and past our gate until I got to the plain walkway. 

I noticed across the street Austin Garcia, the local pretty boy of West-Ville high aka boy who lives opposite me.

He, according to fan girls, had what we called the ‘cool’ dark hair, 'cool' muscular build, 'cool' dark piercing eyes, loved 'cool' music, was a 'cool' skater and had a 'cool', handsome face any guy would die to have. He was pretty much cool at everything. I didn't know why people liked to idolise him.

For me, I saw him as nothing but a trouble maker because that was all he ever did in school- make trouble. He was on every teacher's hitlist in school. It was even worse, my brother was one of his friends.

I didn't like him and I was sure I never would.

As if sensing my look on him, he glanced over to where I stood and gave me a long stare, before getting on his skateboard and skating down the route I’d be taking on foot.