“What do you know about proofreading?” Mr. Lynch asked.
“Uh, nothing, but I can learn.”
“Can you learn today? Helen’s having her baby early and I’m kind of stuck.”
“So what do you think of this? The strip wasn’t working out, but I did these five as a single panel. I think they’re pretty funny. I couldn’t get Rusty’s hair right so I got frustrated and added a cowboy hat, but it makes him more visually interesting, don’t you think? No? Do you even understand art?”
Toby reached for his glass of apple juice, spilled the bottle of ink all over the seventh version of the drawing he was working on, and used several words that he could never include in the comic itself.
“I’m calling it Rusty amp; Pugg. Not inventive, I know, but it has a nice rhythm to it, right? Rusty amp; Pugg. Rusty amp; Pugg. I’d read it, wouldn’t you? Also, I’m going back to the strip format instead of the single panel.”
Mr. Lynch tossed the newspaper on his desk in front of Toby. “I got three different complaints about this typo. It’s right in the headline. Makes us look stupid.”
“What’s wrong with it?”
“Raccoon has two c‘s.”
“It doesn’t have to. Both spellings are correct.”
Mr. Lynch frowned, then grabbed a dictionary from the corner of his desk and flipped through the pages. “I’ll be damned, you’re right. What the hell is wrong with these idiot readers?”
“I know there aren’t any monsters in it, but it’s pretty good, don’t you think?” asked Toby, flipping through the pages one by one.
Yes.
“I’m going to mail the samples off to a few syndicates tomorrow. Wish me luck, buddy.”
Happy.
“Me, too.”