He’d have to ask Connor what it was.
“There,” Connor said, turning the phone to Max so he could see thephoto. “Happy?”
Max stared at the photo for a few moments. It was weird to seehimself being kissed like that, but he didn’t hate it. They looked happy. Theylooked like theycouldbe in love, which was the main thing.
“Works for me if it works for you.” Max shrugged.
“I think it’s a good photo,” Connor said. “It looks… natural.Which I think will work in our favor.”
“Okay,” Max said, watching Connor send the photo to his laptop.“What’s next?”
“They wanna know how we met,” Connor said. “Thoughts?”
“Uh…” Max looked at the question on the screen, unsure what tosay. “I don’t really know how gay guys meet, so…”
Connor turned to look at him. “You’re not gay?”
Max shook his head. “No. I mean, I’m guessing you are because youdidn’t even bat an eyelid when I suggested this, but… I’m not. Is that… okay?”
Connor smiled wryly. “I never expected to be asked if it was okayto be straight,” he said. “But yeah, of course it’s okay. This is allmake-believe. But it’s twice as sweet now that you’re doing this for yoursister.”
“It is?” Max asked.
Connor nodded. “Yeah, I mean… alotof straight guyswouldn’t even consider pretending to be gay for anything, and you didn’t evenhesitate. I’m impressed.”
“Oh.” Max looked down at his lap, not sure what to think of that.“I just… she’s my sister. I’d do anything for her. There’s nothing wrong withbeing gay, so… why shouldn’t I let people think I am?”
“And now I’mpositiveunicorns are real, and I’m looking atone,” Connor teased. “You’re one of a kind.”
Max blushed, shifting in his chair. It was nice to becomplimented, but he wasn’t really good at taking them. “So maybe we met… here?I mean, since it’s true and all…”
Connor smiled at that. “Probably a good idea. I was new in town.You were sweet and kind to me, and you were making my coffee, so it was prettymuch impossible not to fall in love with you.”
Max chuckled. “I can imagine that, yeah. You’d have to havesomereason.”
“Okay, so, let me make up a little work of fiction here,” Connorsaid, tapping away on the keyboard. “We met here, I slowly fell in love withyou over cups of coffee, when I finally got up the courage to say something itturned out you felt the same way…”
“Sounds like a romance novel,” Max said. “Not, uh… I mean, my momreads them, I…”
“You should know I read them,” Connor said. “Before you continue.”
“I wasn’t gonna say anything bad,” Max responded, hoping Connorbelieved that.
“I actually don’t care what anyone thinks,” Connor said, but itwasn’t harsh. It sounded to Max like hereallydidn’t care. “But you’reright, and that’s the idea. We’re trying to win this, but we’ve gotta getpicked first. The cuter our story sounds, the better.”
“We should add a dog,” Max said. “You know, that brought ustogether.”
Connor laughed. “I thinkyouread romance novels.”
Max cleared his throat. “Maybe one or two. They were lying aroundand I like that nothing bad happens in them. Nothing that doesn’t get solved,anyway.”
“Me too,” Connor agreed. “So next question, what do we like mostabout each other?”
Max blinked at Connor. He had no idea what to say. He could seethat Connor had good qualities--he was obviously smart, and determined, and heclearly took care of himself and dressed well. He wasn’t hard to look ateither, and his smile made Max want to smile back.
That was… probably the kind of answer Max was meant to give, butall he could think of was that he liked Connor because Connor was nice to him.
He liked alotof people for that reason, but this seemed alittle different in a way he couldn’t pinpoint.
