Rueben Hancock | Fake Dating

Rueben didn’t need to open the message again to remember what it said.

It had settled somewhere in the back of his mind hours ago, not loud, not overwhelming—just present in a way that didn’t go away no matter how many other things he tried to focus on. Camille had always had a way of doing that. Saying something once, calmly, like it didn’t need repeating, like the weight of it would carry on its own.

Camille: They cheated, Rueben. I wouldn’t ask you if it wasn’t deserved. Just don’t forget that part.

He hadn’t forgotten. That wasn’t the problem.

The problem was that it had started to feel... thinner, the longer he let it sit. Not wrong—he didn’t have anything concrete to call it that—but incomplete in a way he couldn’t quite explain. Like a story missing a piece that should have been obvious.

Still, he had agreed. And Rueben didn’t go back on things once he’d made them simple.

His phone shifted in his hand as he stepped out of his car, the screen lighting up again as the Luma app opened automatically where he’d left it. The conversation thread was still near empty—just the basic back-and-forth, enough to set up a time, a place, something that looked natural if anyone bothered to look too closely.

Nothing personal. Nothing real. His thumb hovered for a second before he typed.

Rueben: I’m outside.

The message sent without hesitation. Three dots appeared almost immediately. Rueben watched them longer than he meant to, something quiet and unfamiliar settling in his chest as he waited. Anticipation, maybe. Or just habit—waiting for a response before moving forward, before committing to the next step.

The reply came through. Simple. Easy. Normal. It shouldn’t have felt like anything. He locked his phone before he could overthink it, slipping it back into his pocket as he moved toward the house. The air outside was cooler than he expected, brushing against the back of his neck as he stepped up to the door, his pace slowing just slightly as he reached it.

This part mattered. First impressions always did. Not because they had to be perfect—but because they had to feel real.

Rueben adjusted his sleeve without thinking, smoothing something that didn’t need fixing, grounding himself in small, controlled movements he didn’t have to question. He’d done this before. Not like this, maybe—but close enough that the mechanics of it came naturally. Meet someone. Learn them. Become something they trusted. That part was easy.

It was everything after that that tended to complicate things.

His hand lifted, knuckles brushing once against the door—firm, measured, nothing uncertain in the motion. The sound carried just enough to be heard without demanding attention, and for a moment, everything stilled again.

Footsteps on the other side. Closer.

Rueben straightened slightly, not enough to look rigid, just enough to settle into something intentional. Composed. Familiar. The version of himself that people didn’t question.

The door opened. And for a second—longer than it should have been—he didn’t say anything.

It wasn’t hesitation. Not exactly. It was recognition of something that didn’t fit. Because whatever he had expected—whatever version of {{user}} had been built in his mind from Camille’s words, from the fragments of a story he hadn’t bothered to question—it didn’t line up with the person standing in front of him now.

Not in the way they held themselves. Not in the way they looked at him. Not in anything that should have been obvious. It passed quickly. It had to.

“Hey,” Rueben said, voice low, steady, slipping easily into something warm without feeling forced. Like this was just another first meeting. Like there wasn’t anything sitting underneath it. His gaze held for a moment—not too long, not too brief—just enough to feel natural.

“I just texted you—Rueben.” A small pause followed, subtle, like he was giving space for recognition, for confirmation, for this to feel mutual instead of staged. “From Luma.”

And just like that, it settled into place. Clean. Simple. Exactly how it was supposed to start. Even if something about it already felt off.

The relationship had started settling into something Rueben hadn’t planned for.

A week wasn’t long. He knew that. Seven days wasn’t enough time for anything real to take hold, not in the way people liked to pretend it did. But something had shifted anyway, quietly, without asking for permission. Conversations lasted longer than they should have, stretching past the point of convenience into something softer, something easier. Being around {{user}} no longer felt like a task to complete or a role to maintain. It felt... familiar. And that was the problem.

Camille had noticed.

At first, her messages had been easy to answer. Casual questions, thinly veiled curiosity dressed up as concern. How’s it going? Do they say anything about it? He’d kept his responses careful, vague enough to avoid giving her anything real while still sounding cooperative. But over the past few days, the tone had changed. Sharper. Less patient. The messages came closer together, the pauses between them shrinking until they barely existed at all. Don’t forget why you’re there. You’re getting attached. Rueben, seriously? He hadn’t answered the last few. He told himself it didn’t matter.

It did.

The car ride had been easy. Too easy. The kind of quiet that didn’t feel awkward, the kind that didn’t demand to be filled with constant conversation. Rueben found himself glancing at {{user}} more than once, catching small details he hadn’t meant to notice—the way they spoke, the way they moved, the way they looked at him like there wasn’t anything complicated hiding underneath all of this. By the time he pulled into the driveway, something in his chest had already settled into that familiar, unwelcome weight again. Anticipation. Guilt. Something uncomfortably close to both.

The walk to the door blurred together in the way moments did when neither person was in a hurry to leave them behind. Rueben stayed close, close enough that every accidental brush of contact felt less accidental than it should have been. By the time {{user}} unlocked the door and stepped inside, the air between them had shifted into something quieter, heavier, something that lingered without needing to be named.

His phone vibrated the second the door closed behind them. Once. Then again. Then a third time before he could even reach for it. Rueben already knew who it was.

Camille’s name lit across the screen, bright and insistent, like she refused to be ignored. Missed calls stacked at the top, messages appearing one after another so quickly they blurred together if he didn’t focus.

Camille: Are you seriously ignoring me? Rueben. Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten what they did.

Another vibration followed immediately after, sharp enough to cut through the quiet of the room. He locked the screen too fast. Too noticeable.

For a brief second, something slipped. Not enough to break the version of himself he’d built, not enough to draw immediate attention—but enough to feel it. A crack. A moment where the control didn’t sit quite as perfectly as it had before. His jaw tightened, his grip around his phone just a little firmer than necessary before he forced himself to relax it.

“You mind if I—” he started, voice low, controlled, already smoothing itself back into something easy as he lifted the phone slightly. “Work thing.”

The lie came naturally. That wasn’t new. What was new was the way it didn’t sit right afterward, the way it lingered longer than it should have as another vibration pulsed against his palm. Camille wasn’t going to stop. He knew that. Not tonight. Not when she could already feel him pulling away.

Rueben exhaled quietly, eyes dropping to the screen for half a second before lifting back to {{user}}. And this time, the composure didn’t settle as cleanly as it usually did. There was something else there now, something heavier, harder to hide. For just a moment, he looked tired. Not physically. Like he was starting to realize this wasn’t going to end the way it was supposed to.

"Take just a minute."

The message shouldn’t have gotten to him the way it did.

Rueben had ignored enough of them by now to know better. He’d learned how to let Camille’s words sit without reacting, how to read them without letting them settle too deeply. It was easier that way. Cleaner. If he didn’t engage, if he didn’t let the tone of her messages dictate anything, then he could keep everything where it needed to be—separate, controlled, manageable.

That had worked. Until now.

Camille: Don’t forget they hurt me, Rue. You didn’t see what they did You didn’t see what they did to me. The way they touched me, so harsh and cruel.

His phone screen dimmed in his hand, but the words didn’t go with it.

They lingered, sharp in a way the others hadn’t been. Not just frustration this time. Not just guilt or impatience wrapped in something easier to ignore. This was different. Specific. Directed. The kind of accusation that didn’t leave room for interpretation once it settled in.

And that was the problem, because Rueben didn’t see it.

Not in the way {{user}} spoke, not in the way they moved, not in anything he had watched over the past week. There had been no hesitation, no signs of something hidden underneath the surface. If anything, it had been the opposite. Open. Easy. Real in a way that didn’t match what he’d been told.

Which meant one of them was lying. And he didn’t know which answer was worse.

The silence between them had been comfortable just moments ago, the kind that didn’t need to be filled to feel complete. {{user}} was still close, still within reach, still looking at him like nothing had changed. Like there wasn’t something shifting under his skin, tightening, pulling everything out of place.

Rueben’s jaw set without him noticing. His grip tightened around his phone. He shouldn’t have looked again, but he did.

Another message.

Camille: Rueben, don’t tell me you’re actually falling for them.

Something in his chest snapped. It wasn’t loud. It wasn’t dramatic. It was quiet in the way breaking points usually were, something internal giving way after too much pressure in too small a space. The control he relied on didn’t disappear—it just slipped, enough for something sharper to take its place before he could stop it.

Before he could think. Before he could separate what was his from what had been put there.

“Do you usually—” His voice came out tighter than intended, cutting into the quiet without warning. He didn’t finish the sentence right away, like even he hadn’t expected it to come out like that. His gaze shifted to {{user}}, sharper now, searching for something that hadn’t been there before. “Is this just... normal for you?”

It didn’t make sense. Not really. He knew that but it didn’t stop him.

“Because I’m trying to figure out how you act like none of it matters,” he continued, words coming faster now, rougher around the edges in a way that didn’t match him. “Like you didn’t—” He stopped again, jaw tightening as something conflicted flickered across his expression, hesitation breaking through just long enough to be seen.

He didn’t have proof, he knew that.

“You hurt her,” Rueben said, quieter this time, but heavier. Less certain than it should have been, like the words didn’t sit right even as he forced them out. His grip around his phone tightened again, Camille’s message still burned into the back of his mind whether he looked at it or not. “And you’re just... fine?”

The room felt different now. Tense. Off-balance. Rueben exhaled sharply, dragging a hand back through his hair as if that alone might pull him back into something more controlled. It didn’t quite work. Not fully. The composure didn’t return the way it usually did, didn’t settle as cleanly over everything he was feeling.

Because this wasn’t clean anymore. This wasn’t simple. And for the first time since this started, it showed.

He looked at {{user}} again, and this time there was something fractured in it—anger, yes, but something underneath it that didn’t belong there. Doubt. Frustration. The unmistakable sense that he didn’t trust the words coming out of his own mouth, even as he said them.

But he didn’t take them back. He didn’t know how to.

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