Somebody needs a date. Or a girlfriend by Friday. Or a fiancé, with a family reunion, a wedding, or an election on the calendar and nobody to bring. So two people shake on it. It’s only pretend.
Reader, it is never only pretend.
Here’s what the trope is, why it keeps working, and where to find the good ones on screen and on the page.
What the fake dating trope means
Two people agree to act like a couple when they aren’t one. Each has a reason. Usually the reasons don’t match, which is half the fun.
The deal might be a handshake, a list of rules scribbled on a napkin, or a fourteen-page contract drawn up by a lawyer in Lexington. The audience might be a pushy mother, a whole office, a high school hallway, or an entire town. Somewhere between the first staged hand-hold and the end date, the act stops being an act.
Fake engagement is the trope with the stakes turned up. A ring means family dinners, questions nobody rehearsed, and sometimes a party somebody else plans.
Why we keep coming back to it
Fake dating hands two people a permission slip to spend time together. Dinners, town events, long drives home. They’d never choose all those hours on their own, and now they can’t walk away from them.
It also lets us in on a secret. We know the truth while everyone around them watches the show, and we get to sit in that gap and grin.
For sweet romance readers, there’s one more reason. Fake dating builds restraint right into the plot. The couple talks through their boundaries before they ever kiss. So when a small touch finally lands, a thumb along her jaw or his hand at the small of her back with nobody watching, we feel every bit of it.
The beats a good fake dating story hits
The deal. Each one needs something the other can give. The terms get spelled out, sometimes in writing.
The rules. Hand-holding at events, fine. One brief kiss if the moment demands it. Every rule is a line we watch them creep toward.
The audience. Family, coworkers, voters, a whole town. The performance has to convince people who know them well.
The slip. One of them stops pretending first. Then they spend chapters wondering whether that look across the room was for the crowd or for them.
The deadline. The wedding, the holiday weekend, Election Day. The end date gets closer, and neither one wants to reach it.
Fake dating movies to watch
While You Were Sleeping (1995, PG) Lucy collects tokens in a lonely booth on the Chicago “L.” On Christmas Day she pulls a handsome stranger off the tracks, and he lands in a coma. His big, noisy family decides she’s his fiancée, and Lucy can’t bring herself to correct them. Then she meets his brother. Sandra Bullock and Bill Pullman make this the warmest fake engagement ever filmed. Save it for a December evening with a mug of cocoa.
The Proposal (2009, PG-13) Margaret is a Canadian book editor about to be deported. Her solution is to inform her long-suffering assistant, Andrew, that he’s marrying her. He names his price, and they fly to his family’s home in Sitka, Alaska, for a weekend of keeping the story straight under one roof. Sandra Bullock again, with Ryan Reynolds and a scene-stealing Betty White. It’s the trope at its most screwball, with a little more grown-up humor than the others on this list.
Leap Year (2010, PG) Anna flies to Dublin to propose to her boyfriend on February 29th. Bad weather strands her on the far side of Ireland, and the only person willing to drive her across the country is a grumpy innkeeper named Declan. To get a room for the night, they pose as a married couple, and the pretending gets harder to shake from there. Amy Adams and Matthew Goode, with green hills in nearly every frame.
Holiday Engagement (2011, Hallmark Channel) Hillary promised her mother she’d bring her new fiancé home for Thanksgiving. Then he broke up with her. Rather than face her mom, she posts an ad and hires David, an out-of-work actor, to play the part. A crowded family table, a nosy mother, and a fake fiancé who’s a little too good at the role. Bonnie Somerville, Jordan Bridges, and Shelley Long as the mom. A perfect pick for Thanksgiving week.
To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before (2018, TV-14) Lara Jean writes secret love letters to every boy she’s ever had a crush on. Then somebody mails them. To dodge the fallout, she and Peter Kavinsky strike a deal and write their fake-relationship rules into an actual contract. Lana Condor and Noah Centineo star in this one, based on Jenny Han’s novel. It’s a high school story, so it plays best for older teens and up. You’ll find it on Netflix.
Fake dating books to read
Honeysuckle Dreams by Denise Hunter Brady Collins’s ex-wife has died, and his baby son’s wealthy grandparents want custody of little Sam. Brady’s attorney tells him an upcoming wedding would help his chances at the final hearing. So Hope Daniels, a local radio personality, agrees to play his fiancée. A single dad, a baby, and a fake engagement with a courtroom deadline, all set in the Blue Ridge.
My Phony Valentine by Courtney Walsh Poppy Hart bumps into a stranger in a coffee shop and, on impulse, tells him he’s her boyfriend. The stranger is Dallas Burke, a hockey player with a bad-boy reputation, and he plays along. His manager and his meddling grandmother see a win for everybody. The publicity could save Poppy’s struggling restaurant and polish Dallas’s image. It’s set in a small town during its Valentine’s Day festival, and it kicks off Walsh’s Holidays with Hart series.
Rocky Road by Becky Wade FBI agent Jude Camden’s assignment is to pose as the boyfriend of Gemma Clare, a perfumer in Maine. FBI rules say no romance on an operation, which makes falling for her a real problem. There’s a mystery from the past in the mix, too. It’s the second book in Wade’s Sons of Scandal series, and if you loved Falling for You from our second chance list, you’ll feel right at home.
Jade’s Match by Hallee Bridgeman Cora “Jade” Anderson came home from the Rio Games with an Olympic silver medal. Now a cell phone company wants her to run a flirty, fake media campaign with ice hockey star Davis Elliott. Their romance plays out on social media for everyone to see, and somewhere along the way it stops being an act. Then Davis makes Team USA and faces ugly racism as a Korean American. A very public confrontation weeks before the Olympics tests whether these two can hold on to what they’ve found. It’s book seven of the Jewel Series, and it’s fake dating with a gold-medal deadline.
And one from Fox Hollow
The Mayor’s Fake Fiancée On August 1st, the commercial oven at Sweet Mercy bakery makes a sound no oven should make. Sophie Callahan needs twenty thousand dollars she doesn’t have, right before the fall rush. Across the square, Mayor Grayson Caldwell is watching a twelve-point lead shrink to three. His opponent has a camera-ready family and a mailer ready to tell every household in the county that a man who won’t commit to a family can’t be trusted with a town.
Grayson comes to Sophie with an offer. She comes back with conditions. Every term goes on paper, and the exit gets written before they ever walk in. The whole arrangement ends on Election Day, November 4th. You can guess how well that contract holds up. It’s the second book in the Fox Hollow series.
Who’s your favorite fake couple, on the page or on the screen? Tell me in the comments.