Noah

 

“Relax,” Gabriel hissed. He laid his hand over mine, which were restlessly tapping a beat on my thigh.

“Easy for you to say,” I said.

I started swinging my leg back and forth. He pressed his loafer-clad foot on mine to still me.

“This is not a big deal,” Gabriel said, rolling his eyes. “It’s going to be a fluff piece—she’ll ask us about our ‘journey’ as a couple, make us look like we’re in a Cinderella and Prince Charming story, we’ll smile, kiss for the cameras and we’re done! We’ll live to pretend to be in love another day!”

“Am I supposed to be the Cinderella here? More importantly, you’re Prince Charming?” I said disbelievingly.

“You know, some people think I’m quite a catch,” Gabriel informed me, mouth twitching like he was trying to suppress a smile at my evident surprise.

“It must be easy to seem like a catch when you’re rich,” I replied, raising my eyebrow at him.

Gabriel leaned forward so far that I could count his eyelashes. His breath puffed against my lips as he spoke.

“I’ll have you know,” he said—no, purred, “I have a lot more going for me than money.”

“You’ll have to convince me some time,” I said, leaning even closer in challenge. I tried to convince myself that the proximity was having no effect on me but I was feeling a little breathless.

“Um…is this a bad time?”

We both leapt away from each other as though we’d been electrocuted and turned to look at the girl who had spoken. For a fleeting moment I was annoyed with her for interrupting, and then came back to my senses.

“Not at all,” Gabriel said, clearing his throat, “What do you need?”

“The show’s about to start, so I’m supposed to have you take your places,” she explained. She looked very young and very nervous. Gabriel must have felt the same because he smiled reassuringly at her.

“We’re ready, aren’t we my love?”

“Huh? Oh, right, of course we are…um….sweetie.”

“Oh stop,” Gabriel muttered so only I could hear, “You’ll make me blush.”

I hid a smile as we approached the hot lights and cameras of the stage. I stopped for a moment to nervously check my reflection in a passing mirror. Gabriel tugged me by the hand—wait, when had we started holding hands?—impatiently.

“You look gr—good. You look very nice,” he said.

“Thanks,” I said.

I was entirely in Gabriel’s shadow looks-wise and I tried not to let it bother me. I was wearing one of Federico’s suits, though, and it gave me a good confidence boost. It was made from material so fine that I felt grubby just looking at it. It probably cost more than my entire year’s salary, so it was just as well that I wasn’t paying for it.

A beta with blonde hair and a smile so wide I internally winced for her, greeted us effusively.

“Gabriel! Noah! So thrilled to have you on the show,” she gushed. “The whole world is looking forward to hearing about your whirlwind romance!”

“Thanks for having us on the show, Tracey,” Gabriel said easily, submitting to her hug and a series of air kisses that completely baffled me.

“Yes, thanks so much,” I said weakly, settling for an awkward handshake.

“Trace and I have known each other since primary school,” Gabriel explained, “She pushed me out of the way to get to the swing set—we’ve been friends ever since.”

“You shouldn’t have hogged the swings. Nobody likes a swing hog,” Tracey returned.

I knew this already but laughed dutifully anyway. It was why we’d chosen her show to go on as our first interview together, we knew she’d go easy on us and make us look good by throwing us softball questions.

“Ten seconds!” someone called.

“Ooh, we should sit down,” Tracey exclaimed, and we hurriedly took our seats.

If you’ve never been on a talk show, you just need to know that it was a horrifying experience. Thankfully, Tracey didn’t have a live audience—even the thought of it sent me into a nervous sweat—but the harsh lights and the dozens of people that were required to record and capture every moment, the many takes we had to do to get the angles right or capture the sound correctly, it was all nerve racking and exhausting.

That wasn’t even counting the questions themselves.

“So how did you two beautiful people meet?” Tracey asked, leaning forward, prepared to hang on our every word.

We were ready for this one.

“Well, Noah works at a restaurant—“

“—and Gabriel turned up drunk—“

“Oh, of course,” Tracey broke in, “I think we all know every story featuring Gabriel is going to have him drunk, don’t we?”

“That’s absolutely right,” I agreed. I was starting to relax despite the bright lights and the sweat that was beginning to build under my collar.

“So he turned up horribly drunk and ordered caviar—and we were a crappy burger joint!”

Tracey laughed and turned to Gabriel.

“Tell me you didn’t!”

“In my defense, I was out of my mind at the time.”

“Anyway, we were not located in a safe part of town and he was clearly too posh to be safe in that neighborhood, so I took him home to let him sleep it off.”

“That’s so sweet! Gabriel, what did you think of Noah when you woke up and met him again sober?”

Gabriel took my hand very deliberately and kissed my wrist. I felt my pulse rate pick up.

“I looked at him and just knew—that I would marry him some day.”

I could almost hear everyone in the room swoon at the exact same time.

“—and part of me thought he was crazy, to let some random drunk person he didn’t know from Adam sleep on his couch, but that’s just me and my suspicious mind.”

“No, I knew I had a high chance of being murdered by you. That’s just how nice I am,” I told him.

We both grinned at each other.

“And you, Noah?”

“I just wanted him out of my house, to be honest.”

They both laughed.

“No but really, I thought he was---extraordinary. He’s just so vibrant and alive, and I couldn’t keep my eyes off him from the start.”

“Aww,” Tracey cooed. “You two are so sweet. But Noah, I think we all want you to know what you’re getting into…so we’re going to play a video of Gabriel’s greatest hits and you’re going to tell us if you’ve changed your mind about him at the end!”

“Trace!” Gabriel said, looking horrified. He had temporarily forgotten about the cameras. “You promised you wouldn’t!”

“Oh, but I think your fiancé deserves to know about your life, don’t you?” Tracey said, smiling evilly.

“Don’t worry,” she added reassuringly, “This is all publicly available online. It’s nothing he couldn’t have found on the internet.”

“Well I vote for showing me this video, if it helps,” I said with great interest.

“You heard the man!” Tracey called, “Play the video!”

What followed was probably excruciating torture for Gabriel but a thoroughly enjoyable experience for me.

Pictures of Gabriel flew by on the slideshow—Gabriel as an adorable baby looking wide-eyed at the camera, Gabriel in a frilly dress at some kind of ceremony, Gabriel in some kind of middle school play dressed as a wizard, Gabriel in all-black in what looked like a nascent teenage goth phase, Gabriel in leather pants with a Mohawk on stage with a guitar, Gabriel in salmon colored shorts and a backwards baseball cap grinning at the camera with his arms around a bunch of guys…

The list went on. The real life Gabriel was trying to sink into the couch cushions next to me.

“Oh my god,” I said delightedly as a picture of Gabriel in some snowy country having his hair chewed on by a yak flashed by.

“Is it over? Thank god!” Gabriel said, removing his face from his hands.

“See? That wasn’t so bad,” I said, patting his shoulder comfortingly.

“You’re right, it was worse. Thanks a lot, Tracey,” he added.

“You should be grateful that I didn’t include some less family friendly pictures of you,” Tracey said brightly.

“So, moving on from Gabriel’s sordid past, I’m going to ask what everyone wants to know—when are you two crazy kids getting married?”

“I just want to make sure Noah’s comfortable with all the royal protocols and the formalities before subjecting him to the circus of a royal wedding,” Gabriel said, sounding sincere as he put his arm around me.

“That’s so thoughtful!” Tracey exclaimed. “What happened to the guy who filled a swimming pool with vodka and then tried to swim in it?”

“That’s all in the past, Tracey. That was me pre-Noah.”

“You’re a good influence,” she told me, eyes twinkling. “Let’s hope Gabriel doesn’t mess it up.”

“I don’t think he could,” I said, putting on a soppy expression. I didn’t conclude with ‘because he’s paying me so much I’d be an idiot to walk away’, but I think we were both thinking it.

I turned and dropped a kiss on the corner of his mouth, hoping it looked affectionate and not coldly wooden. Gabriel turned just as my lips met his skin and suddenly we were properly kissing, moving our lips against each other, feeling the wet slickness and the heat between our bodies. His lips were soft but demanding against mine, and he nipped my bottom lip lightly, making me moan softly.

We both jerked apart at the same time and tried to act casual even though our faces were on fire.

“I’m glad that ended so I didn’t have to bring in a hose to break you two up,” Tracey said. I could hear a camera man sniggering and blushed harder.

“You can’t blame me for not being able to keep my hands off Noah,” Gabriel drawled, “I mean, look at him. If you have a chance to spend a lifetime with this guy, you take it.”

I smiled through my confusion. Did—was Gabriel implying that he thought I was attractive? How ridiculous, that wasn’t possible. I mean, anyone who looked at him and looked at me would—oh god, did people think this was a shotgun wedding?

“I forgot to ask the most important question of all! The whole world is dying to know—who proposed and how?”

“I proposed,” Gabriel said immediately. “As for how—“ he turned to me, “Darling, do you want to do the honors?”

“Sure, sweetheart. We were at the park, feeding the ducks. And I’d mentioned to him that I thought it was the most romantic place in the world, with the water and the little wooden bridge and there’s an arch covered in flowers, and the birds—anyway, I just mentioned it once and didn’t even think he remembered. But one day we were at the park feeding the ducks and he got down on one knee—and you know the rest.”

“That is so strangely thoughtful compared to the Gabriel I always knew,” Tracey said wonderingly. “Well folks, it looks like settling down really has changed our favorite playboy prince! Stay tuned for my interview with killerking33, the serial killer who’s become a social media star!”

We got up and went backstage. I tugged on my collar reflexively. It was itching and I was still hot from the lights on stage.

“Here, let me,” Gabriel said, and with gentle hands began undoing my tie and loosening a button on my shirt so it felt like I could breathe again.

“You couldn’t wait till you got home?”

We turned to find Tracey grinning at us. I realized how it looked—Gabriel undoing my clothes, both of us flushed and sweaty from the heat.

“We weren’t—“

“Oh, I know, I was just teasing you. What I would really like to know though, is why both of you have agreed to take part in this charade?”

“What—what’re you talking about, Trace?” Gabriel stammered.

“Drop the bullshit, Gabriel,” Tracey said kindly, “I’ve known you for years. And I know what it looks like when two people kiss for the first time on my show, like today. You both did good though. Anyone else would have bought it.”

“You can’t tell anyone,” I said. I was pleading with her.

“Oh honey, don’t worry. I would never sell Gabriel out. But you both need to be more careful. No one else is going to go this easy on you.”

She quickly hugged Gabriel goodbye and then, to my surprise, embraced me as well.

“Good luck,” she murmured in my ear, smelling of lavender.

Then she walked away briskly, leaving us to look guiltily at each other.

“Do you really think she won’t tell anyone?”

“We can trust Tracey,” Gabriel said, rubbing his ear. I noticed that he always did that when he was nervous. “If anyone else finds out, though, we’re probably screwed.”

“We’ll be careful,” I agreed.