Page 1 of Of Monsters and Mazes

Chapter 1

“Loser.”

“Total Chad.”

“Probably married.”

“Forty years old and still bragging about your high school football wins, buddy?”

“Oh, nice goatee—Tell me you’re a sociopath without telling me you’re a sociopath.”

I scrolled listlessly through the dating app on my phone, narrating my first impressions of each candidate for my feline audience, while I lay on my stomach in bed. At this point, I was barely bothering to read the profiles of my wonderful options.

One might think that in such a big city, there would be at least a handful of diamonds peeking out through the shit piles. One might even think that dating at thirty-five would come with more mature and stable men than it had in my twenties.

And one would be so very, very wrong.

Instead, it seemed that all the men my age who were still in the dating pool were either:

A) Narcissists looking for fresh victims.

B) Deadbeats wielding weaponized incompetence like it were a gas-powered chainsaw in a room full of zombies.

C) Shit stains who were married and looking for an affair to feel “young again.”

Or D) Forty year olds who still hadn’t figured out that they’re not in their twenties anymore.

But I was here too, so I probably wasn’t any better than anyone else. In the dating-loser pool, I could probably be summed up as the “lonely workaholic who doesn’t need a man, and has the patience to assure she never gets one.” It’s not like I was down to waste two years on another commitment-phobic man-child in the hopes that they would grow up and be a good partner one day.

I perused some more profiles to my disdain, not sure if I was more attracted to the train wreck of it all or if I was just that desperate. I’d been so hopeful when I started out with online dating, thinking these programs were for lonely, busy professionals looking for companionship amidst impossible work schedules. I was hoping to meet someone without having to spend time at a bar. Maybe skip the ‘I can fix him’ phase for once with someone halfway well-adjusted. But fuck—was I even well-adjusted?

Obviously not, considering I was more lonely and depressed than ever, despite kicking ass at my job, shattering every glass ceiling, reaching new heights, and coming up with one of the most popular IPs in gaming history. I’d thought achieving success and finally getting the respect I deserved would fill every void in my life, and yet there was always something missing. Why I thought the middle aged dating pool would solve that deficit, I didn’t know. Even the most promising and puppy dog men didn’t excite me, while the ones that did get my stomach butterflies fluttering left me feeling dirty and disgusted with myself. My whole relationship experience was that of a naïve child in a brightly colored lawn chair, cheering on a parade of lies and crushed dreams.

Yet, while I knew all this, here I was on a Friday night, staring at my phone like everyone else, as if any one of these men were worth more than an unsatisfying ten seconds in bed after an hour of smiling and nodding through another manifesto of questionable politics and disturbing relationship history, all recited while chewing with his mouth open.

“Why is this my life?” I groaned as I rolled over onto my back and spread my arms on my bed. It would have been easier if I could have just met someone at work. We could bond over our lack of social life, our excessive dedication to climbing the corporate ladder, and maybe make stupid programming jokes here and there. If we were lucky, we could even pretend to like craft beer and binge watch mindless TV shows together. Working in tech, there were lots of men like that in my sphere.

But there was nothing in this universe that would destroy my reputation, instantly erasing every step I’d taken towards being treated as an equal in the software development space, like dating a coworker. Even now I occasionally heard the mutters about my alleged “sleeping my way to the top” and getting so called “preferential treatment,” despite having never dipped my pen in company ink. Let’s ignore the fact that I had to work ten times harder than the most mediocre programmer on the floor in order to get an ounce of the recognition. Jumping through hoops was exhausting enough without giving those rumors credibility. It was always better to go into an office where no one could post reviews of my vagina on the company bulletin board with a verified purchase checkmark by their name.

So back to sexual frustration and dating randoms that I had nothing in common with.

I drew in a breath for a deep sigh, just in time for Pumpkin, my fluffy, long-haired tabby cat, to launch himself from the top of his cat tree right onto my stomach. The wind was knocked from my lungs in some unsightly combination of choking, gasping, and laughing.

I really need to move the kitty tower a bit further from my bed.

My little cheese puff mewed, then he circled my stomach, and curled up on my chest once he was satisfied that he’d poked me in the gut enough times with his little kitty paws. It was hard to ever stay mad when the fluffle pumpkin started purring though.

Manipulative bastard. All men were the same—even the cats.

I buried my fingers in his luscious fur, then returned to shopping for my next disappointment.

I was about to close the app and throw my phone against the wall, when I came across the picture of a man so striking, he had to have been using some sort of photo manipulation. He had emerald green eyes that practically sparkled, in a shade so vibrant and surreal it could only exist by using colored contacts. There was a devilishness to his smirk that served as its own warning sign, while his stylish auburn hair reaffirmed the obvious assumption that he was a psychopath. I couldn’t tell if he was wearing makeup or not, and he was undoubtedly another mistake just waiting to happen.

And like most dumb bitches who never learned, I matched with his pretty face immediately. My messages pinged.

Jericho: I knew you’d accept.

Wow, how completely not narcissistic. God, why did I bother? Who wants to take bets that this guy fucks like a dead fish with a strap-on? These men never lived up to their egos.