Page 43 of The Player Next Door
There was a beat of silence, and then Noah beamed at Craig. “See? Even Clare agrees with me.”
She disliked thateven Clarephrasing, and she disliked the look on Craig’s face even more. He looked annoyed, and Craig, like a lot of sensitive writer-types, tended to lash out when irritated. Clare wasn’t like that, but plenty of the men at Quest Gaming were. She was about to do a U-turn and argue for what had clearly been Craig’s idea, before she decided against it. If she wanted her team to listen to her opinions, she couldn’t be wishy-washy. Maybe Craig might even be impressed with her for standing her ground, once he got over the sting of her siding with Noah. That was how a Senior Designer would act, after all. “It’s just so much more unusual, you know?” she said in as friendly of a tone as possible to show Craig there were no hard feelings. “There’d probably be some marketing value in that. Disintegrating orclings throwing spears, that sort of thing.”
Noah gave Craig another smug look, and Craig straightened. “How’s that project of yours working out, Clare?” he asked, just a little too loudly.
She kept her smile placid. “Captain Ellis is great, thanks. Right now I’m working on a kingdom where—”
“And your assignment?” he asked bluntly. “You really do need more of thatlife experiencewe talked about. Especially if you think you should be put up for Senior Game Designer.”
Clare blinked, surprised he was being so blunt. “I’m, um, working on it.” Okay, so she’d had one one-night stand, and now she was sort of developing feelings for Logan, but the longer she thought about it the grosser it all felt and the more she just wanted out. “Noah, uh, ran into me when I was out the other week,” she added, praying that Noah would show one of his occasional flashes of decency.
“Is that what that was,” Noah said drily. “Then yes, I can confirm that.”
“Keep it up then,” Craig said, face still stern. The team started to disperse, drifting back to their computers, and Clare pulled out her phone when she sat back down. For a minute she wanted to text Logan, but she felt weird about that all of a sudden.
Clare
Work question
How involved is too involved for a boss to be in your personal life?
Devi
Involved at ALL is too much
What did Craig do?
Clare frowned to herself. Her friends had never really liked Craig, and didn’t understand why she followed his advice. But that was because none of them really understood what this job meant to her. Sure, they all loved Quest for Sulzuris unreservedly, but for the rest of the group, it was just a game they did on the weekends. For Clare, it was everything. Writing for it was all she had wanted since she was a kid first discovering how exhilarating it could be to pretend you were freeing imaginary lands from dragons and cursed kings and evil sorcerers. If she told Devi what Craig had suggested, Devi would tell her to quit, and that simply wasn’t an option, not when she might be able to move up. She decided to backtrack.
Clare
Nothing
Just watching him interact with the guys, is all
Devi
You know the way they don’t include you in shit is bad, right?
Clare
I know, I know
But it’s my choice
I hate Call of Duty and laser tag and camping
Devi
Weird how your boss only does group activities you don’t like
Clare
Forget I asked
Devi
Seriously, is everything okay?