Mia joined us at my costume fitting. She sat beside Daddy, sipping Pink and resting her head on his shoulder. I wasn’t jealous. I was trying not to be jealous. He kissed her temple, and she nuzzled into his neck, and I said to myself He is your boss he is your boss.
“This isn’t a game of dress-up,” is what Daddy said. He used his eyedrops, blinked the tears away. “Costume is crucial for your image. For sales. You’re your own commercial here. What you choose to wear, it’s marketing. It’s you.” He took the strap of Mia’s dress and slipped it off her shoulder. “It’s what our guests get to strip off you.” Mia slapped Daddy’s hand and he caught her fingers and kissed her knuckles, but I was not jealous because he was my boss.
I didn’t know if they were all in love with Daddy, or if any of them were, but they all loved him, and I got it. Maybe it was that he was the only man on-site. Maybe it was that he promised to care for us. Maybe it was that he was the key to our success. Or maybe it had more to do with the way he touched, like he had to, the way he spoke, so close to the ear, the way he smiled as if you, just by being you, were brightening his whole day.
* * *
Mia laughed when I turned to face them in a tiny tulle tutu that made me look like a wedding dessert. She said, “That’s awful.”
“It’s not very you,” said Daddy. I looked in the mirror. He was right, it wasn’t very me. “A good costume is like good makeup,” he said, “it always works best if it’s blended into you. If no one can tell you’re wearing it.”
He said, “Take the skirt off. Let’s see it just with the lingerie.”
I pushed the skirt from my hips and let it puddle at my feet. I was never shy about nudity. My body was the least embarrassing thing about me. Animal, machine. I had no idea who I was, but my body knew exactly how to be.
“We’d be crazy to hide that body,” said Daddy. Despite it all, I blushed. “Let’s try something simpler,” he said.
There was a rack in the far corner of the room. I started toward it, but Mia stopped me. “We don’t touch that rack,” she said. “Those costumes are off limits.”
“Why?”
Mia looked at Daddy, who looked at me.
“They’re old,” Daddy said. “Worn. You don’t want them.”
“They’re worn?”
“By Bunnies who aren’t here anymore.”
“You mean they don’t work here anymore?”
Mia nodded. “Right. They don’t work here anymore.”
“The girl who was here before me, the one whose position I filled, was one of these costumes hers?”
“You sure are curious,” said Daddy.
The world went black.
Daddy, in the dark, put a hand around my waist and said, “It’s just a reset.”
“But what is a reset?” I said, only to have the question absorbed by shadows.
My phone lit up with a text from Lacey: How’s everything going over there? Have you started saying “howdy” yet?
* * *
The lights came back, and Mia, as if nothing had happened, she said, “I think maybe we should just lean into your natural personality.” I was wearing a long red gown and opera gloves.
“Does that happen every day? The reset?”
“Every day, once a day,” said Mia, a little bored. “Only when there are no guests here. Daddy doesn’t want to freak them out.”
“But what is it?”
Mia circled me. I felt stupid, like a girl playing make-believe, trying out every type of woman I could.
“Why don’t I just wear my own clothes?” I said.
“You have to be in costume,” is what Daddy said. “Your costume is a big part of keeping you safe.” He scanned me, top to toe, and I felt like a car, like at any moment he could slap me on the hood and call me a good deal.
“Why?”
“It’s part of distancing yourself from the job,” he said. “Developing a persona. It’s armor, a costume is.”
I looked at Daddy. At Mia. “I don’t need to distance myself from the job,” I said.
We’d exhausted all the options when Daddy finally stood and went to the used costume rack. He pulled out an outfit. White cropped T-shirt and tiny denim shorts. “Try these,” he said. I put them on. The shorts were too big, they gaped at the waist. The T-shirt didn’t even reach my belly button. I tugged at the hem.
“Oh, wow,” Daddy said.
I looked like a bad Britney Spears impression.
Daddy circled me like a shark, eyes all over. “My god, you look just like her.”
“Like her?” I said.
Then Mia said, “Oh.” She said, “That’s who. That’s who it is.”
And I said, “Who?”
And Mia said, “Willa.”
And I said, “Who?”
Mia started to explain, but Daddy set a not-soft palm on her shoulder, and it was like he’d hit an off button and Mia shut her mouth so quickly it was almost like she’d never opened it at all. “This is your look, Lady,” Daddy said. “You look great.” He cradled my chin in his palm. “Now, look alive, darlin’. You’ve got your very first lineup tonight.”
* * *
Back in my room, my bed was made, my shoes lined up, single file and militaristic, along the foot of my bed. Someone had unpacked my suitcase; my socks and underwear were folded into drawers, everything else hung in a gradient organized by color. The television was on, but silenced.