Page 25 of The Five Stages of Courting Dalisay Ramos

“Shit.” Evan starts typing again, heart hammering, making the edit.

Me:

:-c*

Dalisay Ramos:

See, this is why you have so many spelling errors. :-p

At The Basement for D&D that night, Evan asks what comes next. After the flop that were all his gifts in stage two, frankly, he’s surprised he’s made it this far.

“Let me guess,” he says while JM sets up for the campaign, aligning all the enemy figures on the grid. “For stage three, I have to sing a song about my undying love?”

JM and Pinky share another knowing look.

Reality sets in. Evan shakes his head. He was just being facetious! “No.No, no, no.”

“For real?” Riggs asks. “Evan’s gotta sing a song?”

JM nods. “It’s the stage called ‘The Serenade.’ The potential suitor gathers friends and serenades the lady with a song about his love for her.”

“And,” chimes in Pinky, “if she likes it, she will sing back. It’s mega romantic.”

“We didn’t want to tell you in case …,” JM says, smiling awkwardly.

Of all the possible things he could have to do … He’s always been a terrible singer, and singing in front of a gorgeous woman is a special kind of nightmare, right up there with ones about taking a test he didn’t study for and his teeth falling out.

“It won’t be that bad,” JM says.

“Yeah!” says Pinky. “It’s just like cosplay. You aren’t nervous then.”

“Cosplay is different, and you know it! Dressing up like Spider-Man is not like singing in public!”

Evan is confident in a lot of things, and that confidence allows him to know his limits. Singing is one of them.

“It’s all about mindset,” says Pinky. She presses her hands overhead, like she’s unfurling an invisible banner. “Positive thoughts!”

While it’s easy to slip into character at a convention, performing for Dalisay feels like a cruel and particularly unusual punishment. Cosplay is fun. But this? Evan might puke. “Iactuallyhave to sing?” His voice sounds pathetic even to him.

“You don’t have to be Freddie Mercury or anything,” says Pinky. “It’s about the passion. Confidence! Kurt Cobain had one of the worst voices ever, but it didn’t stop literally everyone on the planet throwing their underwear at him.”

“In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not Kurt Cobain!”

“Oh, we noticed,” murmurs JM.

Pinky shushes him. “Do you want to win this or not?”

She’s right, of course. He can’t back out now because of a tiny little fear of looking stupid or sounding bad. “Can’t I just—I don’t know—pull a Lloyd Dobler and stand outside her window holding a phone above my head playing a Taylor Swift song or something?”

Everyone boos him.

“Come on, Evan,” Pinky says. “Go big or go home! We can help you again!”

She looks at JM and Riggs, but Riggs is already typing away on his phone, a devious smile on his face.

“Who are you texting?” JM asks.

“No one!” Riggs says, innocently enough. Everyone knows that’s a lie. “But I don’t think you’re going to do it.”

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