REND: Prior Cycle (Old Version)

“What is this nonsense?” I asked before plopping a chocolate truffle into my mouth.

None of the passengers stirred. Most of the couples I spotted were old, retirees who simply wanted a relaxing cruise. They weren’t going to force their creaky legs to stand, and they probably couldn’t remember much about their relationship milestones. There were younger couples around, those with energy for games like this, but I could see that they were hesitant to join.

The emcee, Neon Pink Guy, could hear the proverbial crickets chirping. “Let’s have some fun, shall we?” Booming music played as he continued to hype the crowd.

Deen took a sip of her iced green tea—a beverage so utterly devoid of sugar it qualified as a war crime. “I wish we could join events like this…”

“What? We barely know stuff about each other,” I said while chewing the chocolate truffle. “And do you really want to go up on the stage? Like, this is for couples. Everyone will see us together, and your dreaded rumors will spread once someone recognizes you.”

“Maybe… I should stop dreading the consequences. You’re the one I care for the most. I shouldn’t care about anyone else’s reactions to our relationship. Possible opposition.”

“Deen, I don’t want you ruining your relationship with your family,” I said. And I don’t want your family to bother me, I added in my head. Rich people drama? I’ve seen in movies how messy that could be.

A solution would be to run away. Elope, was it? But that was a solution to a problem I didn’t want to have. I was very content with how things were.

“Oh, did I forget to mention our prize?” the director asked the audience in a tone that meant he didn’t forget. The screen behind him flashed bold, golden text. “That’s right! The first-place prize for our ‘Perfect Partners Trivia Showdown’ is a private dinner date on the ship’s upper deck, with unlimited steak, lobster, premium pastries, and a bar of To’ak chocolate, the most expensive chocolate in the world.”

My fork froze halfway to my mouth. Premium pastries? Most expensive chocolate in the world?

“To’ak chocolate?” Deen repeated. “Each bar could run a few hundred dollars. That’s the Masters Series logo, if I’m not mistaken. Six hundred dollars. Their most expensive.”

“I wonder what that tastes like.” I turned my head slowly, my eyes locking onto Deen as an idea formed in my head.

“No,” Deen sternly said, reading my thoughts with terrifying accuracy. “I can buy you To’ak chocolate if you want. We’re not even sure if it’ll be to your liking. Expensive chocolate is usually on the bitter side, the quality and purity of the cocoa beans bringing the price up.”

“But I want to taste it now,” I whined. “Or else I’ll think about this for the whole trip! They also have premium pastry, whatever that means. The steak and lobster are fine, too. Don’t you want to win the prize?”

I wasn’t a child who couldn’t delay gratification for the most expensive chocolate in the world—for sure, most of it was just overpriced marketing shenanigans. And there was no way in hell we’d win. We barely knew anything about each other.

My real goal was to mess with Deen. Aren’t I a good girlfriend?

“Erind, absolutely not.” Deen shook her head. “We’re supposed to be laying low for this mission. And I’ll die of embarrassment if we go up on a public stage and broadcast our relationship to the entire ship.”

“Are you embarrassed by me?” I asked, pouting while acting hurt. “What’s wrong with me?”

“There’s nothing wrong with you. You know what I’m talking about. We were discussing it moments ago.”

“Your family and so on. Yeah, I know. I just thought that it would be fun if we tried this together. A couple’s thing, since we’re a couple, aren’t we?” Just a little more pushing before I return to eating.

“We are…” Deen stared at the ocean. “You’re right. We are a couple… I shouldn’t be ashamed of us.” She began to nod, her voice becoming stronger, filled with conviction. “I’m brave enough to face monsters, yet I can’t stand up for my girlfriend.”

Wait, what? My instincts alerted me to danger. Things weren’t going according to my plan. “Deen, you don’t need to prove anything,” I said. “I know that you value our relationship. I was just, um, wishing for stuff. I’m super fine with waiting to buy the expensive chocolate later. You’re probably right that I won’t like it anyway.”

Deen stood and beckoned me. “Let’s do this. As a couple.”

“Wha-what? What about your family?” I should’ve just kept my mouth shut.

“We’ll deal with that problem when it comes. Maybe there won’t be any problem at all. No one will recognize me, and none of this will reach my family.”

“Bu-but you’re bound to be recognized! Someone will post a video of this on Snippet. Their friend will share it, and so on, until it reaches someone who knows you.”

“Low possibility. Even if it happens, we can claim we were pretending. Either that, or we come out to my family. I’ll be brave for both of us.” Deen raised a brow. “Why are you so resistant to this now? Why the sudden one-eighty?”

“I’m trying to be considerate of you,” I said. “And we won’t win, anyway. We don’t have much history or memories for trivia stuff”

“Then we’ll start making memories now.” Deen grabbed my arm and pulled me up. “I know that being on stage clashes with your introversion, but all eyes will be on me.” She smirked at me. “No one will notice you.”

I rolled my eyes. “Whatever. Let’s go embarrass ourselves.”

Ten minutes later, we were standing behind a podium on the main deck stage, waiting for the questions to start. The pool and the buffet area were in front of us, with around a hundred people eating. Thankfully, most of the passengers weren’t paying attention to the contest. Only a couple of dozen were around the pool, watching the show. The rest were deeper into the restaurant.

To our left was a married couple celebrating their silver anniversary, both wearing matching Hawaiian shirts and looking entirely confident. Silver was twenty-five years, wasn’t it? A long time to get stuck with another person. To our right was a pair of very tanned newlyweds who spent too much time in the gym. There were five other couples on stage, for a total of eight pairs.

Neon Pink Guy explained the rules—six questions for the first round. The bottom half scores, which would be four couples, would be eliminated. The next round would be six tougher questions about one partner. The highest score would be the winner. The couples should have the same answer to the question to score the point.

We were then divided so that we wouldn’t copy each other’s answers. I went with the group on the right, while Deen went to the left. I was on the ‘guys’ side. There were a couple of gay guys, so it wasn’t like Deen, and I stood out. So far, there was no indication that anybody recognized Deen.

I tried to hide myself behind the other contestants, holding a whiteboard while wondering what I had gotten myself into. I hoped we wouldn’t get a zero score.

“Alright, contestants!” the pink-shirted director boomed into the microphone. “Let’s start with an easy question—what is the location of your first kiss? It’s fine if you put a city.”

This one’s easy, I thought, scribbling Las Vegas. All of our nonsense escalated after we moved there.

We presented our answers. All the couples got it right. Deen looked so proud of herself.

“Next question—what did you do for your first date?”

Fuck. What counted as our first date? Deen and I looked at each other, trying to manifest mind-reading powers. We didn’t really have an official first date. Deen raised a brow at me. I subtly tugged at my clothes and looked at the sky. Hopefully, she understood it.

“Let’s see your answers!” said Neon Pink Guy.

Deen turned her board around. She had written: shopping for clothes at the airport.

I nodded as I showed my answer: Buying clothes.

Close enough. We got the point.

I was referring to the time we were waiting for Mom’s arrival, and we did some shenanigans inside the dressing room at a shop in the airport. We didn’t have a label that time, but Deen kept saying that was a date.

The next question was a tough one: What are you most likely to argue about? We really couldn’t say that we argued about stuff like killing people or hiding my secret. Besides those, the thing we argue about was…

I showed my answer—food. Deen’s answer was: sugary food. Neon Pink Guy counted our answer. We answered the next three questions correctly, much to my surprise. And we passed to round two.