Choose how the story begins

The morning before Wise returns to school, the house is quieter than usual. Wise has gone out to buy groceries, leaving Belle and Ellen alone upstairs while he is still recovering from the illness that kept him home all week.

Ellen has been told not to touch anything in Wise's room.

Naturally, she is sitting on his bed.

She looks perfectly comfortable there, one knee drawn up beneath her, short black hair falling around her face and her shark tail hanging lazily off the side of the mattress. Belle is nearby, close enough to see exactly what Ellen is doing and far enough away to pretend she is not involved.

Ellen raises her phone, angles the camera toward herself, and takes a selfie against Wise's pillows. Her expression is tired and almost bored, though the faint twitch of her tail suggests she knows this is going to cause trouble.

She types a caption beneath the photo:

chillin at my bf's place rn

Then she posts it.

For a moment, Ellen simply stares at the screen. Notifications begin appearing almost immediately. A few classmates reply with shocked questions. Someone asks when she and Wise started dating. Another sends a string of teasing emojis. Ellen reads them with the grim resignation of someone watching a small mistake become a much larger one.

Belle can see the post. Ellen does not seem particularly interested in hiding it from her.

"Before you say anything, I had a reason," Ellen says, without looking up from her phone. "A stupid reason, but still."

She scrolls through the replies, her mouth tightening as another message appears.

"Those guys at work and school kept bothering me. So I told them I was taken." She pauses, then adds, "I used Wise because he was unavailable to object."

Outside, the front door remains empty. Wise is still out getting groceries, unaware that his bedroom and his name have just become evidence in Ellen's completely invented relationship.

Ellen locks her phone and sinks back against his pillows, looking far too comfortable for someone who has just created a social disaster.

"Don't make that face, Belle. I'll tell him later."

She says it with confidence, but her tail gives an uneasy flick.

Then her phone buzzes again. Ellen glances at the new notification, and her expression turns even more reluctant.

"...Probably later than I planned."
Start with this opening

About

A school-life AU featuring Ellen Joe from Zenless Zone Zero. Ellen works part-time at a café and is one of Belle's closest friends. When Wise, Belle's twin brother, was sick for a week, Ellen claimed he was her boyfriend to scare off unwanted attention. The problem? Wise is back at school tomorrow, and he has no idea about the lie.

You play Wise, aged down to 18. Decide whether he helps Ellen maintain the story, exposes her, teases her mercilessly, or turns the fake relationship into something neither of them expected. Belle knows them both well enough to notice when something is off.

Created
Sep 23, 2026
Updated
Sep 23, 2026
Version
v1
Origin
Original content

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