Be Dazzled Read online

“The problem is that I’m exhausted,” I say to him. These bad thoughts are trademark Tired Raffy. They’re not what I want to think or who I want to be. “We both are. It doesn’t help that we lost the studio. That’s on Evie, not us.”

  I remind myself often that this is her fault, not Luca’s. It helps me reframe all the extra work I won’t be able to do on these costumes; we’re only barely going to finish them, if we’re lucky. It won’t be my usual high-octane detail work. And that’s okay. We’ll be recognizable. The quality will be good. There’s no glory in an awesome cosplay if you’re too exhausted to actually feel glorious.

  “Has she said anything else to you since that day?” Luca asks.

  “Nope.”

  “Is that good or bad?”

  I don’t know, so I don’t answer. Luca plays with my fingers. “It interesting how neither of our parents like cosplay, but for different reasons. Evie thinks it’s too common, and my parents think it’s too weird.”

  It probably doesn’t help that Luca’s parents are sort of right to be scared. After all, their fear of cosplays and cons is more about their son’s bisexuality, and here he is, creating a cosplay for a con with his secret lover who is a guy. And neither of us have pants on.

  Poor Luca Vitale. Just another pantsless youth, corrupted by arts and crafts.

  Luca stands up and stretches. My thoughts derail completely when I see a sliver of his stomach beneath his bunched-up shirt. Catching me staring, he grabs the shirt’s hem and pulls it over my head, smothering me as we tumble to the floor. He gasps, laughing. My doubt is forgotten as I wrestle back. He’s stronger and definitely heavier, but he acts like I’m made of pure gold as he lets me pin him. Still under his shirt, I find the loose collar of his tank top and push my head through it so we become a two-necked, two-headed monster. I spread my arms out through the sleeve openings, too, curling my hands into his. I adjust so that my forehead falls in the gap between his ear and his shoulder, my breath loud in my own ears as I exhale into his neck.

  “Raffy, what are you even doing?”

  “Honestly? No idea. It just seemed funny.”

  “Wow. You really are exhausted.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You never let me just hold you. You always have to be doing stuff.”

  Someone has to do the stuff, I almost say, but the bitterness is gone. It’s melting as the heat from Luca’s skin pushes through my own shirt, through my own skin. I’m so, so tired. I’ve done so much. Maybe I’ve done enough for today and it’s okay to take a break. He makes me want to take a break.

  “All I want is this,” I say.

  “I think you want a lot more,” Luca observes. An onlooker might think he means something physical, but I know better.

  I sigh. “I want a lot more, yeah, but sometimes I also want just this.”

  I sink a bit further into our joined warmth. Maybe it’s the exhaustion, but I never knew Luca was so comfortable to lie on. My sewing is forgotten. The muslin can wait a little while longer.

  “Just this?” Luca asks.

  Just us, I think. I wait to say it. I wait a long time. I fall asleep waiting, and Luca lets me.

  Twenty-Three

  Now

  I’m used to working in front of a camera. On Ion, I used to do it all the time. I worked, I talked, I joked. I should be okay with the televised round of Trip-C, but of course everything changes beneath the bright lights of Controverse. First of all, there’s more than one camera. There are a dozen. And instead of just talking to myself, I’m talking to everyone. It’s the most public process you can imagine. Creation as consumption. It messy, and fast, and real, and scary. And as Luca and I get underway, I realize something.

  I fucking miss this.

  This. This. Just…making stuff. Just picking up things, putting them together, and creating something without second-guessing every choice. Being free. When Luca and I first met, I remember feeling this way. He changed the way I created for the better. And now the joy of creation is back, ironically, in the most competitive setting yet. I think it has to do with Luca, who always saw the magic in what I could do. Right now, as we navigate our new challenge, I begin to feel that magic again.

  Controverse wakes up around us, crowds pressing against the transparent barriers to gawk at the massive camera contraptions sweeping over us. People call out our team names, begging the cameras to zoom in on what we’re up to so they can see it on the screens above us. When I do allow myself to glance at the crowd, I see that Luca and I have quite the audience. I throw them a shy smile, and they wave. Luca waves back, and they go wild.

  Mostly, though, we work. We work like our history isn’t sitting between us. Or we work like only history sits between us, the fabric of the past slicing apart as we work, turning into scraps of material that we sew back together to form something new, something strange, something so much better. Because of the cameras, we can’t talk. We can only focus on what’s happening right now, and work together at creating something incredible.

  And I feel that magic, that joy, that excitement, that I’d let myself forget in the months leading up to Controverse. It’s intoxicating to feel like myself again. Is it Luca? Is it the lack of Evie? Is it the lack of sleep?

  I don’t know. I don’t think too hard about it. It’s time for my hands to think instead. I just keep working, keep making, hoping I don’t lose it. Besides me, Luca keeps me planted in the present. I give him instructions as we go, the adaptations of our old process coming together in my mind as the cosplay forms before us.

  “Since we’re doing a look that combines features from both, we’ll do the base with neutrals,” I tell him as we finish tracing out the feathers. “That way, we don’t have to paint all of the foam, just the colorful accents. We can do most of the detail work with Dremeling and airbrushing.”

  “So the final thing will be black and white?”

  “We’ll use the light gray and the matte black, but then we can add blues and whites for more depth. Pass me the cutter.”

  I alter the wing shape to be more symmetrical, knowing we won’t have time to correct for anything that accidentally gets traced backward. I quickly sketch out the major shapes I want, referring to the sketch as I hand them to Luca.

  “Sixteen of these, eight of these, twenty of these. One set in black, one set in gray.”

  “Really?”

  “I know it’s a lot, but I think my math is right.”

  “No, I mean, you’re cool with me cutting it all out? You’re not afraid I’ll mess it up?”

  I know what Luca is saying. You trust me? And the way he says it puts an uncomfortable warmth on some old wounds. Was I always so exacting, so demanding?

  “Just do your best,” I tell him.

  “I’m trying. So hard. I don’t want to let you down again,” he says.

  We are not talking about a bird costume. We’re talking about us.

  A camera pans over our work. I keep my voice low. “You won’t. You can’t. You showed up, didn’t you?”

  “I didn’t want you to work alone. I should have shown up so much earlier, Raff. I’m sorry I haven’t always shown up when it mattered.”

  My nose tickles. Am I going to cry? I’m not going to cry. I deflect, motioning at the crowd of people. The world outside of competitive cosplay and this layered conversation. “You had stuff going on. People who needed you to be someone else.”

  Watching Luca and Inaya team up broke my heart, but a part of me always understood why they did what they did. It was just a means to an end so they could both do what they love. I shouldn’t blame Luca for leveraging the easiness of a straight-looking partnership. I should blame homophobic people for demanding that kind of act in the first place. Still, I wish it had all been different.

  “But I’m here now,” Luca says urgently. “I’m here. For us.”


  I look at the plans in my hands—in his hands, too, because we’re both unwilling to let go of these stupid designs. My breath shakes as I pull it into my lungs. My heart skips, my pulse scatters.

  “Can I trust you with this?” I’m not talking about arts and crafts.

  “I’d love it if you could try,” he says. He’s also not taking about arts and crafts.

  And then, just like it used to, time stops for just us. I don’t hear the crowd or see the cameras or feel the chill of the arena as Luca says something that forces everything else to fade away:

  “I want to kiss you.”

  I let go of the designs, and Luca tosses them onto our table without looking away from my eyes. Would he kiss me in front of all these people? He must catch the question in my stare, because a defiance flashes in his eyes. Before I can stop him, he leans in and plants a kiss right on my cheek. More toward my jaw, just under my earlobe. He’s taller than me and has to bend down, so for a moment, we’re curled into each other.

  I hear a whoop go up from the crowd. Luca hears it, too, and I can feel his lips pull into a grin on the skin of my neck. He gives me a warm nuzzle, and the cheering spreads. Then we’re apart and back to working, and a new energy threads through everything. The crowd has a new focus on us. The cameras rush over, looking for any trace of the intimacy we just displayed.

  “All eyes on you,” Luca whispers, pushing me forward as he takes up the task of cutting foam like nothing just happened. The cameras reach us, but instead of a kiss, they get me rambling about our process.

  “We want the feathers to be pliant, to give a drifting look when the cosplayer moves, and so we’re creating the effect with high-density thin foam that we’ll shape, treat, and lightly airbrush.” I catch Luca grinning as he listens to me talk.

  “What about the kiss?” a crewman inquires. “Can we get another—”

  I interrupt. “We also want to keep the ornate filigree detailing that so many illustrators love rendering when they paint Phobos and Deimos, so while Luca cuts out the wings, I’m going to work on a pattern we can use to stamp on, sort of like a texture transfer. It’ll look great from afar, and it’ll really wow up close.”

  Ginger catches up. She nods along as though she’s listening, but I know she’s twitching for a chance to ask about Luca and me again. I don’t give her the opportunity. This is about showing up and showing off, not gay antics. Or actually, it might all be gay antics? I’m not sure. But I don’t give myself time to doubt, and I don’t give Ginger time to ask.

  “For the main part of the outfit, I would typically do a lot of armor plating, but with the time constraints, we can’t mold, sand, paint, buff, and fit a ton of armor. So instead, we’ll do a sort of stripped-down armor over fabric.”

  “Stripped-down, you say?”

  “Yes. Over fabric, as in over clothes. I’m pretty good with patterns, and I know Luca’s measurements well enough to create a pattern, but it’ll be faster to drape.”

  Ginger gives me a wink. “Does that mean you have measured each other up before?”

  “It means we’re trying to work, or are the hints too subtle for you, Ginger?” Luca butts in. He gives me a playful nudge, too. Ginger lights up at this, even though he’s shut her down, and I realize that they’re doing an entire performance that I haven’t even been tracking. Somehow, Luca has both ended the conversation and appeased Ginger’s inquisitiveness all at once, and she beams at him with a note of excitement and…gratitude? I don’t quite get it until she turns to the cameras and says, “You heard it here, folks! These two are up to all sorts of shenanigans. Sparks are flying in the arena, and from the comments, it looks like people are dying to know what’s going to happen next. So don’t you dare look away, Controverse! Thanks, boys, for all the tips.”

  She gives the cameras another smarmy wink, and I get it. She’s trying to create intrigue and excitement around people who are mostly keeping their noses down, working. Luca gave her just enough to create a story.

  But I don’t understand why Luca did this. This is the last story the old Luca would want to tell. For a moment, I can’t move as I think about what he’s given away and why.

  He kissed me. In front of everyone.

  My first instinct is always to worry, of course. Is he going to be angry with me? Will this hurt him? But Luca looks delighted. As Ginger skims over to the other groups, he bounces with a lightness I haven’t seen in a long time. He’s dancing a little bit as he slices through the thin foam, humming to himself. When he looks at me, his eyes don’t betray any regret.

  “Are you sure?”

  “About what?”

  “About that. You know she’s going to lean into that story, right?”

  “What story?”

  “That you and I have a thing.”

  “Don’t we?” He grins.

  “Do we?” I ask sincerely.

  “We could. If you wanted.”

  My pulse speeds up, pinging against the underside of my skin, making me hot all over. I don’t know. I return Luca’s unasked question with an unintentional grin. Then I get back to work, which makes much more sense than my confused emotions.

  Soon the wings are all cut out, and it’s time to shape and glue them. Together, we press them into their new form, and gradually our hard work becomes something remarkable.

  “I’ll go grab the PVC pipe,” I say. This isn’t typically found in a craft store, but it is a very useful material in cosplay construction, so they’ve got a whole bunch of pipes lined up against one wall like a slanting, bone-white forest. While I wait for a clubber to cut the lengths I’ve requested, Inaya joins me. For a moment it’s just us, without the cameras.

  “Having fun with our dearest Luca?” she asks.

  “Yeah, actually.”

  “I figured you’d be at each other’s throats by now,” she says absently. “Not down them.”

  I feel myself blushing. “It was just a kiss.”

  “Just a kiss. Hmmm.” Inaya turns her back as she scans a shelf of screws and fasteners, like she’s really shopping. “I’m not sure it’s ever just a kiss, Raffy. Especially not to Luca or his family.”

  “What are you getting at, Inaya?”

  She turns, facing me. A mysterious, cunning aura emanates off her, same as always. “Nothing,” she says lightly. “I’ve always seen you as competition, Raffy. I was excited to compete with you for real this year for the first time. When I heard you might drop out for May, I was mad. I’m glad Luca came through for you.”

  “May called him,” I say.

  “Actually, May called me, and I called Luca,” Inaya says.

  I nearly step backward into the stacked pipes. They groan as I brace myself on them. “What? You did? Why?”

  Inaya crosses her arms, looking me up and down. “I want to be the best. And to be the best, I want to win against the best. And that’s you.”

  I’m speechless. I craft because I love to create. Inaya crafts because she loves to achieve. I tried to be like that, and it made me miserable. Clearly, she feels differently.

  “I’m glad he showed up for you. Just don’t let him bring you down,” she says, putting one finger in my face and pointing toward the workstations with the other hand. “Luca has a way of distracting you. Don’t let him stop you from doing your best.”

  The clubber returns with the lengths of pipe I requested.

  “Anything else?” he asks.

  “No, I’m good,” I say, taking the chance to edge away from Inaya. She gives me a coy wave, then starts giving the clubber her own list of measurements.

  I dawdle on my way back to the table, trying to think. Inaya’s words snake through my head, pulling my thoughts into strange, bendy patterns. Don’t let him stop you from doing your best, she said. My best, according to Inaya, happens in spite of Luca. She must have dealt with
same the frustrations I did, trying to teach someone so new. Clearly, her way around it was excluding Luca entirely, and she’s telling me to do the same.

  A familiar tightness takes over my heart. The cold fury, the blistering drive. It feels wrong and invasive after the elation of this morning, like the sudden onset of an infection.

  No. I’m not choosing, because there is no choice to make. I can do my best and I can let myself feel what I feel. I won’t cut Luca out because it’s easy to be alone. He’s risking a lot to be himself here with me. I’m not going to shut him out of something he’s fighting so hard to be part of. It would be wrong, and it wouldn’t make me a better competitor. It would only make me ruthless. Like Inaya. Maybe that works for her, but after being with Luca, I’ve realized it’s not for me.

  I grab a heat gun and a few other things as I hurry back to the station. When I’m close, a sudden commotion fills the arena. Cameras push in to get my reaction to what I now realize is some sort of disturbance in the crowd near our station. The rest of the cameras are pointed at Luca, who is blushing so hard that even the tops of his shoulders are red. He’s facing down the clear barrier, behind which a small lady has captured the audience’s attention. She is wide-eyed, her breath fogging the partition. She is speaking rapidly and shaking her head over and over.

  I know who she is.

  This is Luca’s mother.

  Twenty-Four

  Then

  Six months ago

  It’s late on Monday—like, midnight late—and I’m about to clean up my makeshift workstation when I realize Luca never showed up for our session.

  I’ve been so focused on what I was doing that I didn’t even realize he wasn’t here. I got so much done tonight on the props, and I might even have time to insert some LEDs at the rate I’m going. I’m in a great mood, feeling more accomplished than I have in weeks. I didn’t even notice Luca had ditched me until I look at my phone and see a single text from him:

  sorry, something came up tonight.

  You okay?

  Luca doesn’t text me back that night or the next morning. I can sense something is off, but I’m not sure how to ask about it. If he were mad, he’d tell me, right? Or maybe he wouldn’t. But why would he be mad? The last time I saw him, I was bundled up in his shirt, snoring into his collarbone. It was, as he said in a text right after leaving, Mind-Blowingly Cute.