I Hate Everything About You

“No Liz,” I sighed in frustration as she started taking extra pillows into my room. “He can sleep on the sofa.”

I still couldn’t believe I had agreed to let that . . . weirdo, for the lack of a better term, stay in my apartment. Why we hadn’t gone with our original plan to be a married couple in different houses, I didn’t know. Oh wait, yes I did. Mybest friend and that stupid curly haired guy had brought up the fact that that wasn’t very convincing. It meant we would have to let our parents know the real story. And that was something we both wanted to avoid. No, this was easiest, which led to the reason why we Liz and I were making my apartment couple friendly now.

“Sorry Ms. Pierce,” Liz said quickly before walking towards the couch.

I groaned. “Put it in the closet for now Liz.”

“Knock, knock,” Dani said, coming in.

“You could have just waited till I opened the door, you know,” I rolled my eyes.

She smirked at me. “Someone’s bitchier than usual today. You might actually try to be nice today, seeing as I came bearing good news.”

“Which would be…”

“The media is actually buying it all,” she declared, grinning. She took out a newspaper clipping from her purse, handing it to me.

I gawked at it. The headline read: Joe Jonas and Caitlin Pierce? The real deal?” I quickly skimmed the article. “They-they think we’ve been in love for months?”

Dani grinned. “Yup,” she said. “Isn’t that great? It means the plan might work. So you see, maybe you should stop being so grouchy. Why are you so much grouchier than usual today anyway?”

I rolled my eyes playfully at her. “Hm – let’s see. I wonder if it has anything to do with having my fake, weirdo husband moving into my apartment today.”

She laughed. “At least he’s hot.”

I shrugged. “Regardless, six months and this will all just be a distant memory.”

“Unless you guys end up really falling in love,” she smirked at me.

I rolled my eyes again. “Like that is going to happen.”

“You never know Cait,” she said. “This could turn out to be a good thing for you.”

“Ha, please. The only thing that could be remotely good about this is that it’ll save my reputation.”

“You mean people will think you’re less bitchy,” Dani asked. “Like turning a new leaf or something and people will like you again?”

I glared at her. She was a bit too blunt sometimes. “I wouldn’t put it exactly like that, but that’s the general idea, yeah.”

There was a knock on the door. “Well speaking of your hot fake husband that’s going to save your rep…,” she faded out.

I sighed, walking to get the door. “Deep breaths Cait,” I reminded myself.

---

Here we were, Nick and I standing outside Caitlin Pierce’s apartment. Or I should say our apartment. And all I wanted to do was go home. I knew this was going to be horrible. Nick thought this would be god for me – that I’d be a legend, the guy who tamed Caitlin Pierce. But I didn’t want to be a legend that way. I really jus wanted to go home right now. But then, at least she wasn’t moving into our house. With my mom and dad there we would only have two options. The first was telling my parents the whole story, and dealing with their disappointment. The second was not telling them and pretending we were some happy couple. Yeah, that wasn’t going to last too long. Both options seemed pretty disastrous

“Just remember man,” Nick said as he knocked on the door. “She’s hot and it’s only for six months.”

“Hot and six months,” I reminded myself. “Got it.”

And the door opened. “Hi,” Caitlin said. She had on sweats, and though she looked like she was getting ready for a bum day, she still looked hot. Hot and six months, I reminded myself again as we came in. Wow, I gasped, taking in the apartment. There was a big whit sofa in the middle of the large room. It faced a big screen TV that took up half the wall. I noticed a wii and xbox 360 consoles against the wall under it. Behind the sofa, there was a big hot pink grand piano. Hm, I didn’t know she was musical. Dani was grinning at us from the sofa.

“Honey, we’re home,” Nick said, grinning. “Hey Dani.”

“Hey,” Dani grinned back, hoping off the couch. “Wow, um it’s really getting crowded in here. Cait, I’ll call you later, okay? See if he’s still living and whatnot.”

Nick laughed. “I’m going to head out too Joe,” he said. “Don’t worry. I’ll call to see if you’re living too.”

“Funny,” I mumbled as they left.

“Um, do you need anything else Ms. Pierce,” that Liz chick asked Caitlin. Wow talk about personal servants.

“No that’s all Liz,” Caitlin said to her. “You can um – you can go too.”

“Okay, I’ll see you tomorrow,” she said She smiled at me as she passed to leave.

And then we were alone. Neither of us said anything. “So um,” I said finally. “Where should I put my stuff?”

She shrugged. “In my room.”

She sat on the sofa, grabbing the remote, and not saying anything more.

“Okay,” I said, awkwardly before walking towards her room. There were a few empty drawers that she had left open, I guessed, for me. And I saw that she had moved all her clothes to open half the closet for me. That seemed a bit unnecessary, seeing as I had one box and two bags, but whatever. As I was emptying my stuff into one of the drawers, I looked at her dresser. She had pictures covering the edges of her mirror. I saw Dani in a few. Most of them were of her though, performing or doing a photo shoot. There were some candid too. I smiled slightly. Some of her when she was little with some lady, who I guess was her mother. I didn’t really get what was going on there. I vaguely remembered her telling me about her mom, but it was still weird.

“Are you done,” Caitlin’s voice pulled me out of my thoughts as she appeared at the door.

“Just about,” I answered.

“Do you um – need help?”

“Are you – offering to help me,” I asked, a bit surprised.

She shrugged. “Don’t make a big deal out of it.”

I smiled. “No thanks, I got it. I’m done anyway.”

“Okay,” she said. We both got quiet then. “Do you um – want to play Halo?”

“Definitely,” I grinned. Hmm – maybe this wouldn’t be too bad. There seemed to be a whole new side of her. But I was kind of starting to think of her attitude in terms of episodes. She wasn’t triggered yet. I wondered how long this would last.