Along the way, she grabbed a pen and refilled her bedside glass of water. Propped once more against the wooden headboard, she tapped the ballpoint against the first blank page and acknowledged the obvious.
If she wanted to stop hiding, she couldn’t have found a more efficient means of exposure.
Assuming tonight’s thread hadn’t done the trick already, a date with Marcus Caster-Rupp, a world-famous television star, would make her face and body and shipping interests publicly known. At least in some circles. And she knew enough about the Gods of the Gates fandom that she could already see the blog post headlines. The kind ones, anyway.
Gates Fan Accepts Date with Actor of
Her Dreams; Nerdgirls Rejoice!
A Fangirl Scores a Star: And on This Day,
a Million Modern AUs Were Born
@Lavineas5Ever, Stan Icon for the Ages
Which reminded her: The Lavineas server was going to freak out, if the hysteria hadn’t already begun. It probably had, since most of her friends followed Marcus on Twitter. Thank God she hadn’t checked the server’s main chat threads yet.
If they knew @Lavineas5Ever was also Unapologetic Lavinia Stan, and that she was tempted to turn down a goddamn date with half of their OTP, they would fucking annihilate her.
Well, since she’d already made her public debut as a fangirl, she might as well do it right. Might as well spell out everything she needed to do, all the parts of herself she intended to expose to sunlight.
In bold, block letters, she titled her page: ENVIRONMENTAL GEOLOGIST, REMEDIATE THYSELF.
Some of the parts of her plan she’d determined on the drive home today and over the past few months, but others she’d list now. Including the most painful bits.
Say yes to Marcus. Publicly.
Without being obnoxious about it, merge the personal and professional at work. Stop fearing exposure. (Remind self of terrible folk trio as necessary.)
Share Twitter handle and identity with Lavineas friends. Wear earplugs when doing so, as squealing may be heard from space.
Attend Con of the Gates. Meet Lavineas friends and let them see what I look like in person. Even B
At Con of the Gates, enter cosplay contest.
Chewing on the inside of her cheek for a moment, she paused.
No, she was going to add everything. She’d said she would, and she was no coward.
Address fat-shaming in the Lavineas community, even though it might alienate BAWN my friends.
Decide what to do about Mom and Dad. Once I’m sure, tell Mom in person.
Immediately dump any man who wants to change me and/or doesn’t seem proud to be with me in public.
There. That was it. If she wanted to dig out the poison in her personal landscape, that was how to go about it.
Leaving her notebook and remediation list within sight, she woke her laptop from hibernation mode and maximized her Twitter window. Chewed the inside of her cheek for a moment. Nodded to herself.
In the end, it took only seconds. She located Marcus’s invitation amid her ballooning notifications and clicked Retweet with comment.
I would be delighted to have dinner with you, @MarcusCasterRupp. Thank you for your kind invitation. Feel free to slide into my DMs to work out details.
Lavineas Server
Thread: WTAF Is Up with Dido
Unapologetic Lavinia Stan: I mean, first the show totally ignored the books by having her actually die on that funeral pyre, but I guess you could say they were going old-school there (as in, *Virgil*-old). But having Juno bring her back from the dead? Then making Dido some sort of crazed, power-hungry, sex-starved, scorned woman basically boiling bunnies in her Aeneas obsession? As the thread title indicates: WTAF?
Mrs. Pius Aeneas: She’s completely unrecognizable from the Dido in Wade’s books.
Book!AeneasWouldNever: Even Virgil’s Dido, before Aeneas’s arrival and the intervention of Venus, was a supremely competent ruler. I hate to say it, but
Unapologetic Lavinia Stan: But what?
Book!AeneasWouldNever: The show’s Dido has never been anything more than a misogynistic caricature. Carah Brown’s talents are wasted in the role, although she’s the only reason the character has any gravitas. Once they get past Wade’s books, it’ll only get worse.
Unapologetic Lavinia Stan: But why make that narrative choice? It’s so much less interesting than what Wade or even Virgil did.
Book!AeneasWouldNever: I suspect it has a lot to do with how the showrunners view women.
4
HER CELL BUZZED FROM ATOP THE HOTEL ROOM DESK, and April rested her forehead against the faux-wood surface. She lifted her head, only to drop it again with a muted thud.
Without even looking, she knew who was calling and why. At some point, her mom was going to hear about the date with Marcus happening that night. It was only a matter of time, but April had appreciated every minute of it.
And now, her time was up.
One glance at the display confirmed her fears, and she heaved a sigh before tapping the screen. “Hi, Mom.”
“Honey, I just saw a picture of you on Entertainment All-Access. I think.” Her mother sounded both startled and confused. “You were wearing some sort of old-fashioned dress?”
April had wondered yesterday whether JoAnn’s favorite show to watch during dinner prep would feature the story. Evidently, she had her answer. “That was me. In my Lavinia costume. You know, from Gods of the Gates?”
“Oh, my heavens.” Her mother blew out a breath. “April, I don’t even—”
A lengthy silence followed, in which JoAnn likely blinked in shock at her daughter’s sudden, unexpected fame, absorbed the news, and contemplated where to begin the conversation. With curiosity? Concern? Pity? Advice?
Eventually, she’d cover all of the above. April knew that already, as well as she knew what her mother’s advice would entail.
At long last, her mother chose an opening query. “How in the world did this happen?”
That was a question with many answers, some more existential than others, but April settled on the bare facts. Minus a bit of context, in the vain hope they could both avoid the inevitable.
“Well, I have a Twitter account where I post pictures of myself cosplaying Lavinia, and Marcus Caster-Rupp saw one of the photos Wednesday night and asked me out.” She kept her voice calm, as if her world hadn’t exploded in the last several days. As if her heart hadn’t been skittering in her chest since the moment she’d risen that morning. “I’m staying at a hotel in Berkeley this weekend while I get my new apartment ready, and he happened to be in the area. So our dinner is happening tonight, but please don’t tell anyone. I’d like to keep the whole thing as private as possible, under the circumstances.”
As private as possible meant not very private. And that was putting it mildly.
As soon as her Twitter exchange with Marcus went viral, her mentions became . . . incomprehensible. Overwhelming. Filled with commentary both heartening and stunningly ugly. And even though she’d muted all the main threads long ago, new followers and tweets just kept coming, as did interview requests and blogger and media questions.
Her current amount of exposure was more than sufficient, so she’d refused all requests and ignored all questions. Then, just when the hubbub had begun to diminish, the official Gods of the Gates Twitter account had picked up on the story and obviously seen the date, true to Marcus’s prediction, as a great PR opportunity. To her dismay, they’d started promoting the shit out of the blessed event.
Which meant yet more notifications. More DMs. More threads to mute.
At that point, the story had reached her former coworkers. Because of the continued internet uproar, two of her now-ex-colleagues had seen her picture in one of the many stories available online by Friday.
They’d chatted to her about it in hushed corners of the office, and she hadn’t minded their winks and nudges. But their sympathetic winces and pitying pats on the arm—such terrible things people said, April; I can’t imagine how you must have felt—had set her teeth on edge.
When she’d walked out of her old workplace, box of belongings in her arms, she’d done so through a gauntlet of gawking and whispers.
No more hiding, she’d repeated through a suddenly tight chest. No more hiding. Folk goddamn trio.
Then the story had leaped from Twitter to Facebook and Insta, and from there to Gods of the Gates blogs and even a few entertainment news programs.
Including Entertainment All-Access, evidently.
She was trying not to follow the spread of her newfound fame, but how could she not? Even when each post, each televised clip, ratcheted the tension in her muscles until her shoulders ached?
“I see.” JoAnn probably had seen the entire story only moments before, displayed for the public’s viewing pleasure on television screens nationwide. “Are you okay, honey?”
Ah, concern and pity had made a simultaneous entrance into the conversation. Lovely.
“I’m good. Just figuring out what to wear for—” Shit. Rookie mistake. Normally, April never, ever introduced clothing choices into any discussion with her mother. “Just looking forward to tonight. Marcus plays Aeneas, one of my favorite characters.”
Her mother ignored that gambit.
“They showed us part of that conversation on Twitter.” JoAnn’s voice dropped to a near-whisper. “I’m not sure posting pictures there is a great idea.”
It was more or less the same advice April had received for more than thirty years: If people are cruel, make yourself smaller and smaller, until you’re so inconsequential no one can target you.
But April was done cringing and hiding. The opinion of fatphobic randos on Twitter didn’t matter, and she wouldn’t make herself small just to avoid their notice. “I like showing everyone the costumes I’ve put together.”
JoAnn responded carefully, worry and good intentions in every syllable. “That dress . . .” She hesitated. “It didn’t show your figure to its best advantage. Maybe you can make one that doesn’t cling to—”
It could be anything. April’s arms. Her back. Her stomach. Her ass. Her thighs.