Page 18 of My Cosplay Escape
Adam goes on, “You can give me a call. We can work out a Venmo account for payment. I swear I’ll never ask who you are, or ask you to take off your mask.” His face flinches as if he’s just forgotten something. For a moment, I feel his eyes bore into the back of my gloved left hand. “You’re not worried because you’re married or something? I mean—” He’s floundering, rubbing the back of his neck. “My Cardinal Flame is engaged, if it makes you feel any better. She and her fiancé would be happy to talk…” His face is flushed. “Hey, man. Can you stop the car here?”
Our driver gives us some serious stink eye but pulls over.
Adam scribbles a second number on the card. “Give them a call.” He slides out of the car. “Offer stands. Let me know.”
Chapter Five
I don’t know what I would have done if Gwen hadn’t given me her key. What was I thinking? That I’d just walk back into Mom’s house dressed as Catstrike? I was lucky to time my exit when I left for Comic-Con this morning. I didn’t even think about how I would get home.
I borrow a hoodie, Lululemon top, and a pair of sweats from Gwen, shove my cosplay costume into the very back of her closet, and run home in the dark in her sneakers that are two sizes too big. No part of my run feels great after a day in boots, but maybe that’s the point. My face burns with the memory of my arms draped around Adam. How they lingered. How I lingered. Shirley Temples, what is wrong with me? You don’t get fresh with a random stranger when you’re in cosplay. That way lies listing slightly-used wedding gifts on eBay to pay rent, while your husband plans one campout after another with his best friends Tiffany and Charlotte. It’s temporary insanity that I never want to repeat.
And I would repeat it if I were dressed up again, and Adam were there. I mean the flirting, not the doomed marriage, but that’s the problem. Flirting is a gateway drug. Just like comics and cosplay are a gateway drug. Hence my rules that will keep me far from guys like Adam with their charming confidence, winning smiles, and jaws so yummy you want to exfoliate your face on the stubble.
I need more rules. More running. That’s my fourth rule. More running. Always running.
I’m out of my mind, and I’ll run until my senses are restored, and I’m too tired to remember that Adam’s middle name is West and that he has a dimple in his right cheek and eyes the same blue as the ocean before dawn.
You know what? I think I need to sprint the last mile.
* * *
It’s past one a.m. when I get home. If there were crickets in our corner of San Diego County, they’d be chirping. Instead, I have the sound of next door’s sprinklers ratcheting up and spraying the drought tolerance out of every square inch of the neighbors’ back lawn. Irrigation aside, the air seeping in through my mom’s little house feels quiet and sleepy. I might actually sleep until morning.
I creep into my mom’s office/spare bedroom. Everyone has a place in their house where they dump the crap they don’t know what to do with. My mom’s is her office/spare bedroom. I fit right in with the homemade teacher-appreciation Pinterest gifts, old curriculum books, and filing cabinet.
I jump out of my skin when I see Mom’s face lit up with the blue glow of her Mac.
“Mom! What are you doing up this late?”
“Playing solitaire. Trolling Twitter for Russian bots.” She looks up at me, and I know I’m in for it. “Waiting for you.”
I shove my pile of laundry across the floor and stretch.
My mom fixes me with her twenty-five-years-of-teaching stare over the frames of her glasses. “We need to talk, Sarah.”
I groan and touch my head down to my knees in a deep stretch.
“Where were you?” Mom demands.
“Can we please talk tomorrow?” The run was a mistake. My feet and my spine will never be the same after a day in those absurd boots. I am not just sore. I am deformed.
“If you’re going to live in my house, you’re going to tell me.” Mom’s mouth is set into a thin line. Her day-old lipstick has bled into the whisper-thin lines around her lips.
“I was out for a run,” I mutter.
“You’ve been out for a run since this morning? I get home with the shopping, looking forward to spending one of my summer Saturdays with my little girl, and you’re not here. No note. No phone call. Am I supposed to just watchMississippi Bake-Offby myself?”
“I’m sorry, Mom. I thought I texted.”
“Where were you?”
“I was…” I hesitate. No way am I going to tell her I was at Comic-Con. The questions wouldn’t stop, and then after we rehashed my irresponsibility yet again, she’d drag me to her therapist, and we’d sit on a too-small-couch and talk about trust for ninety minutes, followed by goals—all of them pointing directly to Bible study and other new hobbies, like spin class, with my mom and her Bible study friends. Pet human in tow. “I was at the gym. I was working.”
“It wasn’t on the calendar.” Mom taps the dry-erase board above her computer. She insists my shifts be put in writing. It’s the fifth-grade teacher in her.
“Someone called at the last minute, and I forgot.”
She narrows her eyes at me.
