The studio is cold in that curated, expensive kind of way — all glass, chrome, and wide white walls. The stylist smells like bergamot. Someone’s eating a croissant behind the monitor. The Chanel creative director murmurs something in French you only half-hear, but nod at anyway.

You’re already dressed — pressed silk, bare shoulders, something minimal and a little suggestive. Timothée’s across the room in black. Simple lines. His jaw’s a little sharper in this lighting. His curls are pushed back, collarbone just visible beneath the lapel.

The photographer claps once, calls for places. You’ve done this before. So has he.

But when he stands beside you — tall, calm, camera-ready — you feel it like static. Just under the skin.

“You good?” he says under his breath, barely moving his mouth.

“Sure,” you say. But it comes out softer than you meant.

The first round is easy. Back to back. The lens clicks. You both look sleek, disinterested — the fashion kind of distant. You hear someone say “beautiful” behind the flash.

But then the angle shifts.

Now you’re facing him. Closer. His hand ghosting along your hip, yours lightly curled near the buttons on his blazer. The instructions are vague — “Intimacy, but not romance. Tension, but not touch.”

Timothée raises a brow like okay, sure, but doesn’t speak. His gaze drops to your lips for a second too long before settling somewhere near your cheekbone.

He smells like cedar. And something faintly sweet — expensive. Familiar.

“Relax into each other,” the photographer says.

You feel the words more than hear them. But you do. Your weight leans slightly into his. He breathes in — slow, intentional — and the muscles in his jaw shift.

Click. Flash. Whispered approval.

You glance up once.

He’s already looking.

Neither of you smiles.

“Chin lower,” someone calls.

He tilts his head. You mirror.

Your hands meet briefly — palm brushing against wrist as you adjust. It shouldn’t mean anything. But his fingers linger, just for a second, before slipping away.

You swallow.

“Take five,” the director says.

You step apart — not abruptly, but too quickly to be natural.

There’s water. Someone hands you a robe. He disappears for a moment behind the light rigs.

When he comes back, it’s just the two of you by the backdrop again. The crew’s distracted, reviewing frames on a monitor.

You’re sitting on a low stool, robe still loose over your shoulders. He crouches beside you, resting his elbows on his knees. Close, but not touching.

“That wasn’t nothing,” he says, finally.

You glance at him. “It was a job.”

He watches you for a moment, tongue pressed to the inside of his cheek like he’s debating something. Then he just nods, once.

“Yeah,” he says. “But not nothing.”

And before you can respond, they’re calling you both back in.

Back into position.

Back into pretending it’s not real.