Abandoned King Gives No Mercy: Hell Will Burn

The Weight of Pretending

Chapter Eight: The Weight of Pretending

The camera flashes used to feel like home.

Now they felt like chains.

Every time the light hit my face, I remembered the contract the neat signature at the bottom, the words “strictly business” echoing in my head like a warning.

It was supposed to be simple. Six months of pretending. Six months of smiling, posing, playing the part of the perfect girlfriend to a man who didn’t believe in love.

But nothing about Ethan Hank was simple.

We had a photoshoot that morning. Some glossy magazine wanted to do a feature on “The Power Couple of the Year.” I almost laughed when they said it. If only they knew.

Ethan arrived on time, as always calm, composed, every move measured. I hated how effortlessly perfect he looked, how the world seemed to bend a little around him without him even trying.

“Good morning,” 

he said, nodding politely as he joined me on set.

“Morning,” 

I replied, trying to sound normal.

The photographer clapped his hands together.

 “Alright, lovebirds, let’s make magic. Yvonne, tilt your chin a little. Ethan, hold her closer. Yes, just like that.”

It was muscle memory by now. Smile. Turn. Hold his hand. Look like you mean it.

But when his hand slipped around my waist, something inside me twisted not out of discomfort, but the opposite. It was too easy to lean into him. Too natural.

He smelled like cedar and rain clean, steady, familiar. I told myself it was just proximity, but my heart didn’t believe me.

“Perfect,” the photographer said. “Now, Yvonne, look at him. Like he’s the only man in the room.”

I did. God help me, I did.

Ethan’s gaze met mine, steady and unreadable. He didn’t blink, didn’t flinch. But there was something there, something quiet, unspoken.

The shutter clicked.

“Beautiful,” the photographer said. “You two are gold.”

I stepped back when it ended, exhaling quietly. My cheeks hurt from smiling, my chest tight from everything I wasn’t supposed to feel.

“Good work,”

 Ethan said, grabbing his jacket.

“Yeah,” I muttered, forcing a grin. “We make a pretty good lie.”

He looked at me for a second, then said softly, “Sometimes lies are easier to live with than the truth.”

And just like that, he walked away.

Back in the car, I stared out the window as the city passed by in flashes of gray and gold. My reflection in the glass didn’t look like me anymore, just some version of Yvonne Wells that belonged to the public. The polished one. The unbreakable one.

But under that, I was exhausted.

Pretending had a cost. You lose little pieces of yourself every day until one day you wake up and don’t know who’s looking back.

I thought about Ethan. About how he could sit in silence for hours and not seem bothered. About how his voice always stayed calm, even when his eyes didn’t.

He was good at pretending. Too good.

But every now and then, when he thought no one was watching, I’d catch a glimpse of the flicker of something raw. Loneliness, maybe. Regret. I didn’t know. I just knew it made him human.

And I hated that I wanted to understand it.

That night, I couldn’t sleep. My phone buzzed with messages from reporters, brands, magazines, all wanting interviews. The world had forgiven me faster than I expected. Or maybe they’d just found a new story to feed on.

Either way, I was relevant again. And yet, I’d never felt smaller.

I opened social media, a bad idea. There we were, everywhere. Pictures from the gala, the shoot, the dinners. Comments flooded under every post.

“They’re perfect together.”

“Finally, Yvonne’s found someone real.”

“Power couple goals.”

Perfect. Real. Goals.

If only they knew that I hadn’t even figured out how to breathe around him without overthinking it.

I tossed the phone aside and stared at the ceiling. Maybe this was the price of survival, living inside a story that wasn’t yours until you forget what’s real.

The next day, I saw him again. His office felt like his clean lines, dark colors, no wasted space.

He looked up when I entered. 

“You wanted to see me?”

“Yeah,” I said, trying to sound casual. “I just… wanted to talk about the upcoming charity event. The press is asking if we’ll attend together.”

“We will,” he said. “That’s part of the contract.”

“I know.” I hesitated. “I just wanted to make sure you’re okay with it.”

He glanced up, brow slightly raised.

 “Why wouldn’t I be?”

I shrugged.

 “You don’t like crowds. Or cameras. Or people, really.”

For a second, I thought I saw the corner of his mouth twitch, not quite a smile, but close. “You’re observant.”

“I'll try,”

 I said softly.

He leaned back, eyes narrowing slightly. 

“Yvonne… you don’t have to try so hard to be polite with me. I’ve seen the world eat people alive. I don’t need another person pretending they’re fine.”

Something in his tone hit me square in the chest.

“I’m not pretending,” I said quietly. “I’m surviving.”

That made him look up.

 “Is there a difference?”

“Yes,” I said. “Pretending means you still care what people see. Surviving means you stopped.”

He stared at me for a moment, then nodded slowly, like he understood. “Then maybe we’re both just surviving.”

The silence after that wasn’t uncomfortable. It was… fragile. Like a moment that could break if either of us moved too fast.

Finally, I stood.

 “See you at the event, then.”

As I turned to leave, he said,

 “Yvonne.”

I stopped.

He hesitated, then said, “You did well yesterday. The photos looked… real.”

I smiled faintly, not turning around. 

“Maybe that’s the problem.”

And then I walked out before he could say anything else.

Later that night, I sat by my window again, watching the city lights flicker. Somewhere out there, Ethan was probably still awake, working, planning, pretending not to feel.

We were two actors in the same play, both too broken to admit we’d started believing our lines.

I pressed my hand against the glass and whispered to myself, “It’s just a deal.”

But my heart didn’t believe me.

Because every time I looked at him, every time I caught that flicker of something real beneath his calm, it didn’t feel like business anymore.

It felt like the beginning of a story I wasn’t supposed to write.

And I wasn’t sure if I wanted to stop it.