The Geek's Guide to Unrequited Love (15 page)

He looks at Scarface. “Okay. Are you going to show us, or do we need to have a pat-down?”

The guy sends one more angry look in my direction before reaching down and removing the sword from his pants. For a second, I'm actually scared he might run me through with it, before I realize that it is, in fact, plastic and that there are about a thousand witnesses.

“Okay, come with me,” the guard says to the guy, grabbing his arm. He turns to the booth girl. “Do you want to press charges?”

The girl nods emphatically.

“Okay, then follow me to the security office,” the guard says before looking at Amelia and me. “I don't think we'll need the two of you.”

He starts to lead Scarface away.

“Thank you,” the booth girl says to me with a big grin. “That was very important, expensive piece.”

I nod at her with a sheepish smile and then, realizing people are still staring, clear my throat and start to walk quickly away in the other direction.

“Wait. Here. Take this as thank-you.” She lifts something from around her neck and places it in my hand. It's a necklace made to look like three 8-bit heart containers in a row, the last heart only half full.

“Oh, that's not necessary . . . ,” I start.

But the booth girl merely grins. “You can give to your girl,” she says, before turning on her heels and running to catch up to the security guard.

From my side, I hear a gurgle of uncontrollable laughter.

I turn to see Amelia nearly doubled over from the giggles. “I cannot believe,” she manages between fits, “that you just stopped a thief . . . with a
Princess Bride
line.”

“It just . . . came out,” I say, laughing now too as we exit the Block. “I saw the scars on the side of his face and the goatee . . .”

“And the first thing you thought of was Count Rugen?”

“Um. Yes.”

She laughs loudly again. “I freakin' love it. You totally win the nerd card today. And not in a
Saved by the Bell
way.”

She's beaming at me, and I can't help but grin back.

Then she takes out her phone and looks at it. “Oh, man. I have to go. I know you probably think I'm a loner nerd and all, just tagging along
with you, but I am actually meeting some friends now before my next panel starts.”

“Oh, yeah. That's exactly the vibe that comes across with you,” I respond, in what I hope is clearly a sarcastic manner. “Loner nerd. Ready to tackle a thief who's twice her size at a moment's notice.”

Her smile gets wider. “Tackle? Maybe. But defeat with classic movie lines? That is
much
more impressive.” She puts her phone away. “Hey, do you want to come with? My friends are pretty awesome. Just like your group.”

“Oh, thanks!” I say. “But speaking of which, I actually should go find Roxana and Casey. You know, I can't be the douche who just bounces the second another shiny new nerd comes along.”

“Very noble,” Amelia says. “Can I get your number, then? Maybe we can meet up again later, or tomorrow?”

We exchange numbers and part ways. I immediately text Roxy to see where she is, but I get no response. Then I try Casey. Ten minutes later and still nothing, so I conclude that they're either at Artist Alley or one of the underground panel rooms, since cell reception is notoriously bad at both of those locales.

It takes me almost half an hour to find them, but finally, I spot Devin's perfectly coiffed hair atop his tall figure. And sure enough, Roxana is with him. Though I am relieved to see that Casey is too. Roxana is waiting in line for another artist, and Devin is flipping through her Althena sketchbook.

“This is awesome,” Devin is saying. “It's so clever to have one book dedicated to one character like this.”

“Thanks!” Roxana responds. “I have some really amazing ones in there. Oh, that's one of my faves you just passed, actually.”

I alert them all to my presence, and they say hello before continuing their conversation.

Fine
, I self–pep talk as I watch Devin point out some technical detail about one of Roxana's favorite sketches.
But none of this will matter once I get the Zinc page.

“So.” I turn to Casey quietly. “Do we have a deal?”

Casey sighs. “I've been thinking about this a lot. . . .” Of course he has. He's Casey Zucker. The man is one big walking brain. “And . . . okay, yes. But just so I have a totally clear conscience . . . are you sure about this, man? It's a lot of money.”

“I'm sure,” I say gleefully, and hold out my hand for a high five.

He eyes it suspiciously but doesn't bring his own hand up. “Fine. Then tell me who's ranked number one.”

“Felicia,” I say without hesitation, because I know Casey is a man of honor and wouldn't renege on the deal now.

“Goddamn it!” he immediately responds before looking back up at my hanging five in exasperation. “I should have guessed that” is his next remark. And then, “Why does she have to be so perfect? Seriously, how can I possibly exploit a weak spot in
her
?”

He's right, of course. “I'll help you figure it out,” I promise, though I
also currently have no brilliant ideas on that front either. He sighs but finally bestows on me a weak high five.

As one of Roxana's favorite fictional detectives would say, the game is afoot!

I get a ping on my phone and find a text from Amelia.

Dude. You must look at the trending topics on Twitter right now.

I open the app and scroll down the list of trending topics. I stop when I see #InigoMontoyaSmackdown.

Must be a coincidence,
I think.
It couldn't be . . .

But when I click on the topic, a series of tweets come up, most of them retweeting a video.

A video starring a tall, lanky redheaded kid screaming a
Princess Bride
line at one scary-looking dude right in the middle of NYCC.

“AGAIN. WE HAVE TO WATCH
it again,” Roxana says. They're crowded around my phone, replaying the now apparently viral video.

I groan. “How many times do you need to relive my humiliation?”

“Humiliation?” Roxana says to me, blinking. “This is awesome.”

“Really, dude. This is amazing,” Devin confirms.

“You, like, saved the day,” Roxy continues. “At
Comic Con
. If only you were wearing a cape.”

I offer her a half-smile. “Charlie Noth doesn't do capes.” In truth, I don't really know how to feel about the video. I mean, I am a little embarrassed, and the attention is bewildering. But it's also sort of cool. And
most of the tweets and comments on the video are about how great it is, not what a dork I am (though, of course, there is some of that, too. This is the Internet, after all).

Casey, of course, wants to know the logistics of how I came up with that line. The video is too far away to make out the guy's scars-and-goatee combo, so I have to explain how my mind seemed to automatically project the
Princess Bride
villain onto him.

“A study in visual association,” Casey concludes.

“Oh, hey. Here. Do you want this?” I take the pixel heart necklace out of my pocket and present it to Roxana—nonchalantly, as if it hasn't been burning a hole as soon as the booth girl told me it was for “my girl.” “Spoils of my victory,” I add.

Roxana takes a look into my palm. “Oh, wow. That is so cool,” she says as she fingers the three hearts sitting next to each other on the bronze chain.

I gently push my hand in her direction, nudging her to take it. “It's yours.”

“You sure?” she asks.

I smile at her. “I mean, I know it matches my hair and all, but I'm thinking you'll probably get more use out of it.” I'm making jokes to mask the fact that my own heart is beating faster. After all, presenting the girl you secretly love with jewelry—even plastic jewelry—is no everyday occurrence.

“Well, thanks! This is awesome.” She immediately clasps the chain
around her neck, and I know I'm beaming at it, feeling like the happiness of seeing Roxy wear the literal hearts I just gave her might actually have the magic power to fill that last heart container right up. My pulse almost drowns out Casey as he tells us he needs to go, to keep to his schedule.

Eventually, I calm down enough to remember that Roxana and I have a Breaking into Comics panel at three o'clock and, as a bonus, I signed us up for a special critique by the duo leading it: Morgan Donnelly and Brandon Park, who also happen to be two of our creative team idols.

I give her a heads-up on this around two thirty.

“Awesome!” is her first reaction, before she gets nervous about the critique. “Wait, what pages did you bring for them to see?”

Since I was originally planning the whole day as a surprise, I haven't told her about this part either, but I think I know Roxana well enough to be able to pick out the pages from
Misfits of Mage High
that show off both her best work and mine.

She looks at the five pages I chose and flips through her work, stopping a couple of times at a panel that shows Master Vollux transforming into a sloth. “Do you think the shading”—I sense she's about to look up at me, and I get prepared to tell her how awesome I think it is, but she turns to Devin to finish her question—“on this panel looks right?”

He tilts his head to examine it, while I simply grit my teeth to keep from popping a vein. It takes him what I think is an insultingly long time to finally say, “Definitely. I think this is pretty perfect work, Roxana.”

Roxana grins at him and then turns to give me the tail end of the same smile. “Okay! Let's do this.”

Needless to say, my mood is nowhere near as buoyant as before, as I realize Devin is, of course, tagging along with us and that he has, somehow, managed to mooch off some of the glory for this plan of mine. It's only then that I start to wonder if he doesn't have some sort of actual superpower: like the ability to charm the pants off impressionable girls who have a nerd streak.

We're pretty early to the panel and manage to snag good seats near the front. Devin and Roxana chitchat some more while I continue to silently brood, but as soon as the panel starts, we all give our undivided attention to Morgan, the writer, and Brandon, the artist, as they talk about the business end of getting a comic series published. They go over everything from polishing up a spec pilot issue to querying agents or publishers to setting up a website for yourself, and even some marketing tactics. They have a short Q&A session too, but the two of us are hurriedly jotting down notes and don't get to be among the three fans who ask them anything.

At the end, Morgan announces that if we are one of the thirty people who signed up for a free critique, we can come up and hand in our work now. The online sign-up was on a first-come, first-served basis, and I can't help but smile privately to myself as I see the jealous looks in some of the audience members' eyes while Roxana and I get in line.

“I'll wait for you guys by the door,” Devin needlessly promises, though
I'm relieved that he's not going to tag along to the critique, too.

Roxana and I are somewhere near the middle of the line when she insists on taking one more look at the pages.

“It's our best work, Roxy,” I say soothingly. “You know it is.”

She nods. “I know . . . it's just . . . maybe I could have done this differently.” She points to an expository panel showing the moonlit silhouette of the school. It's simple and beautiful. “Is it clichéd?” she asks.

“I think it's great, but, you know, the point of the critique is to get an expert's take on your work. So we can both keep improving,” I say gently.

She shakes her head and laughs. Before closing the folder, she says, “You're right. Of course.”

When we finally get to the front of the line, Morgan and Brandon shake our hands as we gush to them about how much we admire their work.

“Thanks, guys,” Morgan says. “And could you give me the title of this, whether it's part of a series, and a two-line synopsis?”

“Yes,” I say, having rehearsed this part since I read the instructions for the critique. “This is part of our series
The Misfits of Mage High
, about a group of student mages who seem to each be extra gifted with certain small powers but are remedial in general knowledge. Hilarity and hijinks ensue.”

Morgan smiles. “Sounds great.” He jots a note down in an appointment book along with our names and asks us if 12:45 tomorrow is still a good time for us to come back for the critique itself. “Brandon and I
will spend some time with the work overnight and then we'll have fifteen minutes tomorrow to discuss. Sound good?”

“Sounds excellent,” Roxana says, and we leave the table feeling pretty exhilarated at the thought that Donnelly and Park will actually be reading and discussing
our
work.

“There's a panel on
Parallel Moon
next,” I say hastily before we reach Devin and he can derail the plan I originally had for us.
Parallel Moon
is a new sci-fi show that Roxy and I have recently gotten into.

“Cool,” Roxana replies. “Who's going to be there?”

I name the three main actors and the showrunner.

“Let's do it,” she says, and then makes a beeline for Devin, who's been waiting for us at the side of the room. She of course immediately divulges our plan.

“Love that show,” Devin says. Offfff course he does. I'm starting to suspect he's making at least some of these interests up just to impress Roxy.

But then he chimes in with “The last episode was really great, wasn't it? Especially the subplot with Marina and the vortex. I feel like that's going to come back later.”