Fake Dating The Bad Boy-Chapter 32: The Origin Of The Voices

Justin’s POV:

After everything that happened this weekend — the laughter, the nightmares, the mind-blowing sex, the quiet morning cuddles — I still didn’t know what this was.

Were we still faking it?

Or had we crossed into something dangerously real?

Because nothing about her leaving felt like a performance. It felt like retreat. Like she was putting distance between us again, and I didn’t know if it was for her sake or mine. And I hated that I wanted to chase after her, to ask her what we were now.

But I didn’t.

I just stood there at the door after it clicked shut behind her, staring at the spot she’d just occupied. Trying to ignore how empty the apartment suddenly felt. How cold the air had turned without her body pressed against mine, her scent still clinging to my shirt.

I ran a hand through my hair, sighing.

We were supposed to be pretending. That was the deal. Just a convenient arrangement, right?

So why the hell did it already feel like a breakup?

Arrgh. This. This is exactly why I never let anyone into my apartment. Now, I can’t sit anywhere without thinking of her. Every corner of this damn place feels like it’s still holding a piece of her — her laugh echoing off the walls, her scent clinging to my sheets, her ghost haunting my kitchen counter.

Fuck.

And then the voices came back — crawling, whispering, unrelenting.

The ones I try to drown out every day. The ones that remind me just how broken I am. That I’m not fixed. Not healed. Definitely not worthy of someone like her.

June.

She wasn’t supposed to come back into my life. Not after what she promised and never delivered. She said she’d come back with help — that she wouldn’t leave me behind — but she did. And I waited. God, I waited. For six damn years.

I used to fantasize about what I’d do when I finally saw her again. How I’d tear into her for abandoning me. How I’d look her dead in the eyes and ruin her perfect little world just like she helped ruin mine.

But then she walked back in — not the same girl I remembered, but someone different. Still beautiful, still shining, but also somehow... cracked. And I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t destroy her. Not when she looked at me like that. Not when I realized I still cared.

And then something shifted. The longer we spent together, the more I saw her mask slip. Little moments. The shadows in her eyes. The way she screamed in her sleep.

That wasn’t someone who’d escaped the past.

That wasn’t someone who was healed.

That was someone who, like me, was still running. Still pretending. Still barely holding it together behind the perfect smile and the golden-girl crown.

Maybe I wasn’t the only one faking it all this time.

Maybe this whole thing between us wasn’t just a lie for the world — maybe it was the only place we were both telling the truth.

And that thought? That scared the shit out of me.

Because if this wasn’t fake anymore, if she wasn’t fine, and if I wasn’t ready... then what the hell were we doing?

Maybe, just like me, she hadn’t really escaped the past.

No matter how brightly she smiled at school, how perfect she made her life look from the outside — maybe it was all just an illusion. A carefully crafted performance.

And maybe this thing between us — whatever it is — wasn’t just some accidental spark.

Maybe it was the only time she wasn’t pretending.

Just like me.

Maybe this whole relationship we started as a lie...

Was the first real thing we both had in a long time.

The stupid voices were getting louder again—choking, suffocating. That’s why I never let myself get rid of them completely, never allowed the silence to stretch too long. Because the longer I’m sane, the more violent and vengeful they become when they return. Sanity feels like a lie I borrow in pieces, and every time I hold on too tightly to it, the madness claws back with sharpened teeth.

After we were rescued from the lab, they ran a series of tests on all of us. Psychological evaluations, compatibility assessments, memory tests, and all the bullshit they thought would determine whether we were "fit" to reintegrate into the real world. The outside world. As if we’d ever really belonged to it to begin with.

That’s when I found out. That we were never random children, never orphans swept up by some sick coincidence. We were chosen. Handpicked. Created. The children of mental patients. Kids born from instability—our minds, our genetics, our pain all part of their design. Stupid people wanted to see if insanity was inheritable and under what conditions they could make it surface. The insanity.

They wanted to see if insanity was inheritable.

Not just that—but what would it take to make it surface? What kind of pressure, what type of trauma, what blend of pain and fear would flip the switch and awaken the madness sleeping in our DNA?

Each of us was a case study. Some had mentally ill mothers. Others had unstable fathers. But there were two kids—a male and a female—who came from both parents being mentally unstable. The test subjects were me and Number Twelve—June. . The perfect test subjects. A control and a constant. Number Twelve. Now I know her as June.

It makes me wonder—does she hear the voices too?

Mine started after the first escape attempt. We’d almost made it. Almost. But that’s the thing about hope—it’s dangerous in places like that. They punish you for having it. Make you bleed for dreaming of anything different.

After they caught me, everything changed. The torture escalated. The drugs got stronger. And the voices...they came. Ever since then, they’ve been with me. I chose to ignore them most of the time.

At first, I thought it was a side effect of the injections. A reaction to the sleepless nights, the starvation, the beatings. But they never left. They stayed. And over time, I realized they weren’t just echoes of pain or fractured memories. They had opinions. Personalities. Desires. Dark ones.

Sometimes I ignore them. Pretend they don’t exist. Pretend I’m just tired, or stressed, or remembering things that never really happened. Sometimes I even talk back. Play their game. Let them guide me toward what they want just to keep them calm. It’s easier that way. Less noisy. Less painful.

But when they get too loud, too violent, I shut them down completely. Drown them in music, smoke, distractions—sex. Anything to numb the edge of their whispers.

Yeah, maybe that makes me crazy. But at least I’m a crazy person who knows he’s crazy. That’s more than I can say for a lot of people. The real dangerous ones are the ones who think they’re sane.

After the rescue, they ran a bunch of tests on us—psych evaluations and assessments to determine if we were stable enough to be reintegrated into society. Some had already gone mental and are currently in mental institutions. I, and a few others, were lucky to pass the test. So I guess that means I’m not entirely cookoo.

I didn’t tell them about the voices.

Even the people who were involved in our testing never got to know. Because I never told them. I was always the unwilling test subject—no matter how many promises or manipulations they used to try to get me talking.

I passed the reintegration tests. That’s what matters, right? I told them what they wanted to hear. Said I felt safe. Said I was adjusting. I smiled when they needed me to, played normal when they asked. I lied. Through my fucking teeth.

Because if I’d told the truth—about the voices, about the nightmares, about the things I see in the dark—they would’ve locked me up in some padded room and thrown away the key.

A few of the others weren’t so lucky. They failed the test. They’re in facilities now, heavily medicated and monitored like animals. Some of them went mad completely. Others never spoke again. Sometimes I wonder if I’m heading there too. Slowly. Quietly.

But I’ve always been good at hiding.

They never figured it out at the lab either. That I was hearing things. Seeing things. They thought I was just another stubborn test subject—silent and unwilling. They tried to manipulate me. Threaten me. Starve me. All to get me to talk. To break. To give them the data they needed so badly.

But I never did.

Because once you show them how you feel, what you fear, what you need, you’re screwed. They use it against you. They twist it. That’s the first rule of surviving the lab: never care. Never connect. Never let them know who matters to you.

And that’s why they kept me.

They only know what we give them. And if they don’t get a response about how we feel, they stay guessing.

Number Twelve—their other subject, the one similar to me—she managed to escape. That’s why they kept me around. Said they couldn’t raise another kid and wait for it to mature enough to give them the data they wanted. So, they were stuck with me.

Their final hope for their stupid research.

Which meant more torture for me.

They tortured me for six more years. Alone. Forgotten.

And every single day, I waited for June to come back.

She had promised she would. Said she’d come back with help. That she wouldn’t leave me behind. That they wouldn’t win. But no one ever came.

I thought she died. Or maybe she got caught again. Maybe they dragged her back, and that’s why the help never arrived. I imagined a thousand scenarios. Every single one worse than the last. Until eventually, I stopped hoping altogether.

And then we got rescued.

Not because of her. No, definitely not because of her.

And when I found her again—living as the daughter of a rich, influential family, attending a fancy school, acting like she’d never seen me before—it nearly broke me all over again. Like none of it had happened. Like I didn’t exist. Like we hadn’t made a promise in the dark to never let each other die in that place.

She didn’t even recognize me.

Too busy being the golden girl. The perfect daughter. Too busy smiling and shining and living in a world that should’ve never been hers.

And still—still—I let her in.

Let her into my space. My home. My bed.

What does that say about me?

What kind of fool lets the girl who broke his soul crawl back under his skin just because she smells like lavender and looks at him like he’s not some experiment gone wrong?

Maybe it’s the voices. Maybe they wanted her. Or maybe it’s me. The part of me that never stopped waiting at the lab door for her shadow to appear.

But now, I can’t stop thinking about her. Can’t stop wondering—what if her life isn’t perfect? What if she’s faking everything just like me?

The other night she screamed in her sleep. A deep, terrified scream that shook me down to the bone. I didn’t ask her about it the next morning. Didn’t want to pry. Didn’t want to push her away. But it stuck with me.

Maybe she never escaped either. Maybe she brought her demons with her, just like I did. Maybe we’re both still bleeding beneath the surface, just better at hiding it than most.

Maybe I’m not the only one who still hears the voices.