19. “Fuck that guy”

I was dressed as mermaid man from Spongebob. I went up to a table to buy a poster, and the guy was like, “hey, there’s barnacle boy here!” I said “where?” Because I saw no barnacle boy at the con yet. He said “…you!” And everyone laughed because they didn’t realize I was not barnacle boy and they thought I forgot what my costume was. Fuck that guy I’m mermaid man

20. Rocky Horror

I cosplayed Frank N Furter from The Rocky Horror Picture Show at a comic con about a year ago. I had a lot of pleasant interactions with other cosplayers during the day, lots of “ooh I love that movie!”, “hey do the Time Warp!” sort of conversations. A few people hit on me (I’m a woman in fishnets and a corset at a comic con…that was expected). Nothing to weird or uncomfortable.

And then there was this one dude and his friend. They kept following me around, talking to me about weirdly personal topics, and getting far too handsy. Eventually I started to get nervous, so I excused myself to the bathroom. I just wanted to distance myself from them a little. As I go to leave, the guy goes “Wait, before you go, can I get a picture?” Okay. Fine. Just take a photo then leave me alone.

So the guy grabs me, picks me up, throws me over his shoulder so my ass is sticking up in the air (in fishnets and bikini bottoms) and his buddy takes a picture. Then he drops me back on the ground, and the two guys take off. It all happened in about ten seconds so I barely had time to react. Some guy dressed as Deadpool helped me up and walked me to the security booth to report the guys, but nothing ever came of it. So weird, cringey, and terrifying.

I don’t cosplay Frank anymore.