All in all, it wasn’t much of an introduction.

It was my turn. I felt real nervous, hoping in my heart that I would draw the Fish Boy, the card I knew the best, the card that I always saw myself in, or better yet, felt myself in. It’s hard to explain I guess. It’s like, have you ever looked at a painting or heard a song or just been somewhere beautiful—maybe an old creaky house or a sunlit field or in front of a wild oak tree, just as the moon was rising—and felt like, yes, this is me, this is me exactly, I could be looking in a mirror of my dreams? Have you ever felt anything like that at all in your life? If not, well, take it from old Buddy here—you ain’t been looking hard enough. It’s out there for you, the feeling of recognizing yourself in something else, and when you find it, oh it will feel so good deep inside of you. It’ll change you forever.

Everyone was silent. I sure hoped I wasn’t going to embarrass myself by flipping over a home card, or an action or a word, anything that I couldn’t call my person. That sure would be an unrecoverable mistake. That would more or less ensure that I didn’t stand a chance in this game, that I’d gone and lost for sure.

The Fish Boy, I prayed. The Fish Boy please.

I flipped my card.

There he stood, a little awkward, his face perplexed and determined, same as the way I saw myself every time I looked over the edge of the skiff and into the waters, holding aloft a cup with a weird-eyed fish springing out of it. The Fish Boy. My card. I was so happy right then I could have cried.

The rest of the crowd felt it too. There were a couple of gasps even, some yokels slamming down glasses in disgust and some hollering out in applause. Tally clapped her hands and squeezed my shoulder and that made me feel good, real good, actually. I had done it. I flipped my Person card first try.

Now it was my turn to Orate.

My turn to Orate.

Mine.

I realized right then that I’d never Orated before. Not out loud anyway, not even once. I’d only ever done it in my head. And let me tell you, Orating all alone in your head is much, much different than doing it out loud, much less doing it out loud in front of a bunch of seasoned Parsnit pros in the last free house in the swamp.

I took a deep breath and let it out slow, like I’d seen other Parsnit players do when they were all nervous.

“Well . . . ,” I said.

My voice cracked. It did. A few of the house folks cackled. Even old Radegar grinned a little bit, though you could tell he was trying to hide it. That made me mad, it did. I wanted to whoop all the smiles right off those fellas’ faces.