I shift in my seat, sneaking a glance at August. He's leaning forward, elbows resting on his knees, eyes fixed on the pitcher who's shaking his head and fidgeting with the ball behind his back. I can't tell if August is just absorbed in the game or if he's quiet because of the constant shouting of I love you, Maisie! And Is he the secret boyfriend? Or what's his name?

For the last two innings, August has mostly tuned out the crowd, only occasionally glancing back at the stadium, turning so that his gray t-shirt with the Boston Red Sox logo stretches deliciously across his chest. My hands itch to place my palms on that chest and slide them up into his hair. I want to pull him close and kiss him, just like I've been obsessing about since he kissed me in front of his house and then again at the Ice Cream Shop.

My phone vibrates in my hand, snapping me out of my thoughts. I glance down at a text from Andrea, "You could not look more uncomfortable."

I stifle a quiet groan, shifting again in my chair, just as another text buzzes in, "At least act like you're enjoying yourself."

"You okay?" August asks, and I quickly snap my head up to meet his gaze.

I force out a smile and nod vigorously—probably too much—and then stand from my seat, muttering, "I'm going to use the restroom."

"Okay," he says it like a question, watching as I awkwardly back my way out of the row of seats.

"I'll be right back," I add hastily. Once I turn around, I practically sprint up the steps towards the VIP lounge.

The moment I step inside, I pull out my phone and call Andrea. It only rings once before she answers. The first thing she says is, "You look like you're in pain."

"Gee, Andrea, thanks," I say dryly, scanning the room before spotting a quiet section by the couches in the corner. "How do you even know what I look like?"

"I brought binoculars."

"Of course you did."

"What's wrong, Mace? You were doing so well earlier with the whole 'I'm taken' thing, saying, 'That handsome guy is mine,' and all."

"I think it's too much," I rush out, my voice edged with panic.

"What? What's too much?"

August's expression when I looked over at him in the clubhouse with all the players. He seemed so uncomfortable. It's taking everything in to not just take him by the arm and drag him back to his house and hide him there forever. This is exactly why I've avoided going out with him in public. It's a lot to handle. Even for me, it's overwhelming a lot of the time. I've just learned to smile through it, but for August? It might be too much.

"All of this," I gesture urgently around me, even though Andrea can't see it. "Everyone staring, people wanting pictures of me— of us. I told you this was a bad idea. He's not going to want to be part of my life if it's too much for him. People are going to find out where he works and lives and— oh my god. I'm never going to be able to go to his house again. Paparazzi will find it, and they'll never leave him alone after that—"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Mace, calm down. Breathe," Andrea interrupts and I feel like I might hyperventilate, so I drop into one of the lounge couches behind me. "First off, August knew what he was signing up for. He knows how much attention you get." I shake my head, uncertain. Because I'm not entirely sure if he did realize. "Secondly, no one is going to figure out where he lives. Remember, we had all of that information scrubbed from the internet, including his address. And third, Maisie, my god. It's you that I'm going to need to replace, not August. I swear, he is a thousand times easier to work with than you."

I scoff. "Not true."

"It is. And if you don't get back out there and act normal, it's only going to make things worse for him. ESPN has already shown you both three times."

I run my hand over my chest, anxiety rising. "What are they saying?"

"Well, the announcers are clueless about what's going on, but I can guarantee your Rhodie fans are about to go haywire, wondering why you're so awkward with your so-called boyfriend."

"Oh, god," I breathe out.

"Mace, come on. You've got this. You don't need any more pep talks. You've already kissed him once; I know you want to again. Just get out there and pretend like you've got your shit together."

"Twice."

She pauses. "Twice? Twice what?"

"I kissed him twice."

Andrea goes silent on the other end, but I know she hasn't hung up because I can still hear Neil Diamond's "Sweet Caroline" playing a beat behind on the phone compared to where I am in the stadium. I can almost picture her pinching the bridge of her nose.

"Andrea?" I say after a moment.

"Maisie, unless there's an emergency like a baseball hitting you in the face or the ground swallowing you whole, please, for the love of god, do not call me."

"Wait, but—"

"You've got this. You've wanted this for so long. Just let yourself have it," Andrea urges before the call abruptly ends with two beeps. I pull my phone away, my jaw falling open as I stare at the screen that says Call Ended before it flashes back to my lock screen. Andrea has never once hung up on me before, and apparently, I'm acting so insane that she actually did.

I blow out a breath between my lips and stand up, a new sense of determination settling over me.

I can do this, I tell myself. I'm a grown-ass woman who can fake date her best friend. I can do this.

I start to weave my way around the throng of people in the lounge and make my way back to August. I pause when I get there because he's still resting his elbow on his knees, but now he's rubbing the crease between his eyebrows. And I know I'm the one who put that crease there. I'm the one who's acting completely deranged.

Taking another deep breath, I shimmy my way through the row to him. "Hey."

"Hey," August says quickly, standing up and slipping his hands into his pockets. "You okay?"

"Yeah, I was just on the phone with Andrea." I gesture toward the lounge. "She wanted to make sure everything was going okay."

"Oh, good," August nods. "Well, I went to get us some drinks—a beer for me and a Dirty Shirley for you. Extra cherries." He pauses for a moment, then adds quickly as if remembering something more, "Oh, and a hat." He bends down to grab a bag from the team store, pulling out a stack of hats. "Well, actually, hats. I wasn't sure which one you'd like, so I bought a few."

"Hats?" I ask, settling into my seat as the old man behind me grumbles for the third time about me blocking his view.

"Yeah," he nods, sitting down beside me. "I FaceTimed with Clara and Lucy and asked if I should get you a t-shirt or a hat. Clara said hat."

"Is that really what she said?" I ask, raising an eyebrow because in the nine years I've known Clara, I've never once seen her wear a hat, not with all that wild curly hair.

"Well, not exactly. She said something along the lines of, Whatever you buy, it's not going to match her outfit," he admits with a sheepish smile, holding out three different hats for me to choose from. "You don't have to wear one if you don't want to."

"No, I want to!" My eyes flit between the three hats he's offering: one in red with the Sox logo, another in navy blue with a bold 'B', and a third in green with 'Fenway Park' written on it. They're nice, but none quite match the hat I had in mind. My gaze shifts between them before settling on the hat on August's head. His brows furrow slightly as I ask, "What if I want your hat?"

"My hat?" he echoes, pointing at himself as I reach over to pull the hat off his head.

"Yeah." I nod, adjusting the straps. "Yours is, like... vintage."

"Vintage," he laughs, watching as I settle it snug on my head.

"How do I look?" I ask, giving him a slight shoulder pop.

"Pretty." Setting down the other hats, he looks at me before reaching over to make sure the hat sits just right, gently tucking a stray piece of my hair into place. Then, more softly, he says, "I mean, you are my girlfriend. You probably should have something of mine."

Something about hearing my girlfriend from him sets my heart fluttering wildly, even if I know it's all pretend.

"Looks better on you anyway," he adds, running his hands through his perfect wavy hair.

"Thanks," I reply, settling back into my seat as I reach for the Dirty Shirley that August got me, trying to hide the smile on my face. "How did you manage to get all of this while I was gone anyway?"

He huffs out a laugh, sinking deeper into his seat. "You were only gone for like half an hour. I figured you were freaking out in the bathroom."

I turn to him, surprised, the straw of my Dirty Shirley between my lips. "How do you always know when I'm freaking out?"

He gives me a knowing smile, shaking his head slightly before his attention is drawn back to the game by the crack of the bat. "Nine years as friends, Mace. I know you. I know when you're upset with me, when you're sad, and when you're nervous. Your pretty face scrunches up like you've had too much junk food."

I look up at him, my mind snagging on a particular part of what he just said. Because it's the third time tonight he's called me pretty or beautiful. And I can't help but wait for some sort of punchline or an objective teasing comment to follow. While we've always been comfortable with each other—like best friends normally are— I can't ever remember him calling me pretty this often. Friends typically don't see each other like that.

I pause, expecting him to say more, but when he remains silent, I shift my gaze back to the field. Plucking one of the five cherries from my Dirty Shirley, I slip it into my mouth.

A few moments later, I pop another cherry into my mouth and glance at August, only to find him staring at my lips. But by the time I blink, his eyes are focused on the batter at home plate.

Furrowing my brows, I ask, "Can I ask you a question?"

"Of course." He leans back slightly.

I swallow the rest of my cherry before continuing. "Does all of this... bother you?"

"Does what bother me?" He asks, glancing at me from the corner of his eye, his beer hovering near his lips.

"All the people staring and stuff," I gesture around the stadium. "The fact that I'm... famous I guess"

"No." He shakes his head slowly, his dark brows furrowing as he sets his beer down."Why would that bother me? Does it bother you?"

I let out a sigh, shifting in my seat. "I didn't— It's not like I exactly ask for this. It just kind of happened, you know? It doesn't bother me necessarily, not really. I just think I'm still adjusting to it a little bit. I never imagined I would be this popular."

It wasn't what I asked for. I had posted one TikTok video and it sat there quietly for three months until, all of a sudden, it had one million views, then two million, and it just kept growing. It happened too quickly. I wasn't expecting it. I had no idea what one video would change my entire life.

"It doesn't bother me," he says, "It's just... I think I need to get used to it. I had no idea what it was like for you. You never really told me."

"I thought you knew."

"How would I have known?" He shakes his head. "Mace, I knew you were famous, but I mean this." He glances back at the crowd of people, his shirt doing that stretchy thing. "I don't know. It's a lot more than I expected, I guess. It doesn't bother me though."

I nod at him, and we sit in comfortable silence. After a moment, he clears his throat before asking, "So, should we take a picture?"

"Hmm?"

He leans in, so close that his lips graze my ear, sending a shiver down my spine that I desperately try to suppress. His voice is a whisper when he says, "Andrea wants us to take our official couple photo for social media."

"Oh, right. Let's do it," I manage to reply, my voice a little too high. He shifts slightly in his seat to pull his phone from his pocket. Switching the camera to selfie mode, he angles it toward our faces. I lean in, our heads almost touching, and flash a smile.

"Take the picture, Gus," I say through gritted teeth, my smile straining.

"Hold on," he says, shifting. He tucks my arm behind his and places my hand gently on his forearm. Then, with his other hand, he rests it on my bare thigh. My bare thigh. The contact sends a wave of heat through me, and I close my eyes, exhaling a shaky breath that I'm praying he doesn't hear.

Don't freak out, don't freak out, don't freak out, I chant silently, my body on the verge of combusting.

He leans in, his breath stirring my hair as he asks, "Is this okay?"

"Mhmm," I murmur, my eyes fluttering open to find him so close, his face right in front of mine. My gaze instinctively drops to his lips—the very lips I've been obsessing over. Before I realize it, I'm leaning in, drawn to him like a magnet. Like my body can't help but take in this amount of closeness between u and it needs to be closer to his.

"Smile at the phone," he whispers, breaking the spell. I obey, barely resisting the urge to grab him and make out with him right here, in front of the thirty-five thousand people in Fenway Park.

I manage a smile for the camera just as his lips brush once softly against my cheek and then one more time on my jaw. My eyes slip closed at the gentle touch, but he only lingers long enough to snap a few photos before pulling away.

He swipes through the photos, and I steal a glance, hesitant to see how much he affects me. It's a lot. And I quickly tip my head up toward the bright stadium lights.

"I'll send these to you," he says, and I watch as he sends the photos, my phone buzzing with his message. Just when I think he's done, he sets one of the pictures as his home screen. It sends a flutter through my heart that I can't quite handle, so I quickly turn my attention back to the field.

"If someone looks at my phone, it makes sense to have a picture of us on my lock screen," he says as if he needs a justification. But he's just that kind of guy though. He's always had a picture of him and Gwen on his lock screen. This shouldn't be any different.

"Are you going to post one on Instagram?" he asks.

"Oh, yeah, probably later. I'll have Andrea look it over first," I say. "I try not to use Instagram much anymore."

"Why not?" he asks, his hand still resting on my thigh, making it hard to focus.

"Because I'm terrified I'll accidentally like or follow someone I shouldn't, and everyone will see."

"Can people even see what pictures you've liked?"

"Can people see what pictures I've liked," I mimic, laughing. August has never really been too big on social media, barely posting more than two pictures a year. "August, they see everything. I have a finsta account, anyway."

"A finsta?" he asks, confused.

"Yeah, a fake Instagram."

"Ah," he nods in understanding, "a burner account."

"How else am I supposed to stalk people without being obvious?" And how else was I supposed to check if August and Gwen were still together, going on dates, getting ice cream at the Ice Cream Shop without accidentally liking one of her pictures?

Maybe Clara's right; I might be I am a masochist.

"Also, I may have accidentally had an incident where I liked a picture that was over a year old," I add.

He snorts. "Whose?"

"Henderson."

"Henderson?" he muses, "Henderson the...?"

"The screenwriter. The one I dated when I was in LA a few years ago."

He hums softly, his thumb tracing lazy circles just above my knee, probably without even realizing it. "You never did tell me what happened there."

Henderson and I met early in my career while I was recording my first album. I was gaining popularity in the music industry, though not nearly as much as I have now. We had met at a party in the Hollywood Hills, and in my naivety, what I thought was the start of a relationship was apparently just a hookup. And he—well, he used me and my popularity to promote his film.

It was embarrassing and humiliating, and I may have ended up writing one or two or... okay, four songs. I wrote four songs about him between my two albums. I couldn't help it. I've never confirmed or denied it, but my fans, in their obsession, figured out who the songs were about and collectively decided to boycott his movies. So, I guess karma is kind of a bitch.

"And you never told me why you and Gwen broke up this last time," I counter, trying to change the subject. Because if he knew that Henderson ended things via text, saying we should stop sleeping together because he was getting back together with his ex-girlfriend, he'd be furious. His jaw would clench, his eyes would sharpen just as they did any time he got upset with me—like the time I drove from New Haven to Boston at midnight with a dead phone.

"Mutual differences," I add after a moment because his eyes are boring into me. He nods, clearly not buying my response, but he doesn't push, and neither do I.

"So, you're into stalking people now?" he teases.

I laugh. "I follow you, you know."

"You do?" He looks over at me, smiling. "What's your Instagram handle?"

I grin back at him. "Debbi O'Connell."

Before he can respond, the stadium roars in cheers, drawing our attention back to the game. Suddenly, "Kiss Me" by Sixpence None the Richer blares through the stadium speakers. I glance up at the jumbo screen and see August and me framed in a heart overlay.

"I think they want us to kiss," August practically shouts over the roaring crowd.

I nod, scrunching my nose at him. "I think you're right."

He turns to me, searching my face in the sunset's golden glow, his warm chocolate-brown eyes flecked with amber. When he finds whatever he's looking for in my face, he leans in, and I meet him halfway as our lips connect in a brief peck.

The stadium immediately erupts in booing, and I scoff when the announcer says over the speakers, "Oh, come on! That wasn't even a kiss. How about a smooch?"

The camera lingers on us, and soon enough, everyone is chanting, "Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!" I turn to August, and he meets my gaze, his eyes flicking from my lips back to my eyes and back again before he leans in to press his soft lips against mine again. This time, it's a slow, deliberate, delicious kind of a kiss, restrained only by him and the awareness that we're in front of a stadium full of people. Because if we were alone, I'd never want to stop.

The roar of the crowd fades into the background, overtaken by the rush of blood in my ears. He hums softly, a gentle vibration that has me gripping his t-shirt, pulling him closer. There's a hint of surprise in his lips, and his hand slides up to the nape of my neck, tilting my head to deepen the kiss.

And I want more because this will never be enough. I want to unravel all of this calm, all of his restraint, until he's as impatient and desperate as I am.

It's not until I feel him smiling against my lips that I begin to register the crowd's wild cheers. I can't help but smile back as he breaks the kiss. A laugh bubbles out of me because, one, the crowd's deafening applause is unhinged, and two, I've never been kissed with a smile before.