Gwenpool ▷ Peter Parker

1 - ON WEDNESDAYS WE BUY COMICS

WEDNESDAY IS THE BEST DAY OF THE WEEK, PLAIN AND SIMPLE. Not just because I can wear all pink and quote Mean Girls at unsuspecting passersby—okay that's mainly why—but also because it's new comic book day, and as all who know me are well aware, I'm a complete slut for new comic book day.

"It's the most wonderful time of the year," I sang as I skipped into Midtown Comics—what can I say, it's popular for a reason—adjusting the straps of my penguin backpack as I hopped up to the front counter, standing on my tiptoes.

"It's summer, Gwen," Louis said, looking up from where he was flipping through an issue of Deadpool. I always liked coming in when there weren't many people, they always looked at me weird, "But I feel you, the new monthly of the newest Deadpool run just came out today."

I scrunched up my nose, but said nothing; we'd gotten into this argument before, Louis always trying to get me to read Deadpool and me having to explain that I didn't want to, because he was just too meme-y for me. I got that he's actually a nice guy or whatever, I'd seen him in some of the Christmas special issues, but where's the actual substance?

I hadn't even seen the movies, though I heard Ryan Reynolds was great. And the teenage lesbians were always a bonus, but my poor bi heart could only take so much in one sitting, especially with my family right there.

"You know," Louis said, catching my reaction to his mention of Deadpool, "We have the trades of Spider-Man vs. Deadpool. I know how much you love him. And Miles Morales is there too."

I perked up at that, because he would be right, there was no one else in the world I loved more than Peter Parker and his other spider friends, but I had picked up the first few issues when the run came out and was thoroughly confused; I never followed the part where Doc Ock took over Peter's body or whatever, I didn't care. Sue me.

"Did the new Spider-Gwen come out?" I asked instead, trying to peek in from where he was slowly bagging up my pull list.

"Yup, and the last Super Sons," he replied, and I groaned, dropping my head onto the counter. He laughed, reaching out to tap my head. "I'm surprised you even read DC, doesn't seem like your thing."

"I appreciate the families," I said immediately, "I don't really care about what Batman is doing, but if he's just hanging around the mansion with his family, I am so there."

"But what about the action?" he countered, and I wondered how sad his life must be to actually want to have a full discussion with a sixteen-year-old girl, "Weren't you talking about substance."

"There is substance there," I argued, "The love and family. The development. I don't care about Deadpool just slicing up people. If I got a full series of him learning ASL to communicate with Hawkeye, then we're talking. But I don't care about his memes and references and chimichangas or whatever. It's kind of lame."

"Hey, hey, hey," he said, tapping the counter, "What did we say about respect? That is your opinion, make it clear."

I sighed heavily, rolling my eyes; I got why we had to do the respect thing, but it got really tiring after the fifth time I had to correct myself. "Sorry. I think it's kind of lame."

"Thank you," he said, smiling as he placed the bag on the counter, "Do you wanna go look around, we got new first issues in, Wiccan and Speed are getting their own run together where they're going to college, it's in parallel to Ms. America's new series."

There was another reason why I liked to go in when there weren't people around: I could scream as loud as I wanted.

"Jeez, Gwen," Louis groaned, covering his ears, "Art's the same as the one for the Ms. America one, do you want me to add both series to your pull now?"