Girls Save the World in This One - Ash Parsons Page 0,33

down to look in my eyes, then she turns to Siggy.

“Y’all need a drink of water or something?” Imani whispers, and we have to choke back more laughter.

Finally, the session is over, and when my stomach rumbles it’s a surprise, even though I’ve been keeping track of the time so we won’t miss the podcast or the full cast session on the main stage.

Imani must hear it, too, because she cocks an eyebrow at me.

“Should I be worried? Are you about to turn on me?”

“I mean, if I did, I would make it quick, okay?” I say.

We decide instead of returning to the exhibit hall to eat under fluorescent lights, that we will use the skyway hamster tube to cross over to the luxury hotel for lunch. Besides which, since we are already on the second floor for the prepper session in the banquet room, we’re pretty close to it.

We walk down the second-floor hallway, the wall of windows to our left.

“This is a good plan,” Siggy says. “I’ve always wanted to use the skyway.”

We reach the tube and walk out into it, over the street. The sun warms us, and I feel like lying down in the tube for a moment, just luxuriating in it.

“Can we stay at the lobby sandwich counter instead of the actual sit-down restaurant, though?” Imani asks when we’re about halfway through the tube. “It’ll be quicker, cheaper, and we might see celebrities in the lobby, if they’re taking a break from the con.”

“Yes, let’s do that!” Siggy agrees.

We reach the hotel side of the tube, walk past the convention badge and security checkpoint, and take the clear elevators down into the lobby.

As we cross the marble floor, we have to make a small detour around some kind of spill. There are those little collapsible yellow fabric cones spread in a loose triangle around a surprisingly large area of floor.

A maid from housekeeping swipes a large, wet mop across the floor, then lifts the rust-dark mop into her bucket and presses. The red water is vivid contrasted to her white hand.

“Gross,” Siggy says. “That looks like blood.”

“No way that’s blood,” Imani says, but she’s frowning.

“Maybe the makeup effects team dropped a fake blood packet,” I say.

We order sandwiches at the counter, then take a table near the windows, but sit with our backs to the outside. All the better to see the lobby.

We snarf our sandwiches and don’t see anybody famous come through the lobby while we’re sitting there, just more cosplayers arriving in hazmat suits. Maybe the costume shop had a special group rate? The cosplayers spread into the hotel lobby, stopping and scanning people—swiping those heat-sensitive thermometers across foreheads, sticking a fake chem strip into the maid’s bucket water, spreading through the lobby and into the elevators, making people more annoyed than amused.

We’re almost done with our sandwiches when Siggy’s phone goes off, a cacophony of electric guitars.

“Mark?” I ask as Siggy swipes to answer. “Again? He knows you’re here with us!”

I feel my eyebrows pulling down as Siggy makes an apologetic face but takes the call anyway. She gets up from our little table, and takes a few steps away, murmuring low into the phone.

I turn to Imani. “Ugh.”

Imani gives me one of those smiles I’m never completely happy to be on the receiving end of. Even though she is my best friend, and even though it’s gentle, there’s a reprimand in there, too.

“I’m sure it’ll be quick,” Imani says. “Maybe the mail came.”

Meaning maybe there’s an admissions letter.

I glance over at Siggy, and it’s impossible to tell anything. So I don’t think the letter came, because we’d sure be able to tell in an instant if he got in or not.

My fingers drum on the table before I realize I’m doing it. I make myself stop.

Imani scrolls on her phone, patiently, and so I eat the pickle spear left on my plate. My phone just gobbles up power, and it’ s already low so