Real Life Sucks!

15

The drinks with Kevin and Michelle didn't last long. A phone call from a panicking Joseph had Kevin rushing to pack and return home. From what Rory could tell, some disaster in ordering for Kevin's shop had occurred and Kevin was needed. Immediately. The perils of having adult responsibilities, like a business, a husband and a best friend who seemed more like a symbiotic twin, rather than an individual person of her own.

Rory had nothing like that and, after a fashion, felt really quite glad. He couldn't imagine having to juggle so many things and actually think about other people's feelings. His own feelings were impossible to decipher, without trying to understand what made other people tick. Like now. Kevin had moved from having good, but awkward time with Rory and Michelle, to borderline panic himself, wondering whether he had drunk too much to drive. He hadn't. Kevin wasn't a big drinker at the best of times.

Which left Rory and Michelle in the bar of the hotel and Rory wondering exactly how long he had to wait before saying he should really go to bed. Like the others, Rory only really knew Michelle from playing the game and had no idea what she was like outside of it. After Kevin had left, garbled apologies drifting in his wake, Rory had sat, nursing his drink, trying not to catch anyone's eye.

"So, what have you done?" Even though Michelle was a year or two older than Rory, she looked child-like at the other side of the table, drinking her cocktail through a straw. "With Katie? I thought we were all having drinks tonight. That was the plan. So, what have you done?"

She was more than likely right, but Rory had no idea. He frowned, gazing into the pint glass in front of him, watching the foam receding to the edges. Bubbles appearing and disappearing as the carbonation did its work. He had wondered, himself, why Katie had dressed in the Dread Camellia cosplay if she weren't going to parade around in it. Maybe she simply liked dressing up. It wasn't something Rory fully understood.

"I asked her if she'd be my 'plus-one' to the launch party and she said no. I understand that. Why would anyone want to be my plus-one in anything?" He didn't say it for sympathy. That was just the way it was, but Michelle rolled her eyes. "I think she might be ill."

"Oh, my god, Rory! No, she's not ill!" She drew the last of her cocktail through the straw and pushed the glass aside, leaning forward and failing completely to look serious and intimidating. "Look, I don't fully understand your problems. You're neurodivergent, I get that, but you can interact with people. You do it all the time in the game. And you're smart, though you don't think so. So, use that smartness and think about what you said to Katie."

He screwed up his face as he thought back to the conversation. Concentrating, here, with the noises of the hotel bar all around him was as difficult as it could be. Only a couple of weeks before, he doubted he would have left his room. This was all immense progress, but it didn't help him as he tried to recall what, exactly, had happened.

Katie had held his hand, and that was nice, comforting, and she had seemed alright up to that point. Much like herself. Smiling, a little giddy, but a little more reserved than he had come to expect of her. They had talked about her cosplay outfit and Alice wanting to return to the group and then the hug. But it had changed when he mentioned the launch party and the mini-competition. No. That wasn't when things had changed.

It was a struggle and he never even noticed when Michelle disappeared to the bar, returning with another cocktail for herself and another beer for him. He had spent so long running things through his mind. He had to break things down into sections differentiated by specific events. Or was that yet another way for him to put off doing something? Or was thinking that he was putting off doing something actually putting off doing something?

Before his brain disappeared in a cycle of 'what ifs', he took a drink of his beer. To the side, a couple passed the table, all noise and laughter and smiles. He both did and didn't want that. Katie had held his hand, and then hadn't. She had hugged him and then stepped back. What connected those two events? He wished he had an app that could tell him, or a silent friend that could nudge him every time some human interaction was important. Something connected both those occurrences.