“You did it! You broke the ratings record!” Andreae was waiting at Jessica’s place upon her return. They had arranged for a sleepover to celebrate.

“I am so exhausted!” Jessica flopped onto the bed after her shower. “And I am so glad the producer arranged the filming of my outing with Adhha on Friday. It will give me a couple of days to rest.”

“You go ahead and sleep,” Andreae urged. “I will go onto the Arm Wrestle for Love website to initiate a discussion so that I can insert the link to the ‘J Bruise’ website. I’m pretty sure our sales are going to hit the roof!”

Jessica grinned and buried her head under the pillow. It was reassuring to have a friend watch her back.

The next morning, Jessica awoke to the fragrance of fresh coffee. Andreae was seated on the living room sofa nursing a cup of Old Town white coffee. There was, however, a perturbed look on her face.

“What’s wrong?”

Andreae tilted her head and looked Jessica gravely in the eye. “Something went wrong.”

“What?”

Jessica found herself ushered to the dining table where the laptop was set up. Andreae clicked her way to a page she had bookmarked earlier and said, “They found this.”

Jessica felt as though she had had the wind knocked out of her. Someone had posted a photo on the Arm Wrestle for Love website—a selfie she took when she was dating Adhha. He was without a shirt and was embracing her from behind lovingly.

“But I deleted all our photos!” Jessica stammered.

“I am guessing Adhha kept his and one of Chong Jin’s fans dug it out.”

“Oh my God! What am I going to do?”

“Jess, you should check the agreement you signed with Arm Wrestle for Love. They may hold you and Adhha accountable for not disclosing your past relationship.”

Andreae was right. There was a clause in the agreement that penalised any contestant who did not fully disclose relevant information. True enough, the producer of Arm Wrestle for Love asked for an urgent meeting that very afternoon with both Jessica and Adhha.

“This is unacceptable!”

Jessica and Adhha exchanged looks of guilt and trepidation. There was no way they could exonerate themselves.

“I will arrange a live radio interview for both of you tomorrow morning. You will come clean on air, explain yourselves and apologise to the public. It goes without saying that you will have to give up your winner’s title and all the prizes that come with it, Adhha.”

Adhha nodded solemnly. He knew his hope of securing sponsorship for the upcoming ASEAN sports meet would go up in smoke once the radio interview was over.

“As for you, Jessica, things are a little tricky,” the producer continued. “We will need to approach Mr Ng Chong Jin and ask if he is still willing to go on the official winner’s date with you on Friday. If he says yes, you will need to fulfil your part of the contract. Your chosen charity, Migrant Workers Count Too, will however not be entitled to any funding from Arm Wrestle for Love.”