She purred louder.
I thought about Chandra, about all the times she'd had to navigate being recognized in public. She had a whole system. Sunglasses, hat, minimal makeup, different hair. "The key," she'd told me once, nursing a margarita at our favorite dive bar, "is to look different enough that they second-guess themselves. Most people won't approach you if they're only sixty percent sure it's you. Too scared of being wrong."
She'd proven it, too. We'd gone bowling once—actual bowling, at an alley by the Santa Monica Pier. She'd worn a blonde wig and glasses, and not a single person had recognized her. Meanwhile, I'd been mobbed in the snack bar because I hadn't changed anything, and ended up signing autographs on bowling shoes for twenty minutes while Chandra laughed herself sick in lane seven.
"You have to commit, Sam," she'd said afterward, wiping tears from her eyes. "Half-assed disguises don't work. You have to become someone else entirely."
I hadn't thought much about it at the time. Why would I? I wasn't trying to hide. I was trying to be visible, to build a career, to make sure everyone knew my name.
Funny how things change.
I stood up abruptly, startling Purrsephone, who gave me an offended look before retreating to the doorway.
"I'm going to do it," I announced. "I'm going to disguise myself and go to the store like a normal person."
The cat's expression suggested she thought this was a terrible idea.
"Don't judge me. This is proactive problem-solving."
I rummaged through my luggage, which I'd barely unpacked since arriving. I'd brought mostly California clothes—linen shirts, designer jeans, enough athleisure to open my own boutique. Not exactly disguise material.
But I did have a baseball cap. Some sunglasses. And—I pulled out the item triumphantly—one truly hideous Christmas sweater featuring a sequined reindeer with a light-up nose. I wore it every Christmas as a joke, and this year was no exception.
"Perfect," I said. "No one would ever expect Dr. Brock Blaze to wear this."
Purrsephone had migrated to my bed and was watching the proceedings with what I could only interpret as morbid fascination.
The sweater was a good start, but I needed more. Chandra had been clear: commit to the disguise. Half measures would get me recognized and mobbed.
I stared at my reflection, at my carefully maintained stubble and my artfully tousled hair.
My hair.
The tabloids had once described it as "lusciously wavy" and "a testament to premium hair products." It was, admittedly, one of my best features. Dark, thick, styled within an inch of its life even when I was supposedly going "casual."
Which meant it was the first thing people recognized.
I grabbed the baseball cap and jammed it on my head, tucking as much hair as possible underneath. Then the sunglasses—oversized aviators that Chandra had left in my car six months ago and I'd never returned.
I looked like I was hiding something. Which I was, but the goal was to look like I wasn't.
"I need facial hair," I muttered. "Something that changes the shape of my face."
I didn't have a fake mustache. Obviously. Why would anyone pack a fake mustache for a mountain retreat?
But I did have scissors. And a lot of hair that I'd just shoved under a baseball cap.
"This is insane," I told my reflection. "This is absolutely certifiable."
My reflection seemed to agree.
I did it anyway.
Fifteen minutes later, I had a pile of dark hair on the bathroom counter, a noticeably thinner section at the back of my head that was hidden by the cap, and a makeshift mustache constructed from my own hair clippings and double-sided fashion tape I'd found at the bottom of my suitcase. The tape was meant for keeping shirt collars in place and preventing wardrobe malfunctions on set. It was absolutely not meant for adhering human hair to human faces.
The mustache was... something.
It sat on my upper lip like a caterpillar that had been through a divorce. The color was right—it was my hair, after all—but the shape was more "guy who owns a windowless van" than"sophisticated disguise." It curled slightly at the edges in a way that suggested either 1970s pornography or a man who sold fake Rolexes out of a trench coat.
