Out of Character
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Synopsis
Dumplin’ meets Geekerella in debut author Jenna Miller’s queer, body-positive love story that explores online and offline relationships in all of their messiness.
If you asked seventeen-year-old Cass Williams to describe herself, she’d happily tell you she’s fat, a lesbian, and obsessed with the Tide Wars books. What she won’t tell you—or anyone in her life—is that she’s part of an online Tide Wars roleplay community. Sure, it’s nerdy as hell, but when she’s behind the screen writing scenes as Captain Aresha, she doesn’t have to think about her mother who walked out or how unexpectedly stressful it is dating resident cool girl Taylor Cooper.
But secretly retreating to her online life is starting to catch up with Cass. For one, no one in her real life knows her secret roleplay addiction is the reason her grades have taken a big hit. Also? Cass has started catching feelings for Rowan Davies, her internet bestie . . . and Taylor might be catching on.
As Cass’s lies continue to build, so does her anxiety. Roleplaying used to be the one place she could escape to, but this double life and offline-online love triangle have only made things worse. Cass must decide what to do—be honest and risk losing her safe space or keep it a secret and put everything else on the line.
Release date: February 7, 2023
Publisher: HarperCollins
Print pages: 384
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Out of Character
Jenna Miller
Mr. Tuttles would be the death of me.
We’d brought him home as a kitten ten years ago. I was seven at the time, and it was shortly after my neighbor Mr. Tuttles had died. Naming my cat after a crotchety old man who hated me more days than he didn’t wasn’t the smartest idea, but I’d never been good at letting go of things that were bad for me.
This wasn’t the first time Tuttles had run away. I’d usually find him on the porch swing next door like he was trying to take the place of old-man Tuttles. Or he’d be hiding under a car or an equally hard-to-reach place out of cat spite. But he wasn’t in any of his usual hiding spots. He wasn’t anywhere.
“Tuttles!” I yelled, hoping that did the trick. It never did. He was a pain in my ass who showed up when it suited him, but I loved him too much to not look anyway.
A car passed, a few leaves fell from the maple tree in front of my house, and still no cat. My heart started racing. Knowing he always came back didn’t mean something wouldn’t prevent him from making it home. Something like a moving car. “Tuttles!”
“Come on, Cass! You’ll wake up the neighborhood with your screeching!”
Tate Larson approached my yard from his house with a tired grin on his face, clearly proud of himself for the weak jab. As if we hadn’t exchanged this same banter a hundred times over the years. My best friend was, simply put, beautiful. He was Black with warm brown skin, deep brown eyes, and a smile that was all teeth, and he shadowed my five-foot-five frame by almost a head. He and his mom had moved into human Mr. Tuttles’s house a few months after the old man died and Tate’s parents divorced. Being the only other kid my age on the block, we’d become friends immediately.
“Have you seen Tuttles?” I asked, meeting him between our houses and exchanging a fist bump out of habit, but I couldn’t bring myself to smile. “I wouldn’t be surprised if he curled up in your bed in the middle of the night, the ungrateful beast.”
Tate snorted. “Not my fault everyone adores me. But no, he’s not at my house. Want help looking?”
I groaned, not in the mood for a cat hunt when Tuttles was impossible to find. “No, thanks. He’ll turn up. Always does.” I looked around, willing my body to feel as calm as my voice sounded.
“For sure,” Tate said. “In that case, is this a good time to talk about the weekend?”
Of course he was thinking about the weekend on a Monday. “Sure, let’s hear it.”
“Do you have plans?”
“You know me—always got a packed weekend.”
He narrowed his eyes, smirking. “So Netflix, books, and waffles?”
I rolled my eyes, a smile finally forming. It was damn near impossible not to smile around Tate. “Obviously. You?”
“Rachel and Greg are coming over if you want to hang with us.”
I groaned. Again. “Why would I want to do that?”
“Come on, C,” he said, nudging me. “Just because you hate him doesn’t mean everyone does.”
“No, but they should,” I muttered.
Greg Jensen was my first and only boyfriend for a few months in eighth grade. When I came out the next year, he reacted by dragging me online, which was a shitty way to start high school. The drama of it passed quickly enough because no one actually cared about my sexuality, including him, but it was hard to forget.
Tate shuffled his feet. “I know it’s a sensitive subject.”
“It’s not sensitive. I can’t help that he’s an ass who never got over me wounding his fragile male ego because he’s not my type.”
Tate snorted, shaking his head. He and Dad were the only guys I knew who’d appreciate the words fragile male ego. “Look, I get it. He was the worst back then, but he’s good people now. And he’s on the team, so.”
I knew it went beyond them playing football together. “You mean Rachel wants me to come over so someone can entertain Greg.”
He grinned like a boy in love. “Yeah, maybe that too.”
Cue the world’s most exaggerated shock.
I didn’t dislike Tate’s girlfriend, but I knew it bothered her that Tate had a female best friend—even a lesbian who’d rather go without waffles for a month than see him naked. “Why invite him if you and Rachel want to hang out alone?”
“Because I’m trying to juggle everything at once,” he said, scrunching his face. “Between football and senior year already kicking my ass and trying to give a shit about the people I give a shit about, it’s a lot.”
I nodded, understanding the feeling more than he knew. “We’ll see,” I said, which we both knew meant hard pass. Tate tried to involve me in his friend group, and I loved him for it, but it wasn’t gonna happen. Some people weren’t meant to be friends, and that’s okay.
He sighed in defeat. “Fine, fine. But I’m heading back inside. Be ready in an hour or you’ll miss your ride, fail the econ test, and have to deal with me lecturing you about the importance of your future or some other obligatory best-friend bullshit. No pressure!”
“I’ll be ready, you goof,” I said, shoving him playfully toward his house.
Retreating inside to my upstairs bedroom, I sat at my desk and opened my laptop. I had an hour and needed the distraction from a missing Tuttles. Multiple windows awaited me with messages related to the Tide Wars roleplay I comoderated.
I’d only ever been a fan fiction reader, not writer. But the concept of making a character from my favorite two-book series my own and using them to interact with other characters within new storylines excited me. It was like gaming, but with words instead of controllers or dice or whatever the hell people used to nerd out these days.
The roleplay had eleven people in it from across the country, but the Discord server labeled Home Base included my four closest friends other than Tate—Rowan Davies, Carina Moretti, Holly Stone, and Autumn Murphy. I’d met them online two summers ago when joining my first Tide Wars roleplay. I’d stumbled upon it while scrolling Tide Wars Tumblr tags, needing the distraction from my parents fighting again. The whole stranger-danger aspect made me nervous at first, but I’d quickly gotten sucked in. The more my parents fought, the more I relied on online life. And after a month of roleplaying, I couldn’t imagine my life without my new friends and the fake world we inhabited.
When the first roleplay ended only a few months after I’d joined, Rowan and I decided to start our own, and the other three followed. We wrote scenes together either as a group with the larger roleplay we acquired through Tumblr or privately one-on-one, but Home Base was for out-of-character conversations between the five of us. The personal, real-world stuff. And maybe we sometimes used it to bitch about other characters—and the people playing them.
I clicked on Home Base to catch up on morning messages.
Carina: Can someone read my Yale essay? My dad says it’s make-or-break, and I can’t afford to break. It has to be perfect!
Carina: Ugh, I hate being on the East Coast. You’re all probably sleeping.
Carina Moretti was a senior from Boston, on track to getting accepted to Yale for political science. She had Italian and American dual citizenship and was the only one of us in a real-life relationship. Tom frequently took priority over the roleplay, but most things in her life had taken priority over the roleplay lately. I couldn’t remember the last time she’d started a conversation.
My shoulders slumped when I realized she’d reached out only for personal gain. Still, she was my friend, and I wanted to help. I swallowed the hint of bitterness I felt and replied before she could throw herself into a deeper panic.
Cass: Morning! Rowan is the essay expert, but I can look if you need more eyes.
Carina: THANK YOU, CASS! You’re an angel.
Carina: Rowan, please say yes too.
Carina: But I need to go. Class is about to start. Love!
I clicked out of Home Base with a sigh, switching to one-on-one roleplay scenes on Discord. I’d shamelessly snagged one of the main characters, Aresha Petrovka, who was the pirate crew’s captain, meaning I always had multiple one-on-one scenes going at once. As moderators, Rowan and I also got messages from people when they wanted to create a new character or if there was in-character or out-of-character drama to mitigate. Moderating a roleplay sometimes felt like babysitting, but it was worth it for the reward of writing amazing scenes and having friends who shared my love of Tide Wars.
I responded to the scenes that were waiting on me, ranging from Aresha helping a crew member who’d been injured to discussing provisions with a supplier—a needs-based role, not a regular character. Then I moved to the roleplay’s Tumblr site, which mainly acted as a hub for people to apply and get added to the Discord server. There were also pages dedicated to available and taken characters with bios and a general timeline of where the roleplay was to date, helping newcomers decide if they wanted to join.
Our pinned post from day one welcomed me.
Welcome to Tide Wars, nerds!
The roleplay picks up where Macy Whittier’s books ended. In case you aren’t obsessed enough to remember the duology’s final line, it was: “We go home.” Princess Aresha and her crew will begin their journey to Shiibka, Girishtova, so she and her brother, Prince Allain, can rebuild after being away for two years. Although the main enemy was defeated and the king and queen have been avenged, the crew will still encounter smaller, lingering enemies along the way.
Main plots are posted under each character on the Characters page as a starting point, but PLEASE get creative and make them your own.
A few basic ground rules:
- We aren’t limiting how many characters you play or monitoring how often you’re around (we all have lives), but we won’t hesitate to call you out if you ghost for a long time. Don’t leave your plot partners hanging. Communicate, etc.
- We hope to avoid drama as much as possible, but if you can’t figure something out on your own, talk to Cass. (Rowan is garbage at mediating.)
- Any roleplay-wide plots should be run by the moderators (that’s us!) first, since they’ll most likely affect everyone. That said, send us your cute, fun, intense, and spicy ideas!
- Honestly, that’s it, but Cass prefers even numbers.
Message us with questions, and apply to characters at your leisure.
We can’t wait to see you aboard soon.
XoXo Rowan and Cass
I grinned at the post, thinking of how far the group had come since the roleplay started.
Moving to the message inbox, I noticed a new person had applied to join. There wasn’t enough time to dig into their information, character’s bio, and plot ideas, so I left it unread. Rowan was the go-to for applications anyway. She had an eye for who would make a good addition, and I was the mediator who handled character and roleplayer drama. We made the perfect team. I couldn’t do it without her.
A knock came from the other side of my door, and I closed the laptop right as Mom walked in. Her blonde hair was pulled back in an uncommon ponytail, and makeup was missing from her face, including her signature red lipstick and perfect eyeliner that bordered her round hazel eyes. People said we looked a lot alike, but they always left out the part where I was fat and she wasn’t. The omission used to feel awkward, but now it annoyed me when people acted like obvious things didn’t exist.
“Just making sure you were up,” she said, a small smile on her lips.
I laughed. “You must’ve missed me yelling for Tuttles outside.” My brows furrowed as I gave her a pointed look. “Did you leave a door open on accident?”
“I haven’t been out, so maybe it was your dad,” she said as she eyed my laptop. “Not doing anything questionable on there, are you?”
“Of course not.” I tried hiding the inevitable flush of my cheeks for being called out. “Secret project. Will share eventually.”
Guilt rocked me when her smile grew. I’d always been an A/B student in school, but my grades had started slipping last year. She and Dad assumed it was because they’d done a shitty job at hiding their growing tensions with each other. And that was a big part of it, but staying up late to roleplay instead of studying or doing homework didn’t help.
“Well then, don’t let me keep you from it,” she said. “But don’t get too into it and end up late for school. I know how laser-focused you can get.”
“I won’t.”
“And don’t worry about Tuttles. He always turns up when he’s ready.”
“I know, but school would go better if I wasn’t thinking about him all day,” I said, knowing I feared for my cat more than he deserved some days.
“Oh!” she said, her eyes widening. “Speaking of school, don’t forget about your early-action deadline for UIC.”
I groaned. “I know, Mom. I have, like, two weeks to get it in.” I willed her to leave so I could wrap up a couple of scenes before school. UIC stuff was obviously on my mind, but it didn’t matter this second.
“Another reminder doesn’t hurt. Just like I’m going to remind you about Ursula. Halloween is around the corner.”
“I haven’t forgotten,” I said. The costume we were almost done making together was going to be my best one yet. Sure, Ursula was Ariel’s villain, but that didn’t keep her from being a
badass in her own way. I couldn’t wait to make her my own. “We’ll get it finished in time.”
Mom nodded slowly. She remained in the doorway, her eyes locked on mine. “I’m really proud of you—you know that, right?”
“I know,” I said again, smiling in the hope that she’d leave this time. Mom was one of my favorite people, but hovering made me nervous. “I’ll see you after school.”
“Yeah,” Mom said quietly, absently, as she glanced around the room. She was likely thinking about work stuff or what to make for dinner or whatever else parents thought about that I didn’t want to know. “See you.”
I opened my laptop after she left, staring off into the void of my secret life. My parents didn’t know anything about the roleplay or my online friendships. They didn’t need to know how much time I spent away from the real world.
After trading in ice-skating lessons for playing The Sims in middle school, I became all too familiar with gaming addiction. In the beginning, I’d invite Tate over to play with me, but soon he was more of a watcher than a participant and gave up trying to join. Before long, I was bailing on plans with him and other friends to game. I’d stay up late and sleep in on weekends. When that extended to sleeping in on school days, missing assignments, and failing tests, my parents took the game away. Everything settled down after that.
Then my parents started fighting last year, and it became too much for me. So I found a way to cope.
Not only was the past addiction an issue, but the parents also didn’t trust internet strangers in general. If they found out about the roleplay, they’d worry unnecessarily about stranger danger, me falling back into my old ways, and my grades. And that would lead to them feeling disappointed in me for not talking to them, which would lead to them blaming each other and fighting more, which would lead to no technology, no roleplay, and an even shittier senior year.
I refused to let any of that happen. I wouldn’t give up my nerd friends.
And my grades weren’t that bad.
Before I could send another roleplay reply, a horn sounded from outside. I looked at the clock, and sure enough an hour had already passed. And I wasn’t ready. Fuck. It was yet another morning of getting behind because of online life. I couldn’t keep doing this to Tate.
I texted that I’d be right out before rushing to get ready, throwing on jeans and a green hoodie over a Tide Wars T-shirt. After knocking my twenty-minute morning routine down to three, I grabbed my phone and backpack and ran downstairs for a granola bar and bottled coffee drink. I raked a hand through my messy hair on my way out to his truck when I heard my name.
I froze at the sight of Taylor Cooper approaching me, my ginger loaf of a cat in her arms. Gods, she was beautiful. Her pale skin contrasted against her dark-brown bluntly cut bob with a side shave. She had more piercings on her left ear alone
than I’d have in a lifetime, and her large blue eyes pierced my heart in a swoony way. She looked almost exactly like Rowan’s roleplay character, Roux. It was perfectly normal to crush on someone who looked like my online character’s fictional ship partner.
But it wasn’t just that. Taylor was cool. Not like popular cool, which was totally different. Being around her made people feel like they were floating—or maybe that was just me. She was a pansexual gamer, in newspaper club with Rachel, and nice to everyone in an adorably snarky way. And she worked at Spyhouse Coffee, my favorite Minneapolis coffee shop. Not that I knew anything about her.
Locking eyes with Taylor, I immediately forgave Tuttles for running away.
“Is this one yours?” she asked when I didn’t say anything.
“Yes,” I said, relieved and nervous at the same time. What if Mom came out and embarrassed me? What if Tate hollered something as a joke that made it obvious I liked her? I didn’t know which possibility was worse. “Where’d you find him?”
“On my route to school a couple blocks over. He was playing with a leaf on the sidewalk.”
A nervous laugh escaped me as she shuffled Tuttles into my arms, and he was purring. I didn’t blame him. “Sounds like him. But how’d you know he was mine? Or where I live?”
“So many questions.” A swoonworthy smile formed on her lips. “I went to a party at Tate’s house last year and heard him mention you were neighbors.” She shrugged. “And your cat’s kind of a regular on your Insta.”
I blinked. Taylor Cooper followed my Instagram? Or she at least popped by it enough to know about Tuttles. This information hit me in a new way. I obviously kept a casual eye on her life, but I didn’t realize she did the same to me. “He’s the star of it, honestly. Thanks for finding him.”
“You got it.” Taylor’s gaze lingered on me for a beat before she nodded toward an SUV on the street where a man sat with the windows down. “Anyway, my dad’s waiting. See you around?”
This moment was either a stroke of fate or a cruel joke. Probably a cruel joke, because fate sounded made up. Either way, it was over before I could let it sink in. “Yeah, see you.”
“Cool.” She winked at me before walking away.
The simple gesture turned my body into mush—something I wasn’t used to. I watched her go and waved to her dad in thanks before securing Tuttles in the house and rushing to Tate’s truck. “Sorry about that,” I said as I hopped in and buckled my seat belt.
“Don’t be sorry,” Tate said as he backed out of the driveway. “But Taylor Cooper. Damn, C.” He let out a low whistle.
I immediately turned scarlet. “Shut up,” I said, swatting his arm. “She found Tuttles. It’s not a big deal.”
“Uh-huh. You’ve only been into her since you knew you were into girls. But sure, it’s not a big deal.”
Okay, maybe it’s a big deal, but I don’t want to overthink it.”
“I’ll say no more.”
I knew there was a hidden for now buried in that statement but left it alone. “And sorry for the delay. Girl shit, et cetera.”
“Yeah, your just-woke-up look must’ve taken hours,” Tate said, not unkindly. “But it’s all good. We leave twenty minutes early for a reason.”
Me. I was the reason. And the worst part was that he didn’t know why. Like my parents, Tate knew nothing about my roleplay life. Netflix, books, and waffles were really all he thought I did on the weekends—unless I had plans with him, of course. And he wasn’t technically wrong, but my free time was spent online more than anything else.
I was an out lesbian who didn’t hate my fat body, yet this part of my life was a secret. It would be one thing if I was ashamed of it, but I wasn’t. Roleplay had entered my life exactly when I needed it—my own little safe haven. And maybe it had become more than that, but it wasn’t dangerous.
As much as I hated keeping the secret from Tate, I knew it was for the best. He’d been around for the whole Sims addiction drama, and I didn’t want him thinking this was the same thing. I didn’t want him to worry. And considering how close our families were, I knew he’d tell my parents about it if he ever had a reason to think it was a problem. So he didn’t need to know.
I pulled out my phone as Tate sang along to a daily Spotify mix, both of us aware I’d gone into my own head. Home Base had a few new replies.
Rowan: Thanks for the voluntold, Cassidy Williams.
Rowan: I’ll read the essay, Cari, but only if you stop second-guessing your genius.
Rowan: Off to school. Love!
Rowan Davies was my roleplay comoderator and online bestie. She lived in Chicago and was a senior like me. Also like me, she wanted to go to the University of Illinois Chicago next year for English. Our characters were a ship, which basically meant we constantly had a scene going together. And unlike me and our characters, she was straight.
I knew the Love! mockery was frustration and hurt talking because Carina wasn’t around much anymore, but I couldn’t help but laugh. I opened our private out-of-character server.
Cass: You’re an asshole, Rowan Davies. Love! ;)
“What’s that grin for?” Tate asked.
“Cat meme,” I said, instantly hating myself for how easily the lie slipped out. I put my phone away to focus on him, trying to calm my face as if smiling over a friend’s snark were a crime. I’d wanted to tell Home Base about this morning’s encounter with Taylor—because of course they knew all about her—but it could wait until after school.
Rachel, Tate’s girlfriend, was waiting in the parking lot when we pulled up. She had a lot of friends, but she didn’t
need a girl posse at her side to look confident or get noticed. On top of being in newspaper with Taylor and on the volleyball team, she also volunteered at a women’s shelter a few days every month.
“Good morning, Cass,” she said politely as we approached, holding her hand out to Tate. Her long brown hair fell perfectly down her back, and her minimalist makeup look was flawless.
Tate took her hand and looked back at me, grinning. “See you in econ. Don’t choke.”
“Don’t die,” I retorted, smirking back at him before heading into the building to brave my weekday nightmare—the no-phone zone. I didn’t hate school, but most of my classmates had friends to talk to throughout the day. For seven hours every weekday, I was completely cut off from 80 percent of my friend group, and the other 20 percent was usually with his girlfriend or in a different class. I also hated small talk with people I wasn’t close with, and that was a major component of high school. Disappearing wasn’t an option here.
By the time economics rolled around, I was mentally exhausted. There was a special place in hell for teachers who scheduled tests on a Monday, and Mr. Blake was no exception. He was the kind of teacher who gave you a chance to rewrite a paper using his feedback on one draft, then turned around with opposing feedback on the next draft. He was also the head football coach, so he loved students like Tate and tolerated students like me. But taking econ meant I got out of taking history class, which I loved since the biased American perspective was grating.
“Pencils out, everything else away,” Mr. Blake said, looking at a few students pointedly.
Tate shot me a similar look before wiggling his eyebrows and facing forward.
I wanted to die at the thought of another potentially failed test. But it was my own fault.
I really needed to stop roleplaying after midnight.
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