Chapter 16
Comic Con is…a strange experience. But despite it being busier and bigger than the convention I went to with Jake in September, it’s a lot less intense and overwhelming—probably due to the presence of more mainstream fandoms like Star Wars or Marvel.
Max ends up not bothering with a panel Jake wants to see and we lose him for a while afterward, so I actually get to spend some time alone with Jake, which is a relief.
Or it would be, if I didn’t feel like Max was suddenly avoiding me. I don’t even know what I did to upset him so much that he suddenly can’t bear to put up with me, and while I think that’s more of a him problem, I still feel guilty that I might have spoiled his enjoyment of the day.
Still, Jake and I get to hang out just the two of us, and it’s like old times.
It’s better than old times.
Maybe that’s just the recent distance talking, but I think it’s got more to do with how he’ll take my hand every so often so we don’t get separated.
Without Max third-wheeling, we both get swept up in the atmosphere of the convention—or, rather, Jake does, and his excitement is so infectious that I’m just happy to share it with him.
He darts between stalls selling merchandise and autographs and samples of mead we’re not old enough to taste even though he tries valiantly to persuade the stall owner; he gushes about celebrities and snaps photos from afar of them at their signing tables, and I get a little thrill at seeing some of the OWAR cast in real life, although my favorite characters aren’t here.
Then, when Jake spots someone dressed in a really high-quality Mandalorian costume, I offer to take a photo of him, but he insists on asking a stranger so we can be in the picture together.
He grins at the photo afterward, both of us striking silly poses while the person in cosplay looks more like a professional from the Disneyland parks, and uploads it to Instagram—making me so glad I’m not in cosplay, and dressed cute instead.
“An official memento of our first Comic Con together,” he tells me, beaming so wide that his mouth splits from ear to ear, and my heart flutters—it sounds like he’s saying it’ll be the first of many things the two of us do together, and I like that thought a lot.
Taking full advantage of our alone time, I do my best to flirt with Jake.
When we look at the lightsabers on sale, I make him teach me how to hold one, relishing when he stands behind me with his arms all the way around my body, encasing me against him while his hands settle over mine, guiding my arms…
Although he does make all the “whoosh” noises in my ear, which puts a real dampener on the romance of the situation.
I no longer hesitate to reach for his hand, even when the crowds aren’t too thick, and he tugs me along eagerly to each new corner of the convention, his fingers interlocked firmly with mine, his palm warm and smooth.
When we wait in line to get some bottles of water, I play with my hair and tell him how good he looks today, how nice his hair looks, how brilliant it is to see him in his element like this and how glad I am that we get to share it.
Then I purposely don’t buy my own drink—and Jake, of course, offers me a sip of his, which is hardly the first time but feels different now, like this, when there’s just the two of us, and it’s not some big group outing to Barry Island in the heat of summer, passing around a Diet Coke.
I really try my best. I go all in, as bold as I dare to be.
The place is so packed, it almost grants us privacy: everyone is too preoccupied to pay any attention to us.
Unfortunately, though, every time I think Jake and I are truly having A Moment and something is going to happen…he gets too preoccupied by something else going on around us and it never gets a chance to fully manifest.
Now, though, we’re squashed into a standing-room-only panel that includes the guy who plays Daxys in Of Wrath and Rune, and Jake is forced to stand flush against my back.
I’m acutely aware of everywhere the lines of his body are pressed into me, far closer than when we looked at the lightsabers, and the unexpected proximity makes me positively vibrate with excitement.
He initiated this one, I’m sure of it. He could’ve kept a bit of space between us if he really wanted to, right? I have to fight to stand totally still.
Jake leans his chin on to my shoulder, the side of his forehead resting against mine. “You all right? You’re stood all funny.”
“Fine!” It comes out thin, and he tries to shuffle back to steal another inch of space so I can be more comfortable, putting an arm lightly over my shoulder as if to buffer me from the person on my left.
I can’t very well explain that it isn’t the crowds that’re making me so awkward, but I appreciate the chivalry and throw him a grateful smile.
When he stands holding me so casually like this, it’s as if we really are boyfriend and girlfriend.
I let the daydream take over and relax. Jake rests his head against mine again to see the panel better, and it’s so lovely that I never want it to end.
My skin tingles where he touches me, even through all the layers of clothes between us.
If this was real, I think, if he’d just ask me to be his girlfriend, we’d never have to think twice about this sort of affection…
Jake is just perfect boyfriend material. He’s truly the sort of guy that rom-coms are made of: kind and sweet and funny and attractive, so inherently likable and lovable, and we go together so well. It’d be impossible not to have a crush on him.
I just wish he’d realize.
Short of outright declaring my feelings for him by singing “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” as I dance down some bleachers, 10 Things I Hate About You–style, I just don’t know what else to do to make him see it.
—
By midafternoon, we still haven’t found Max, and Jake insists on getting out of the crowds to text him and try to track him down.
But we were having such a good time without our third wheel…
“I thought you wanted to try and beat the line to see that guy from the Lord of the Rings show?” I say.
Jake winces. “Isildur will have to wait.”
“But you said you wouldn’t have time to see him and get a picture with Daxys.” It’s not that I don’t want to find Max, but…I mean, he’s seventeen, he’s a big boy, he can look after himself, and it’s only some hall full of nerds.
Jake, though, shakes his head. “It’s okay. I already got him to sign my poster at the last one. I just didn’t get a photo with him…But we should really find Max, it’s been ages. And this sort of thing is way more fun with others than by yourself.”
I barely hide my flinch, realizing that the tables have turned: here, I am the third wheel, I am the one who’s gotten in between them and spoiled their day together, sharing in something they love and have been looking forward to for months.
I am the one who was pointedly not invited to evenings spent building cosplay wings together.
So I wait patiently as Jake tries phoning (it goes to voicemail) and then sends a couple of texts. It is good of him to check in on his friend, I suppose, and it does feel like maybe it’s my fault that Max has gone AWOL…
I’m sure he has no such conscience when he’s the one interfering.
Jake looks agitated, gripping his phone in both hands and staring at the screen as if he can will Max to reply. I put my hand on his arm, my fingers curling around lightly, ready to pull him along.
“Shall we do a loop of the hall?” I suggest. “He’ll be here somewhere. And he should be easy to spot, especially with his wig.”
“Between the Legolas, Daemon Targaryen, and Witcher cosplays that are here, I wouldn’t be so sure…”
Of course he’s right; I quickly realize there are an unprecedented amount of guys in long white-blond wigs.
But we do a circuit of the hall anyway, eyes raking over queues for autographs and the crowds around lightsaber displays, until there’s a cry not far off, several voices in unison yelling, Be Ye a Rascal, Roach?
and descending into cheers and laughter.
I cut Jake a look, finding he’s brightened considerably. “Do you think that’ll be him?”
He laughs, and starts off at a jog toward the group of OWAR fans behind a row of merch stalls.
There are two girls in Lady di Silver cosplay, though both wear her usual armor rather than the green dress; a guy with a very impressive set of huge, leather-look mechanical wings as Daxys; two more less-impressive Moonwalkers; and a few other miscellaneous character cosplays—including a guy with a Minotaur head tucked under his arm.
In the midst of them all, in his wig and pauldrons, is Max, and—
“Holy shit,” Jake breathes, now that I’ve caught him up. He grasps my arm tight, though his eyes are wide and fixed ahead. “Holy shit. Cerys, is that…is that…? That’s…”
It’s Daxys. Well, the actor who plays him.
And he’s got his arm slung around Max like they’re good buddies. He’s such a huge man—easily six and a half feet, barrel-chested, and bald, with a smile that crinkles his eyes—that he practically dwarfs Max by comparison.
The group of fans gathered around them are reacting to his presence much the same way as Jake: eyes bugging wide and hardly blinking, mouths fallen open in glee, their entire bodies positively vibrating with excitement at this unfiltered, unguarded interaction with a favorite character and beloved actor.
Max, for his part, has on his usual cool, borderline-bored expression, as if he could not care less that he is currently being embraced by Jake’s idol. Daxys (what is the actor’s name? For all Jake’s talked about him, my brain blanks now. Bryan? Bernard?) is chatting affably with Max and the group.
“Go over there!” I whisper to Jake. “Go say hi.”
“Are you crazy? I can’t!”
“You already met him. You were literally going to pay thirty quid to get a selfie with him.”
“Yeah, but—but—”