2 001 - The Convention

"Now, all set to go!" I said as I finished packing my bag with things I need to bring to a convention as advised by my best friend.

How did I end up in this situation, you say? It happened a week ago when my best friend and at the same time my comrade, Asahina Yukki.

- A week ago -

"You got some free time next week, Yuuma?" Yukki asked me casually.

Asahina Yukki, she might be weird in the eyes of our classmate to talk to me, but she's on par with the models featured in the fashion magazine my little sister was buying every time we are buying outside. She has a mellow apricot colored skin and a dark brown eye color. She often ties a headband around her head and on top of that, she wears a pair of glasses which can totally make others fall for her.

The only thing that was keeping her from getting a man is because of her being close to me, the infamous me.

"Of course I got a lot of free time every day, you should know that by now, right?" I responded in agreement in her question.

As soon as she heard my answer, it feels like she was expecting that kind of answer all along. Why bother asking me though? The look on her eyes kinda gives a vibe of her having something planned on that day.

"Great! To be honest with you, I have a plan laid out next week," she responds to my answer, filled with joy in her eyes which I can tell as clear as day.

"You know the anime convention happening on Akiba, right?" she pushes further with the details of her plan with excitement written all over her face.

Now, this makes it a lot harder for me to reject whatever she has in mind so I just nod my head even though I have no idea what she's talking about.

"I just happened to have an extra ticket with me, so can I ask you if you can join me?" this way of her inviting me is kind of old and clichéd that makes me pity her for not realizing that this line is pretty obvious that she did it on purpose - buying an extra ticket, that is.

"Well, I followed through your gimmick, I think it is my responsibility to respond in kind." I accepted her invitation although half of it was totally forcing me to go with her in an indirect manner.

- Present -

Well, that's pretty more like it and now we are here in the situation where I am all ready to go to our meetup.

"As far as I can remember, our meetup is Shinjuku Station." well, that's pretty overused already in anime, I see where she's getting her ideas of meetup even though she is just four blocks away from our home.

"Well, there's nothing I can do with that now that she might be already on her way to our meetup." I picked up my bag which contains three pairs of face towel and four change of clothes, which also includes a bottle of perfume.

At 15 minute travel, I made it to our meetup ten minutes earlier than what I expected. Looking around, I saw her wandering near the clock tower named NTT Docomo Yoyogi building. It is now clear to me that she's copying all of this from an anime, probably from the one she's currently watching. As soon as I get near and she has spotted me, she waved her hands.

"Are you here for long?" I asked her as I got near where she can hear me.

"Oh, no, I just got here," she answered. Liar. I can clearly tell that she's been wandering here for about half an hour or maybe an hour.

"Oh, is that it. Well, I've been wandering here for about an hour, talk about who's late." I lied to her upfront.

As soon as she heard my "kind" response, she pouted.

Her pout is like copied from an anime mom who has been transferred to a parallel world. She looks cute, but I ain't going to smash to that.

"Well, I think let's go now to the convention hall. Hmph!" Now she's a tsundere.

I don't know if this what happened to her through watching too many anime or it is really her and her being bipolar. Hopefully, just a bipolar.

We took a short walk and get in our train to travel through Akiba by taking the Yamanote line and the travel just took 5 minutes for us to get to our destination.

Being here for the first time and attending a convention for the first time too, I am hoping my first experience will be not a disappointment. Seeing all the people around us, there are about thousands of attendees today and we are going to be a part of that. That's why she told me to get four change of clothes and perfume, is it?

My will has been strengthened and I was about ready to be part of that huge tide of the crowd but unfortunately, we took the route with a handful of people inside. She gave me an ID Pass with "GOLD" written over it.

"What is this GOLD thing means?" I asked her out of curiosity.

"It means we get a GOLD pass which makes us able to enter the convention one hour ahead of opening time. In short, it is a VIP Pass." she proudly puffed out those words from her mouth.

"W-what?!?" I exaggeratedly respond to what she just said.

My exaggeration made some of the guard wary of what happened to me that they need to check up on me. For this time, it is not a lie but I experienced it real time. The people around us might be laughing now, which made me embarrassed about myself. Shame on me.

Well, that's pretty much it on me entering my first ever convention.

Next: Yukki