More Than Comics (9 page)

I
got back to my hotel room and hopped in the shower without a word to Jared, who was still in bed, alone. Maddie must have returned to her room already. Good, one less person to deal with.

The hot water washed away all physical traces of last night but couldn’t erase the memories. My mind was stuck on a loop, replaying this morning and trying to figure out how I could’ve handled things better. I came up with a thousand better responses to Tara’s questions now that it was hours later, but that only made me even more miserable.

Because it hadn’t just been sex. It had been so much more.

When I got out of the shower, Jared was making a cup of tea using hot water from the room’s tiny coffee maker. He wore a t-shirt with Freddy Krueger on it and gave me an appraising look. “Long night?”

“Leave me alone,” I muttered, rubbing my hair with a towel.

His eyebrows shot up. “Good morning to you, too. I’ll make you some coffee.”

I plopped onto the bed. “Don’t bother. I’m going back to sleep.”

He ripped open a packet of honey and poured the entire thing into his tea. For his voice, he always said. “You can’t go back to sleep. People are already lining up outside the convention center to get in.”

“I don’t care.”

“It’s Comic-Con. You can’t spend your entire day in the hotel room.”

“Fuck off. I can do whatever I want.” I was being a total asshole but I couldn’t help it. Everyone wanted to talk, talk, talk, and I just wanted to be left the fuck alone.

“What the hell is going on with you?”

“I don’t want to fucking talk about it!”

He threw up his hands. “Okay, chill.”

He dropped into the chair behind the desk, playing on his phone while drinking his tea. For a few minutes I lay there with my eyes closed, but my mind wouldn’t shut up. Regret and anxiety created a sick feeling in my gut that I couldn’t get rid of. I rubbed my face, then dug out my phone to check if Tara had texted me. Yeah, right.

“Last night’s show went pretty well,” Jared suddenly said, almost as if to himself. He leaned back and propped his booted feet up on the desk. “Although I think we should add some lights behind the Villain Complex logo so it stands out more.”

He continued on about how we could improve our performance for our next shows on the tour, but I knew he didn’t expect me to reply. It was his way of letting me wallow for a while and showing he wasn’t pissed at me for snapping at him. And something about his steady voice droning on about the band made me feel a little better.

“Though I never expected Becca to show up in our dressing room,” he said, with a short laugh.

I’d missed whatever had led to that comment, but now I sat up, head spinning. My situation with Tara was not that different from Jared and Becca’s. They’d been friends with a working relationship who’d had one night of sex they’d regretted the next morning. After that, things fell apart between them until Becca left the band, and then they never spoke again. Until last night, anyway.

Would something like that happen with me and Tara? We were better friends than Jared and Becca had ever been and we’d known each other a lot longer, but that didn’t mean we weren’t heading for the same fate.

“If you’d known Becca was going to leave the band, would you still have hooked up with her?” I asked.

Jared frowned, but didn’t look up from his phone. “I wasn’t really thinking straight when it happened. But what does it matter? It worked out in the end, and we got Maddie instead.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

Jared put down his phone and studied me. “What are you really asking?”

“I don’t know.” I gave up on going back to sleep and started making myself some coffee. “Do you think you and Becca could ever be friends again?”

“I’m not sure. Before yesterday I would have said no chance in hell. Even now, I don’t think we’ll ever be friends, but as least there won’t be any bad blood between us. Which is why I invited her to the party tomorrow.”

I stared off into space while the coffee maker gurgled. They’d patched things up, but they were both moving on with their lives and would probably never speak again. Would that happen to us, too? Would Tara and I both drift apart to separate lives? It seemed likely, with the band gaining popularity and her new job.

I didn’t want our friendship to be over. Or to stop collaborating with her on
Misfit Squad
and future books. But I didn’t know if I could repair the damage to our relationship after what had gone down.

I didn’t notice the coffee maker had finished until Jared moved to my side. He added two sugars the way I liked before handing the paper cup to me. “Becca and I were never as close as you and Tara. I don’t think you need to worry.” He coughed. “You know,
if
something like that ever happened to you.”

I wasn’t sure I liked this new, perceptive Jared. He seemed to have figured out the whole story without me even telling him. Damn best friends. I scowled but took the coffee from him. “Thanks.”

He grabbed his wallet and slipped it in his jeans. “I’m meeting Maddie and Kyle for breakfast, then we’re going to some panel on movie scores. You can come if you want. Or stay here. But you shouldn’t waste a day of Comic-Con moping in your room.”

As much as I hated to admit it, he was right. I’d never be able to sleep and would just make myself crazy lying in bed thinking about Tara. I could hit the gym and try to work some energy off, but then what? Sit around, driving myself insane until the party tonight? Get drunk and try to forget?

“Fine. I’m in.” Hanging out with my friends would distract me from obsessing over Tara, if nothing else. I’d force myself to put her out of my mind completely.

Until the party tonight, when I’d have to face her again.

CHAPTER NINE
TARA

I
should have been having fun. It was Friday at Comic-Con and there were a million things to do and see and each one was better than the last.

But all I could think about was Hector.

As I wandered the exhibit hall alone (yes, I was trying to get better about that) everything reminded me of him. A woman dressed as Cruella de Vil brought to mind his friends and their villain-themed party. An artist doing a live sketch awakened memories of Hector’s drawings of me. A poster for a sci-fi TV show made me recall the times we’d watched it “together.” I’d had to record each episode and wait to watch it since I was three hours ahead of him, but it was worth it to hear his snarky live commentary, which always made me laugh.

I couldn’t even
look
at the Black Hat Comics booth, where our book was prominently on display. Especially since going near it ran the risk of me running into him. It was bad enough I’d have to see him at the Black Hat party tonight. Maybe it would be crowded enough I could avoid him or something. But that was stupid, because I couldn’t avoid Hector forever, and I didn’t want to either.

I paused beside a Pokémon display and pulled out my phone to text him, but couldn’t find the right words. Nothing seemed appropriate for the situation. I wanted to ask if we were okay, but I was so worried the answer would be no. Or that he’d shut me down again like this morning.

God, I wished he had just told me what he wanted. One second he’d said the drawings meant something and that he’d wanted to kiss me for years, but then he’d said it was just sex and he didn’t want anything from me. But if he didn’t want to try a long distance relationship where did that leave us?

The problem was, I didn’t know what I wanted either. Twenty-four hours ago I’d only seen Hector as a friend, but now my feelings for him were all jumbled and confused. There was no denying that our sexual chemistry was off the charts. Or that last night had been incredible. Or that I felt more comfortable with him than with anyone else in the world. But even if we didn’t have the distance problem, I’d just gotten out of a serious relationship with Andy a week ago. I didn’t want Hector to be a rebound, or to use him to make me feel better about my breakup or less alone. In the past, I’d jumped straight from one boyfriend to the next because I hated being single, but I was trying to change. Hector deserved better than that.

Of course, that was assuming he saw this as more than a one night stand. He’d never had a girlfriend in all the time I’d known him, but every now and then he had some brief hook-ups. Was that all he wanted—a short fling over the next few days? But then what?

Last night threatened to ruin everything between us, but I couldn’t lose my friendship with him. He was not just the artist of my graphic novel, but the person I looked forward to talking to every day, the person I texted first with news, the person whose opinion I trusted the most about both my writing and my life. But it seemed the two of us were not meant to be anything more than friends.

And I wasn’t sure if we could even be that now.

I gave up on texting Hector and went to that panel on writing and drawing diverse characters, even though I knew he might be there. Or because I
hoped
he would be there. But I scanned the room and didn’t see him, and then spent the entire panel wishing he
was
there because I wanted to talk to him about it. I missed him so much already.

After the panel ended, I walked a couple blocks away to an area of the Gaslamp Quarter that wasn’t quite as busy as around the convention center. I ducked into a bright, modern café and found the person I was looking for, already seated at a table.

Giselle Roberts.

I made my way over to her, completely star struck, still clueless as to why she wanted to talk to me. She was a curvy black woman in her forties with dark, wavy hair and confident eyes. She always looked stylish, and today she didn’t disappoint in a form-fitting blue dress that was both sophisticated and sexy. Next to her I felt underdressed and sloppy in my ripped jeans and
Legend of Korra
t-shirt.

“Tara, right?” she asked, standing. She held out her hand. “I’m Giselle.”

“So nice to meet you.” I shook her hand and sat down, trying not to openly stare at her. The woman was a legend. Not only had she created some of my favorite TV shows, but she’d broken down barriers for women and people of color in entertainment and media, too. She was the closest thing I had to a role model.

“Thanks for having lunch with me,” she said. “I know it’s hard to find a spare moment during Comic-Con.”

“No, thank
you
. I’m flattered you wanted to meet with me. And I’m sure you’re even busier than I am.”

She laughed, a sound that seemed to bubble out of her like champagne. “Luckily, I have assistants to do all the things I don’t want to do.”

“Oh. Of course.” I wondered where her blond hipster assistant was. Off running an errand probably.

“I’ve been wanting to talk to you for a while.” She leaned forward, pressing her hands flat on the table. “I love
Misfit Squad
. I’ve read it three times. I’m confident it’s going to win a ton of awards next year.”

My fingers tightened on the menu, the edges digging into my skin. I wasn’t sure how to handle all this praise from someone I held in such high regard. “That’s…wow. I’m honored. Thank you.”

She waved a hand like it was nothing. “Just speaking the truth.”

I let out a nervous laugh. “I’ll have to make sure my editor gets you an early copy of the next book.”

“Already taken care of.” She leaned back in her chair and studied me. “I’m sure you’re wondering why I asked you to meet me today. Part of the reason is that I wanted to sit down with you so I could fangirl over your book in person. And the other reason…” She took a long sip of water and I thought the suspense might kill me. “I’m starting my own superhero show and I want you to be a part of it.”

“You…what?” Suddenly it seemed a lot harder to breathe in the café. Giselle Roberts doing a superhero show was the best news I’d heard all day at Comic-Con, and that was before it hit me that she wanted
me
to be a part of it.

“It’s already getting a ton of interest from the networks. Think
Arrow
or
Heroes
but with a female lead.
Hunger Games
meets
Batman Begins
. It’s going to be huge.”

“I would watch that in an instant.”

“Good. Because I want you to be one of the writers.”

“Shut the front door.” The words slipped out before I could stop them, but at least I’d used the censored version my mother would say. I couldn’t imagine swearing in front of a classy woman like Giselle Roberts.

Luckily, she laughed, like she found my reaction amusing. “I already have the pilot done but I need good writers for the rest of the season. Based on your work on
Misfit Squad,
I know you’ll be perfect.”

“Wow.” I sat back and let her words sink in. I couldn’t believe she wanted me. I was just a small-time comic book writer whose graphic novel happened to get popular thanks to Hector’s newfound fame. Working on a big TV show was way out of my league. Though I supposed writing for TV wouldn’t be
that
different from writing comic books—I’d write the dialogue and action, then someone else would take it from there.

“I’m stunned. And flattered. And I think it sounds amazing. But I’ve never written for TV before.”

“I’m sure you’ll pick it up quickly. You’d have to move to Los Angeles immediately of course, but we’d cover all of your moving expenses.”

I sucked in a breath, my head spinning with possibilities. Hector lived in Los Angeles. If I moved there maybe, just maybe, we could have a future together.

If he wanted that.

If
I
wanted that.

Or it would only make things more uncomfortable between us if our one night of passionate sex had been nothing more than that.

Or if it ruined our friendship forever.

Hang on, what was I thinking? I already had a job lined up. My
dream
job. The job I’d been working my ass off for years to get. They were also paying for my moving expenses to New York, and I’d already agreed on a start date in a few weeks. I couldn’t back out now. But somehow this unbelievable job had practically fallen into my lap like some kind of
deus ex machina
, and how could I possibly say no to Giselle Freaking Roberts?