Page 45 of One Adult, Please

"Beck." I point the red crayon at him. "You're defense. You're the one who makes the park hard to get into and easy to be dead in. You built half of the adventure part's defenses with zip ties and queue ropes. You're the wall guy."

Beck grins. "I accept. What are you?"

I look at the crayon plan, my friendship paddle leaning against the desk, my tote bag full of skull mugs and gummy sharks, and a cape that's waiting for its moment. "I'm... the strategist."

"You drew the plan in crayon," Joel says.

"Strategists can use crayons. There's no rule about medium."

"What does the strategist do?" Beck asks.

"The strategist... strategizes. I do the thinking. In the thinking box. With the crayon plan."

"So you sit in a chair and draw," Joel says.

"I sit in a chair and lead. I make the hard calls. I allocate resources. I maintain morale through the strategic deployment of funnel cakes from the dessert armory."

"So you eat funnel cakes," Beck says.

"I deploy them. Strategically."

They look at each other, communicating with their eyes in a language I don't speak.

"The Glue," Beck says.

"What?"

"That's your role. You're the Glue."

Joel's face is doing something that looks like agreement, which is notable because Joel agreeing with Beck is a thing that should be recorded and archived.

"He's right," Joel says. "You're the reason we're here. You're the one who said we're keeping the park. You're the one who sees the connections. You connect the zones, the people, the plan. You're the Glue."

"The Glue," I repeat. It doesn't sound official. It sounds like what you call the thing that holds other things together when the things don't know how to hold together on their own.

Oh.

"The Glue," I say again. Softer. "Fine." My eyes are doing something that I'm going to blame on the funnel cake sugar. "I'm the Glue. But I'm the kind of glue that has authority. The Glue makes the calls."

"The Glue makes the calls," Beck confirms.

"Within reason," Joel adds.

"Within my reason. Which is different from your reason. My reason has crayons."

"Noted."

I pick up the periwinkle again. Under the map, on the blank space at the bottom of the brochure, I start a list. THE PLAN, I write across the top, and then underline it twice because important documents get underlines.

I write:

Kill bad ones.

"Succinct," Joel says.

"Thank you."

Fix walls. (Joel's job. Check all gate things. Lock the locks.)