The True Love Experiment

The theme song plays, there’s a vaguely cheesy light show, and they cut to the first commercial. When we return, the segment opens with a montage reel introducing each of the Heroes’ archetypes and showing them in their daily lives, on the show, and talking about meeting me. There are wolf whistles when we see a clip of Colby doing shirtless pull-ups, some laughter as Arjun gets his shoes polished by a street vendor, fangirl screams when Dax launches himself out of an airplane, and the sound pitches higher when the video transitions to a clip of Isaac walking down the hall with a piece of robotic equipment I’m sure they had him hold as a prop so he would appear very Hot Nerdy.

The audience laughs as Dax exits the café after our first meeting and exhales a breathless “Holy [bleep], she’s sexy.”

I clap a hand over my mouth, holding back a cackle.

“Fizzy has this aura, you know?” Nick says in the video. “Confident, strong, grounded. But [long bleep], she’s hot.”

More laughter, and then it doubles when Arjun says: “Yeah, I don’t think we connected.”

The audience cheers when Isaac appears. “Fizzy is the kind of woman a man could wait his whole life for and never meet. You look at her and think, ‘Damn, she’s fine,’ and then you start a conversation and realize she’s got you running in circles and you didn’t even realize it.”

“I knew even when we first dated that she was something special,” Evan says. “A word of advice: don’t get a Bart Simpson tattoo.”

The crowd roars. The video makes me feel this tight tangle of emotions high in my throat. Why couldn’t I fall for one of them?

When the footage ends, Lanelle waits for the applause to die down before she comes in for the salacious part of the show.

She asks the Heroes who were eliminated early vaguely cutting questions with a smile—didn’t Tex think it was a bit sexist to ask me what my father thought of my romance career? Why did Colby think the audience voted him off? Did Arjun watch his episode, and how did he feel he came across?

But then she dials up the charm with Dax and Nick, flirting shamelessly, asking them whether they’d change anything they did or said on the show, whether they think they’d do a show like this again. And then there’s a surprise announcement: both Dax and Nick will be back as the leads in the second season.

“Holy shit,” I murmur to myself. “Holy shit!”

I wonder whether Connor is producing it, or if he’s free now. If he can do exactly what he wants without fear of losing his job and his life in San Diego. I want to ask him, but I have no idea what happens after tonight.

“Hi,” a deep whisper comes from right behind me, and I startle, clapping a hand over my mouth and turning. I’d given up thinking I would see Connor at all tonight, assuming he was watching all of this up in some bird’s-eye-view editorial suite. The instinct to throw my arms around his neck is strong, but even stronger is the desire to drink in the sight of him. His hair is soft and falls across his forehead, but he’s wearing a crisp black suit with a thin black tie. He looks soft and devilish, cuddly and powerful. He is everything in one man, every hero right in front of me, and it takes all my willpower not to uselessly declare my love for a fourth time.

“That’s amazing about Dax and Nick!”

He nods. “I think so, too.”

“Are you EP again?”

“I haven’t decided.” His voice is steady, but there’s something in his eyes, some tightness that I’ve never seen before.

I step a little closer. “You okay?”

“Yeah.” He tugs at his shirtsleeve in his suit jacket, smooths his hands down his chest, then over his hair. Fidgety Connor is a surreal sight. He glances at me and away. “You?”

“I would say I’m comparatively chill. What’s with you?”

“Finale,” he says simply. “Just nervous.”

“Everything is going great,” I tell him. “Haven’t you been watching?”

“Yeah—just—” Connor sucks a deep, jagged breath and then blows it out. “The hard part is coming.”

I turn to face him fully and set my hand on his chest. This, I know: “Everything is going to be amazing,” I promise him. “You don’t have anything to worry about. I will not let you down.”

He nods, and his gaze falls to my mouth, drifting unfocused.

My heart decides to evaporate from my body.

“Whatever happens,” I whisper, forcing the words out, “we did this spectacular, brilliant, once-in-a-lifetime thing together, and I will never regret it. I will never regret you.”

Before the words are fully out of my mouth, he’s already leaning down, lips on mine, warm and urgent, his hands cupping my face. Surprise pulls a cry from my throat, but my instincts send tight, possessive fists to the lapels of his jacket, and I stretch up onto my toes, eager for his mouth, desperate for the addicting balance of domination and tenderness in his touch. I don’t know what this is, but I’m no fool. I’ll take anything this man will give me.

With a quiet groan, Connor tilts his head, deepening the contact into a decadent slide, sending a hungry hand down my body, cupping the curve of my ass, and pulling me tightly against him. The other threads fingers into my hair until he’s holding the back of my head and pouring everything he has into the kiss. It is the perfect balance of soft and hard, wet with teasing licks and sucks. He catches my bottom lip between his teeth, drags slowly away, and I chase the contact, but he stops me, pressing his thumb over my lips.

He stares at his finger, conflicted, before sliding it away for a final, lingering kiss.

“Connor.”

“You’re right,” he says.

“About what?”

But applause breaks out in a blast of sound behind me. We are back from commercial and that’s my light cue illuminating overhead.

Connor turns me bodily, gently pushing me forward, and in a daze, I walk onstage—hair mussed, lipstick gone—to find out who I’m meant to spend the rest of my life with.





fifty FIZZY




The roar of the audience feels like a hive of bees inside my head. I glance out, trying to gauge how many people are here, but the stage lights are blinding. I can’t see anything.

What just happened?

Did Connor just kiss me goodbye?

The set has been restructured, with a love seat inserted beside Lanelle’s chair, and the two sofas with all the Heroes put off to the side, one next to what I presume is my love seat, and the other behind, on a riser so they sit in two rows of four. I presume whoever wins the audience vote will come sit beside me, but the moment I sit down alone on the two-seater, I feel weirdly exposed and self-conscious.

My lips still tingle from the fever of Connor’s mouth.

I have a couple of minutes to get myself together as the video montage of my life plays; in the darkness, a SWAT team of hair and makeup artists rushes in to fix the damage. On-screen, I’m shown writing (LOL), jogging (there’s a lone cackle from the front row; I’ll discuss that with you later, Jessica Marie Pe?a), and body surfing in Pacific Beach (welp, that’s quite a wedgie). God, in hindsight, why didn’t I say no to any of these ideas! An accurate portrayal of my life would be me double-dipping tortilla chips into a giant bowl of guacamole with Crash Landing on You playing on the television for the seventieth time and my laptop gathering dust in the corner. But I guess that doesn’t scream Heroine material.

When the video ends, we cover what we already know: that I previously dated Evan and hated his tattoo; that Arjun and I had no chemistry; that Tex and Jude rubbed me the wrong way; that Dax and I looked like we wanted to eat each other but didn’t actually have that much in common; and that I had great chemistry with Nick, Isaac, and Evan.

We all banter, we all bicker playfully. We break for commercial, and while everyone is joking and chatting, I feel my pulse start to climb. We’re almost there. Almost there. Odds are good I’m going to puke on live television.

I want to be done with this, but also never want it to end. I don’t know how to maintain a relationship with Connor after the show is over, or even whether I should. It’s weird to be thirty-seven but only now learning how to do this: confess my feelings, go after who and what I want in my romantic life, manage rejection. I never expected to be the kind of person to have a hard time letting go.

The lights rise, signaling we’re back. My palms are sweaty and I resist the urge to wipe them on my dress because I’m sure it would be very obvious that I’m freaking the hell out right now. We’re going to find out the audience vote. We’re going to find out our scores. We’re going to find out the name of my soulmate.