First, a lengthy bit of exposition.
The setting: The Portland advance screening of Serenity.
Dramatis personae: Myself, and a young man dressed like Jayne (“Guy Dressed Like Jayne”)
[8:00 PM. Two hours before the showing. Our fetching heroine, a short redhead in jeans and a sleeveless blouse, walks up to the theater. She is sans ticket for the evening’s screening, but carries $25 in her wallet and hope in her heart. She spies a group of three young men sitting on a bench in front of the theater, one of whom is dressed like Jayne and holding a sign which reads, “WILL PERFORM THRILLING HEROICS FOR TICKETS.”]
TRACY LORD: Hah! Nice sign.
GUY DRESSED LIKE JAYNE: Thanks.
TRACY: [pauses momentarily to think.] Hey, can I – get in on that? I don’t have a ticket either. Ha ha! [laughs in show of ticketless, fannish camaraderie.]
GUY: Yeah – yeah, sure! You guys mind?
OTHER GUYS: No! [scoot over]
TRACY: [sits on ledge] So, how’re the thrilling heroics treating you?
[8:45 PM. Miraculously, all four people scored tickets at no more than fifty cents over face value. Equally miraculously, a few more PDX Browncoats have shown up with brownies, strawberries, and hilarious-to-eat ice planets. As can be seen in the pictures above, nearly everyone present is thwacking themselves in the face with frozen balls of Kool-Aid and having a grand old time. One of the GUYS from the bench has a camera out, and is filming a mini-documentary.]
CAMERA GUY: I’ll put this up on our website!
GUY DRESSED LIKE JAYNE: Ha ha! Yeah!
OTHER GUY: Great!
TRACY: [hits self in face with ice planet]
[9:15 PM. Everyone with a ticket is sitting inside the theater, playing the trailer on some fellow’s laptop, chatting, complimenting costumes.]
TRACY: …so, yeah, I took the bus out here from the boonies, came for the line party, didn’t really expect to get a ticket, and now it’s either take a ridiculously expensive cab home or walk across the river to the youth hostel! [laughs] Totally worth it, though, huh?
GUY DRESSED LIKE JAYNE: You know, I could probably give you a ride home.
TRACY: …are you sure? Because I live, like, forty-five minutes away.
GUY DRESSED LIKE JAYNE: Totally! [to OTHER GUY] Hey, we’re going on an adventure after the movie!
OTHER GUY: Cool.
[9:45 PM. We take our seats. Fortuitously, GUY DRESSED LIKE JAYNE and TRACY LORD are sitting side-by-side. GUY DRESSED LIKE JAYNE pulls out a sheet of paper and proceeds to make his way to the front of the auditorium, lead the audience in a round of “The Hero of Canton,” and sit back down.]
[12:05 AM. The movie has finished. The foursome sits back in our seats, somewhat happily stunned.]
CAMERA GUY: I can’t believe they (MAJOR PLOT POINT)!
OTHER GUY: I know! How nerve-wracking with (OTHER MAJOR PLOT POINT)?!
TRACY: No kidding. [pause] But man, how hot was (MINOR CHARACTER)?
[GUYS nod enthusiatically.]
GUY DRESSED LIKE JAYNE: I mean, talk about your tracts of land!
TRACY: No joke!
CAMERA GUY: …I still can’t believe they (MAJOR PLOT POINT).
[ALL nod, slowly.]
[12:55 AM. After navigating the backwoods of Washington and Clackamas Counties, a road closure, and TRACY LORD suffering brief home-from-college-terrain-change-amnesia, a car pulls up at TRACY LORD’s abode.]
TRACY: So, gosh, thanks so much for the ride!
GUY DRESSED LIKE JAYNE: Not at all.
TRACY: [thinking quickly] Here, I’m going to give you my email, and why don’t you drop me a line when that movie’s up on your website?
GUY DRESSED LIKE JAYNE: Can do, most definitely!
TRACY: And thanks again!
GUY DRESSED LIKE JAYNE: Talk to you later!
[TRACY unlocks the door to her house as OTHER GUY moves from the back seat to the passenger seat. GUY DRESSED LIKE JAYNE honks and drives away.]
**
Now, Guy Dressed Like Jayne has just dropped me an email (perfectly hitting the two-day window, BTW), which was brief and basically consisted of “Here’s a link to the video we filmed. Hope things are going well, and that you like the movie!”
NOW, I have to figure out how to segue from “Yeah, it’s a fun movie” to “Hey, maybe you want to go out sometime?” Because he seems funny, friendly, and generally great college-student-summer-dating material.
Here are my worries: that I’ll be coming on too fast (don’t tell me there’s no such thing :p), and that he’s just a really helpful guy and not actually interested (if he wanted to make a move, wouldn’t he have done so in the email?)
Basically, after all that setup, is “Yeah, the screening was fun, great movie – hey, do you want to go out sometime?” too much of a non-sequitur?