Cosplay Shenanigans

5 - of ulterior motives and first challenge

"Well then, I accept your challenge." Abel placed his arms on his hips and beckoned his fingers. "I'm ready whenever you are. Bring it on, woman."

Silence continued to be the crossdresser's answer, but she lowered her head in the process. Her bangs consequently curtained her eyes, but she most likely was looking at the floor with utter shame, as she should be. What are you gonna do now?

Abel's grin widened as pride coursed through him, but his heart gratuitously crawled up to his throat and his breaths picked up its pace. Wait, why am I so hesitant about this? Come on Abel, don't be such a coward.

Seconds ticked by, and Mairi peered up at last, but Abel swore he saw her lips slightly twitched. A part of him rejected those findings though, and so another debate of whether it was real or a hallucination clashed inside of him. He bit the insides of his cheeks as he anticipated for some sort of a reaction. What's she going to say? Is she going to-

"You're cute," she remarked.

And that was when Abel's blood precipitously surged into his entire face. He felt as if his ears and cheeks were scorched by flames that were eating up his skin. All of this sudden hotness... was why his brain short-circuited, further explaining the delay in processing what the fuck her comment meant. Now he was the one left speechless, but he forced himself to bounce back quickly.

Wh... What?!

"Are..." Abel stumbled, before he managed to form a proper sentence. "Are you making fun of me?!" He cried out, his voice cracked midway. Is she high or something?!

"Oh my, this is the first time I actually see you blushing," Mairi pointed out, trying to instigate him further. "I guess the compliment's too much for your huge ego?"

"I never asked you to compliment me! I was asking you about something else! Are we even on the same page?!" Abel exclaimed. Why the hell am I so agitated over some comment? This is not the time! She's gonna ridicule me because of it!

"But I thought you're the type to take all kinds of compliments no matter what," taunted Mairi. "I kinda wanna test if that works..." She nodded in approval. "And it really does."

"I'm not your test subject!"

As he seethed, rambunctious giggles erupted from behind him, jolting every inch of his body and erecting the tiny hairs on his neck. There was no need to guess who. No other people howled at him while doubling down unless they were Charlotte and Adrian, who had their hands filled with new posters and figures. Those grating laughters surely were the bane of his existence.

Ugh, of course they'll mock me...

"Since when have you been listening?" grumbled Abel.

"When you were flaunting yourself to her. Not so arrogant now, eh?" Charlotte instigated, batting her eyebrow. "I always thought your arrogance couldn't be helped, but guess I was completely wrong."

Adrian... well, this dude was pointing his phone right on Abel's face for some reason. However, the moment a cunning smile streaked across his malicious mien followed by a sharp snap of a camera, the detective didn't have to even second-guess.

"Oops..." Adrian clamped his mouth in such an exaggerated manner, like those characters from a slapstick comedy. "Looks like I forgot to turn off the sound."

Anything but that! Abel was on the verge of lunging towards his guffawing friend. If he ever got hands on that stupid phone, first he would expunge all those morbid photos of him at his worst, then he would catapult the heck out of that thing to the skies.