Page 8 of A Follow-Through in Faking

Santiago

First day of being hitting partners with Catalina.

First of hundreds.

My head sags at the very thought, but Papá laughs like it’s the funniest thing in the world to see me this bent out of shape.

“You still want me to take care of you when you're old, so I’d be careful,” I warn, mostly teasing, which only makes my father bend over at the waist to laugh even harder.

“ Mijo , I’m rich. I don’t need you to take care of me,” he replies, so I roll my eyes at him.

“Plus, Manuela would take care of me if I asked her to,” he adds, and the mention of my sister, who’s been on vacation with her girlfriend for the last week, makes me miss her even more.

We’re twins. She’s supposed to be here so I can vent to her after every session with Catalina.

“I’ll find a different way to get payback then,” I say right as Charlie and Cata step into Lumière des étoiles’ indoor tennis courts.

Cata has sunglasses resting on the top of her head, pulling her brown hair out of her face.

She’s wearing a two-piece set, yoga shorts that hug her ass and a tank top in the same color and fabric that frames her chest and stops right above her belly button.

Her piercing there sparkles in the light a little, and when my eyes trail up, I notice imprints of what look like piercings by her nipples, too.

I forget all about talking until she’s in front of me, waving her hand in front of my face to snap me out of my staring trance.

“If you’re done admiring my tits, can we get a move on? I have other shit to do today,” she says, and I try to find a witty comeback, but I’m still so intrigued by the possibility of her having nipple piercings that I struggle to breathe.

My mouth opens to reply, but no sound leaves me, none other than a strange wheezing one I’ve never made in my life before.

“See, this is what happens when you work with men who like boobs. The faintest sight of a pair of them and all blood leaves their brain and goes to their dick. It’s really no wonder then that the world is going to shit with straight men in charge, is it?

” Cata goes on, pushing past me with her tennis bag slung over her shoulder.

“She has a point, you know?” Papá chimes in before walking past me too and following Cata. Charlie grins as they appear in front of me, grabbing my shoulder and squeezing once.

“I might throw myself in front of a moving train if she doesn’t murder me first,” I say, getting a laugh out of them.

“It’ll get easier. The two of you haven’t found your rhythm, and you have yet to apologize for what happened when you were both still doubles partners as kids,” Charlie says as if that would comfort me.

Also—

“What the fuck did I do? She’s the one who all of a sudden hated me without an explanation,” I reply, taking a step back to break the skin contact between us. It’s not Charlie’s fault, but I’m pissed now.

Their face turns all serious, their lips parting in surprise.

“I’m assuming you don’t know because that only makes you slightly stupid. If you know and are pretending it wasn’t your fault, then you’re not just an asshole but also the most emotionally incompetent person I’ve ever met.”

They don’t offer me another explanation, simply walk away like all of that made any sense to me.

Once I manage to catch my jaw off the floor, I start walking toward the court where Cata, Papá, and Charlie are. With her back toward me, I spot some writing on Cata’s shirt.

Santiago Castillo Hate Club

I almost burst into laughter.

“Where did you have that made?” I ask instead, poking Cata’s back where the writing is. She spins around to get my finger off her, scowling at me like she always does.

“I had shirts made for all the members of the club,” she says, crossing her arms in front of her chest. I’m convinced it’s her way of shutting me out, closing herself off, and I find I hate it more and more every day.

“Even haters are fans. I’m glad I mean so much to you that you’d found a club in my name,” I reply with a smirk, loving the way she almost growls at me because I twisted her words.

“Let’s get on with this. What do your training habits look like?” she asks as she walks over to her bag to get some bands out.

“I work best with a reward system and lots of praise,” I tell her, still smiling because I know it pisses her off.

“What, you need a cookie every time you do a good job?” she asks, her fists moving onto her hips as she watches me with a confused look spreading across her features.

“Anything you want to give me will be the sweetest reward, mariquita .”

She scrunches her nose up in disgust at the insinuation of my words, but I finally understand what to do.

I need to win her over, charm her, flirt with her.

I need to be the perfect fake boyfriend to truly get on her nerves.

She’s used to us bickering, thrives off it like a fire being fed with gasoline.

This? Me doing a complete one-eighty?

It might throw her off long enough to let her forget whatever made her hate me in the first place.

She shudders visibly, then says, “I will not be rewarding you, cabrón . And if you need to be praised for a job well done, call your mother,” she says right before she starts running around the length of the court to warm up.

Charlie and Papá are snickering, but my father tilts his head in Cata’s direction to get me to move my ass. With a groan, I start running, picking up my pace to catch up with her.

Cata and I jog in silence. Warming up our muscles by rotating our arms in circles. Running with our knees high, stretching after. Then, we start hitting balls back and forth, slowly and consistently.

Well, until I “accidentally” hit a ball too fast and too far placed in the corner of the court for her to reach.

Competition follows after that.

We’re playing as if it’s a game with points, both of us probably counting in our heads so we know the score and can remember it later.

“Alright, you two, enough! You’re supposed to be partners, not rivals.

You’re acting like children, and I’m sick of it.

We’re doing drills until you pass out. Let’s go,” Papá says, but Charlie just stands next to him with their arms crossed in front of their chest and a smile on their face.

They will let us continue this until either Cata or I give up.

Which won’t happen until one of us drops dead.

Papá makes us run.

A lot .

He drills our backhands and forehands until every muscle in my body hurts.

Cata is breathing heavily by the time he tells us to practice our serves.

She bends over at the waist, taking several deep breaths.

I sip my water before holding out my bottle for her.

She emptied hers about ten minutes ago, and Charlie hasn’t returned with Cata’s refill.

“Here,” I offer, making my hitting partner and fake girlfriend look up before she eyes the bottle with distrust. “You saw me drink out of it. It’s not poisoned,” I say with a laugh, so she snatches the bottle out of my grasp and downs the entire thing.

“ Bruja ,” I curse when she hands me the empty bottle.

“ Pendejo .” She sinks into a squat, still breathing heavily. My heart is also still racing, my lungs burning, so I can’t even make fun of her.

“Now we only have to practice our serves and then we can go our separate ways for today,” I promise her, holding out a hand to help her up. We’ve been training for two hours without a single break longer than two minutes.

“Give me a second. Your father is ruthless,” she says, waving my hand away.

Even after two hours of training, Cata looks good. Her long hair is still firmly wrapped in a bun, but her baby hairs are sticking to her forehead. Her cheeks are perfectly pink and her lips, too.

Not that I’m looking at her lips.

“While we’re taking a break, I’d like to discuss our first date,” I say, hating myself for forgetting to raise my fingers to put quotation marks around the word.

“God, I hate that word. ‘Date.’ It used to mean excitement, anticipation, thrill. Now it means obligation, torture, and misery,” she replies, but I’m not entirely sure if she meant to say that out loud to me.

I mean, logically I know she must have. People don’t just talk without being aware they said something, but it’s so vulnerable, I can’t quite believe she’d admit how she feels to me.

“It’s not ideal for me either,” I reply, but Cata laughs at that.

“You have no idea what it means to go on a date, Santi. You don’t go out with people to date them.

You go out with them to fuck them. I love going on dates.

I love planning dates to take beautiful people on.

I love kissing them at the end of the night with the promise that we’ll go on another date.

And another after that until we’re falling into something consuming and full of emotion.

I date to fall in love, not to fuck around.

You don’t understand that because you’ve never felt anything like it. ”

Catalina is right. I’ve never been on a date like the ones she’s describing.

I’ve never wanted to be with someone for longer than a night, but I have no idea why.

I always thought it was easier because of my job.

But when I look at Cata and she looks up at me with her breathtakingly pretty scowl, I get a feeling it’s not that simple.

I’ve never been in love before.

Have I?

“You’re right, but I have an idea for our first public date that you will also enjoy. Do you want to hear it or not?” Cata gives me a skeptical look but also a small nod, so I sit down next to where she’s squatting and pull out my phone to show her.

“Isabella Ada has a concert in France?” she asks, her eyes lighting up with happiness. Isabella Ada is Cata’s favorite artist. The Colombian makes music that the entire world is obsessed with, including Cata and me.

“Yes, and I got us front row tickets,” I say with a proud, smug smile.