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I deleted #nina from my search to see what everyone was saying about the show. There were memes of Drew in his swim trunks, standing on the beach for one of his in-the-moment interviews. One of the captions read, "I don't always go on national television, but when I do, I make sure to bring my rock hard abs." Another had that same image with a rose Photoshopped into his hand, saying, "Will you accept these abs?"
A giggle escaped out of me when I clicked on the next photo.
"What?" Drew asked, looking up from his own phone.
I held my screen up so he could see it. "Your abs have their own Twitter account."
Drew jumped across the cushion between us and grabbed my phone to look at it. His eyes bulged when he saw the closeup of his torso set as the profile pic, with the handle @DrewBurrowsAbs.
"This is ridiculous!" he said, as he scrolled down the page. "My grandma better not ever get on Twitter."
"You don't like the idea of fans just gazing at your abs all day?"
Drew scrunched his nose. "No. That's so weird."
He tossed my phone back to me, and I had to admit that he was kind of adorable when he was embarrassed.
Like, the way his cheeks had turned red was a super cute look on him.
But instead of telling him that I said, ”You had to know people would do something like this. I mean, you are the bachelor on a hit show watched by millions of women."
"Yeah…no." He sunk back into the couch and draped his arm across his eyes for a moment. “Like, I knew a few people would recognize me here and there," he said, sitting up, "but really, when I signed on, I had no idea how big this thing was. I think you forget I didn't grow up watching this show."
"I did invite you and Aiden to watch it…so don't be mad at me for not trying to enlighten you."
The commercial break ended, and soon Drew and Nina were back on the screen, sitting at a table with food they didn't touch.
I watched Real-Life Drew. Since I already knew what was coming, I wanted to see how he reacted to watching himself. His jaw was tense, and his eyes focused like he was picking apart everything he did on the screen. When he lifted the rose from its silver platter, the signal that he was ready to tell Nina if she was invited to stay longer or not, Real-Life Drew sucked in a breath, as if bracing himself for a blow. On-Screen Drew seemed to do the same.
Real-Life Drew held his breath clear until Nina had tearfully let him walk her back to the SUV that would take her to the airport.
"How was it, sending people home like that?" I asked quietly, noticing an energy shift in the room.
"It was gut-wrenching. Every. Single. Time." His eyes were hollow when he looked at me. "Breaking up with amazing women who just weren't right formewas so hard. My stomach still gets all twisted up when I think about it."
"I could tell. All these months later and you still seem to be having a hard time watching the show."
He nodded. "Even though it happened months ago, I'm just getting my first view at all the things the ladies said to the cameras about me. I had no idea just how invested those women were before, so hearing it now is pretty sobering. And it only got harder each week."
"But they knew going in that there were twenty-four other ladies fighting for your heart, so it shouldn't be too surprising to them. Right?"
"Yeah, but they all thought it would be them in the end. It's that crazy."
I frowned, not understanding it. How could they all be so sure, when they saw him going on dates with these other women, having connections with all of them?
Seeming to sense my confusion, Drew said, "I guess you can't really get it until you're there. But on this show, you're completely shut off from the rest of the world. They take your phone, there's no Internet, you're completely immersed in this new reality of finding love with the bachelor or bachelorette. All you do is talk with the other contestants about this person, or think about him or her, or have the producers and handlers and others on set tell you what a great connection you seem to have. It's crazy. In real life you have a job, friends, family—you name it—to occupy your mind. But on the show, everything is about finding love with that one person. So much about them is built up, it's crazy. And then when you only spend like seventy-two hours together, you're expected to know if they are yoursoulmate.Sadly, for everyone behind the scenes, it didn't work so well with me."
He blew out a low breath and I sensed frustration coming off him. "You shouldn't feel bad that you didn't propose to Gwen. You still have eight weeks to get to that place."
"But what if I don't want to?"
And when he met my gaze my stomach twisted in a tight knot because there was something in them that scared me. Like there was something behind them that might mean something to me.
And I was speechless as I tried to process what he'd just said.
Washe trying to say something? Could he possibly have feelings for me?
It was then that I looked at the screen and realized what he'd said had nothing to do with me. It was, in fact, just a reaction to what Gwen was doing in this particular episode.
On camera, Gwen was throwing a literal hissy fit about how one of the girls had done something to frustrate her. I, who had been so focused on my conversation with Drew and my own pathetic daydreams, had missed what happened on-screen, which was Gwen in a group date with seven other girls. They'd been playing a game of soccer.
"Would what you just said have anything to do with what’s happening on the screen?" I asked, pointing at the TV even though I wasn’t quite sure I wanted him to tell me.
And when Drew sighed and nodded, my chest fell. "Yeah. Along with what she did on last week’s episode…and the week before that. I'm starting to wonder if I even know her at all."
