Lily
Isuppress another yawn, partially due to the snore-worthy lecture on ethical business practices, but mostly because I’m a Comic-Con survivor. No one who hasn’t experienced it truly understands just how taxing a weekend of cosplaying, contests, booze, and partying can be.
The unbearable jocks lounging in the back row of our lecture hall think of us as Sheldons in skirts, boring nerds incapable of letting our hair down, but in actual fact, our crowd could out-party theirs any day, although their side of campus is almost constantly throwing keggers.
“Here,” Olivia whispers to me, placing a can of Red Bull on my desk. “I picked it up at the vending machine before class.”
“Oh, you beautiful human!” I grin at my friend. “I owe you, big time.”
I’m actually not a fan of the beverage, but right now, anything with caffeine sounds as delectable as ambrosia.
Retrieving another can from her bag, she grinned back. “Six hours. We can do it.”
“Can we?” I eye her dubiously. “Why do we do this to ourselves?”
After driving at dawn, we got into town at seven in the morning and our first class started at nine, so we’re both out of it right now. I’m certain poor Jack suffers just as much in his engineering classes.
“I’m an innocent bystander,” she protests. “You convinced me to tag along, remember?”
“Right,” I reply with a wink. “It takes so much convincing to wrangle you into Wonder Woman armor.”
Liv beams, infused with a confidence I rarely see in her. “The new 3D printed corset was pretty sweet.”
I grin at my friend. Cosplaying is my hobby, not hers, but there’s no denying that she blossoms, shedding her overly timid shell the moment she’s in a costume.
I can relate. While not nearly as reserved as the petite brunette seated by my side, I long ago discovered how powerful I could feel, stepping into a character’s persona.
I love cosplaying. I don’t know what it says about me, but I simply I adore the looks I get, the admiration.
I get away with doing and saying whatever I want because I’m not truly me when I’m in a superhero’s costume.
I think most people would feel the same.
Everyone likes to be complimented once in a while; in full cosplay, we receive praise nonstop for hours on end.
I won yet another trophy yesterday—not to mention the prize that went with it. Enough money to fund the set of wings I want to hand-glue to my next costume: Hawkgirl.
“All right, it totally was worth it,” I admit, despite my fatigue. “But kick me if I fall asleep, and I’ll do the same? I need to pay enough attention to see if he says anything important.”
Considering the events of my first semester at Rothford, I know better than to get complacent, though my new club might help if I fuck up again.
“Deal,” Liv agrees.
Frankly, between all the soulless classes I have to take in order to continue to qualify for our scholarships, and the shit we handle from the assholes who constantly bug us, the trauma of finding Charlotte almost dead in the pool, then all the worry about Claire, I just had to do something fun to chill.
Cross doesn’t quite figure amongst the long list of things that contribute to my constant state of anxiety, but his nonsense certainly doesn’t help. I keep thinking about what he did to me whenever I close my eyes.
Cosplay day was definitely a must, despite my pathetic state right now.
I can’t be myself in Thorn Falls. I remember the one time I came back from a convention without getting changed out of my brilliant Catwoman costume first. The cat calls, the laughter, the derision from the legacies.
Yes, I like to cosplay, ahaha, funny. Get over it.
Some people peaked in high school and try their hardest to bring the rest of us down to their level.
I can’t help myself. Thinking about them, I glance over my shoulder, my eyes seeking his, just like they always do when he comes to mind.
I’m tense even before finding him, energized by the mere thought of Hector Cross. And all the preliminary vexation is immediately justified, because he’s staring at me, smirking smugly. My mind flashes back to last weekend and I blush.
It should be illegal for anyone to look this self-satisfied.
It’s not just that Hector Cross is six foot one of lean, defined muscles, with the face of a GQ model on top, and hair worthy of a cologne advertisement.
The dick also is an artist playing women like fiddles with the tip of his tongue.
Truly, he’s the proof that the world is a cold, unfair, and unfeeling place, because this much beauty, wealth, and intelligence shouldn’t be combined in one individual.
The only flip side? He’s a complete prick.
Proof: holding multiple blowjobs over my head just to infuriate me, and leaving me hanging.
Cross lifts an eyebrow when my gaze meets his, challenging as ever.
I roll my eyes, straightening up, and focus my willpower on paying attention to the most boring professor in the entirety of Rothford University.
I know that for a fact. I set up a survey for Rothford Weekly last week, and about forty percent of the students who voted anonymously on the site chose this teacher.
Mr. Powell even bypassed the Latin professor.
Perhaps I’ll make the next survey about the most annoying student. I only dismiss the idea in case Cross doesn’t make the cut; I’d probably lose faith in humanity at the result.
“Ten minutes,” Olivia says under her breath. “We can make it without falling asleep.”
Debatable. I’m pretty certain my body’s tilting forward right now.
To distract myself, I take a sip of the sugary-sweet energy drink with a grimace.
It’s truly revolting. Ten minutes, then I can head to the cafeteria for the largest vanilla latte they sell with three extra shots of coffee.
With a bit of luck, Dez’ll be working. Maybe she’ll take pity on me again and give me pie. I certainly look pathetic enough.
I’m mentally weighing the likelihood of getting caught if I end up taking a teeny tiny little nap on my desk when something hits the top of my head, before sliding to my lap.
What the fuck?
I turn, my eyes immediately finding the smug ass comfortably lounging on his chair, arm extended over the backrest, like a lord holding court. His friends chortle like the mindless apes they are, following their leader.
Part of me realizes that the best way to annoy him would be to ignore him. Toss the wrinkled paper ball without checking it out first. I could even just put it in my pocket and look later, when he can’t study my response.
But on the other hand, I’m no longer tired, my annoyance at his general existence taking prevalence over any other consideration. Besides, I can’t afford to ignore him. I owe him. What if he’s demanding his due? I feel my insides contract at the thought.
The thing with Hector Cross is that the entire class of legacies takes their cue from his actions, bending over backward to please him. Each year has its leader, and he’s the undisputed sophomore king.
The guy who led the seniors last year, Claire’s Keller, made his generation of legacies behave.
At least, they never said a single rude word to any of us scholarship kids.
And the guy in charge of this year’s seniors, his cousin, Markus?
One single glance and everyone in his year practically pisses themselves to fall in line.
Cross just watches the chaos. He could have absolutely chosen to be a decent human being.
Instead, he lets his sycophants act like nasty teen elites, bullying anyone who isn’t considered cool.
As far as I know, Cross doesn’t target anyone himself. He likes to be a dick to me, but if I’m entirely honest, I can admit it’s not malicious. He teases me, infuriates me, gets under my skin, but he doesn’t make me cry like his friends do to Olivia. Besides, I can admit I sort of started it.
Not all of us are trust fund brats.
I heavily implied he was a dumb joke the first time we had a conversation, and didn’t even believe he deserved his grades when he informed me he was first in our year.
It wasn’t until we were paired up in class that I had to admit the truth.
I’d been sorely mistaken. In that sense, I certainly earned our rivalry.
But the way his friends consistently bug Olivia gets on my nerves.
Unlike me, she’s shy, and a bit of a crybaby, too.
She usually manages to make it to her dorm before sobbing into her pillow all night when someone says something mean to her.
Me? I snap back. Their treatment of my friend makes me want to punch the lot of them in their perfect teeth, and Cross, twice, for not preventing it.
He could. I’ve seen him stop the worst of the bullies, Nate, with a single look.
He just doesn’t think Olivia’s worth the bother.
I unwrap the wrinkled ball, gritting my teeth.
His rushed yet elegant script reminds me that he uses a fountain pen rather than a ballpoint like a normal person. There’s only one line, but it’s enough to incense me.
Looking good in green.
“He did it again, huh?” Olivia remarks, studying my expression.
I must look like I’m sucking on a lemon.
“How the hell does he do it?” I grunt.
It doesn’t matter how far we go, Cross always knows what cosplay I wear.
The only people supposedly aware of the fact that I went as Gamora are Olivia, Jack, and my ex-roommate. None would betray me to bloody Hector Cross.
Claire might be shacked up with one of the legacies, but she’s one of us—a scholarship kid, and a geek to boot. She knows better than to take their side. Besides, Cross has held my cosplays over my head for ages. She only arrived three weeks ago. Cross has known about my cosplays since last year.
As for Liv and Jack, they would rather set themselves on fire than voluntarily speak to the jocks about anything. So how the hell does he know?
“Maybe he follows your socials?” Liv guesses.
I shake my head. “It’s set to private. And I would have noticed if Hector Cross followed me.”
“Not under a fake account,” she retorts.
“He’d have to find my cosplay account in the first place,” I point out. “I don’t use my actual name for that, you know.”
It’s not linked to my regular socials in any way I can think of.
I’m dying to confront him about it, but that would mean speaking to him, and I’ve actively attempted not to since the beginning of our acquaintance. Doubly so after the bullshit of last week.
“Come on. You know he only has to cross the street to bug one of the nerds in the Web House, and he can have your entire digital footprint,” Liv reasons just as the bell rings, signaling the end of the torture.
Finally.
And of course this lecture was completely useless: everything Powell said was in the textbook. I could have gone for a two-hour nap instead.
“It’s not like he’s going to actually go to the effort of stalking me,” I retort, gathering my stuff as quickly as I could. “He likes to torture me, sure, but not that much.”
Olivia snorts, with a secretive smile that reminds me she was there last year when I received that text summoning me to his house.
I blushed, rushing out of doors.
I need coffee.