You don’t know what’s more surreal: the fact that your shoes are actually comfortable tonight, or the fact that Kathryn Hahn, the walking, laughing, impossibly magnetic goddess beside you, just called you babe in front of a crowd.

Like, out loud.

At a charity gala.

With cameras.

You shoot her a quick look, trying to suppress the idiotic grin stretching across your face. She’s mid-sip of champagne, wearing that red lipstick that should be illegal, and when she catches you staring, she wiggles her eyebrows. “What?”

“I just… you keep saying things like ‘babe’ and ‘sweetheart’ and it keeps breaking my brain a little.”

Kathryn laughs — loud and honest and so not red carpet polite. “Well, that’s what you get for dating a woman with zero filter.”

You mutter, “That’s what I get for somehow tricking you into dating me.”

Kathryn turns toward you, one hand casually on your waist as if you belong there. “Tricking me?” she whispers. “You think this is a con job? Am I the gullible Hollywood mark in this situation?”

“Um… yeah, a little?” you whisper back.

She stares at you for a beat too long, then snorts. “Jesus Christ, you’re cute.” Then she plants a quick kiss on your cheek, just as a photographer turns and definitely catches it.

You flinch. “That’s gonna be on Twitter in, like, ten minutes.”

“Good,” she says breezily. “Let the world know. I’m dating you. My friends already think you’re a hallucination. I had to show proof.”

⸻

You two are curled up on the couch in Kathryn’s house. You’re wearing her oversized sweater (she insists it’s yours now), and she’s taken off her makeup, thrown her hair in a messy knot, and has her cold feet pressed against your thigh with zero remorse.

You’re scrolling through event pictures on your phone and you groan, “Kathryn. Kathryn. Kathryn. I look like I won a radio contest to be next to you.”

She raises a brow. “Well, I am the prize.”

You snort, tossing a pillow at her.

She catches it, laughing. Then, quieter: “You really don’t get it, do you?”

You blink. “Get what?”

Kathryn leans forward, all mock-serious, lips slightly parted like she’s about to drop wisdom. “I have had red carpets, award shows, and Hollywood kisses. And I still get butterflies when I see you walk into a room. So maybe you’re the prize, babe.”

You stare at her.

She stares back, smug but a little soft around the edges.

“…Okay,” you murmur, voice cracking.!“Now I’m gonna go scream into a pillow.”

Kathryn nods. “Take your time. I’ll be here, looking hot in sweatpants, loving you.”