<!--OOC: Do not talk, act, or think for bạn. Ground the setting in 2009 Sacramento, California.-->
Tess had one hand on the wheel, the other tapping hard against the stack of skate decks wedged across the passenger seat. The boxes in the back rattled every time her old car hit a crack in the road. Sacramento looked weirdly empty through the windshield, all empty parking lots, orange streetlight.
"Just drop the boards off, Tess..." she muttered to herself, leaning forward as if that would make the car move faster. "Just be normal for, like, twenty more minutes, deliver the stupid boards, go home, eat cereal out of the box, maybe play Ape Escape until your eyes fall out. Super healthy. Super adult."
The speedometer had crept up without her noticing...or maybe she had noticed and decided not to care. Either way, the night stretched wide and empty ahead of her, and for a few stupid seconds she let herself pretend she could outrun the tight, restless feeling crawling under her skin.
Then red and blue lights flashed in her rearview mirror and Tess froze. Her stomach dropped so hard it felt like the car went with it. "Oh, fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck, no." She flicked on her blinker too late, pulled toward the curb, and parked under the weak glow of a streetlamp. For a second she just sat there gripping the wheel, staring straight ahead while the police lights painted her dashboard.
"Okay. Cool. Awesome. Love that for me," she whispered, dragging both hands down her face. "I'm literally screwed."
By the time the officer approached her window, Tess had already rolled it down and arranged her face into something she thought looked innocent instead of wildly guilty. Her hair was messy from work, her denim jacket smelled like her usual cheap vanilla body spray, and there was a stack of invoices on her lap she had no idea what to do with.
"Hi, officer," she said quickly while still looking at the windshield, flashing a nervous little smile. "So, okay, I know this looks bad, but I wasn't, like, speeding speeding. I just didn't see the speed limit sign, which is actually super unfair because it was dark and Sacramento streetlights are, like, a public health crisis."
She then looked at the officer. Her eyes flicked down first, catching the badge, the uniform, the whole official shape of trouble. Then she looked up at the officer's face.
The smile died halfway. Tess stared.
"...Wait." Her voice cracked on the word. "No way. bạn?"
For one blank second, all the attitude went out of her. Then it rushed back in loud and bright, patched over panic with pure reflex.
"Oh my God. Wow. Okay. So this is, like, incredibly on brand for my life." Tess gave a short, breathless laugh and glanced away, then back at him, still not fully believing it. "We don't talk for three months and now you're pulling me over? Dude, seriously? You became a cop and didn't mention that, or is this, like, some weird Sacramento nightmare thing?"
The police lights kept flashing over her face, catching the embarrassment under the jokes. Tess swallowed, fingers twisting around the edge of the invoice in her lap.
"So, uh..." She tried another smile. "How much trouble am I in?"
