The Charm Offensive(8)

After that, Charles relaxes more with each woman he meets. When the contestants make bold choices for their entrances, like coming out in a kangaroo costume because they’re Australian or wearing a pregnant belly because they want to be the mother of his children, he takes it all in stride. He makes it through all twenty carriage exits without vomiting again, and everyone is impressed with Dev’s coaching, because apparently that is where they’ve set the bar.

“You’re doing fucking spectacular!” Dev tells him as the cameras get ready to move inside for Charles’s welcome speech to the gathered women. Charles blushes and smiles down at his feet in response, like this is the nicest thing anyone has ever said to him.

Dev temporarily worries this is the nicest thing anyone has ever said to Charles Winshaw. He swoops in to adjust Charles’s hair. “So, based on first impressions, which of the women would you describe as your type?”

Charles arches away from Dev’s fingers. “Uh, none?”

Annoyance spikes in Dev’s chest. “What about Daphne? You’re both shy and a little… awkward.”

“Which one was Daphne, again?”

“Blue dress. First out of the carriage. We filmed the scene five times.”

“Oh… I…” End of sentence.

A camerawoman is nearby, and Dev lowers his voice. “I can’t coach you if I don’t know what you’re looking for in a partner.”

In response, Charles does an elegant sidestep that almost ends with him facedown in a succulent. “A partner? With a woman here? B-but… I mean, I’m not. That’s not why I… But this show is fake.”

The crackle of annoyance shifts to a full-blown wildfire inside Dev’s stomach. “What do you mean, fake?”

His eyebrows are scrunched in confusion. “I mean, the show—it’s not really about love.”

Charles Winshaw is standing in front of him, but all Dev can see is Ryan six years ago when Dev first joined the crew, fresh out of USC. Ryan Parker: leather jacket, dark hair falling in front of his eyes, apathy perfected. “This show isn’t really about love,” Ryan said as he gave Dev a tour of the castle. “We aren’t here to help people find happily ever after. We’re here to help Maureen Scott make interesting television.”

And Dev was already so smitten—with Ryan and with this show and with the idea of being behind the cameras, making the stories come to life—all he’d said in response was, “There’s nothing more interesting than love.”

Ryan never misled him. Dev can give him credit for that, even now. From their first night together, Ryan told him he didn’t believe in soul mates or fairy tales or loving one person forever. Dev willingly threw away six years on a man who told him from the beginning exactly how their love story would end.

Now Dev is going to throw away nine weeks on another man who thinks this show is fake. He’s about to fly around the world with a man who isn’t here for love; he’s about to spend every waking minute next to a man who is clearly only here to use the romantic expectations of twenty women for his own selfish needs.

On this show, in this world, happily ever after is supposed to be a guarantee.

So what is he supposed to do with the fact that Charles Winshaw doesn’t want a happily ever after?





Charlie


He’s not sure how he went from “fucking spectacular” to fucking it all up, but he can see it in Dev’s expression. Charlie doesn’t understand.

He just met twenty women and forgot the names of twenty women, and he doesn’t have much mental capacity for understanding anything beyond the fact that the front of his tux is somehow covered in glitter.

He considers apologizing again, but Dev stomps off toward the giant white tent across set. Jules swoops in, her bun bobbing like an Adam’s apple. “Come on, Charles. I’ll take you inside for your welcome speech to the women.”

He tries not to obsess over what he did to anger Dev. Naturally, he obsesses over it.

He obsesses over it throughout the generic speech his former handler wrote for him, about how he’s “excited for his quest to find love” and how he’s “sure his future wife is in the room.” He obsesses over it as the cameras shift again for the social hour. Then a blond woman grabs him by the wrist, and he can’t obsess about anything but the unwanted touching.

“Can I steal you away?” the woman purrs. He thinks her name is Megan. She tugs on his wrist and drags him outside to the patio. Charlie hears the producers whispering to contestants as they pass:

“Wasn’t that forward of her?”

“I guess someone is here to win.”

“You’re so much prettier than her.”

Megan drags him to a small bench beside the pool where cameras are already waiting. She proceeds to sit too close to him, touch him too much without permission, and drone sweet nothings in his ear about her YouTube channel where she posts exercise videos. People have always told him he has terrible social awareness (usually while firing him, or dumping him, or trying to ring up his groceries), but he isn’t totally oblivious. He’s aware of how he looks and of the effect his looks have on some people. Particularly women. Particularly this woman, who is putting her hands all over his thighs.

He clenches his jaw and tries to listen to her stories about working as a spray-tan technician in Tampa until they’re interrupted by another blonde who comes to confront Megan about hogging Charlie’s time. Soon, the two women are yelling at each other. He tries to de-escalate the unexpected tension, then quickly learns the tension is not so much unexpected as it is carefully coordinated by producers with headsets who poke and prod the women into these little altercations.