Con crushes are kind of Jayla’s thing—find somebody nice, spend the weekend flirting, and then go back home, no muss, no fuss—or they were, before she started casually seeing the other co-captain of the soccer team, Emily Hayes, a few weeks ago. I was supposed to pick up her slack on that front, but no luck so far. It’s not that I’m not open to it . . . it’s just that nobody has caught my eye.

Jayla stops at the door next to ours and I knock. My mom opens the door, her bright red hair shining in the hallway light as she blinks hard. She’s probably just waking up from a nap, and I don’t blame her. After working in the shop booth all day so Vera could sketch and talk to fans in Artist Alley, she’s got to be beat.

“Hey, Jubilee.” She yawns, but I can tell the second she really looks at me, because her eyes widen and then her eyebrows scrunch together the way they do whenever she’s pissed. “Nope.”

“Is everything okay?” Jayla asks all innocently, like she doesn’t already know.

“Vera,” Mom yells over her shoulder, pulling the door open wider. “Look at these kids!”

Vera’s sitting on the edge of the bed, pointing the remote at the TV and lazily flipping through channels. She looks over at me and Jayla and nods appreciatively. “Are you evening-gown Mora? Amazing! And wow, Jayla, incredible detailing on the Shuri chest plate. That must have taken forever!” She sounds utterly delighted. My mom is going to kill her.

“Thank you so much,” Jayla says with the most wholesome smile she can muster.

“Vera.” I can only see the back of Mom’s head now, but I know that tone. I get that tone from her all the time. It’s the “you’re lucky I love you, because you make my life nearly impossible” tone. “Jubilee cannot go out dressed like that.”

“It’s prom,” Vera says. “Give the kid a break.”

“It’s not real prom—it’s comic-book-people prom, which is worse. And she looks twenty-five.”

“It’s my winter-formal dress,” I point out. “You were fine with it in December.”

“See, it’s her winter-formal dress, Lillian. It’s fine.” Vera smirks like that solves everything. I hope it does, but I also know Mom way, way better than that—and Vera should too. They’ve been together four years now, which means she’s had forty-eight months to learn what I’ve known for as long as I can remember: when Mom stands with her hands on her hips, her pinky finger tapping ever so slightly, it means trouble’s definitely brewing.