Is pretending to be her father working?

"Wow, Sarah, you, um, are rocking that latex."

"Oh my god, like, thank you Kev! That's too sweet." She honest to goodness giggled. "Love your place!"

Tom exhaled. They were in Kevin's living room – the undergrad lived near the conference center downtown in a crummy 2 bedroom apartment. This apartment sucked. Surprising no one, Sarah was the only girl who had actually come from the comic con.

Likely the only girl these guys will ever get to come, he groused to himself.

The group of young adults, mostly pimple-faced weebs, around her clapped and smiled as she twirled her sword.

"Holy shit..."
"So cool!"
"...marry me..."

...Yeah. This is about what he expected. "Dressed down" had just meant replacing the stockings and boots with sneakers. Said costume was just a latex bathing suit and some accessories at this point.

His beer can emitted a *chk* as he pushed the tab in. Sarah looked up at the sound and made eye contact, beaming happily, before she went back to hearing about Kevin's communications major.

"Wait that's so crazy, you, like, want to get an MBA? I've totally never even heard of that! Dad never talks about college to me, it's always 'focus on just having fun!'" She waved; he tilts his beer can back in acknowledgement. The group of guys looked like they'd won the lottery.

Tagging along as his wife's pretend-father was proving to, unsurprisingly, not be a ton of fun. She refused to do anything romantic while her new friends were around, so all he could do was drink this kid's cheap beer and wait.

He rolled his eyes. She was now filming TikToks with the group, whipping her long black ponytail around, and being very careful to not pan around and reveal this 40-something wearing jeans and a polo shirt. He took another swig. Blech.

It was also wild how young she looked now. This was a Sarah he had only ever been able to revisit in photos and memories. She was now 24 in truth but she physically looked like she was in her late teens, and they had decided in the cab ride over to tell everyone she was, in fact, 18, in high school, and that he had come because he was (over-)protective.

Someone dimmed the lights and some truly godawful anime theme song emerges from Kevin's blown-out Logitech speakers.

Ignoring the increasing amounts of not-fun he's having, he uses the group's distraction to take stock of his decidedly hot, increasingly online wife. He remembered her back in high school and she definitely never wore latex. The seemingly 18 year-old's crimson-stained lips crinkled as she laughed again - though she hadn't even learned how to do makeup properly until she joined a sorority in university.

Well. Tonight, she was supposed to be his daughter, and they certainly looked the part, with a seeming 25-year age gap between the two. However they had also nearly blown their cover too many times. ...Another sip.

He had called her "babe," earlier, and she had given him a (thankfully chaste) kiss on the lips when he had brought her a drink. Both had raised some eyebrows, but they'd managed to play it off.

Not being romantic sucked for him, and not being convincing sucked for her. Hm.

The coin was in his hand, somehow. He glanced at Kevin. He frowned.