Okay, enough already with the cloak and dagger, big brother 1984 shtick.

We were talking about Monday night, the final round of play.

Sara and I have played with teenage characters before, but none of them are regulars. Monday afternoon, sitting around her living room reading, we made up two new ones, Nick and Jules, to play with that evening, planning to eat dinner and watch old Buffy episodes in character.

Nick and Jules grew up together, best friends, their families close. Their favorite games had been cops and robbers, cowboys and indians, and spy versus spy. Is this sounding familiar to anyone out there?

When she was 15 and he was 16, their family vacationed that summer at the beach as usual. But on the last night of the trip, Nick finally worked up the nerve to kiss Jules. He'd had a crush on her for a couple years now. And she kissed back. They made out under the boardwalk. ... And then Jules' parents moved away and they didn't see each other again until three years later.

Jules' family is visiting Nick's family. The 'rents have gone off on one of those gambling cruises, leaving the two together. She's a freshman at UGA; he's a sophomore at Nebraska. And it's a little uncomfortable being thrown together again. They never got a chance at a relationship, and it's not like they can just pick up the friendship where it left off.

They ate dinner, watched old Buffy, and Nick suggested a game of spy vs. spy for old time's sake. Jules laughed, "No way." I had to convince her. I did some blatent goading of the "well, you're probably too mature to do this, and I'd win like always anyway" variety. And then I bribed her with the prize, a Joss Whedon autographed script. (No, not really)

The rules of the game went like this. We'd turn all the lights out. We each got a small flashlight. Jules was to try to get the script out of a drawer in the dining room and take it upstairs to my room (yes, the attic), which was the "got safely away with it" area. But before she could proceed to the attic, she had to spend at least five seconds in every room on the first floor. She could steal the script at any point while she was on the first floor.

Meanwhile, I would be stalking her, trying to stop her. I could only fully aprehend her if she'd already stolen the script, and I couldn't stay in any one room longer than 15 seconds at a time (so that I couldn't just stake out the DR and wait).

Sorry. I've got to get ready to go to class now. I have to leave by 7:15 or I'll be late. I'll add more later in the day if I can. Really, I'm not just trying to be a tease.