A/N: Thanks to everyone who reviewed the last chapter! It's good to know the Sarah Dessen board is so friendly. I'm sorry it took so long for me to update, I've been settling back into school. I hope everyone's still reading!

Two

"Are you for real?"

That was the question of Dexter Jones, frontman of Truth Squad. He filled the entire TV screen, his bushy black curls nearly out of sight completely.

"Remember," he continued. "We have one girl, three guys. And the aim of the game is for the girl to decide which two out of the three guys is playing a game – assuming a fake persona. If she chooses the one who is for real, she gets the prize money. If she doesn't, she leaves with nothing."

The longer he stood there, the more I noticed. Like a ketchup stain on his collar. And the fact that he was missing a button on his shirt. And even that the pocket stitched on is ever-so-slightly wonky…

In fact, it was a relief when the next commercial came on. My OCD was about to kick into overdrive.

Yesterday, when Lissa found out about me being on the show, she just about had an aneurysm. Especially when she found out that Dexter would be hosting it. I should have expected it, really. I mean, she has about three different posters of his on her wall.

Dexter, for some inexplicable reason, is some kind of teenage heartthrob. He shot to fame a year and a half ago, aged sixteen, with his band Truth Squad after they were found playing in a club in West Virginia. Their first single "Potato Opus One" shot straight to number one of every imaginable chart, achieving platinum status. And I know all of this because my friends never shut up about him. Though personally, I can't see the appeal.

I turned off the T.V in disgust, even though the commercial advertising R U 4 REAL is long-gone. It's enough that I'm the main contestant; I didn't constant reminders when I was just tuning in to The View.

Since I came round to the idea – or rather, my mom just happened to mention the matter of prize money – I've had to sign a million things. Mostly disclaimer contracts – I understand that NBC will not accept any responsibility for injury, illness, or emotional distress I receive whilst participating – drawn up by lawyers who use words that are way too long for me to understand, even with my AP English knowledge. So I just signed away. I probably shouldn't have, but it was the easiest way to shut my mom up. I had more pressing matters to dwell on.

Like the fact that today was the day I start filming.

Because today was a Monday, it meant I had to skip school. A cause for celebration for anyone else; a bummer for me. AP placements mean you have to copy up everything you miss if you're absent from the school day. Plus, I was pissed about the daunting prospect of hours sat in Hair & Make-Up (yes, it's apparently capitalized).

A sharp rap on the door behind me sounded, and I swivelled in my chair to see my mom lingering in the doorway. She had a huge grin on her face – unlike me, she can't wait to meet Dexter – and her best clothes. With a sigh, I collected every document I needed, and got to my feet.

"Ready to go?" my mom asked. With the one look I shot in her direction, she already knew the answer.

"Can you see him yet?"

Even though I had the phone an inch away from my ear, Lissa's excited voice was still audible. It was also several octaves higher than anyone else's within close vicinity, so was pretty distinct. I was standing in the middle of a crowded set, waiting for some instruction, but everyone who hurried past didn't even acknowledge the fact that I was supposedly the main contestant. I was practically invisible.

Even to my mom, who was stupidly keyed up about being on a set, despite the fact that she'd been on a thousand talk-show sets, advertising whatever bestseller was coming out soon.

"No, not yet." Lissa sighed impatiently. I could practically hear her bouncing off the walls. I was under strict instruction to pounce on Dexter the second I saw him, and hand the phone to him so that he could say hi to my friends. In fact, being the daughter of two doctors and therefore required to have perfect attendance was the only thing stopping Lissa from following me straight onto the set.

"Remy!"

I swivelled on the spot to see a short, perky woman with about a gazillion microphones attached to her one way or another head purposefully in my direction. I raised an agonized eyebrow in the direction of my mother, who shrugged helplessly.

"Remy, honey." The woman reached my side and seized my wrist, forming a thin manacle around it with her fingers. I narrowed my eyes. It was bad enough I allowed my mom to call me 'honey'. This stranger was treading on very thin ice.

The woman – who later informed me that her name was Jill, along with the fact that she was born in Ohio, raised in Detroit and has seven kids at home – pulled me down into a hug. I bent down stiffly, shooting daggers over Jill's shoulder towards my mom, before straightening again. Now I was pissed. Nobody invades my personal space and expects to live.

Jill's hold on my arm tightened, and she started to tug me away, before an angry buzzing came from the walkie-talkie strapped on by her belt, and she released me at once. I massaged my pink flesh as she retrieved her talkie, whilst shooting me an apologetic look. Though in my opinion, she had more to apologize for than just answering a call.

"Stay right there," she mouthed at me, before disappearing as quickly as she came, throwing herself into the crowd that was hovering around the stage. I released a huge sigh of relief. I turned to face my mom.

"Mom? Please tell me you brought my moist wipes…"

But she was gone, and I was still covered in icky Jill-cooties. I groaned, before realising that Lissa was still talking on the other end of the phone. I lifted my cell to my ear.

"Lissa? Hi. I was just attacked by a psycho-techie." Lissa, apparently, didn't seem to care.

"That's nice, Remy. Have you seen Dexter yet?" I ground my teeth in order to restrain my irritation. This nightmare of an experience was slowly getting worse.

"Lissa, would you please just- ouch! What the hell?" Before I could finish my sentence to Lissa, something very bony collided with my side, causing my cell phone to fall from my hand to the floor, and scatter into several million pieces. "Shit."

"Oh, wow." I looked up, tossing my bangs out of my face so that I could glare with full force at whoever had disturbed my conversation. "Are you O.K?"

To my surprise, I saw that it was in fact Dexter Jones staring back at me, and with a concerned expression at that. He was at my feet within seconds, trying to scoop the remains of my Samsung into the palm of his hand, leg outstretched behind him and shoelaces untied. I felt my ulcer burn just watching him.

"No, I'm not O.K." Every syllable was sharp. Sharp enough, I saw with some amusement, that Dexter glanced up worriedly, as if I was going to scold him like a schoolteacher. "That phone cost me a hundred and twenty bucks," I added, hoping he would get the message and just leave me alone.

"Crap." Instead, Dexter got to his feet and presented the fragments of my cell like a peace offering. "I'm sorry. I'm just so clumsy." When I didn't take the pieces of my phone, he stretched out his other hand and offered that to me instead. "I'm Dexter Jones."

"I know who you are," I answered, ignoring his extended palm. "You're the host of this show." The maker of my fate, I contributed silently. What did he have in store for me? Humiliation, or education? That was the question.

He stuck both hands in his pockets and took a step backwards, studying me with a chewed lip. "You must be Remy," he said, finally, and he waited, like he was expecting a pat on the back or a gold star. "Well, I gotta say. You're certainly… charming."

I was just working out whether or not he meant that as an insult, before Jill reappeared and grabbed hold of me again. Dexter watched with glee as I was tugged away, face like thunder. He even waved.

I hated him already.

"I see you've met your host," Jill said, staring straight ahead as she pulled me along. "A great guy. And handsome, too." I didn't know what planet she was on, but I definitely wasn't on the same one. The only adjective I could find to describe Dexter was repulsive.

As we turned a corner into Hair and Make-Up, I was reunited with my mom, who was deep in conversation with a stylist about, I realized as I came nearer, heated rollers. I was forced down onto a hard seat and had a cape snapped behind my neck within seconds before I could catch my breath. It was like being in Joie's.

"Remy, sweetheart!" My mom had finally noticed me. "You're just in time. Your three possible knights in shining amour are due any second." And with that, right on cue, three bulky guys appeared behind her, each eyeing me the same way I was sure I was eyeing them: with caution.

The first one stepped forward. "I'm Jonathan," he said, and he took my hand automatically and kissed it. I tried to compose my face, but it wasn't easy. It was even difficult to decide whether I wanted to burst out laughing or throw up in my mouth the most. He definitely seemed the type who was a total Ken. Then again, he could have been faking.

The second one introduced himself with a simple handshake. He was bulkier than Jonathan, most probably an athlete. On his left hand was a faint indentation, where a wedding ring must have once been. So they're fixing me up with a divorcee. Classy. "Mark," he grunted, before ducking away again.

The third one didn't take my hand at all, which was probably why I noticed his. They were great hands, as far as hands went, and I had trouble pulling my eyes away from them to see him bow his head at me and give me his name. He was called Paul.

"Smile, Remy," my mom whispered in my ear, but I remained stony-faced. After all, any two of them could be telling me hard-faced lies. For all I knew, they weren't even their real names.

The boys were shooed away then, and I was preened, plucked, blow-dried, straightened, filed, polished and painted within every inch of my life in the next two hours that followed. I ran out of gossip magazines to immerse myself in within the first twenty minutes, and so had to wait out the remainder eavesdropping on the stylists' conversations. But considering they spent a whole hour and a half discussing one shade of nail polish, I was pretty bored.

In fact, it was almost a relief as I was scooted out onto the stage and placed into my seat, all by myself on the one half of the set. On the opposite side sat my three choices: Jonathan, Mark and Paul. There was an audible hum of excitement as the director began counting down the minutes till shooting, and I gripped the edge of my seat repeating my mantra.

"One hundred thousand dollars, one hundred thousand dollars…"

"Hey, Miss Anal Retentive." I looked up to see Dexter standing before, one hand on his waist. "Relax."

Yet again I was left without a chance to reply as he took his place as host centre-stage as the lights in the studio dimmed and the spotlights on me and the other contestants. The heat started prickling on my neck, and I rubbed it in discomfort.

"Come on," I murmured. "Start the show…"

"And action!" The director made a theatrical gesture in the air and simultaneously three cameras swerved to focus in on three points – me, Dexter, and the boy contestants. I fiddled with the buttons on my shirt, instantly nervous.

Dexter grinned, watching me, remaining silent to prolong my agony. He knew as well as I did that he should have started the show several seconds ago, but he was paying me back for my rudeness earlier. O.K, now it was officially game on.

Seeing me squirm a final time, Dexter shifted his weight, transforming into peppy host-mode. He shot me a wink, and spun on the spot to face his camera, introducing the show.

But I didn't hear the words. All I knew was that the wink he had spun so nonchalantly in my direction was replaying over and over again, and – to my distress – it was making me even hotter than the studio lights.

If I had thought before that this show was bad, it had now gotten even worse.