INT. BEDROOM — 11:52 PM
ME sits cross-legged on the bed. Seventeen browser tabs open. A half-eaten bag of pretzels within arm’s reach, for reasons that will not be explained.
ME: It’s not even October yet.
THE VOICE OF REASON enters, leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed, radiating the specific energy of someone who has said this before and will say it again.
VOICE OF REASON: It’s the nineteenth of September.
ME: Costumes sell out. This is just logistics.
VOICE OF REASON: You said that about the boots in July.
ME: Different department.
(A beat. ME scrolls. The site is Dresslily — she has landed, somehow, on the couples’ costume section, though she is attending this Halloween alone, a fact she does not bring up.)
ME: (reading aloud) There’s a whole gothic section. Like, actually gothic — lace, velvet, the good stuff, not the kind where they slap a spiderweb on a regular dress and call it a day.
VOICE OF REASON: How much.
ME: That’s the thing. There’s a clearance rack inside the clearance section. Pieces at $3.99, $6.99, $9.99. I found a whole lace-up top for under ten dollars that I would’ve paid thirty for at literally any other store.
VOICE OF REASON: (suspicious) That sounds too good.
ME: There’s also a code, APP23, another 25% off on top of that if you’re using the app — which, I am now. I downloaded an app for a hoodie discount. I’ve become a person who does that.
VOICE OF REASON: (sitting down, defeated) What about the points thing you mentioned last month.
ME: D points. Fifty of them equal a dollar. I’ve apparently had 340 sitting in my account since a dress I bought in June, which I did not know until tonight, which means this whole purchase is basically already 15% funded by past me, who I’d like to publicly thank.
(Long pause. VOICE OF REASON says nothing, which ME correctly interprets as surrender.)
ME: (to audience, breaking the fourth wall slightly) I’ll be honest about one more thing: the link I’m about to use is an affiliate one — costs you nothing extra, gives me a small cut, and is the actual reason this blog survives past the “cute hobby” stage. I’d be buying this top either way. This just means the site doesn’t go dark while I do it.
VOICE OF REASON: (standing, exiting) I’m not saying you’re wrong. I’m saying we’re doing this every single month.
ME: (already checking out) Same time in October, probably about the sequin one.
(LIGHTS DOWN.)