Wednesday, November 17, 2010

122. Running Out of Time

"You look like a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle. And I don't mean Rafael, the hot one. More like Donatello," I said eyeing Cayden's "gladiator" costume up and down and scrunching my face in distaste.

"I look like a Christmas tree. And what the hell is this?" he asked, running his fingers along the hideous green felt pleats that dropped to mid-thigh.

"It looks nothing like the picture on the package," I said, and we both stared down at the paper insert with a photo of a sexy, chiseled man decked out in gladiator gear, including shiny shin guards and a metal chest plate. In reality, the accessories were made of a flimsy rubber and the abs on the chest plate dented in instead of out. The whole thing smelled so strongly of cheap rubber that I had to hold my breath.

When we originally planned our costumes we were going for more of a Spartacus and Roman Goddess look. But my "toga" was too conservative, and nothing about it made me feel like the sexy female characters on Spartacus Blood and Sand (one of our favorite TV shows).

This was my first couples Halloween. My first couples costume. This would also be the first time all of my friends would meet Cayden. I wanted it to be perfect. But instead, we both looked ridiculous. It would have been like, "Hey guys, this is that sexy Prince Charming I've been raving about, only he looks a little more like a Teenage Mutant Ninja Christmas Tree."

I'd actually looked into Prince Charming and Princess costumes because I thought that might have a cute touch to it. But the only decent costumes were more than $100 each, and this broke-ass CInderella would have to map a lot of floors to earn that kind of extra dough.

I'd wanted Cayden to go as Russell Brand so I could be his Katy Perry. He had the accent; I had the boobs. It would have been perfect. But Cayden whined about how he can barely find regular jeans to fit his thighs, much less skinny jeans. What a princess. So here we were, stuck with crappy costumes and the first of our three Halloween parties started in a few hours.

"Our costumes suck," I said, throwing my hands up in the air and backing away from his rubber armor so I could breathe normally.

"Well, we have a few hours. Should we go look for last-minute costumes?" Cayden asked.

We'd been up since 5:45 am, and we'd planned on using these three hours for sex and nap time, but now we were in quite the predicament. Hmmm, sex or potentially better costumes? What if we went to the costume place and looked all over but didn't find anything? Then we'd get to the party sleepy, unsexed, and in hideous costumes.

"Get changed. We have some shopping to do!"

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In the car on the way there I wracked my brain for something cheap and creative. We'd both already dropped $45 on our god-awful costumes. There had to be a solution. Maybe it wasn't too late to talk him into Russell Brand. I was trying to picture what I had in my closet. What could possibly pass as a costume?

Then I had a flashback to that morning.

"Babe!" I said, turning to him, excited. He looked at me expectedly. "We could be marathoners!"

"Like, runners?" he asked, tilting his head.

"Yeah. You brought your tennis shoes, right? I mean, your trainers? And you brought running clothes? I still have my number bib from my race last weekend and you could borrow Rae's bib from this morning. I even still have my timer chip on my shoe from my race!"

He looked amused by my excitement.

"Yes, I do have my trainers and running vest and my shorts."

"You'd get to wear your short shorts, baby! You love those!"

He laughed and shook his head.

"Let's just see what we see when we get to the store."

My excitement died a little by the time we got to the store. Why would anyone ever go as marathon runners for Halloween? There was nothing funny or creative about marathon runners. What a stupid costume idea.

We walked into Halloween Express and it looked like it had been ransacked. The day before Halloween is probably the worst day to look for a costume. Kids ran past us in full costume and make up. Accessories were scattered on the floor. The wigs were all out of their bags and hanging on random hooks.

We scoured the place top to bottom, right to left, left to right, kids' aisle to adults' aisle, and came up empty handed. We were shit out of luck.

"Well, I guess our costumes aren't that bad," Cayden said, trying to reassure me. I grabbed a hat with a ratty gray wig attached to it and pulled it over Cayden's head. He ran his fingers through the tangled hair, and I laughed at how ridiculous he looked. But at the same time, he looked sort of sexy. Kind of like how Johnny Depp looks sexy even when he's dressed as a creeper.



"Umm, I'm kind of turned on," I said, running my hands down the front of his shirt.

"Really? It looks good?"

"No, it looks awful, but there's still something hot about it."

He leaned down to kiss me and the scraggly hair tickled my neck.

"Oh, that's so gross," I said, batting it away. "Let's go try on more wigs!"

I pulled him over the the wig aisle. I was scanning the colors and styles to see which one I wanted to try on first when Cayden grabbed my hand.

"Wait. I have an idea."

"Go on," I said, hoping it had something to do with us having sex with wigs on later.

"So, back to your marathon idea. What if we bought afros and went as 70s marathoners? There's this advert in the UK where these two guys with afros run around doing weird things in running clothes and they say 118-118."

"I have no idea what you're talking about, but I'm sold!"

We both lunged for afros and pulled them over our heads.

I looked in the mirror and had a flashback to 7th grade when I lived in Houston and before Chi straighteners existed. But it was still better than the Ninja turtle getup.

"Now we need sweatbands! Oh, and we can bring water bottles to drink beer out of them!"

"It's perfect! Oh, and I need a mustache."

He was right. It was perfect. I didn't care that no one would know what we were supposed to be. I didn't care that we missed out on our nap and sex (OK, I cared a little). And I didn't care that Cayden looked hot in a wig, but creepy as fuck in a mustache. All I cared about was that I was spending my first couples Halloween with the sexiest 70s marathoner alive.


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4 comments:

  1. When do we get to see a pic without black bars!?

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  2. Hehe the 118 advert is classic. Glad to hear it's transferred to the states!

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  3. I watched it on YouTube and it's so... odd yet hilarious.

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  4. Natascha- I don't want to post pictures without bars so you can picture us however you'd like. Keep the mystery alive :)

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