Hot take: the fake engagement is the best trope

Maybe even better than enemies-to-lovers?

True story: I was on my way to party and I popped into a fancy chocolate shop to buy a gift for the hostess. While I was busy overthinking over my selection, two young clerks are chatting. As I finish paying, the girl turns to the guy and says “Okay, we have to get our story straight on how we met.” And then inside I’m screaming: fake relationship between two people who work in a chocolate shop?!?! Yes please!!!

It’s like I stepped from midtown Manhattan straight into a small town contemporary romance novel. Swoon!

Lately I’ve been thinking about the fake dating or fake engagement trope because I just reread and republished my Fake Engagement Trilogy about a bookish heroine teaming up with a tech entrepreneur to fake a relationship so she can impress her ex-boyfriend and everyone at her upcoming high school reunion and so that he can secure the funding he needs. As one does. Spoiler alert: they end up falling in love for reals.

I think fake dating might be the best trope, superior even to the beloved enemies-to-lovers. We’ve all seen or read it a million times (or maybe even done it IRL, like those two cute kids from the chocolate shop), but it’s essentially this: there is a wedding, a reunion, a big family thing, or significant milestone life event looming on your calendar and you don’t want to be alone for it. Enter random attractive person who, for Reasons, will pose as your plus one and thus demonstrate to the world that you are lovable and successful at life. What could possibly go wrong?

This trope is a perfect set up for comedy and hijinks—two people pretending to not only know each other, but be in love, when they are essentially strangers? Ha! Two people putting on a show with no script and having to agree with everything the other says? Ha! Two people trying to be chill with each other when they are quickly falling in love? Oooh! 

To take things up a notch, add a dash of enemies-to-lovers and watch them struggle to be lovey-dovey while despising each other. One scene I had such fun writing takes place in The Wicked Wallflower where Emma and her duke are at dinner at house party, trying to convince everyone their love is real and they foolishly did not, as my chocolate shop friends presumably did, get their story straight. So the duke has to agree that he learned the flute and wept as he proposed while Emma can’t deny his claims that she drinks sherry for breakfast. Then when she mentions a courtship via letters, they must go off to, ahem, get their story straight and in the process, start to know each other and start falling in love. 

I love watching (and writing) the external actions of the characters slowly begin to sync up with their internal, emotional state. It starts out with two awkward strangers pretending to be in love for an audience of skeptics. Once they realize they are the on the same team, once they get to know each other, once they accidentally run into each other naked and have to sleep in only one bed…their charade becomes less of an act. The pretend feelings become real. 

The fake date/relationship is great because it’s also got a real emotional oomph that we can probably all relate to at some point or another: the feeling that we’re not where we thought we would be at this point in our lives and we are made to feel ashamed about that. In my novella When Jane Met Duke, Jane thought she would be married or at least engaged for her upcoming high school reunion. She thought she would be and feel more successful. In the absence of a real confidence in herself and her life, she seizes the opportunity for a fake engagement to a hot billionaire so that his glow becomes hers. Yes, it’s totally cheating. But it speaks to the desperation she feels. I’m not where I want to be at this point in my life.

Related to all that is the character’s need to prove to friends and family that they are lovable. This isn’t the case for every fake engagement story, of course (like Green Card or The Proposal) but it frequently happens that a character doesn’t just whip up a pretend plus one for lols, but because they’ve been getting pressured from friends and family to be married, to settle down, to have babies, to be more like their sister/brother/cousin who is a married doctor with children. And the message that sends is you’re not enough on your own. A fake date buys breathing room. It buys peace. It shows a painful desire to be loved not by a Plus One, but by their own friends and family. 

With this fake relationship comes a threat of reveal that is so deliciously terrifying because it speaks directly to the initial reason for doing it—shame at the truth of one’s life at the moment. This is that but even worse—not only is our character single (gasp) but also lying about it and pretending to be something they’re not. Sad! 

In the end, everyone in a romance novel does find real love. And the protagonists learns they are loved just the way they are. They discover that they’re loved no matter what, or who they’re with or how successful they are. Though sometimes, the family or community also needs to learn that they need to demonstrate that better; maybe less nagging about the love life and professional status and more welcoming with open arms.

In any romance novel, a good HEA is never just about the couple getting together, it’s about the love, support and connection they have with their friends, family, “found family” and community as well. This trope especially isn’t complete without that.