Holly Black (35 page)

Billie thinks about going over to ask for an autograph. Pretending to be a fan. Could you pop that bubble with a ballpoint pen? This is the kind of thought Conrad Linthor goes around thinking, she’s pretty sure.

Billie catches her bus. And that’s the end of the story, Paul Zell. Dear Paul Zell.

Except for the ring. Here’s the thing about the ring. Billie wrapped it in tissue paper and sealed it up in a hotel envelope. She wrote “Ernesto in the kitchen” on the outside of the envelope. She wrote a note. The note says: “This ring belongs to Paul Zell. If he comes looking for it, maybe he’ll give you a reward. A couple hundred bucks seems fair. Tell him I’ll pay him back. But if he doesn’t get in touch, you should keep the ring. Or sell it. I’m sorry about Hellalujah and Mandroid and The Shambler. I didn’t know what Conrad Linthor was going to do.”

So, Paul Zell. That’s the whole story. Except for the part where I got home and found the e-mail from you, the one where you explained what had happened to you. That you had an emergency appendectomy, and never made it to New York at all, and what happened to me? Did I make it to the hotel? Did I wonder where you were? You say you can’t imagine how worried and/or angry I must have been. Etc.

I’ll be honest with you, Paul Zell. I read your e-mail and part of me thought, I’m saved. We’ll both pretend none of this ever happened. I’ll go on being Melinda, and Melinda will go on being the Enchantress Magic Eightball, and Paul Zell, whoever Paul Zell is, will go on being Boggle the Master Thief. We’ll play chess and chat online, and everything will be exactly the way that it was before.

But that would be crazy. I would be a fifteen-year-old liar, and you would be some weird guy who’s so pathetic and lonely that he’s willing to settle for me. Not even for me. To settle for the person I was pretending to be. But you’re better than that, Paul Zell. You have to be better than that. So I wrote you this letter.

If you read this letter the whole way through, now you know what happened to your ring, and a lot of other things too. I still have your conditioner. If you give Ernesto the reward, let me know and I’ll sell Constant Bliss and the Enchantress Magic Eightball. So I can pay you back. It’s not a big deal. I can go be someone else, right?

Or else, I guess, you could ignore this letter, and we could just pretend that I never sent it. That I never came to New York to meet Paul Zell. That Paul Zell wasn’t going to give me a ring.

We could pretend you never discovered my secret identity. We could go on being Boggle the Master Thief and the Enchantress Magic Eightball. We could meet up a couple times a week in FarAway and play chess. We could even go on a quest. Save the world. We could chat. Flirt. I could tell you about Melinda’s week, and we could pretend that maybe someday we’re going to be brave enough to meet face-to-face.

But here’s the deal, Paul Zell. I’ll be older one day. I may never discover my superpower. I don’t think I want to be a sidekick. Not even yours, Paul Zell. Although maybe that would have been simpler. If I’d been honest. And if you’re what or who I think you are. And maybe I’m not even being honest now. Maybe I’d settle for sidekick. For being your sidekick. If that was all you offered.

Conrad Linthor is crazy and dangerous and a bad person, but I think he’s right about one thing. He’s right that sometimes people meet again. Even if we never really truly met each other, I want to believe you and I will meet again. I want you to know that there was a reason that I bought a bus ticket and came to New York. The reason was that I love you. That part was really true. I really did throw up on Santa Claus once. I can do twelve cartwheels in a row. I’m allergic to cats. May third is my birthday, not Melinda’s. I didn’t lie to you about everything.

When I’m eighteen, I’m going to take the bus back to New York City. I’m going to walk down to Bryant Park. And I’m going to bring my chess set. I’m going to do it on my birthday. I’ll be there all day long.

Your move, Paul Zell.

Text by Holly Black and Cecil Castellucci. Illustrations by Bryan Lee O’Malley.

by
john green

Right after our last class, Kayley and I are walking past the only bit of stone wall that survived the epic 1922 fire that nearly destroyed Hoover Preparatory School for Girls. Tragically, the school was able to reopen, which led inevitably to our matriculation at this god-awful place. The only redeemable facet of Hoover is Kayley herself, who is about the best baof one could ask for. (Baof meaning, of course, best and only friend; it is the final frontier in friendship, the heady waters out past the Sea of Bff.)

So we’re walking past the waist-high ruin of the wall, which everyone since 1922 has touched whenever walking past it—the wall has been touched so many times that it is worn down into an almost pleasant oval. Kayley walks past, spits in her hand, and rubs the wall. I laugh, and then don’t touch it myself, not because I’m scared of Kayley’s germs, but because I hate traditions.

Hoover Preparatory School for Girls has a number of profoundly stupid traditions—such as the singing-the-alma-mater-song-every-Thursday-at-lunch tradition, and the stand-when-your-teachers-enter-the-classroom tradition, and the everyone-has-to-wear-the-exact-same-uniform-so-that-no-one-will-be-able-to-tell-who-the-geeks-are-except-of-course-everyone-can-tell-who-the-geeks-are-because-geek-isn’t-something-you-wear-it-is-something-you-are tradition.

As it happens, I think doing things solely because they were done in the past is absolutely idiotic. I suppose it shows respect to our teachers when we stand every time they come into the room, but you know what would show more respect? If the insolent students who have colonized this awful place paid attention in class. Or took notes.