Role Playing(43)

“There’s not really much to tell,” Maggie hedged. “It’s actually kind of silly. Total fluke. One-in-a-million shot.”

“How is it a fluke that you wound up in a hot guy’s kitchen, afraid he was going to kill you?”

Maggie let out a sound that was half frustrated sigh, half growl. “It wasn’t . . . it was a safety check, Rosita!”

“What were you doing at his house?” Rosita countered. “Sidebar: I notice you’re not protesting his hotness.”

“Like I said, he’s a friend from a video game group I joined. I texted you that I was playing with a guild, and he’s the leader,” she said. “I thought he was just this dorky local college kid who’d fractured a bone in his foot. He seemed like he was having a tough time, and I thought I’d bring him some soup. Then once I got there, I just kept hearing Kit saying ‘This is how you wind up on a true-crime podcast’ in my head, and I freaked myself out. Then I found out that just because Aiden’s going to community college does not mean he recently graduated from high school, which was a stupid assumption on my part.”

Rosita snickered.

“And he found out I wasn’t an octogenarian grandma,” Maggie added. “So I wasn’t the only one who was guilty of misassumptions.”

“So . . . you laughed it off, and left?”

“I mean, I heated up his soup,” Maggie said. “Guy is on medication and wearing an air boot. He was kind of out of it.”

“And then you left?”

“I had lunch with him . . . what?” she snapped when Rosita burst out laughing. “I was going to make lunch for myself anyway, and it was pho, which you know I love, and—”

“You gave him some of your pho?” Rosita interrupted. “Damn. You must like this boy. Man, I mean.” More laughter.

“Goddamn it,” Maggie muttered. “Listen, I would’ve done this for one of Kit’s friends. As far as I knew, he was Kit’s age. Why would I bail on him just because he’s my age?”

“He’s your age, huh?” Rosita pounced. “Hmmm. That’s interesting.”

“No, it’s not.” Maggie scowled. “You stop that.”

“I’m not saying you have to marry the guy, for God’s sake,” Rosita said.

“What are you saying, then?”

“I’m saying he’s the first guy you haven’t chased off with either your looks, attitude, or your baton since Trev left,” Rosita pointed out. “Don’t think you’re fooling me, chica. You started to let things go when Trev moved you out to the fucking wilds, and ever since he left, you’re leaning in, trying to pull a whole Sasquatch thing. I haven’t heard you so much as mention a male of the species. No dating apps. No setups. Certainly no hookups, because you’d have told me.”

“If you hadn’t married Oscar,” Maggie said, “you would probably be in the same boat.”

“The hell I would. I need sex, sweetie.”

“I’m having plenty of orgasms. Men just aren’t involved.”

A pause. “Women, then? Or nonbinary?”

“Pure silicone,” Maggie said, with a short laugh and the comfort that came only with being friends with someone for over thirty years. “Gotta say, I’m better than anybody I’ve ever been with. I’m never breaking up with battery powered.”

“Oh, hon.” Rosita sounded pitying. “You just weren’t with many people. You slept with that guy from high school, and let’s face it. Sex in high school is pretty wretched. Nobody knows what they’re doing. Then you dated that asshole in college . . .”

“He wasn’t as bad, skills-wise,” Maggie clarified. “Probably because of all the practice he had with other women at the same time he was sleeping with me.”

“And then you married Trev.” Rosita sighed. “Three people. Any scientist is going to tell you: that’s a small data set.”

Maggie stepped outside. The sun had set, and it was pitch dark, the clear, cold skies showing the first sprinkling of stars. She pulled her sweat jacket closer around herself. “I have no interest in pursuing the research,” she said. “I’ve come up with a better alternative through technology. They’ve been automated out of a job.”

She knew from Rosita’s huff of breath that she was frustrated. “You know I don’t want to hound you,” she said. “I haven’t brought up anything in the past five years. I know you were totally focused on getting Kit to school. I know you’ve been working your ass off to keep that house, even though I voted for you to sell that fucking thing and move back to California . . .”

“You know why I couldn’t,” she said. “It’ll take a while to sell this house. Besides, I didn’t want to rip Kit from his friends and his school when he’d already lost Trev. He was dealing with a lot of shit, and he had Harrison and his other friends. He needed the stability.”

“Again, I know,” Rosita said, far more gently. “But Kit’s in college now. You can focus on you.”

That sounded terrifying. “I can. I am,” she said, hoping she sounded more convincing to her friend than she did to her own ears.

“And you seem to like this guy.”