31. PRESENT DAY – March
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
GARRISON ABBEY
T he proposal was last week, and now that I’m in Philly, I’m back to doing this thing where I try not to mope while the girl I love is an ocean away. By now, I’d say I’m proficient in the art of being okay with long-distance relationships. Productivity is key or whatever.
That’s why I’m at Superheroes & Scones today.
It’s weird being back and not being an employee or babysitting Moffy here. I enter the breakroom and ask the store manager where Lily is. Seeing the new face wearing the “manager” nametag reminds me of Maya.
Last I heard, Maya Ahn is still in Portland working for Image Comics.
It was a big deal when she first landed the job. Lily and Willow were really proud.
There was a whole goodbye party when she left the store, and I learned enough Korean to tell her that she’ll always know more than me and she’s really cool.
She smiled and said shit back in Korean that she knew I wouldn’t understand. We laughed, and I hate that I’m remembering all of this—Jesus, I swear every time I walk into Superheroes & Scones, I’m thrown back into these bittersweet, feel-good memories.
The new manager says, “She’s in the storage room.”
I pop the tab of a Lightning Bolt! energy drink and shove inside. Boxes of merch and comics line the space. Familiarity surrounding me, and I’m honestly trying not to face-plant on Memory Lane.
I find Lily and her two kids pretty easily.
Baggy Star Wars tee on and phone close to her ear, Lily looks like she snuck back here for a quiet moment. Which I’m about to interrupt.
Awesome. Looks like I still have Grand Slam worthy timing.
I shut the door with my foot, not bailing.
“Lo,” she says into the phone, face flushed, “you didn’t tell Garrison, did you?”
“Tell me what?” I stand by an old comic stand in need of serious dusting. Remember when you dusted the clearance merch with Willow?
Like yesterday.
Near a life-sized Magneto cutout, Maximoff Hale leaps off a cardboard box and races towards me. “Uncle Garrison!”
The corner of my mouth lifts. Moffy acts like I’m the coolest thing in the room, and we’re surrounded by crates of action figures.
The five-year-old rolls up to me, and we do a secret handshake that ends with a fist-bump.
“Never mind,” Lily tells me, then listens to her phone call.
“Did you see Luna?” Moffy smiles and points out his one-year-old sister, hiding in a cardboard box. She giggles, glittering eyes peeking out at me.
“Whoa, she’s getting smaller and you’re getting taller.”
“I am?” His smile mushrooms.
I pretend to measure his height with my free hand. “Definitely a centimeter taller than when I last saw you.” Which was this morning. I still live with the Hale family.
“You think I’ll be as tall as you, Uncle Garrison?” His voice sounds like he’s five, but he sometimes acts older, like he’s already leveled-up to a preteen in a 90s cult classic movie starring Jonathan Taylor Thomas.
“Way taller.” I’m not that short, but his dad is six-two.
“Cool,” Maximoff says and stares off in thought.
Lily hangs up her phone, so I walk closer, and Moffy matches my pace. Before she asks why I’m here, I tell her, “I need your help on something.”
Lily tickles her daughter in the box, and Luna tugs her mom’s finger with another giggle. “What can I do?”
I sip my energy drink and gesture to a few cardboard boxes labeled The Fourth Degree.
I’m guessing each contain comics slipped in protective plastic.
Here, back stock is usually just obscure issues that don’t sell or extras to replenish ones that fly off the shelves.
I explain, “I need every comic that has Sorin-X. There are too many issues and spin-offs now. Honestly, I don’t have time to go through all of them. ”
I always thought Vic Whistler would continue to be the most popular superhero in The Fourth Degree universe. Somehow, Sorin-X surpassed the hero that launched the franchise.
It still blows my mind.
I wait for Lily to ask why I’m requesting this shit. She doesn’t yet. Instead, Lily picks herself off the floor and glances at her son. “Moffy, there’s a little Luna in a box—”
“I got her, Mommy.” Maximoff goes to the box and plays with his sister, like babysitting is the equivalent of a trip to Disney.
Weird.
But wholesome.
Honestly, I like being around both.
“They’re all in here.” Lily guides me to The Fourth Degree labeled boxes. “Lo will be here soon, and he might be more help. He’s read every issue about a million times.”
We tear open a couple boxes and flip through the comic, setting aside any with Sorin-X.
Ones without the character, Lily gingerly slips the issue into its plastic cover. “Are you going to read these?” She motions to the Sorin-X pile.
I place another issue on top. “What else would I be doing with them?”
“I don’t know.” She squints at me. “You don’t really read comics, not like Willow.” She notes, “You had no clue who Cypher was when you started working here.”
“Yeah, and none of the employees ever let me forget it.” I begin to smile, remembering how Willow tried to help me learn factoids about the New Mutants so our co-workers would stop giving me shit.
Six years ago. I swig my energy drink to swallow down the nostalgia and say, “I’ve read New Mutants, by the way. ”
Lily wears a giddy smile. “Because of Willow?” I love how supportive she’s always been of me and Willow, especially since she was there at the beginning of it all.
“Yeah, because of Willow.” I shake a comic back into the plastic sleeve.
“Which brings everything to Twitter. Gillow Engagement has been trending all day, did you see?”
My stomach nosedives, energy drink curdling.
The headlines are pretty generic:
Willow Hale Gets Engaged! Check out Loren Hale’s New Brother-In-Law!
I prepared for press to be all over our ass, but I’m worried the amount of paparazzi interested in us right now could go from “Chaotic Good” to “Chaotic Evil”. I’d really love if my fame capped out here.
No more.
Lily continues, “Connor said you both made GBA Entertainment News last night too.” I pegged him as a daily C-Span viewer. The guy still reads the paper. As in newspaper. Printed. In his hands.
“He watches entertainment news?” I say with cinched brows.
“That was my reaction.”
Maybe to check himself out. He is a narcissist.
I flip another comic, recalling other trending Twitter topics. “You also forgot about Garlow Engagement and Wilson Engagement. ”
Fans still can’t decide on a ship name, which are dumb anyway. Willow loves ships though and even owns Raisy, Coballoway, and LiLo merch. She’s too kind to play favorites, so she supports all three of our ship names too.
“Does all of this bother you?” Lily asks me. “You and Willow never talk to us about the media presence.”
Because they’re the cause of our fame, and it feels shitty to complain when they’ve done a lot for us.
I shrug. “Being around you guys, it just comes with the territory, and we both kind of gradually stepped into it.” Thank God we weren’t thrown into the deep end at the start. If the paparazzi were all over me back then like they are now, I don’t think I could handle it.
I tilt a comic upside-down, the panel sort of backwards. Brown hair hangs in my eyes. Need a haircut. It’s starting to bug the fuck out of me.
My stomach is still in knots. And I know it’s not about my hair.
Paparazzi.
Coming home from the engagement in London was pure hell. Fans and media bum-rushed us at the airport, and I could barely see. Barely breathe. Rabid crowds, I’ve dealt with before, but for maybe the first time, the spotlight was centralized on me.
If I think too hard, I can still feel hands scraping down my arms. Tugging my body. Pulling at my shirt, choking me at the collar until Lo’s bodyguard shoved them away.
Sickness churns at the thought of that happening again.
But at some point soon, I have to go back to the airport. I have to see Willow.
And next time, Lo, Ryke, Connor, and their security won’t be with me.
“Lily…can I ask you something?” I peek over at Moffy, ensuring he’s not listening. Last thing I’d want is to scare him about the media. Especially when they’re raising their kids to be accustomed to crowds and cameras.
He’s climbed into a plushies box with Luna and chats to his sister. She baby-blabbers back.
Lily smiles fondly at her kids, then nods to me. “Sure.”
“I just…” I shake my head. Don’t complain . “Forget it. It’s stupid.” I chuck a comic aside.
“I bet it’s not.” She sidles closer.
I stare down at an issue called Battle of the Extent and just let it out. “The airport—I don’t want to be mobbed like that when I go to London alone.” I inhale. “I just…I don’t want to be touched like that again.”
Lily holds a breath, concerned. “Are you scared to go back to the airport?”
I shrug and then nod.
“I can ride to the airport with you when you need to go, and there’s this thing we can do.” She explains, “We can drive right up to the private plane and bypass the normal airport entrance?”
When Willow left for London, she did that, but I didn’t think the offer would ever be extended to me.
I frown. “We can do that?”
“We’ve done it before. The airport gives us permission because we cause a lot of disruption. It’s safer for us and for everyone else.”
“But it’s just me…I don’t usually fly in a private plane.”
“Yeah but you can take our planes alone. We don’t mind. We’d want you to.”
I’m already shaking my head. “It’s too much for just me.” I don’t know what I expected her to offer—but this feels like the entire world, and I just need…
I don’t know.
Air.
“Then I’ll send Garth with you,” she says, offering me her 24/7 bodyguard for travel. “He’s the best. If it’s only you, the crowds won’t be as bad. I know they won’t.”
I have a temporary bodyguard that I sometimes use. He’s okay, and I know that bodyguards who are constantly around the families and assigned to specific people are ten-times better. They’re trained for everything. Even kidnappings.