Chapter 6: Confessions Under Studio Lights

6

[Okay, I’ll eat my shoe.]

[This unfamiliar, deliberately avoiding vibe feels off.]

[Oh, Ryan turned off the lights.]

[Is there anything my VIP membership can’t see]

Actually, nothing happened. Ryan rolled up in a thin blanket, sleeping on the floor. Breathing very shallow.

I lay on the bed, staring at the ceiling, unable to sleep. Because this bed was too noisy. Just turning over made it creak.

Before, I used to complain to him about this. But while complaining, I’d also say something in a tone worn down to no temper.

“Ryan, don’t… take it easy.”

When we were young, it was day and night. Now, just turning over. Creak.

And I remembered. I wasn’t the only one who remembered.

Ryan lifted his blanket, wearing only a thin gray T-shirt, got up and went outside. Closed the door behind him. With a click.

In the deep neon night, a cigarette was lit in his hand. When I met him, he didn’t smoke, was very well-behaved. Now, he still didn’t smoke. Just lit it.

Not far away, car lights flashed. Ryan ran into Ethan, who had just gotten out of a car.

“Delivering cake.” Ethan explained as he peeked in through the window. Seeing the beds, one on the floor and one on the bed, not interfering with each other. He smiled knowingly.

“No choice,” Ethan said, “she’s too clingy.”

Clearly, two people who weren’t even familiar didn’t talk, but Ethan just wanted to find a sense of presence.

“She’s wanted it for so long, insisted I buy it, wouldn’t take it if someone else did.”

“She’ll see it in the morning and be so moved.”

“Hey,” Ethan lifted his eyes, “you wouldn’t understand, I’m her first love.”

“Really?”

The other finally replied.

“Why would I lie?” Ethan said, “She’s on the show just to make me come back.”

That cake. I never saw it, even after I woke up the next day.

The livestream ended.

This time, in the extra post-show interview, the four of us were together for the first time.

I was late, the last to arrive. The staff gave me a headset. The headset was cold against my ear, and the studio’s air conditioning made goosebumps rise along my arms. My freshly washed hair was too smooth and kept slipping off.

On the other side, Lauren and Ethan were drawing Q&A cards. I bowed my head. The headset almost slipped off. But the hand of the person on my left caught it quickly.

“Thank you.”

I tried to take it from Ryan’s hand. But he didn’t let go. Instead, he helped me put it on. While putting it on, he adjusted it. His fingers brushed mine, just for a second. He flinched like the touch burned.

It wasn’t an intimate gesture. Just colleagues looking out for each other. After all, the camera was there, and people were there.

“It’s caught.” He said. Between my hair and the headset. He had to lean a bit closer.

Over there, Ethan’s voice came, and his gaze swept over Ryan and me. A very normal action. If not for Ryan subconsciously kissing my hair.

Too familiar a scent. I rarely change my habits, even after all these years my shampoo still smells the same. The scent he used to wash.

The room suddenly fell silent. Ethan stood up abruptly. Ryan withdrew his hand, very politely and restrainedly said to me:

“Sorry, I accidentally brushed against you.”

The producer reacted and broke the awkwardness: “It happens all the time, let’s keep asking questions.”

After all, it was just a moment, the contact fleeting. So fast Ethan didn’t even see it clearly. It must have just been an accident. He sat back down.

Q&A game. When it was my turn to draw a card, I got the first love card.

The producer asked me: “Is your first love your greatest love?”

Ethan propped his head, his usual laziness gone, looking at me. Everyone’s eyes wandered between me and Ethan. Everyone thought my first love was him.

“Yes.”

When I answered, Ethan sat up straight, couldn’t help glancing at Ryan, looking a bit smug. But the other was absent-minded. Ryan turned his face, looking out at the falling snow. The window reflected my face.

“The same question,” the producer said, “for Ryan.”

He and I were a pair. The card questions were the same. Lauren wasn’t his first love. No one knew who that person was.

“She drives me crazy, you know? Like, she goes and marries someone else, then says her biggest love is me. Who does that?”

Everyone perked up, ears ready for gossip.

“So much resentment,” the producer asked, “what did she do?”

“For example,” he turned his head, drawing out the words, “marrying someone else but saying her greatest love is me.”

It didn’t make sense. No one at the scene understood. But Ethan still unconsciously frowned slightly.

The producer flipped the last card. “Natalie, what do you want to say to your first love now?”

A hundred safe answers flashed through my mind. But what came out was:

“I hope he doesn’t hate me too much.”

Very reasonable. Everyone could understand. They all thought I wanted to get back together with Ethan.

Ethan’s laziness returned, raising his eyebrows, wanting to string me along, not planning to give me any leeway.

Until, to the same question, Ryan answered: “I just lied to her, I don’t hate her.”

The cameras kept rolling, but I barely heard the next question. For the first time, I wondered what would happen if I stopped pretending.

A silent tension lingered in the air after the final answer, the kind of awkwardness that only happens when cameras are rolling but the real feelings have nowhere to hide. The studio’s overhead lights hummed, a constant buzz, and outside, the muffled sound of traffic filtered in, reminding everyone they were just a short ride from downtown LA. I could feel the heaviness of the moment settle in my chest, like humidity before a summer thunderstorm. Ryan didn’t look at me, but I could sense his restlessness in the tap of his sneaker against the set’s fake floorboards. Ethan’s eyes were on me—hard, searching, not the soft gaze of someone secure. Lauren’s hand gripped her cue cards so tightly the edges bent. Even the crew held their collective breath, waiting for someone to break the spell, for the show to move on. In that moment, beneath all the scripted lines and carefully curated drama, the past and present tangled together, raw and unresolved, the way heartbreak always does in real life, even under the glare of reality TV.