The Summer I Became a Nerd - By Leah Rae Miller Page 0,36
introduced us.” When I don’t immediately say anything, he fiddles with the zipper of his jacket and says, “Don’t worry, it’s only a game. We just have to pretend to be together.”
It’s a good thing I’m wearing blue paint because I can feel my cheeks heat up. I glance at his hands. He can’t stop fiddling with the zipper. When I try to make eye contact, he avoids looking at me. His zipper must be really awesome.
I nudge his arm with my elbow. “Okay. Gotta keep things believable, right?”
“Right. It’s all to make things as real as possible.”
His shoulders relax, and he lays his arm across the back of my chair. He fidgets a little more, his fingers drumming a rhythm on the back of my chair, then drops his arm back down to his side. It’s adorable, really. I scoot my chair closer to him and wrap my arm around his elbow, smiling up at him as coyly as I can while batting my super-long eyelashes. He laughs that honest laugh.
“Have you ever done this before? Had your character in a relationship?” I ask. “It seems like such a professional gamer thing to do.”
“I, uh—” His gaze darts to the group of dark fairies. He opens his mouth to continue, but the music stops. Everyone around us begins to move to surround the tree, but I can see someone trying to fight through the stream of people. That scary dark fairy has her evil eyes trained on Logan and me as she weaves through the crowd.
“Looks like things are about to get going. Let’s go see what Tommy, I mean, game master Sorenson has to say,” Logan says. He stands, and I follow him into the crush of people.
By the time everyone settles down, the evil fairy is nowhere in our vicinity. I relax slightly.
The Dumbledore wannabe from earlier climbs onto a coffee table that’s been placed in front of the tree. He holds his hands up for quiet, and I have to admit it’s pretty cool when everyone goes silent.
“Welcome to every one of you, new and old,” he says in a decent English accent. “I hope you’ve all come to Sanctuary tonight to have some civilized fun, because we have an interesting evening in store for you.” He ends with a flourish of his robe, and the crowd erupts into applause.
He drops the accent and says, “If you have Area Knowledge under your specialties, see game master Torrak.” He motions to one of Dan’s clansman. “That’s it, and remember the rules, folks.”
People spread out. Some dance to the music that has taken an upswing in tempo, but most form the same groups as before. Logan takes me with him to Torrak because he has the area knowledge thing. He says his character would tell my character everything he knows anyway so I might as well hear it straight from the dwarf’s mouth.
Torrak has spared no expense on his getup. His foot-long red beard looks freakishly real. The plate of armor covering his chest could have been picked up at the Lord of the Rings garage sale.
A sickly-looking vampire who smells like baby powder gets to Torrak first, so we hang back and wait our turn. I take the moment to do some more creature-watching, which turns out to be a bad idea. Everyone here seems so comfortable in their fake skins. It’s intimidating and wonderful, and I want to be just like them. But I keep thinking I don’t deserve to be here. If these people knew how ashamed I’ve been that I’m like them, they wouldn’t accept me. They’d dub me an imposter, a poseur. My gaze drifts to Logan’s face. It’s overly scrunched up in a worried look which makes me realize he’s mimicking my own expression. I force my brows to unknit and try to put on a relaxed smile.
He steps closer to me and takes my hand. Instead of a normal, friendly handhold, he laces his fingers between mine. I don’t know if it’s real or just my imagination, but the warmth that travels from our interlocked fingers, up my arm, and over my whole body makes all the tension in my muscles melt away.
Finally, the vampire leaves, and we step up. Torrak pounds his chest with a closed fist and says, “Ho, friends.” He tells us there have been some abnormal events going on in the city. Random human citizens have been committing crimes that just don’t fit with who they are.