The first time I spoke to Bree, she said she dressed up in character for midnight movies and could even do “the hair.” It’s probably something sexy/adorable, i.e., catnip to Undersea fans, right?

TheDuchessB: I’ll wear a certain hairdo we all know and love.

GreatSc0t: . . . seriously?

Do the ellipses connote lust or horror?

TheDuchessB: Go big or go Flirtville, right?

GreatSc0t: Are you a Flirtville refugee, too?

TheDuchessB: Couldn’t get out of there fast enough. There’s a DuchessB-sized hole in the wall where I fled.

I’m rewarded with the heart-eyes face emoji. I can’t help smiling back at it.

GreatSc0t: Can we make it a brewery? I’m on a mission to test out the local taps.

Shit. Bree and beer don’t mix. They’re literally an anagram of each other, and anagrams are how the devil communicates with humans. Red rum, etc.

(On the other hand, beer’s not liquor exactly. It’s wheat! It’s fine!)

TheDuchessB: Let’s do it.

GreatSc0t: Looking forward to it! Here’s the address. See you then. :)

* * *

I plunk down $30.06 (two take-out dinners) for a taxi ride to Porchlight, because it’s only the second company meeting Clifford has held since I started working for him, and I want to appear to be a model employee. It’s galling, per his latest memo, to know he might not even attend, but I can’t risk not showing up.

The taxi ride is a sensory nightmare. Besides the endlessly blaring TV that can’t be muted or turned off, the a/c is on too high and I don’t have my arm warmers to console me. I stare out the window like a dog trapped in a car headed for the pound. To my right is the Hudson River, aka the setting of the Miracle on the Hudson. Sully CANNOT be a hoax. I need Sully. I need the Miracle on the Hudson.

Bicyclists and joggers look loose-limbed and almost free, flying past one another on the surprisingly wide, clean-looking sidewalk along the edge of the water.

Maybe next weekend I’ll have the courage to join them.

It’s a nice thought, anyway.

* * *

“Did he ask you to be the ‘international face of the company,’ too?” I ask Aisha Ibrahim loudly, trying to be heard over the cacophony of the bar. We’ve secured ourselves a dim spot in the corner.

She grins and rolls her eyes. “How ever did you guess?”