I had told Cirrus that I liked her. Cirrus had said the same thing back. That had actually happened. I floated around my room like a happy heart-shaped balloon, which, if inverted, could also look like a pair of humongous buttocks, and that was absolutely hilarious!
Cirrus and me had just become we.
I held a paradise-pink flyer in my hands.
RUBY HIGH TALENT SHOW—AT THE
LEGENDARY MISS MAYHEM ON SUNSET STRIP
IN HOLLYWOOD, CALIFORNIA—
NO PRESSURE LOL
“We will rock you,” I said.
The cool comes later, replied the flyer, quoting Mr. Tweed.
I knew Jamal and Milo were not interested in getting the cool. I already had a fake version of it—but now I wanted the real.
I wanted to be that Other Me.
I wanted to play the show.
I wanted to be up on that stage, vamping with Gatsbian heroism. I wanted a new word to define my high school self, I decided. Not SHAME, but
COURAGE
I paced the room now, clearing a white plastic storage container at every eighth step.
Why have I lived in fear for so long? Why have I never fought back?
It’s not fair to expect people like us to retaliate against bullies like Gunner.
Then why didn’t I just change myself? Adapt to survive?
Hey! Why should we have to change?
I feel you—but look: We changed, didn’t we? And isn’t life already becoming more amazing because of it?
I guess.
Wouldn’t you like to see how much better things could get if we took things further?
. . .
You do!
Shut up. I do.
I spent the morning watching videos with great determination. Not LARPing videos, or maker videos, but live music performances. I watched with headphones on, under a blanket, because I did not want anyone to know what I was doing, which was researching.
I was researching how to be cool.
It was morning, and the texts from Jamal and Milo were already trickling in. I dismissed them all. I was busy.
As I watched, I became convinced of my hypothesis that music performance was a form of LARPing in itself. Rock performers, after all, hoisted their guitars like heavy axes; their screamsong was a kind of battle cry. Rappers swayed their arms and cast elaborate spells with cryptic finger gestures and fast rhymes. Pop stars danced love dramas, superstar DJs commanded their hordes via mass hypnosis, country crooners sold a pastiche of folktale simplicity long vanished.
There were videos on proper hair care techniques for voluminous headbanging flourishes. Videos explaining how to achieve primal screams safely by singing from the diaphragm. Videos showing the canonic list of metal stage moves: the power stance, the backswing, the pick flip, the agony of the floor solo.
I got out from under my blanket and unearthed a Gray outfit I’d hidden in a plastic container. I changed: black mesh zombie top, black wristbands, ripped jeans, Ring of Baphomet. I grasped an invisible mic stand, windmilled an arm, and raised devil horns to the sky—the rapturous satanic prayer of rock heroes throughout history.
How different was this melodramatic playacting from a role-playing game, or RPG for short, not to be confused with rocket-propelled grenade or rotary pulse generator?
It was cool, that was how.
Role-playing games were what you did when you were too scared to put yourself out there—and putting yourself out there was how the real cool was won.
I used to put myself out there in my own small way, back in the Arroyo Plato backyard of my youth. I was a paladin wielding a plunger, and my friends loved it. This was of course before I went into hiding with my dice and my hex graph notebooks.
I could put myself out there again.
I stopped at a sound—the doorbell, the front door, murmuring, and now two sets of footsteps hammering up the stairs.
My bedroom door opened to reveal Jamal and Milo. Jamal wore a shirt with a picture of a twenty-sided die and the words THIS IS HOW I ROLL. Milo’s shirt simply had the word NERD in large collegiate capital letters. These were their favorite shirts for the weekend, when they could let it all hang out safely and without fear of judgment.
“I think we might have something,” said Jamal, and brandished a stiff plastic tube about a meter in length.
Milo eyed my chest. “I can see your nipples.”
“No,” I said, and covered myself with an arm. “Can you?”
“Behold,” said Jamal. “Esmeralda’s Veil.”
Jamal clicked something, igniting a concealed smoke bomb. The smoke traveled through perforations lining the tube, which he waved about to create a wide white scarf. The room filled with acrid sulfur; in moments the smoke alarm began shrieking.
“Plus six missile weapon defense,” shouted Jamal.
“Turn it off,” I shouted back, reaching up to yank the detector from the wall.
“We haven’t figured out that part yet,” said Milo in the sudden silence.
“Help me open windows,” I said.
We shut the door, opened the windows, and waited for the smoke bomb to run out of fuel. It took a good thirty seconds. The smoke cleared. A little. Not really.
“You’re supposed to run ideas through the CREAPS checklist before actually building them,” I said, waving my hand.
“Sorry,” said Jamal. “We tried texting.”
“You’re the Idea Guy,” said Milo. “We can’t do this properly without you.”
“I was busy,” I said.
Jamal and Milo looked at me in my outrageous clothes. Then they looked at each other.
“I’d apologize for not making myself available,” I said. “But we kissed.”
“What?” said Jamal.
“Oh my god, Sunny!” cried Milo, and hugged me.
“That’s amazing,” said Jamal. He shrugged with resignation. “That’s really, really great. Me and Milo can go figure out an off switch for this thing ourselves, I guess, mumble mumble.”
Milo stopped Jamal with a hand. “Be happy. Sunny’s in love.”
“I’ll mention that to Lady Lashblade,” said Jamal, drooping now.
Milo held his hand firm. Jamal relented. “I’m happy for you.”
“Also,” I said with a deep breath, “I’m not going to pretend anymore.”
Jamal held his forehead with surprise. “You’re coming clean?”
“Listen,” I said.
“That’s the right thing to do,” said Milo. “Even if it risks forever driving Cirrus away and branding you in school legend and lore as the resident psychotic long after you’ve graduated and gone.”
“When I say I’m not going to pretend anymore,” I said, noting that my hands were held out in my trademark hear-me-out pose, “I mean we do the talent show.”
“Nooo—” said Jamal.
“We can absolutely rock the house, with just a little practice,” I said.
“—ooooo—” said Jamal.
“I think all of us could stand to break out of our shells and quit being such basket cases,” I said.
Jamal stopped in mid-O and peered at me. “Speak for yourself. I like my shell.”
“Me too,” said Milo. “I always thought basket case had a nice connotation, like a little bunny all cozied up in a wicker hamper.”
“Then do it for me,” I said, squeezing the air like it was a value-size bottle of mayonnaise. “Please.”
Jamal folded his arms. “This persuasion feels familiar.”
“Think of it as role-playing, but in real life,” I said. “I get to play the paladin, but in a way that is socially acceptable, nay, celebrated!”
Milo held his chin and winged Jamal with his elbow. “It’s an interesting way of looking at it.”
“You’re encouraging him,” cried Jamal.
“Milo the drummer: the warrior of the party,” I said. “Unrelenting strength and power.”
“Hurr, yeah,” said Milo with a grin.
“Dude,” cried an incredulous Jamal.
“Jamal, hear me out,” I said. “I see the bassist as a member of the rogue thief class. Stealthy. Dexterous. A little bit dangerous.”
Jamal brushed his fingers on his collarbone and batted his eyelids. “You really think I’m dangerous?”
“Really,” I said.
Jamal shooed his own hand away with disgust. “Ugh! Stop trying to convince me!”
Milo commented very quietly to himself, “He’s got me convinced.”
I waggled jazz hands. “Talent show! It’ll be so so fun!”
Milo nodded. Jamal folded his arms.
“But just the talent show,” said Jamal, as more of a question. “And then we go back to normal.”
I maintained my Idea Guy pose. “Yes! Maybe! See how you feel!”
Jamal relented with an eyeroll.
“You guys are amazing,” I said.
Jamal squeezed out a tongue-fart and held out Esmeralda’s Veil. “Can we get back to this now, please?”
“Absolutely, of course, wonderful,” I said.
But I never got to have a look at the thing, because from downstairs came the sound of a doorbell. I froze.
“Shh,” I said.
Voices. Murmuring. Then:
“Sunny!” yelled Mom.
“Whaaaat,” I lilted, eyeing Jamal and Milo with growing fear.
“Come say hi to Cirrus’s parents,” yelled Mom.
Strobes descended from the ceiling and bathed the room in battle station red.
“Gray’s room, go go go,” I said.
Jamal and Milo ran into each other, fell over a white storage container, and played hot potato with the doorknob before spilling out into the hallway.
“Why are we doing this?” said Jamal.
“Think, man,” said Milo.
Jamal thought for a tenth of a second. “Oh.”
“Close off that smell,” I hissed, and Jamal fumbled to seal shut the door to my room.
“Sunny?” said Mom from downstairs.
The three of us sock-stumbled our way into Gray’s room, where Jamal flapped his arms.
“Now what?” said Jamal.
I glanced at Jamal’s shirt, and then Milo’s.
THIS IS HOW I ROLL
NERD
I rummaged as fast as I could and held out two of Gray’s old tee shirts. “Put these on,” I whispered.
“I like my shirt,” said Jamal. “It’s the weekend.”
“Sometimes we do things for love,” hissed Milo.
I ripped off my zombie shirt—no one downstairs needed to see my nipples—and opted for one of Gray’s old skull pattern tees: something I could both wear to school or onstage.
I turned to exit. I gripped the doorjamb. “When I get back, just act like we’ve been here all morning.”
Jamal stripped off his shirt, revealing his shockingly skinny torso. “You owe us.”
“I know,” I said.
I spun into the hallway. I paused. I closed my eyes:
Get into character.
Normally, I would take a moment to consider all the ramifications of this thought. Get into character, meaning stash away your real persona to make room for the fake one.
But I didn’t have a moment to think, because now I could see Cirrus smiling up at me from the bottom of the stairs.