Page 1 of Turnabout Is Fair Cosplay
Chapter 1
Now is the summer of my discontent made bearable only by nightly reading binges, sugar, and copious amounts of caffeine. It may not be healthy, but it’s the only way I’ve found to cope with all the reason and love that keep me little company nowadays.
Oh, jeez. I’ve definitely read too much Shakespeare this week.
If fiction is a cure for infatuation, I’m going to need to read a whole lot more. Because no matter how many words, words, words I devour, I can’t stop thinking about a pair of honey-colored eyes.
Still, I probably should not have stayed up until four a.m. reading. I definitely should not have slept in on this particular July morning, but what’s a woman to do when she’s halfway through a Tolstoy novel at midnight?
“Bea, are you up?” Mom calls from the hallway.
“No!” I answer, pulling a pillow over my head, but it’s no use. A leaf blower has started up outside.
My bedroom door swings open. “Honestly, you keep the hours of a teenager,” Mom says as she pushes open my blackout drapes, sidestepping a stack of books in her way.
I hiss in the blinding sunshine. It has everything to do with my eighty-hour workweek, the depositions that I had to wade through yesterday, and nothing to do with being a full-grown woman who still sleeps in her childhood bedroom. Twenty-six with no hope of affording a place of my own until I’m fifty-two. I crunched the numbers a few months ago and have not recovered. Southern California is expensive, and Del Mar, honestly, is the worst.
Mom picks up a crumpled pantsuit on the floor with her forefinger and thumb. “Looking at this mess, no one would ever know you’re a brilliant legal mind.”
“I’m not a brilliant legal mind.”
“No one who isn’t brilliant finishes Berkeley Law before they’re twenty-four.”
I roll onto my side. “Except someone dumb enough to go into corporate law.”
Mom’s nose wrinkles as she takes in my bookshelves. “Did you add to your collection?”
I survey my shelves with pride. Scattered among my many limited editions are thirty-four adorable cacti ranging from bunny ears to monkey tales, barrels to organ pipes. The latest acquisition is a blushing pink prickly pear. “Are you asking about my books or cacti? Because either way, the answer is yes.”
“Just move your plants to the top shelves. The last thing we want is to spend the day picking spines out of one of our little guests with tweezers. Now…” Mom pulls my duvet down and off my bed. “Hurry up and get dressed. I need your help.”
Today is my nephew’s first birthday. It is also my father’s sixtieth birthday party. That’s right—Pop-Pop, aka George McKinney, and his grandson, Eaton, are celebrating together, and my mother, Molly McKinney, has planned the party to end all parties.
I tug on a robe and head downstairs.
“Why is the gardener here on a Sunday?” I put the kettle on the stove.
Mom’s smile surfaces. “Eaton loves the smell of fresh-cut grass.”
I drop a bag of blood orange tea into a mug. “Does he also love the smell of gasoline and exhaust?” I mutter as the two-cycle engines whir outside. I shove the kitchen window shut.
“I want everything to be picture perfect.” Mom frowns. “You are going to wear something else for the party, yes?”
I shove an English muffin into my mouth. “Maybe. I’m sure there are more horrific outfits I could find than my cutoff sweats.”
Mom takes the bait. “You’re so pretty and polished when you head to work every morning. I don’t understand why you dress like a slob on the weekend. Maybe, at the very least, do something with all your curls instead of piling them into a messy topknot?” Mom gasps like I do when a paralegal leaves cookies in the break room. “I could call Jacqueline at the salon. I’m sure she could work you in this morning if you wanted to get some lowlights, bring out the auburn in your hair.”
“Sure.” I shake my hair out and tug it into a low ponytail. “And while we’re at it, why don’t you put me down for microneedling,some dermal fillers, maybe a laser treatment, Botox.” Anything that will let me skip today’s festivities.
“Why? There’s nothing wrong with your face.” Mom pats my cheek. “Ah, to have your collagen.”
I groan. “I need to go back to bed.” I’m nursing a migraine from a week of too many late nights, too many pages turned, and too little sleep. I need a nap, but I can’t for one simple reason. I live here. I’m an associate at Del Mar’s premier corporate law firm and can’t afford even a condo on my own. If I’m going to have roommates, they may as well be my parents who don’t charge me rent.
“Are you going to bite my head off if I ask a favor?” Mom’s clacking around her kitchen in a pair of red-soled kitten heels, opening and closing cupboards.
I groan again. “Can I at least have breakfast first?”
“No time.” She pulls out a crystal Waterford vase from a bottom cupboard. “I forgot to ask the florist to make an arrangement for the upstairs bathroom. Fill this with dahlias and some of my roses.” Mom hands me a pair of pruners along with the vase.
