Shanaya Thakur, [Mumbai]
Right now, in this wholly ridiculous, cosmically absurd moment of my life, I, Shanaya Thakur—aspiring divorce lawyer, professional overthinker, and serial avoider of emotional intimacy—would like to officially acknowledge a few hard truths:
Yes, I was stone-cold, eyebrow-raised sane when I uttered the words: "Fake marriage."
Yes, my radiant best friend Zeel—my sunshine with claws—was currently marooned like an abandoned yacht on the absurdly plush velvet couch beside me, gaping at me as if I'd just suggested we harvest her organs and sell them on the dark web. (Her kidneys specifically. Left one, probably.)
And yes, we were both utterly disturbed, emotionally waterlogged, mildly puffed up with lunacy, and one hundred percent gobsmacked in every dictionary-defined sense of the word.
"Are you freaking kidding me!" Zeel's voice hit a note so high that only nearby dogs and emotionally stable people could hear it clearly.
Not rage, no. It was all parts of Disbelief. Pure, uncut, and unfiltered disbelief.
I let out a breath that had been staging a coup in my lungs. "I'm not kidding. I was stone-cold sane when I said it. Fake. Marriage. I know exactly what I said. I used real syllables and everything."
Zeel blinked at me as though I'd told her I was moving to Mars to become a potato farmer.
"Well, guess what, genius? That's not a thing. People aren't exactly lining up to play pretend-spouse in the name of side hustles. This isn't a Netflix original. This is real life. Where people cry over taxes and run out of oat milk. I could list the reasons why this is a flaming disaster, but we'd need a weekend and three whiteboards."
I folded my arms tight across my chest, my stance screaming, mule-level stubborn. I'd clawed my way here—survived on caffeine, cold pizza, and sheer spite through nights of exam prep that bled into morning. I'd smiled through an internship from hell under a lawyer who thought 'cranky' was a personality trait worth bragging about. I'd freelanced like a madwoman to dig myself out of a financial crater big enough to sink a small town. All of it led to one thing: landing this job at BR Advocate, the law firm with a reputation slicker than a Hollywood prenup.
I knew their policies were... unorthodox. So what? That's their charm. But no policy—no matter how glitter-dusted in "tradition"—was going to stand between me and the life I've fought like hell to build. Not now. Not when I'm this close, I can practically taste it.
If playing house gets me in, then so be it.
I'll marry Mr. Convenient (strictly on paper), play the smitten newlywed, stage some picture-perfect Instagram moments with just the right filter—
"Number one," Zeel announced, raising her index finger like a courtroom attorney about to crush someone's entire legal defense. Her voice sliced straight through my ironclad monologue. "You are about as immune to true love as a billionaire is to a Black Friday sale. Emotionally bankrupt. Which means, sweetheart, you couldn't fake being in love even if your life—and your wardrobe—depended on it. Your face? It's basically a live-stream with emotional subtitles."
My jaw ticked. I hated when she made a good point. Unfortunately, she'd made about five in one breath.
"I can pretend," I muttered, trying to reassemble my pride from the floor. "Actors do it all the time."
She snorted. "Actors are paid professionals. You, on the other hand, once flinched during a wedding proposal—in a rom-com movie. Not even your proposal. You've got the emotional range of a brick wall—if the wall was also filing a restraining order."
Ouch. That one actually hurt. But in a character-building way.
"Number two," she continued, holding up a second finger like she was counting sins at confession, "Sure, you can have a fake husband. But Amazon doesn't have a 'Rent-a-Husband' tab with Prime delivery. And trust me, I checked."
She pointed vaguely into the air, like she expected the guy to materialize beside her like a genie with commitment issues. "So, your options are as follows: A) You convince one of your male friends to play pretend husband in this asinine charade and get you through the firm's requirements." She paused. "Of course, that would require having male friends who haven't already proposed to you, gotten rejected, and then ghosted themselves out of sheer embarrassment. So, that leaves us with your exes. A lot of them actually..."
"Just get to the damn next point" I snapped, already spiraling through nine stages of reality check.
"Fine, B) You go the illegal route."
I blinked. "Sorry, what?"
"Relax, Bonnie. I don't mean illegal illegal. More like morally gray. You know, the dark web of matchmaking. There's a whole underground network for this sort of thing. Men who'd sign a contract, play the part, and vanish like your last three attempts at a relationship. But again, there's one problem here."
My brain tried to take flight. But it flapped once, hovered like a drunk pigeon, and crashed straight back down to the ground. Thanks to her over-the-top dramatics.
"What is it?" I bit out, squinting at her. "Stop being so dramatic. It's annoying me now."
"Time," she answered solemnly, clutching her imaginary pearls. "We don't have it."
I laughed. Not just a chuckle—one of those breathy, slightly manic laughs that made strangers edge away slowly.
"Oh please," I waved her off. "We have all the time in the universe. A whole month, minimum. That's like, five eternities in dating app time."
She leaned forward, positively oozing sarcasm. "Really? And when was the last time you checked the application deadline, Ms. Eternal Optimist?"
The smile slid off my face like warm cheese on a summer day.
My lungs forgot how to lung. A tiny bead of sweat formed at the nape of my neck. And there it was—the slow-motion horror movie realization moment.
SHIIIIITTTTTTT.
I could feel Zeel's eyes squinting, unblinking, and boring into my soul like two heat-seeking missiles of judgment as I lunged for the laptop as if it was a bomb I needed to defuse and yanked up the application details, praying to every higher power known to mankind that I wasn't too late.
I was.
My fingers froze. My eyes bulged like cartoon saucers, and I slowly turned toward Zeel with the kind of expression you'd reserve for watching your own house burn down… while you're still inside it.
"I'm dead," I said flatly, like a woman reading her own eulogy. "I'm so epically, cosmically screwed. The last date to apply is May eighth. That's in four freaking days. Four. Shittt." I groaned into my palms and dragged them down my face. "How? How am I this functionally useless?"
Zeel, ever the embodiment of smug tranquility, sighed like a disappointed yoga instructor who'd just watched her student light a cigarette mid-meditation.
"I knew it. We can't have nice things. The universe senses when we're even slightly thriving and throws a goddamn wrench soaked in failure. It's a hobby now."
That was it. I lost my patience.
"Stop telling me what I already know!!" I barked out, "I know I'm doomed! I don't need a TED Talk from Miss Enlightenment 101!"
I stood, nearly knocking over my coffee, which of course landed on the already stained rug because—why not? Chaos was clearly trending.
"I don't care what we have to do," I hissed, stabbing the air with one dramatic finger. "Flyers. Bribery. A full-blown charity gala with fake tears and rented tuxes. I'll marry the next man who can walk, talk, and legally sign a piece of paper."
I leaned in, channeling the full energy of a woman on the edge—possibly of a breakthrough, more likely of a breakdown.
"We have four fucking days. That's ninety-six hours. Five thousand seven hundred and sixty minutes. And every one of them is a countdown to public humiliation unless I find a man."
I inhaled sharply before declaring, "A fake husband," I emphasized. "I NEED A FAKE HUSBAND."