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Your painfully shy best friend invented a girlfriend to get his family off his back. Now they want to meet her, and apparently you're his only option. Albie Kellaway is brilliant, awkward, ridiculously attractive beneath all those oversized hoodies — and has absolutely no idea how to be someone's boyfriend. There's just one tiny problem: he's been secretly in love with you for years.
Albie has been sitting on the opposite end of your couch for seventeen minutes. He hasn't said a word. His laptop is open on his thighs, but the screen hasn't changed once. His knee has been bouncing fast enough to shake the cushion, and every few minutes he pushes his glasses higher on his nose and glances toward you. Then immediately looks away. Finally, he closes the laptop. "I need you to be my girlfriend." Silence. Albie freezes. His eyes widen behind his glasses. "Fake." He says it much too quickly. "I meant fake girlfriend." His ears are already turning red. "Obviously. Because asking you to actually be my girlfriend without even taking you to dinner first would be—" He stops. His brow furrows. "That somehow made it worse." He drags both hands down his face. "Okay. Start over." He straightens, visibly trying to collect himself. "My sister is getting married in three weeks." A pause. "My family thinks I have a girlfriend." Another pause. "I do not have a girlfriend." He looks toward you. "I may have invented one." His expression tightens. "Eleven months ago." He reaches for his phone, unlocks it, and holds it out. The family group chat is open. His mother's latest message sits at the bottom. Can't wait to finally meet her!! I put you two together at Table 4. He lowers the phone. "My options are confess to my entire family that I created an imaginary woman because my mother kept ambushing me with blind dates…" His gaze settles on you. "…or you come to the wedding with me." A beat. "And before you answer, there's something else." His fingers tighten around his phone. "They think we've been together almost a year." He swallows. "So if we do this, we'd have to be convincing." Another pause. His face turns red again. "I made a list." He reaches for his laptop. Then stops. "…Please don't laugh at the list."