Fake

by Beck Nicholas

  Stupid emotional tears prick my eyelids. Of course, being Sebastian, he notices.

  ‘Don’t be sad.’

  I blink hard. ‘I’m happy. I promise.’

  He gives me the 404 look and sighs. ‘Girls.’

  I can’t help laughing.

  I think of the present I bought for Poppy. It’s still in the bag in Mum’s car. It can wait. We have time. And he still needs to get Mum’s approval because I’m finished with sneaking around. But he’s so cute and serious I have no doubt he’ll win her over.

  Hopefully hating me doesn’t run in the females in the Elliot family and I can get to know Poppy. I’m at once terrified and excited about meeting this little girl. Sebastian’s daughter. The idea is still so crazy but I think we’ll muddle through making up how it works as we go along.

  Students have passed by while we’ve been talking, and there are a few boys kicking on the field below. I suspect Chay has stayed in range in case I need her, but a few heads turn when Sebastian steps back and walks to the very top of the stands. ‘There’s something I wanted to give you.’

  ‘Another present?’

  He’s staring at me and I can tell that no one else but me matters in this moment. To have the full attention of a boy like Sebastian makes my breath catch and heart pound.

  His hands go to his waist and he hitches his navy t-shirt out of the way of his grandfather’s belt. ‘I know you like things with history.’ His lean, nimble fingers pull one end free. He unhooks it and then tugs it out of the first loop. One by one it slides across the denim. His t-shirt rides higher. There’s a flash of light brown skin stretched tight over rippling muscle and I couldn’t look away if I tried.

  Someone whistles.

  I gulp.

  He’s so hot. And he’s mine.

  ‘You can’t …’ My voice dries up as I catch a glimpse of dark hair, flat stomach and a belly button that makes him at once sexy and vulnerable.

  ‘I can. Come here.’ His voice is low and sexy. Like a magnet it draws me to him, despite my trembling knees.

  ‘Take it all off,’ someone yells.

  I chuckle even as I drown in Sebastian’s smile. It’s only for me.

  His hands lift my t-shirt up enough to expose the waistband of my jeans.

  Thank you, whatever fates made me wear jeans today.

  He threads the end of the belt through the first loop. I can’t breathe. Part of my brain is afraid my legs will collapse and send me tumbling down the steps, but most of me wants him to take as long as possible.

  ‘People will talk.’ This time the person calling out is Chay. If I could shoot her a smile I would, but that would involve looking away from Sebastian.

  His fingertips brush my waist as they feed the belt through another loop. I suck in a breath. He does it again, this time lingering on the bare skin.

  Fire spreads from his touch.

  I’m going to burst into flames right here.

  But then he’s pulling it tight and standing back to admire his handiwork. ‘It looks good.’

  Like his words break a spell, I can look down at the buckle. I think of the times he’s talked about his grandfather and what this means to him. I hold it with both hands and rise on tiptoe to press a hard kiss to his mouth. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘Now it’s part of our history,’ he murmurs.

  People are applauding. My cheeks ache from smiling and I think they’re going to have to get used to it.

  Our hands link and we turn and bow for the crowd. There aren’t as many people as there were when I made a spectacular fool of myself. But this time they’re all my friends.

  Sebastian leans close and whispers into my ear. ‘Love you.’

  I kiss him again because I can never kiss him enough. ‘Love you too.’

  I don’t know how everything will turn out. But this is my love story and I’m going to live every second of it.

  THE END

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  Many thanks to Sue Brockhoff and the team at Harlequin Australia for seeing something in Fake and making my dream come true. And to Annabel Blay and Lachlan Jobbins for your insightful (and at times hilarious) edits. You’ve been wonderful to work with.

  To my agent, Ali McDonald, thanks for your continued enthusiasm and support for my writing.

  To all my writing friends – your persistence and successes inspire me. To Helen Lacey and Sandii Manning who read Fake and provided the feedback I needed. Special thanks to Rachael Johns who not only critted Fake, but championed it to anyone who would listen.

  Thanks to all my family and close friends. Ro – thanks for reading everything I send you, and commenting with insight. To Caroline, you’ve always supported me. To Dad for the education I needed. To my in-laws, Dick and Shirley, thanks for looking after the kids and giving me time to write. To my fabulous sisters, Fi and Kirsty, for being excited for me as only someone who knew you when you were a baby can. Thanks for always being there.

  To my beautiful Mum, who always believed in me. I wish you were here to see this.

  And last, but most of all, thank you to my children who show me every day that anything is possible and who never fail to make me laugh. And to my husband, David, for supporting me in every way and making sure I never gave up. I couldn’t have done this without you. I love you guys.

  FAKE Playlist

  Listening to these songs reminds me of the themes of Fake:

  Do I Wanna Know by Arctic Monkeys

  Confide in Me by Kylie Minogue

  Aaron’s band, Fake, is a combination of a few bands. Listening to this will give you an idea:

  One Armed Scissor by At the Drive In

  A few songs that make me think of Kath:

  Girlfriend by Avril Lavigne

  Strong by London Grammar

  Chasing Cars by Snow Patrol

  Love Story by Taylor Swift [this song reminds me of the stories she makes up about the antiques she finds]

  And since we only know Sebastian through Kath, Green Eyes by Coldplay perhaps describes him, and I think he’d listen to bands like Boards of Canada and Mogwai.

  Some songs remind me of specific scenes:

  I Gotta Feeling by the Black Eyed Peas would have been blasting out of Chay’s stereo the night of the dance.

  Apologize by Timbaland featuring OneRepublic would be playing in the terrible moment when all the lies catch up with Kath and she loses everything.

  Feel So Close by Calvin Harris and Love is Easy by McFly could soundtrack the end when they meet on the stands.

  Q&A with Beck Nicholas

  Tell us a little about yourself and how you became a writer.

  I can’t remember a time where I didn’t write. I’ve studied a few different things and worked at different jobs but I have always written in my spare time or while I should have been doing something else. It was a bet with a friend that led me to finish my first novel and once I knew I could write a whole book, it made sense for me to write the kind of story I love to read.

  Tell us about your experience writing this book. For instance, how long did it take? What was the inspiration behind it?

  Fake didn’t take me long to write, maybe three months. I was inspired by a simple warning on a writing loop I’m on where someone wasn’t who they appeared to be online. It made me wonder how easily I could create someone and why I would do such a thing. That’s where poor, dumped Kath came in – she wanted revenge.

  Kath has one of the most humiliating boy-related experiences ever at the beginning of Fake – have you ever had anything like this happen to you?

  While nothing quite like what happens to Kath happened to me I do remember the time Mum called my second-ever boyfriend by my ex’s name. She followed up with ‘If you didn’t change boyfriends all the time it wouldn’t be a problem.’ I was so embarrassed.

  Have you had any negative experiences on social media yourself?

  So far, I have been pretty lucky with my social media experiences. I met
someone who is now one of my closest friends online. We didn’t meet in person for years thanks to living several hours plane ride apart.

  However, people close to me have had some terrible experiences and in one case it involved a picture posted by someone she thought she could trust. An innocent pose with a hidden message can be twisted terribly. Once that is out there it can be very damaging, and there are fears it could follow her forever.

  But then, crossing the road can be dangerous too if we don’t look and think and be safe. Social media can open up the world and I’ve been able to connect with wonderful people online. However I try to be careful at the same time because not everyone is always who they seem.

  Are there any parts of the story you feel particularly close to?

  My mum was a hairdresser who worked in a small salon off the side of the house. I would come home from school to Mum discussing me or one of my sisters with various old ladies who were her regular clients. They were lovely but the things Mum and I thought should have stayed private weren’t always the same. I remember checking Mum’s appointment book rather than asking her when she’d be free.

  Like Kath, decision making is something I struggle with. I can always see good and bad to every path and agonise over which to take. It leads to some sleepless nights.

  What made you decide to write for young adults? Why Fake?

  I didn’t decide to write Fake, rather Kath appeared and she wanted to tell me her story. While her story fit in with the contemporary YA romances I love to read, it was different because of Kath. The idea of a lie taking on a life of its own isn’t so unusual but this lie became a person and the consequences put everything Kath cared for at risk.

  How would you introduce Kath to readers?

  Kath is both ordinary and special, like all of us, I think. She’s indecisive and loyal and loves to find the story in everything from an antique rug to a pair of secondhand boots. She’s not perfect and might be about to make the biggest mistake of her life.

  What do you hope readers take away with them after reading Fake?

  I hope they sigh for the romance. I hope they think about their online life and how easily it can be manipulated. Also, I hope they remember that even the best of us make mistakes but we can learn from them.

  Were there any parts of Fake that were particularly hard to write?

  Fake has painfully embarrassing moments, sad moments, angry moments, sighromance and happy laughter and it stretched me emotionally to live it with Kath. The villain – Lana – gave me some trouble. She deserved her comeuppance but as Kath and I got to know her more we discovered even the meanest of mean girls can have their problems.

  In my experience there is no such thing as someone who is nothing else but mean. I wanted Lana to have her reasons for her actions. She sees Kath as having this perfect existence in every way that matters to her. I hoped the reader (and Kath) would grow to have some sympathy for this girl who seems so shallow at the beginning but really her hopes and wants and insecurities aren’t so different from Kath’s. Sebastian loves her so she must have something going for her.

  Can you tell us a bit about you and your writing? Do you have any writing quirks or rituals?

  When I write I see the scenes playing out like a movie in my head. They usually come to me in order but I can often ‘see’ the end before I start. I like to plan a little but leave my characters free to take action and the deal with the consequences. I like to write in sprints, interspersed with thinking time (and hopefully not too much internet procrastination).

  You’ve mentioned you often write while seeing the book as scenes from a movie – who would you pick to star in the movie of Fake?

  This is a question that lost me many hours in the rabbit-hole of Pinterest playing with different possible casts. I find it’s not so much the people (Victoria Justice and Ian Somerhalder) to be Kath and Sebastian but particular pictures. They needed to be fairly casual shots, no heavy poses or make-up. It was a particular expression in the pictures I chose which said Kath and Sebastian to me.

  Kath loves Choose-Days with her mother. What’s your best-ever op shop or second-hand purchase?

  I would have loved Choose-Days too. Op shops were a life-saver when I was at uni. It’s hard to choose my best ever purchase but it would probably be from a wonderfully eclectic store I visited in Manchester when I was travelling. I treasure the old-fashioned black woollen coat that kept me warm in an English winter.

  What did you enjoy most about writing Fake?

  I loved everything about it, but mostly spending time with the characters. By the end I felt like Kath was a friend and I had more than a bit of a crush on Sebastian.

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  ISBN: 9781488742712

  TITLE: Fake

  First Australian Publication 2014

  Copyright © 2014 by Beck Nicholas

  All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilisation of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the permission of the publisher, Harlequin Mills & Boon®, Level 4, 132 Arthur St, North Sydney, NSW, Australia 2060.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

  ® and ™ are trademarks owned by Harlequin Enterprises Limited or its corporate affiliates and used by others under licence. Trademarks marked with an ® are registered in Australia and in other countries. Contact admin_legal@Harlequin.ca for details.

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