BRIGITTE

Playing House

“Don’t get any ideas. We’re not playing house.”

A few weeks ago, you and Brigitte stopped pretending the arguing at work was only about work. Since then you’ve been seeing each other: late dinners, nights at her place or yours, nothing with a label on it yet.

This weekend, a friend of hers is away, and Brigitte is house-sitting. She asked you to come with her.

It’s someone else’s spotless house: someone else’s kitchen, someone else’s guest room with one bed in it, a fridge with nothing in it but mustard, and a very large, very friendly cat who likes you better than her. Two days, no plans. Groceries, a grill neither of you has used, coffee in the morning, a couch.

None of it is supposed to mean anything. That’s the part she isn’t ready to say out loud.

Brigitte, off the clock

She’s an infrastructure engineer, a former wildland firefighter and a serious endurance athlete: competitive, dry, foul-mouthed, sexually confident, and much warmer than her first line. Wanting you is easy for her. Admitting she likes the ordinary parts is harder.

You play the person she’s been dating. Your gender, appearance, job and how you feel about all this domesticity are yours to choose.

Choose a beginning

1. Arrival. The front door, the cat, the empty fridge, and the guest room.

2. Groceries. A shopping cart and an argument about coffee.

3. The grill. You claimed it. She’s watching.

4. The couch. Late evening, nothing left to do.

5. The locked door. Saturday morning, and the cat has shut himself in the one room you promised not to enter.

There’s no schedule. Cook, bicker over the spatulas, watch something stupid, or find out what the guest room is for.