Play Date
 | This chapter is exclusively available to members of Bittersweet Club International. |
| Play Date | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Published | April 23, 2017 |
| Page count | 11 |
| Major characters | Lucy, Augustus |
| Minor characters | Carol, Mike, David |
| Chapter navigation | |
| ← Magical Girl Redux | Blood Lust → |
| Read in the BCI Members’ Library | |
Play Date is a non-canon Bittersweet Club International-exclusive comic that imagines Augustus as Lucy’s age, sitting in her kindergarten class on her very first day.
Partial synopsis
Carol drops little Lucy off for her first day of kindergarten, telling her not to be shy and to go make some new friends.[1] The girls playing with princess dolls do not appeal to her, and neither does the boys’ game of cars, destruction, and burps. When Lucy finally works up the nerve to approach a pair of kids, they scream “COOTIES” at her. She winds up curled up alone, clutching somebody else’s toy car.[2]
The car belongs to a young, cap-wearing Mike, who starts to point that out. David calls him away to play marbles before he can finish.[3] The child who does sit down beside Lucy is Augustus. She defensively demands “Are you gonna yell at me too?!”, and he flatly says no before starting a game of cars with her.[4] Their cars soon acquire armor and hovering powers in an arms race of kid logic. When Lucy pounces and crashes hers into his, both children grin.[5]
From there the comic follows the two of them up through the school years, as the shy new girl becomes Augustus’s shadow and then his loudest friend. Where Augustus comes from doesn’t change just because Lucy is in his corner now, and keeping him out of trouble is going to take a lot more than one good day at the toy car bin...
Character dynamics
- Lucy and Augustus: In the main comic, Augustus is older than Lucy and runs errands for the gang that attacked her.[6] In this story, he is her age and is the first classmate to sit down and play cars with her.[4]
- Mike and Lucy: In canon, preschool Lucy meets Mike through his toys.[7] Here, Mike starts to tell her that she has his toy car, but David calls him away to play marbles.[3] Augustus sits down with her instead.[4]
Trivia & observations
- The opening pages revisit the canonical kindergarten flashback from Left Behind, with the same princess-doll game and children shouting “Cooties!!” at Lucy.[2][9]
- Oliver posted the comic’s “Your face is funny!!” sequence on the official Tumblr as a public teaser. Responding to a fan, he wrote “It is cute. (Only on BCI!!)”.[8]
- This story draws Augustus at kindergarten age.[3] His youngest canon appearance is in the childhood flashback from Trapped.[10]
Related chapters
- Left Behind: Its flashback provides the canon counterpart to the toy-car setup. Lucy meets Mike in preschool through his toys, and they reconnect in first grade.
- Trapped: Its flashback shows a neglected young Augustus caught shoplifting. After Alejandro invites him home, Augustus spends years running errands for the gang.
References
- ↑ Play Date, page 1 🔒 (members only)
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Play Date, page 2 🔒 (members only)
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Play Date, page 3 🔒 (members only)
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Play Date, page 4 🔒 (members only)
- ↑ Play Date, page 5 🔒 (members only)
- ↑ Chapter 40: Moving On, page 1
- ↑ Chapter 26: Left Behind, page 2
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 “Ask response on the Play Date teaser”. 2017-10-28.
- ↑ Chapter 26: Left Behind, page 3
- ↑ Chapter 86: Trapped, page 8