Page 6 of My Cosplay Escape
Gwen rolls her eyes. “Yeah, whatever. K. I’m buying tickets.”
A crawler has found me and attempts to use my back as a table. “You can’t just buy tickets for Comic-Con. You have to register first.”
“Fine, I’ll register.”
My arms shake. “They sell out the day they go live. In March. And they’re not tickets. They’re badges.” I assumed she had tickets when she asked me to go. Though that was clearly a stupid assumption.
Gwen pauses and looks up slowly from her phone. “Holy jeepers, Nightbat. Sarah’s a closet nerd.”
My face is crimson, but I can blame it on the strain of planking with a teething baby trying to climb on top of me. “Am not. Can you give me a hand?”
Gwen hops on the counter instead. She thoughtfully narrows her eyes at me, the hint of a smirk haunting her face. “Name five superheroes who have red hair.”
My exercise buddy has pulled himself into a stand and is slapping my back with howls of laughter. The words come even as I try to stuff them back in. “Admiral Autumn is one of my favorites—”
“Clock is ticking.”
Fine! “Fascination, Dr. Jillian Slate, Batty Nightgirl, Cardinal Flame, Poison Hemlock, Ruby Carmine, Viscountess Incarnadine.” The crazy is out of the cage. And it’s not going back in. I collapse out of my plank with a groan. “There is an unrealistically high representation of redheaded heroines in comics because the colorists needed to punch up their palettes.”
“Total nerd,” Gwen says with wide eyes and a grin. She laughs in disbelief, and that’s good. I need to be reminded that my love of comics is laughable. “How have we been friends all summer, and you kept this from me? We’re going to Comic-Con.”
My stomach is spasming from my plank. “I don’t have a badge,” I pant.
“Do you have a costume?”
Holy Shirley Temples, Nightbat! You don’t ask the addict if she kept some of her stash for the memories.
I hop to my feet and check to make sure all the Kids Club kiddies are still breathing and still reasonably entertained. “No.” I sink to the floor to clean up a pile of blocks.
Gwen leans back against the counter and inspects her nails. “You gotta stop turning bright pink when you lie.”
A little hand tugs on the hem of my polo. “I went poop!” Evan, a frequent Kids Club flyer, says.
I try not to inhale. Working the Kids Club might permanently damage my ability to smell. “Okay, honey. I’ll call your mama.” I join Gwen at the counter and quickly scroll through the list of sign-ins. “Janet Stephens to the Kids Club, please. Janet Stephens to the Kids Club, please.”
“Why do you even want to go to Comic-Con?” I ask Gwen.
“Tony mentioned it. He said he was going this Saturday and asked if I was going to be there.” She shrugs, but in my comic book brain, her eyes start to shimmer. Faint pink heart bubbles may burst and pop around us. Oh my gosh. Who would have thought comics withdrawal would manifest like this?
Gwen pulls me back to the present with a squeal. “Then he started tittering about how we could meet up outside if I didn’t have a pass. So I told him I was already going with some friends.”
“Please tell me you didn’t name me.”
“No. First rule of keeping a guy interested is to be vague, silly. I thought everyone knew that.” She flips her hair.
I reflexively tug my tight stub of a ponytail tighter. Holy insecurities, Nightbat. “And I thought everyone knows Comic-Con sells out within seconds.”
A sweaty Janet Stephens shows up and whisks her poopy cherub to the bathroom.
“Oh, please.” Gwen twirls a strand of her hair between her fingers. “There has to be some nerd forum where we post our pictures and say Poison Hemlock and Fem Fantastic want to be your date to Comic-Con, and then the internet breaks with all the desperate, lonely nerds who want to go to nerd prom with the pretty girls.”
I try to smile as I greet another parent, this one a dad, who has no qualms checking out Gwen’s butt. It’s the exact kind of behavior that warrants a pithy line, but I’ve got nothing.
“Hey?” Gwen asks when we are alone—well, as alone as two women can be in a room full of children. “What’s up?”
My lip wobbles. “I met Daniel—my ex—the last time I cosplayed.”
Gwen forms her lips into a perfect O, but says nothing.
