"I can't believe I'm seriously about to do this," Mitchie whined.
"It's not that bad," I promised her. "And when you're done, I'll take you somewhere special and you can forget it ever happened."
We were waiting in the green room at the British equivalent of TRL. She was going on after the #3 video was finished. I think they thought that was clever because the top two videos were going to be our video for "Bittersweet Blonde" and her video for "Your Plastic Heart," we just didn't know in what order.
"Where are we going?" she asked, for the millionth time.
"If I told you, it wouldn't be a surprise."
I was going to take her to those gardens – the candlelit ones that I was going to take her to the first time I took her out. Mitchie was going back to LA in three days, but the guys and I were leaving in two. If something real was going to happen between us, it needed to happen fast. I just wanted to take her somewhere romantic, where we could really be alone, so then if something was going to happen…it could just happen.
"Okay…" she replied, pretending to be really disappointed that I wouldn't tell her. "I don't get what they were thinking when they signed me up for this interview…I'm trying to keep everyone out of my family business. How the hell is this going to help?"
"Just keep the conversation on the music and us. That's all they care about right now," I told her.
I took Mitchie's hand and touched the ring on her finger. She'd put on a different one – a diamond ring that had been her mom's – because people would obviously know we weren't engaged if they got a closer look and saw that it was made of plastic. But she was still wearing the plastic one, too, just on a different finger. I hoped that meant she thought it was special…maybe because it came from me?
"I'm glad you're here," she smiled at me.
"I'm glad I'm here, too."
I leaned in and kissed her, but she pulled away after a few seconds.
"We don't have to pretend right now, Nate. Nobody's here," she reminded me.
Ouch. I guess I'd totally read those signals wrong.
"Oh, right," I tried to laugh it off.
"Mitchie? You're on after the commercial break," one of the crew told her.
She sighed. "Well…here's goes nothing."
"It's going to be fine, I promise. I'll be here when you get back."
"Thanks," she replied as she stood up and left the room.
I grabbed the remote and turned up the volume on the television, a live feed from the stage.
"And next we have the lead singer of Blonde Get-Up, in her first interview ever…Mitchie Torres!" the host, Damien, introduced her.
Mitchie walked out onto the stage, smiling and waving to everyone. She looked incredible. She had left her hair wavy instead of straightening it, and her outfit was awesome.
"How are you, Mitchie?" Damien asked her.
"I'm great, how are you?" she replied, taking a seat next to him.
"I'm good, thanks. Shall we just get down to business? I know there are a few questions on everyone's minds I'd like to ask you."
"Let's do it," she smiled enthusiastically.
"I'm sure you can guess the first topic…" he joked.
"Is it cute and an amazing kisser?"
Amazing kisser, huh? I liked where this was going already. I hoped she wasn't just saying that.
He laughed and looked at the ring. "Let's just get this question out of the way – are you two engaged?"
Mitchie grinned and gave him a mischievous look. "We're very happy. That's all I'm going to say."
"How did you meet?"
I froze. Why hadn't we thought of that? We'd made up answers for every other question he could possibly ask about us – how had we forgotten the most obvious? Obviously the real answer wasn't going to fly.
Mitchie didn't miss a beat. "Well, he brought his little sister to one of our shows a few months ago, and they came backstage afterwards. We started talking and we just really hit it off."
Wow, if this music thing didn't work out, she could be an actress.
"What do you think of the other guys in Connect 3?" he asked.
"Shane and Jason are so much fun! And Nate gets along great with the girls, too. That's really important to me," she explained.
"What do you like most about him?"
Mitchie thought for a moment. I was definitely interested in what her answer would be.
"Nate is such a sweet guy. He's always there for me, and he's really easy to talk to. And I always have fun with him, even when we're just lying around," she told him.
"We have to go to commercial, but when we come back, we'll talk a little about your new single and introduce the top two videos," Damien said, and the audience clapped.
"Nate!" Mitchie said into her microphone while she made a 'come here' gesture that I could see from the live feed.
She wanted me to go out there? I looked over to a crew member to make sure I was even allowed to do that. He nodded, so I left the green room and stepped onto the stage, much to the surprise of the audience. They all started screaming. I bent down so I could whisper to her.
"What's up?" I asked her.
"Please tell me you have a little sister," she whispered, covering her microphone.
I laughed. "Yeah…Taylor. She's twelve."
"Thank God," she sighed, relieved.
"Hey, can you stay?" Damien asked me.
He looked between us to make sure it was okay with both of us. We looked at each other and nodded. "Yeah, sure."
I sat down next to Mitchie and laced my fingers through hers.
"And we're back, with Mitchie Torres and Nate Black!" Damien announced. "Now, Nate, what's your favorite thing about Mitchie?"
I kissed the back of her hand and smiled. "That's easy. Everything."
A collective "aww" came from the audience. It was cheesy, yeah, but it was the truth. I couldn't think of anything I didn't like about her, other than the fact that she wasn't my actual girlfriend.
"Well, one of you has the number one video, and one of you is second. Would you like to announce our number two video?" he asked.
"Sure," we both replied.
Mitchie took the envelope from him. "And the loser is…"
She opened the envelope very slowly to be dramatic and handed it to me to read. I glanced at the answer and smirked.
"Sorry, baby. The number two video is 'Your Plastic Heart' by Blonde Get-Up," I announced. "Which means…who's number one, babe?"
She rolled her eyes. "You are…"
"Thanks for being with us today, guys," Damien said to us. "Roll the video!"
He shook our hands when the video started playing and we headed back into the green room.
"That wasn't so bad, was it?" I asked.
"I guess it wasn't that bad…" she admitted. "Can you tell me where we're going now?"
I shook my head. "You'll have to wait and see. But let's grab something to eat first."
A/N: Can you tell I'm having a lot of fun with these band name/song title generators? Kind of a lame chapter, sorry. I have sort-of an idea of what's going to happen on their date, but I'm having a little writer's block…so if you have any suggestions, PM me!