“Lover and Hater of Tower of Hate and Love” (65.4) (Zeta)

"Nothing but dread wherever we look," Arlit said. "Pandora, take my hand."

"OK, like, watch right here," I said, pausing the show right as Arlit had the most incredible expression of pining towards her friend Pandora, whose eyes were glossy from the tears welling in them. "You cannot tell me they didn't wanna kiss there, it's so obvious."

"I could see it, yeah," Kalei said.

Having this many friends over was surreal. It brought a certain kind of warm and fuzziness to me to think about this not even being all of my friends. The others were snacking or chatting. Sai kept checking their phone.

"Oh, this next part's great!" I said. "Everyone, it's the fight with the asteroid people!"

I watched everyone's reactions as one of the best set pieces in Tower history played.

"Sai, you should see this," I said as the devil checked their phone again.

"Oh, I've seen it before," Sai said.

"You have? Isn't it grea—" I started.

"It's just that it's terrible, so."

I felt like they just hit me with a shockwave of bad vibes. I knew plenty of people who didn't like Tower of Hate and Love, for instance Marmalade wasn't a fan despite my best efforts, but she never described it that bluntly.

"Well," I said. "That's. Certainly an opinion to have." I laughed nervously. "Are you sure you've seen this particular chapter of the Tower saga before? It's a rare TV movie."

"Yeah," Sai said.

"How did...I mean, it's not streaming anywhere, and it's quite hard to come by, so I'm just a little curious about...how you..."

Sai shrugged. "My friend had the DVDs, she has this one too."

Maybe they just hadn't been paying attention? I had to investigate their Tower knowledge. Seeing the War of the Rolling Asteroid Colonies movie without seeing all the show could have made it a bit more confusing. Maybe.

"How many episodes have you seen? The first season is rough, even I'll admit that." I said.

"I watched at least twenty episodes," Sai said. "I did not get the impression that it would get much better."

"Well, it does!" I said. "You just have to, well, you gotta see more! Well, it does for sure get better. And I think it's already pretty dang good at the start!" I was saying 'well' as much as Stella said 'so' when she was nervous.

"And if this movie was recent, then yeah. I don't think it got much better," Sai said.

"It's...not too recent...but! Not too old? So? Well?" I said. "We should watch some more episodes! You just need to see the good ones, the really great ones even!"

"This feels familiar," Sai said, shaking their head.

"Huh?"

"Nothing..."

"Can we do something else?" Ash asked.

"I doubt Faleur has any good games," Roux said.

"She's still got my eGame 2," Kalei said.

"Koridia, silence," Roux said. "I was merely introducing that I brought one of my duplicates of the eGame X Pro, assuming this would happen." They opened their backpack, revealing a console with a ton of controllers.

"Yeah, well, I figured that'd happen too, so I brought mine also!" Kalei pulled out her own backpack, also with a console inside of it.

While they fought over how to best plug in their consoles, I kept asking Sai, trying to figure this out.

"What is it about Tower you don't like?" I asked.

"It's just a bunch of dumb, vague mysteries with annoying melodrama about everything," Sai said.

"Tower doesn't give you the answers easily, sometimes it's...ephemeral," I said.

"Zates, do you even know what that means?" Kalei asked.

"Do you?" I asked.

"Calm down, you're kinda freaking out a bit," Kalei said.

Whenever anyone tells me to calm down, like clockwork my reaction is always to scream "I am calm!" back to them.

"I mean! I'm not freaking out! I just...wanna know what it is about this that...I mean, I think that Sai could be a fan someday, I just want to show them the right..."

I wasn't sure why I kept going, something inside me told me I could win this and convert Sai to be a true Tower of Hate and Love fan.

"I don't really want to watch anymore, sorry," Sai said. "I hate shows that are just bait, that's the worst part for me."

"But!" My lip quivered. I knew Tower wasn't the greatest for rep, but it was important to me and my queer journey. But I didn't know how to phrase that when I was already heated. "It's not necessarily bait, there are lots of allusions and! And uh!"

"Eh," Sai said, cutting through any argument I had with a single sound.

"Maybe...we could watch one more after we finish the movie?" I said.

Sai's phone buzzed, and they sent a quick message before standing up.

"I actually have to step out for a second," Sai said.

"No!" I said.

"Hm?"

"I mean...you can, just..."

I kept stammering as Sai left. I didn't join in as Kalei and Roux had put my movie to the wayside and loaded up a party game. I was still keyed up, so I paced back and forth as Kalei and Roux teamed up to play against Ash and Myles in a tennis game.

"Tower's a great show, though," I muttered to myself. "It's really good."

"This is honestly more entertaining than the movie," Kalei said.

"Shut up! I am incredibly embarrassed here, I'm...I haven't even processed it!" I said.

"I finally get to see Diast's house, and Zeta has a hilarious meltdown," Kalei said. "This is a great day."

"It's not hilarious! I'm having a situation here!" I said.

"It's pretty funny," Marmalade said.

"And I wouldn't say meltdown..." I pouted, but part of me knew Kalei was right.

"How else would you describe this humiliating outburst?" Roux asked.

"As...not that!" I said.

"I didn't wanna get this reaction out of you, but since you're in the middle of it anyways, I agreed with everything Sai said about Tower," Marmalade said.

"That's...super rude!" I said.

After a few rounds of the tennis game, Sai still hadn't come back. And instead of my confused anger, I had settled into a more embarrassed sadness.

"OK...OK, I'm calming down a bit," I said.

"And you're realizing how much you embarrassed yourself there?" Kalei asked.

"Maybe..." I said. "Perhaps I could just say I was kidding?"

"I don't think they'd buy that," Kalei said.

"Do you think they'll even come back?" I asked. "I might've scared them off."

"I don't think you scared more than increased your cringe levels past capacity, driving them from your home," Roux said.

Myles looked to Ash, who shrugged.

"I've never made them so mad they leave," Ash said.

"Wow, you really blew it then Zates," Kalei said.

Everyone laughed like this wasn't a big deal, but to me it felt like I'd just ruined everything.