I'm Still Rocking Your Hoodie

Pax

I was biting my nails so hard that there was barely anything left at this point. I bit my nails when I was nervous; it was a habit I've had since I was small. And I had plenty of reason to be nervous.

You can never really prepare yourself for the moment you meet one of your heroes. You think you can - you play the scene over and over again in your head, you prepare a speech based on a conversation you predict you might have with that person, you practice your laugh, check yourself out in the mirror to make sure you look great - but it ultimately does not prepare you for the exact moment you finally see that person.

You find yourself stuck in a state of shock as the person you've been dying to meet comes into eye sight and suddenly everything you've put yourself through to brace this moment falls to millions of pieces and dies.

That's what happened to me when I caught a glimpse of Sean McLoughlin from the middle of the line of his meet n' greet. I had let other people walk past me in the line because I was too afraid to move. And it was so stupid! This was another human being, not some idol made to be worshiped (as my mother would say). He was just another awkward nerd like me, with probably even more anxiety problems than I had, why was I freaking out so bad?

I had everything planned, yet my body became absolutely stunned at the mere sight of the young man several yards away. How silly of me! I thought, but I still could not bring myself to move.

I had been waiting for this moment nearly three years (and 6 very long hours). I quit my job, I moved away from home in with a friend in New Jersey just so I could start my own Youtube channel, just so I could be noticed by other Youtubers like Sean. I wasn't all that recognized. The majority of my viewers were women and that didn't bother me, but it was a start. And I did all this, just so I had a topic for Sean to relate to when I finally met him.

And what was I doing? Wasting all the money I had spent to get me here to Seattle so I could stare at my hero. I do that at home, why spend money on it?

I nearly jumped when I felt a sharp poke in the back of my shoulder.

"Move it, Quinn. You're holding up the line." A short Beetlejuice stood bouncing in anticipation behind me.

It took me a moment to grasp that he was talking to me before I realized he had referred to me as my cosplay; I was dressed as Harley Quinn from the Batman video game Arkham Asylum. He had a glaring eye as he waited for me to move. I looked from Sean back to the midget Michael Keeton and slowly started to walk forward.

Then I stopped again. I could here his Irish accent from here. He was laughing at something some kid dressed in a septic Sam shirt was telling him.

I got chills when he laughed. His thick, black rimmed glasses rose on his face when he smiled. He was running his hand nervously through his teal hair (the kid he was talking to had probably been there for a moment and Sean was just too polite to shoo him away)and adjusted the glowing cat ears on his head. When the kid left, Sean looked on down the line as it moved forward. I stayed put; the kid behind me just went around me, like the others had.

Sean must have noticed, because he took a step back to look on down the line at me. If I wasn't frozen before, now I felt as if Elsa had come from my nightmares and spun her ice magic at me to hold me in place.

Jackspeticeye was staring at me.

He turned his head crooked, smirking in amusement.

My eyes grew wide and my stomach felt like it was about to do a flip.

I bolted.

I don't know why, but I just lost it. My heart was pelpitating so hard, I thought I was going to die. I didn't stop running until I made it to the escalators and up the opposite way they were rolling.