Twelfth Knight

9. Head Swap

The person at my front door is not Viola Reyes.

“Close your mouth,” she says. “You look ridiculous.”

(Okay, maybe it’s Vi after all.)

“What,” I begin somewhat belligerently, “are you wearing?”

It’s something that at first glance I can only describe as… glittery black armor. Well, there’s definitely some sort of iron breastplate involved, like what the knights wear in Twelfth Knight, only her chain mail is tiny and delicate, more like jewelry, with little stars blinking and catching the light. The actual armor portion cuts off around her ribs and then there’s some sheer paneling that skims the waistline of black leather leggings; on her feet are a pair of black combat boots embellished with studs, rhinestones, and more stars. She’s also wearing a lot more makeup—thick black eyeliner and dark lipstick with silver drawn on beside the corners of her eyes—and her black hair is pulled up high on her head, braided like a crown.

Just when I’m thinking she looks like she could pull a knife on me, she shifts, revealing the leather-wrapped handles of two daggers strapped to her legs: one to her left thigh, the other to her right ankle, sticking just out of her boot.

“Jesus,” I say, unable to manage much of anything else, and her eyes narrow.

“You can’t go like that,” she says.

I blink. “What?”

“You’re not in costume.”

“So?”

She gives me a sharp glance.

“Come on,” she says, and walks away.

There’s a moment—while I’m caught in a battle between my crutches and the keys to the door—where the glimpse of her lingers in my periphery, and as annoyed as I want to be about this situation, there’s something else I haven’t put into words yet. Obviously I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about Vi Reyes (not that much, anyway), but there’s a fraction of a second when the possibility flutters across my brain that I might actually respect her more than I dislike her. Sure, she’s a dick most of the time and she’s a headache to work with, but in a strange way, this outfit suits her.

No, not the outfit. The power, I guess. It’s broad daylight on my pristinely suburban street, but that doesn’t seem to bother her in the slightest. She walks like nobody’s going to stop her. Even I don’t walk like that, like I make no apologies for existing. My swagger is built on a foundation of adoration and envy. Hers is a flat-out refusal to let anyone tell her who to be.

I guess she must have figured out that bending to other people’s opinions didn’t do much for her, which is the opposite of my approach. I wonder which of us is better off for that.

“Stop gaping, Orsino,” she says over her shoulder, unlocking her car and dropping into the driver’s seat while I linger helplessly at the edge of the curb.

Before Olivia called me this morning, I’d been really looking forward to today. An hour-long car ride with Olivia was not only sixty times longer than any conversation I’ve had with her in weeks, it was also the convenient brokerage of an entire day’s worth of progress. The fact that I was still on crutches? Unimportant. The fact that it was MagiCon, which is by all accounts a festive gathering for dweebs? Irrelevant. I thought it was my chance to regain a little of what I’ve lost—right up until Olivia coughed at me that not only was she no longer going (gutting enough on its own), I was on the hook for a full day’s volunteer hours, per the contract that Past Me very optimistically signed, and thanks to my still-injured knee, I also had to catch a ride with someone else.

A wide-awake nightmare of a person, it turns out. And embarrassingly, it’s occurring to me that I can’t figure out how to get into the car without asking said nightmare for help.

I reach carefully for the passenger door, trying to maintain my balance without toppling into the gutter, but then, quick as a flash, Vi is out of the car and at my elbow. “I’m fine,” I grunt to her, which she ignores. She puts her shoulder under my arm, firmly but not forcefully, and I take it because why not? This day is already slipping out from under me. Why not my legs, too?

When I’m seated, she takes the crutches and slides them into her back seat.

“We’re going to my house first,” she says when she resumes her place in the driver’s seat. “We’ll still make it as long as we get on the road in twenty minutes.”

“What? But you said—”

“Yes, I know what I said. But the point of making sure you were on time was to allow for any necessary delays.”

“And is this necessary?” I demand.

She looks at me for a second, then purses her lips.

“Yes,” she says, and starts the car, dutifully tapping her turn signal despite the street being empty. (So much for neighborhood watch, right? It’s a wasteland on an early Saturday morning as a fully weaponized villainess steals me away.)

We drive for about two seconds before my confusion outweighs my preference for silence. “What are you?”

“Who,” she corrects me. “Who am I.”

“Fine. Who are you?”

“Astrea Starscream. Assassin.”

“From… a comic book, or…?”

“Original character.”

“Wait,” I say, and she glances at me, a flicker of something—annoyance? Dread?—appearing briefly on her face. “You made this? From nothing? Like, no copying a character or anything, you just… made this up? Originally?”

She opens her mouth.

Closes it.

“I obviously have an idea what the character looks like,” she says in a hard-toned voice. “She has a full backstory. And her wardrobe is part of who she is.”

“Are those real knives?”

Her mouth twists. “No.” She pauses. “Seriously?” she adds, but it doesn’t sound vicious, like usual. She sounds like she’s making fun of me.

“It’s not like I know the rules,” I grumble.

“You think the convention center is going to be cool with me taking actual weapons inside?” she asks, using her are-you-literally-the-dumbest-boy-in-school voice, which is totally undeserved.

“I’ve never been! How am I supposed to know?”

“What made you want to go to this, anyway?” she demands—and aha, do I detect a hint of curiosity in her voice? I think she’s been wanting to ask me that all morning.

“Can’t a guy be curious how the geekier half lives?” I reply musically, knowing it’ll irritate her not to get a real answer.

She shoots a glare at me. “I assume this is about Olivia—”

“Well, you know what they say about assumptions—”

“—which means you must be miserable about this outcome,” she comments over me.

“No more miserable than you,” I reply.

“Me? I’m thrilled. I love MagiCon.”

Ha. Liar. “That may be true, but you don’t want to spend the day with me any more than I want to spend it with you.”

“I won’t spend the day with you, Orsino. I’ll dump you on some volunteer coordinator and have a wonderful time by myself.”

I know this is my opening to say something clever, or something about how I, too, would rather be surgically attached to a complete stranger than spend the entire day with her, but instead there’s a tiny lump in my throat. A whole day alone, with no one I know?

I’m not good at being alone. And contrary to whatever Vi thinks, being charming takes a lot of energy that I don’t currently have. Wish I’d just stayed home.

By the time I realize I haven’t snarked back, Vi’s talking again.

“It’s for ConQuest,” she says. “This character. She’s my ConQuest character.”

I nod silently.

“I kind of assumed you were going to make fun of me for that,” she adds.

I’m not surprised she thinks so. She always thinks the worst of me, but if she paid any attention at all, she’d realize that I can’t afford to make people hate me. And that includes making fun of them, even if I do secretly think ConQuest sounds like an extremely weird way to spend your time. Isn’t it essentially make-believe?

Which,a small voice in my head reminds me, is what computer games are, too.

“There’s still a whole day left,” I say casually. “Can’t just waste all my heckling in the car. Have to warm up to it.”

“Thanks,” she mutters, but I think she knows I’m not going to. Somehow, the stiffness between us melts just a little.

Just a bit.

“Are you sure I don’t look stupid?” I ask, shifting to get a better look at myself in her bathroom mirror.

“Of course you look stupid. But there’s no changing that,” she replies, adjusting my… tunic. It’s her brother’s Renaissance Faire costume, which is interesting. And weird. I feel more than a moment’s awkwardness about being in Cesario’s house, given how insistent he is about privacy, but apparently Bash is busy with some band-related thing. It’s very strange to think that this is where he plays Twelfth Knight, because nothing about his room seems like the kind of place for someone who loves fantasy TV shows or combat games. There’s just scripts and sheet music littering the desk, to the point where I don’t even see a laptop.

Anyway, I’m wearing “hose” and a “tunic” and I have a “shield” and it’s all extremely dumb, but Vi insists she’s not letting me back in her car unless I wear a costume.

“Do they seriously not let you in if you don’t have one?” I demand.

“Oh, they’ll let you in. But the ride isn’t free.”

“Ah,” I realized glumly. “You’re trying to embarrass me.”

“Embarrass you? No.” Liar. Her starry eyes are laughing. “But if you’re going to experience this, you’ve got to do the whole thing. Costume included.”

Everything’s a little short on me, so she bends down and lets out some of the seams, adjusting so it fits. It’s amazing how quickly she can do this.

“Hm?” she asks, pins in her mouth, and I realize I said it aloud.

“Nothing.”

“Mm.” She stands up, scrutinizing her work. “Want a sword?”

“Seriously?”

“Fake sword. Sheathed.” She rolls her eyes.

“No, I mean—” Duh I want a sword. What’s the point of a costume like this if it doesn’t involve a sword? “Yeah, sure, sword works.”

“One sec.” She disappears, and though I expect her to go back into Bash’s room, she opens a door farther down the hall and slips inside, shutting it hastily behind her. I peer into the hallway, leaning as far as I can on one leg to see if I can catch a glimpse.

I’m assuming it’s her bedroom.

She reemerges in a whirl of black leather and shuts the door so quickly that I don’t see anything but a darkened cavern. “Here,” she says, strapping the sword around my waist so perfunctorily that I don’t think either of us notices she’s manhandling my hips. “Now you’ll at least pass as a knight or something, so—”

“Arthur,” I say.

“What?” She blinks up at me.

“Arthur. He’s a king. Better than a knight.”

“Oh. True.” She clears her throat. “But that’s not really, you know, con-related… unless you count the game.”

“Game?” I echo. I guess part of me is curious whether she knows what her brother is up to at night, or if Cesario (Bash) keeps a secret from his own twin.

Her reply is a shrug. “Twelfth Knight. It’s kind of a big deal at the con.”

Oh. That’s something I might want to see. “Is it?” I ask casually.

“I’m not a gamer,” she says evasively, which I figured. In my experience, girls aren’t fans of violent video games; Olivia would probably be repulsed if she knew how I spent my free time these days.

“Right, yeah.” I cough. “Does your brother have a crown, or…?”

“God.” She rolls her eyes. “He’s been like four different Shakespearean kings. He’s got a museum of crowns.”

“Should we go look, or—?”

“No, I’ll grab one. You get started down the stairs.”

Ah, I was hoping to look around for more evidence of Bash’s secret life. “But—”

“We’re going to be late, Orsino!” she barks like a drill sergeant. “Move it or lose it.”

Good ol’ Vi Reyes. “Good talk, chief,” I reply with a salute.

“Oh my god,” she informs me, pivoting away while I hide a laugh.

I didn’t believe Nick when he said this thing was huge. I mean, I believed him—I’ve seen the stuff on the news about it—but even before we reach the convention center there are people wandering the streets of San Francisco in every costume you could possibly think of. Superman is standing in line at Starbucks behind someone with a press badge and a pair of Yoda ears. Three Zelda-looking dudes walk over from one of the parking garages. It feels like every other person is holding a lightsaber. I thought people would stare at me—certainly at Vi—but there’s no staring going on at all. People are looking, but they’re doing it appreciatively, or waving to us like we’re friends. Initially I assume Vi knows them, since she seems to know her way around the area, but then someone comes up to her that’s clearly a stranger.

“I hope this isn’t weird, but can you tell me who you’re dressed as?” asks a twenty-something girl dressed as some kind of haunted Victorian doll. “I love those boots.”

“Oh, I’m an OC,” says Vi, “and thanks, they took ages.”

“I bet,” the girl gushes. “Can I take a picture with you?”

“Oh sure, yes.” Vi’s cheeks flush a little and I realize she’s… excited. Which is fair, because if that outfit took as long as it looks like it did, I’m sure she’s happy someone noticed.

Which makes me realize that I don’t see Vi looking happy very often.

Which also makes me realize that I don’t see Vi getting noticed very much.

“Want me to take it?” I offer, startling Vi into remembering I’m standing next to her.

“Oh, sure, that’s—”

“I’d love one as well,” comes another voice. “Original character, you said? ConQuest?”

“Yeah,” Vi exhales, looking giddy and trying to hide it. “Astrea Starscream.”

“Great name,” says the first girl. The other, I realize, is wearing a press badge that says the name of some website: MonstressMag.com.

“Can you both sign this release?” asks the photographer, and I realize with a little thrill of secondhand excitement that Vi’s going to end up in a blog or a magazine or something.

Vi and the other girl scribble their signatures electronically and then pose. Neither of them smile; instead they assume different stances that must represent their characters. I’m impressed, and also elated that I’m not part of this.

“Thanks, girls! Check out our coverage this afternoon.” The journalist or photographer smiles and is gone, ready to snap pictures of other people, and the haunted doll blows Vi a kiss.

“Have fun today! You guys are adorable together,” she tells us, and though Vi and I both start to protest, she’s already gone.

“Well.” Vi falls into step beside me again. “That was weird.”

Oh, she’s glowing. It’s hilarious and kind of cute, though I don’t know where to put that observation. It’s not a thought I’ve ever had about Vi, or that anyone in history has ever had about Vi, to my knowledge. “Have you ever been stopped like that before?”

“A couple times, yeah. But usually only when I’m dressed as a recognizable character.” She’s pink-cheeked and winded. “That was weird.”

“It was awesome,” I tell her, because it was. “That was really, really cool. Was that a blog?”

“Monstress Mag? Yeah, it’s a pop culture blog.” She’s practically skipping with joy. “I love it, I read it all the time. I’ve tried submitting things before—”

“Yeah?”

“Just a review of—” She clears her throat. “This show. And a blog post. Like, an opinion post about…” She trails off and swallows. “Anyway, it’s not a big deal.”

“Kind of seems like it is,” I observe, and she breaks out in a broad smile.

“It totally is,” she half shouts, and I can’t help a laugh. “God, that felt great. I’m sure you think it’s stupid, but—”

“Not stupid.” I shake my head, but then I can’t resist the opportunity to tease her. “You know, unlike you,” I add loftily, “I don’t make fun of other people’s hobbies.”

“Whose hobbies do I make fun of?” she demands.

“Uh, I believe your exact words were ‘jock cult’?”

She rolls her eyes. “Oh come on, the sportballs are asking for it.”

“Would you stop—”

We argue until we have to flash our volunteer badges, and then Vi herds me over to the central station. “We’re the second shift. Kind of a prime spot,” she informs me, “so you’re welcome. Setup isn’t nearly as fun.”

“Why didn’t Antonia want to come to this?” I ask, and Vi falters.

“What?”

“Well, I just assumed that since I took her spot—”

“Assuming again,” she says, a little more snippily than our earlier tone of banter. “I’m not in charge of her. I have no idea what she’s doing instead.”

“Oh, I just thought—” I shake my head. “Sorry. Never mind.”

She opens her mouth, maybe to retort again, but softens.

Softens? No way. Vi Reyes doesn’t soften. But she doesn’t say anything back, instead leading me over to one of the volunteers in her typical bossy way, parting the crowd so easily I have to be grateful. Dressed like this and acting like that, she certainly knows how to get people to make room for a guy on crutches, even if she’s not doing it specifically for me. Or even on purpose.

“Hey, Megha,” she says to the person who must be in charge. She’s dressed as something I sense I should recognize but don’t. “Got something for me?”

Megha directs her to another person, much younger, and because I don’t know what else to do, I follow.

“Can you put us somewhere central?” Vi’s asking when I reach her side. “It’s his first time.”

Us. So she’s not going to leave me.

I let out a small, internal sigh of relief.

“Aw, I love a virgin,” says the other volunteer, Stacey, who I think is dressed as the princess from the movie Empire Lost. (I’ve only seen it once, at my mom’s insistence. My dad was kind of interested when they cast a Black actor as the lead for one of the spin-offs, but as usual, that storyline got tossed aside for the two white leads.) “Sure, as long as you’re up for the usual?”

“Law and order?” Vi guesses with a smirk.

“You bet.” Stacey glances at me. “Sorry about the mix-up, by the way.”

I don’t know what she’s talking about, but Vi waves her concern away. “It’s nothing.”

“Better he’s not a runner anyway,” Stacey adds. “Bum knee?” she asks me.

“Yeah.” Sure, let’s go with that.

“Oof, been there. We’ll make sure you’re somewhere easy. Though—” She leans in. “If you want me to move you, just let me know. Xavier’s here.”

Vi’s eyes blow wide. “What? You’re joking.”

“Who’s Xavier?” I ask.

Apparently this is such a big deal that Vi doesn’t waste time with disdain at my ignorance. “Jeremy Xavier. He wrote War of Thorns.”

“Oh, no way,” I say, and the next words fall out of my mouth unbidden: “I love that show.”

“Me too.” Luckily Vi’s too enthralled to notice. “God, that’s tempting.”

“I can move you,” Stacey sings, teasingly hovering her pen tip over the page, but Vi looks at me, then shakes her head.

“It’s okay. I’ll have time to wait in line later.”

“You sure?”

She nods. “Just put us in the middle of the floor so he can see.”

“You got it, babe. Mwah,” says Stacey, air-kissing Vi until she leads me again to our new location.

“You didn’t have to do that,” I say, trying to keep up with her. She walks fast, purposefully, though she slows down once I catch her.

“You’d be useless as a runner. I’d end up doing your job for you, like always.”

“Ha, ha,” I drawl. “But really, you could’ve done it without me. He seems like he’s a big deal.”

“Nah. Never meet your heroes.”

“Seriously?”

“People are always disappointing in real life.” She shrugs. “They never live up to what you want them to be. This way, he’ll always be interesting.”

At first I think she’s making excuses, but then I realize she really believes that. I don’t have time to say anything, though, because she’s pointing things out to me.

“Those are the rooms where they have guest speakers and stuff. There’s some really cool ones this afternoon—there’s one with a graphic novel editor who publishes all the best stuff out there. She’s amazing.” It’s a tiny room with a long line. “That’s the room where the ConQuest exhibition will be, if you want to catch a live game.” A larger room with a longer line. “That’s the artist alley, and over there’s the gallery.” That’s massive, easily the biggest room here, nearly the size of a stadium with bright lights and a wave of sound. “That’s where the gamers are.” She glances at me. “We can check it out, if you want. Just to see. Pointless not to go look, right?”

“Right.” The gallery does look exciting; it seems like all the film companies and game companies have enormous stalls, each one transformed from a basic cubicle-style area to manufactured versions of their movie sets and game worlds.

“Well,” I say, “listen, I appreciate… this.”

“Hm?”

“You showing me around and stuff, I appreciate it.” It’s loud, so I don’t think she hears me, but by then we’ve reached whatever it was Vi was aiming for, which seems to be the head of yet another extremely long line.

“Hey,” Vi says, tapping the person taking tickets at the front of the line. “We’re here to relieve you.”

“Oh, thank god,” says the other volunteer, a small dude dressed as Ironman who looks more frantic than Ironman probably should.

“That bad?” Vi asks playfully, and Ironman’s gaze flicks to someone in line before hastily returning.

“Well, I wouldn’t say bad—”

“You never do,” Vi assures him, adding with a nod to me, “Can we get a chair?”

“Sure, have this one,” offers someone, setting it up for me without needing to be asked. (There’s something about being here that’s so bizarrely welcoming.)

“Oh,” I attempt, “you don’t have t—”

“Shut up and sit down,” Vi advises, taking an eagle-eyed spot next to me. “Okay, next?” she barks to the line.

An older guy, possibly in his thirties, wearing a bow and arrow and elf ears, storms up to her in a way that immediately explains Ironman’s twitchiness. “I have been waiting here for three hours,” he says without preamble, “unlike those girls—” He jerks his head to a few neon-haired con attendees, most of whom look as giddy as I felt when I first arrived. Before we can brace for whatever inevitably comes next, Vi interrupts him.

“I see,” she says. “Is there a problem with your ticket?”

The lanyard around his neck is littered with pins from previous cons, so I take it he expects to be treated a certain way for being a real fan, not unlike some NFL attendees. “No, but—”

“This is ticket support,” Vi says, pointing over her head to a sign that I’m assuming says Ticket Support. “So, do you have a ticket-related question?”

“Listen, I know my way around this con, okay? And if that’s the kind of group who gets priority in the queuing system—”

“Sounds to me like an issue for queuing support,” Vi says coolly. “But your displeasure is noted.”

The man (elf) stares at her.

“Bitch,” he says, and turns away. Part of me wonders if I should say something, but the word just bounces off Vi, or seems to.

“What?” she says, catching me looking at her. “Gonna tell me to be nicer?”

I know I shouldn’t, but… “It might help.”

“Ha.” The sound is hollow. “Yeah. I bet.”

On further consideration, I think maybe I should just shut up. Something tells me that guy would have felt he had a right to call Vi a bitch whether she’d been nice to him or not.

“Your way does seem a lot more efficient,” I admit.

She slides a glance to me, surprised. Her eyes get Disney Princess big, and all of a sudden she looks younger. Grateful.

“Well, it’s not always like that,” she informs me gruffly. “Most people are friendly. It’s just… the occasional tantrum.” Which, by the looks of the much calmer conversations around us, people are more than willing to hand off to her.

“And this is a good job?”

“Centrally located,” she reminds me, gesturing to our view of the convention center. “And someone will relieve us soon.” She glances at me. “Gonna have trouble with people hating you?”

There’s a whole subset of people who do that on sight. But I know what she means.

“Trouble? Nah,” I say, gesturing to some dude in a barbarian cloak who’s almost definitely going to yell at me. “Come on, Viola, you know that’s not my style.”

In a lot of ways, conventions are like Disneyland: the happiest place on earth. By and large, everyone is friendly, accepting, and smiling, including me. But lest you forget that the antis on Reddit are also likely to attend a con, there’s the support line. It’s a nice reminder that while the internet allows a convenient cover of anonymity, it doesn’t change the fact that some people just are what they are.

When it comes to that special genre of buzzkills, Antonia and I made a great team. I played bad cop, of course, reminding the bully in question that he’s not actually king of the world, and then Antonia brought it home with an apology so impossibly earnest he’d wind up flustered, torn between glaring at me and staring at her in confusion.

Jack Orsino has a slightly different approach.

“I don’t understand why you can’t just make this go faster,” says someone in a ConQuest T-shirt. It says CHOOSE YOUR WEAPON, followed by the images of several different dice, and I loathe that I want it. “You people are exactly the problem,” the dice guy adds under his breath, which is funny, because I was just thinking he’s the exact kind of con-goer who thinks that Jack and I are here to steal something that rightfully belongs to him.

Never mind that I’ve been in fandom for, oh, only my whole life or whatever. And even if Jack is new to it, that doesn’t mean he should get shut out.

“Wait, is the line slow?” asks Jack, with a look so incredibly vacuous I have to actively work at not laughing.

Don’t get me wrong—most people I’m happy to help. But others…

“Yes,” says Dice Guy, getting red-faced. “We’ve been waiting for over an hour!”

“Oh my god, an hour?” Jack echoes, again with palpable concern.

“Listen,” Dice Guy says angrily, “that’s not funny—”

“I agree,” Jack cuts in, turning to me. “Do you think it’s funny, Vi?”

“Did he say he’s been waiting for forty-five minutes, Jack?” I reply.

“No, Vi. An hour,” Jack tells me solemnly.

“An hour?”

“An hour,” Jack repeats.

“A whole hour?” I say, aghast.

“This is seriously messed up,” Dice Guy interrupts with a growl.

“I agree,” I reply. I’m not sure what our approach technically is—it’s not good cop/bad cop so much as let’s see who can be more annoying—but it’s certainly making the time go faster.

“I’d like to speak to your manager,” Dice Guy informs me.

“Me too,” says Jack with his usual sport-star grin. “I’m thirsty.”

“When you speak to our manager, please inform them that Jack would like a Pellegrino,” I tell Dice Guy, whose cheeks flare again.

“Listen, you little—”

“I am not especially picky,” I assure him. “Tap water will be fine.”

“Show-off,” says Jack, sending Dice Guy off in a huff before the universe rewards us with the sweetest seventy-two-year-old Empire Lost fan the world’s ever seen. (Her barcode got messed up by her new baby grandson, named after the hero of the franchise.)

After pledging my life to my new idol, Maura, who started a fanzine at her high school back before social media fandom was a twinkle in Mark Zuckerberg’s eye, there’s only a handful of difficult cases, and then it’s finally our turn to venture out into the con.

“So, what do we do now?” Jack says, reaching for his crutches. I can see on his face how much he hates using them; I don’t blame him. I do a lot of waiting around for him, which I try not to make obvious. People think I walk too fast, but in my defense, I have to. My mom says the best way to avoid being a convenient target for anyone with nefarious intent is to always seem like I have somewhere to be. (Super fun how she had to teach me that, but not Bash.)

“Well, I’d like to pop in on the ConQuest game,” I say. “And I told you we could check out the gaming expo.”

“Right,” Jack says. I can tell he’s dying to see the Twelfth Knight booth, which makes sense because I am, too. Not that I can let him know that.

“If you’re hungry—”

But then I cut myself off, noticing someone in the crowd.

“Honestly, I think I ate about ten of those mini-bags of Doritos,” Jack answers, and frowns at me. “What?”

“It’s Cesario,” I say without thinking, and Jack immediately looks in the wrong direction.

“Actual Cesario?”

“What? No, Jack—” Honestly. “No, of course not. But it’s a really good costume,” I say, aiming him in the direction of the oncoming Cesario cosplayer just before he passes by. It’s an astonishingly good replica of Cesario’s winter clothing, complete with multiple kinds of fake fur and all the leather armor and everything. It would have taken forever, and it has to be from scratch.

I’m openly staring when I realize Jack is saying something again. “Can we get a picture? I mean—is that, like, allowed?”

I glance at his face in time to catch it faltering. “Because if you want one,” Jack clarifies, “I can take one for you—”

Oh my god. It’d almost be cute how excited he’s trying not to be. If he weren’t Jack Orsino, that is, and therefore not cute at all. “Come on,” I say, darting into the aisle to catch Cesario before he walks by.

“So sorry,” I say, a little breathless when I reach him. I know I’m fangirling, but come on. I know from experience that the whole point of putting in this much effort is so that other people will appreciate it. “Would you mind taking a picture with me and my friend?”

Fake-Cesario is good-natured, a total himbo. “Sure! What are you?”

“I’m my ConQuest OC, Astrea Starscream, and he’s—”

“Oh, no way? King Arthur,” Cesario says to Jack, bowing before him. “My liege. Sorry to see you took a war wound.”

Jack smiles back, composed and no longer hilariously starstruck. I forgot how easily he takes to being the center of attention, though today is the first time I realized the extent of how his Duke Orsino persona is less real than I thought. “That costume looks awesome.”

“Are you both fans of War of Thorns?” Cesario asks. I hand my phone off to someone else in his group that offers to take it, but then another photographer—this one a MagiCon media person—hops in to grab a shot.

“Yeah, we love it,” I say, blithely forgetting whether this version of me knows that or not. There’s a bustle of activity, though, so nobody’s paying attention; we pose for the shot, Cesario’s hand very carefully hovering over my waist without touching it, and then Cesario’s friend hands me back my phone.

“Check out our official blog!” chirps the MagiCon guy before disappearing.

“Enjoy the con,” Cesario adds, nodding to Jack and me before continuing on his way.

“Damn,” Jack says, sidling up to me as I glance down at my screen to look at the picture. “He even walks like Cesario, it’s uncanny—”

“Oh hey, you posed,” I say, noticing that rather than smile, Jack put a hand on his fake sword, looking cool as a cucumber next to Cesario himself. I didn’t realize how close in height the two of them would be, but Jack looks almost as impressive. Minus the impromptu costume, but at least he got into character.

“Well, duh. Even I know smiling would be the dorky thing to do.” He glances at me, and I think for a second that it’s incredible how quickly Jack can figure out the right move in any situation. No wonder this whole injury-plus-Olivia thing threw him for an existential loop.

Which is definitely something I shouldn’t know. For a moment I feel a wave of guilt, like I’ve done something awful. It occurs to me that Jack’s an actual person who deserves better than a lie, which is ultimately what I’m doing, even if it’s a harmless one. Or meant to be harmless, before he confessed his life and problems to someone he thought was a friend but was actually just me, a person he doesn’t even like.

Shame curdles temporarily on my tongue, but it’s not like telling him the truth would do either of us any good. Besides, it won’t happen again. He had a bad day, that’s all, and so did I. It’s not worth jeopardizing my identity over.

(A small voice reminds me that Jack probably wouldn’t tell anyone my secret if I told him the truth, but that’s easily silenced when I remember everything that Antonia chose over me. I thought I could trust her and I was wrong. What do I really know about Jack?)

“Congratulations on not embarrassing me,” I tell him, safely recovered from my momentary crisis of conscience. “Much appreciated.”

“Hey, I do what I can, Viola.” His gaze drifts hungrily out to the expo. “So, should we…?”

“Oh my god, just admit it,” I groan. “You’re dying to see the game demos, aren’t you?”

“Wait, they demo it? In front of everyone?” He looks awestruck.

“Uh, yeah, of course. That’s how they sell it.”

“They get people to play it? Like, good players?”

“Again, that’s how they sell it, Jack—”

He’s already rocketing off on his crutches, and I have to fight a laugh.

“Okay, okay,” I sigh to myself, before realizing I’m smiling.

So obviously I wipe it off my face before reminding him not to look like such a noob.

By the time we get back in my car, we’re both exhausted. I have to sit there for a couple of minutes just to relieve the pressure on my feet. (The first rule of MagiCon is to wear comfortable shoes, but even that only goes so far after a whole day of wandering around.)

“So everyone who plays ConQuest makes up their own characters?” Jack says. He’s been asking me questions like that all day.

“There are specific game characters you can get assigned,” I reply, massaging out my neck, “but yeah, mostly everyone makes their own.”

“It’s so wild how talented people are,” Jack says. “The voices and stuff.”

He means the QuestMaster who organized the live game. “Yeah, that guy’s awesome.”

Jack nods, adding tangentially, “Jeremy Xavier isn’t what I expected, though.”

“Hm?” I’m fiddling with my phone, trying to pick out a playlist.

“Jeremy Xavier, the War of Thorns author.” We managed to listen to him when he was a surprise guest on a panel about worldbuilding, which Jack did not want to go to. By the end, though, I think he was more into it than I was.

“Well, he’s, like, a millionaire now,” I remind him. “Even if he used to be a dork playing ConQuest in his mom’s basement, he probably doesn’t look like that anymore.”

“No, I know.” Jack laughs. “I just thought he was surprising.”

“You should really read the books.”

“Yeah, I think I might.” He clears his throat. “If I have time, I mean,” he says quickly, without looking at me. “I’ll be off crutches soon and probably ready to play again, so I’ll be going back to practice and stuff in a few weeks.”

Cesario knows that what Jack just said is a lie, and Jack seems to know that, too, but I’m not Cesario in this situation. I’m just me, and Vi Reyes isn’t exactly the kind of person Jack Orsino wants to have an honest conversation with.

Still, it doesn’t seem right to just blindly agree with him. That’s not very Vi Reyes, either.

“You know,” I attempt slowly, “you’re good at stuff besides football.”

“Yeah?” He cuts me an arrogant smirk. “Glad you finally noticed.”

“Seriously?” How quickly good intentions backfire. “Shut up or I won’t drive you home.”

“You’d just leave me here?” he says, feigning devastation.

“Stop. I’m just trying to tell you that maybe you shouldn’t hang your whole future on football, okay? I’m no anatomy expert,” I add, “but it seems like you don’t screw up your knee and get right back on the field. Didn’t you have surgery?”

Of course he deflects. “Keeping up with the rumor mill, Viola?”

“Don’t make me tell you to shut up again. And it’s none of my business what you do or don’t do,” I point out, turning the car on. “I’m just saying that maybe you need to accept that some things are out of your control. Like the fact that your knee hurts.”

“It doesn’t hurt.”

I glance skeptically at him before checking over my shoulder to reverse.

“Well, whatever,” Jack sighs. “But greatness is pain, right?”

“No. Pain is just pain, and it’s there for a reason.” I back up, then put the car in drive. “Personally, I don’t think there’s only one outcome for life,” I add, and when he says nothing, I continue, “I mean, I don’t think there’s a predestined fate or anything. You’re not born to play football. There’s a version of your life where you do other things. Infinite versions. And when you make a choice, you cast off one possible outcome, but then, I don’t know—ten more pop up in its place. And you just keep going like that, choosing a path and watching new paths branch off in front of you. Even if the old ones disappear behind you, it doesn’t have to be sad,” I say with a shrug, though of course I feel a little pang in my chest, like it’s Antonia I can see in my rearview.

Jack is quiet for a few more minutes, so I get us from the parking garage to the street, turning on my GPS to lead us to the freeway.

Eventually I assume he’s asleep, but then he interrupts the sound of Elvis Costello crooning to Veronica. “What if I don’t see any other paths?”

I sigh. “It’s just a metaphor, Orsino. We’re teenagers. We don’t know what comes next.”

“I know, but—” He stops. “What if I just see nothing?”

Somehow I can tell that what he’s really asking is what if he is nothing, but the idea that Jack Orsino—Duke Orsino, who so many people like and respect—would think he doesn’t matter is so painfully unfunny I want to laugh until my throat falls out.

Or maybe cry.

“Then make something.” I think my voice is harder than it needs to be. “Don’t you understand how good you are at just, like, existing?”

“What?” He looks amused, which makes me want to shake him. Or to make him swap places with me so he can see what I see and quit whining.

“I know you think I’m a bitch, Jack,” I say irritably, “but it’s because I already understand that most people aren’t going to like me. I already get that I’m not for everyone, but—”

“I don’t think you’re a bitch.”

I shake him off. “Whatever, of course you do. I’m just saying—”

“Viola, you are not a bitch.” He looks at me. “Or, like, you are,” he corrects himself, and I roll my eyes. “But it doesn’t mean what other people think it means.”

“Pretty sure the whole world is clear on what it means, Orsino.” I’m the kind of girl that other people want to make suffer because I refuse to be as small as they want me to be. I know that, and I don’t take it personally. If other people think I’m a bitch, that’s fine. I don’t need to be loved. I don’t need to be liked. I don’t need anyone, and that’s the gospel truth.

I don’t know why I’m not saying any of that out loud, but after a couple of minutes Jack twists in his seat, staring at me from the passenger side before shifting his attention to his injured knee.

“If you were me,” he says, “you’d have come up with a million other solutions by now. You wouldn’t just sit around waiting for life to happen to you.”

“And if you were me,” I retort gruffly, “you’d be going to MagiCon with your best friend instead of driving back with someone who can barely stand you.”

We sit in silence a few minutes longer, the lights of the freeway rushing by. In the wordless quiet, Jack’s phone screen lights up, and he glances down.

“I texted my brother the picture we took with Cesario,” he says, “and he asked me if I have a concussion.”

It’s such a random comment that I snort in response, which snowballs into something that’s a full-on uproar of giggles, and I can tell that Jack is laughing just as hard. We’re sitting there, driving, not talking, trying our best not to howl hysterically at something that’s not even very funny—except, somehow, it is. Because the idea that I just went to MagiCon with Jack Orsino and took a picture with some dude dressed up as a fantasy outlaw prince can’t possibly be funny, but it is. It really, really is.

My stomach hurts by the time I regain my sanity, wiping away moisture from the corners of my eyes while Jack pulls at his smile, shaking his head.

“You’re all right, Viola,” he says eventually.

“Yeah,” I manage, sniffling like I just had a four-hour sob. “Yeah, Orsino. You’re okay, too.”