Oliver stirred under the sheets but could not bring himself to get up. His paper needed revising, but working in food service was surprisingly more tiring than he expected. It wasn't the physical demand of the job but rather, the inane requirement for him to continually smile and socialize with people around him that completely wore him out. The times he felt haggard the next day after forgoing sleep in order to do research or to connect nebulous clues to solve a case, were nothing compared to the exhaustion he felt now. This was what it meant for him to be truly mentally exhausted.

He reached beside him to turn off the incessant beeping of the alarm (which he'd 'snoozed' thrice already) and massaged his facial muscles. Why had he even bothered setting it last night? Today was supposed to be Gene's day off.

He placed his right arm over his eyes and exhaled loudly.

Eugene's life was quite difficult.

"Why did I agree to this?" he asked himself. His mind recalled the events yesterday concerning an obnoxious brunette, and Oliver thought he might as well try to make sense of everything that had happened.

It was only because he found himself in such an incoherent situation that he allowed himself to not only follow the girl home, but even, of his own volition (though of course at her urging), follow her into her room. At least, that's what he figured now looking back anyway.

He had been so confused that for the first few minutes he stood there dumbly watching as she frantically grabbed several things off the floor and threw them inside her closet. He remembered clearly that during that time he was focused on an entirely unrelated thought, reciting to himself how thermal equilibrium, according to Boltzmann, is the state in which several microstates of the system statistically become all equally possible.

By the time he snapped out of it Mai was already fumbling nervously about the bed, rearranging her pillows and sheets, so he hastily formulated an excuse. He would feign a terrible stomach ache and lock himself in her bathroom until he could think about part two. He didn't care how long it took him and how embarrassing it would be. He was Gene . Let him deal with the humiliation when he gets back.

But before he could speak she suddenly hopped over to him and violently tugged on his arm, then practically pushed him on the bed. With his momentum going against him, he easily stumbled and fell backward, and he then reflexively propped himself up with one arm to stare at her in stunned stupefaction.

"Oh, whoa, oh my. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," she had jittered apologetically.

Her nervousness had refueled his courage. He frowned at her and had said, "Your advances are quite bold, but your bravado is obviously forced. Why don't you just let this go?"

She replied, "W-what are you talking about, Gene ? Didn't you like it like this? Is this not rough enough for you?"

Ignoring the mortifying and completely unnecessary information aside, he retorted, not wanting to be the first one to falter, "Don't strain yourself, Mai. This needn't happen unless you want it to."

"Oh unless I want it to?" she had scoffed and joined him on the bed. "Are you saying you don't want to bed me? Why, what's the matter, Gene? Is something going on with you that I should know about?"

He had rolled his eyes and moved to sit up, but Mai pinned him down. He recalled how her arms had trembled.

"B-because this is happening, unless of course, you have a reason we shouldn't ?" She then straddled him. But she was doing it in such a way that she wasn't touching him. He wasn't versed in such activities, but he was sure that's not how it was supposed to be done.

She was obviously just as uncomfortable about this situation as much as he was. And that was what gave him hope that she would soon break, but thinking back now, he should have stopped the farce then and there. Because he should have realized by then that Mai was an annoying and exceptionally persistent git, and there was no way he could have outlasted her in their charade. Yet he continued to tempt it.

She then audibly gulped, leaned back a bit, and postured to take off her shirt. At the first glimpse of skin he regretted his foolhardiness and immediately shot his hands out to pin both of hers down by her sides.

"No. Don't."

The silence around them had been maddeningly deafening.

Then with a sigh he was forced to admit, "I am not Gene. I am his twin, Oliver, and he asked me to pretend to be him for 15 days."

And whatever happened afterward was a blur. The adrenaline eventually wore off so his recollection of the rest of the events were not as detailed. He just remembered they had some few back and forths, with him judging her for being insane enough to proposition and bring a man she didn't know into her home, and to which she haughtily responded that he was a hypocrite because he willingly followed a woman he didn't know to her home. For all he knew, she argued, she could have planned to drug him and cut out his kidneys to sell in the black market.

Oliver rubbed the sleepiness out of his eyes and got up to go to the restroom. A few minutes later he emerged, got dressed, and headed to the cafe with his laptop, determined to get some writing done.

-00-00-

"How were you so sure I wasn't Gene?"

Mai rang him up and handed him another order of tea. "You're going to need to go to the bathroom soon with how much tea you've ingested."

"Hopefully this time the tea isn't over-steeped?" He handed her the signed receipt and frowned. "I gave a tip again. I need to stop doing that until you figure out how to properly make tea."

Mai glared at him and snatched the receipt away from his hands before he could make any corrections. "There's a tip required for interacting with perfection, didn't you know?"

He raised his brow. "Then why don't I see you giving me any tips?"

"You are such a narcissist. You think you're so hot and beautiful and all that?"

"Don't you?" He watched in amusement as her entire face flushed.

"You really must believe you're handsome."

"I've seen Gene. He isn't bad on the eyes."

Mai laughed. "I guess not." After a few seconds of just watching him, she resumed, "You smile differently. Something about your eyes betray you, like you really don't want to be here. Gene is always happy to work here."

Oliver shrugged. "That would probably be because he associates the work with you. Speaking of that, how do you plan on explaining the events yesterday? I caution you against providing him too much detail. He can be very emotional."

"What? What are you talking about?"

He raised his brow. "Your little test. Gene is, unfortunately, the jealous kind."

"Why would he be jealous? There's nothing between us."

"Indeed, there is nothing between us, but-"

"-No!" she cried exasperatedly. "Between me and Gene, there is nothing between us. Another reason I knew you weren't Gene was because we have never been intimate and yet you seemed so unsure and confused. So I figured that made you uncomfortable, so I took that as an opportunity to expose you."

Oliver frowned. Aggravating, but clever. He cleared his throat. "I don't recommend relying on that tactic in the future."

Mai smiled at him. "I had a feeling you'd be a gentleman about it. It took you a lot longer to cave than I expected, but you did. Eventually."

Chapter 4: Day 3