“Everyone told me I should’ve handled it with more grace,” she mutters. “You don’t think I fucked things up for myself a bit?”
“No,” I answer without hesitation. “I think you showed people you know your worth. That scares them. Especially in industries that survive off of people accepting crumbs.”
That earns me a breathy, relieved laugh.
“God,” she says, shaking her head. “It’s wild hearing that from you.”
“Why?” I ask.
“Because you’re… you, Jabari McKingsley,” she replies. “You win. A lot. I didn’t think you’d get it.”
I shrug. “Different field. Same bullshit.”
She nods slowly, absorbing that.
“Either way,” she says, straightening, slipping back into work mode, “thank you. For backing me when it would’ve been easier not to.”
She scans my face and studies the reference screen again, arms folded, then glances up at me like a thought has just finished baking.
“You know,” she says slowly, “maybe we could use some of your moves in the game.”
I raise a brow. “My moves?”
“Yeah,” she continues, warming up to it as she talks. “Like… actual football techniques. Special attacks. Skills. It could be really cool.”
A grin spreads across my face before I can stop it. “It is cool. I like it.”
She snorts. “You like everything that paints you in a positive light.”
“Of course,” I say easily. “Why wouldn’t I?”
She rolls her eyes but she’s smiling now, tapping her tablet pen against her lip. “Leon’s gonna kill me. Still. It makes sense. The game has a lot of strategy and timing. Football’s the same thing. There’s overlap.”
I nod. “Alright, I’m in. How you gonna pull it off though? A.I.?”
She makes a face like I just insulted her. “Fuck A.I.”
I blink. “Oh. My bad.”
“I mean really,” she starts her tangent. “Why would I waste time marking you and putting all this effort in if I could’ve taken a picture of you from google, uploaded it into whatever rubbish these tech bros call the ‘future’, just for it to come out as a lifeless, soulless, dull, shadow of what it could’ve been if I had just taken the time to perfect it?”
She looks at me like she expects an answer.
“Is… that a trick question?”
Her shoulders drop in exaggeration, “No, I just get offended at the idea. That’s all. I’m a creative Jabari. I want my work to outlive me. I want the player tofeelall my efforts. I want them to relate to my characters. I want them to feel represented and heard in a way only people would get. It’s funny ‘causewhen I talk to people about it, they think I have an unhealthy relationship with my work but I care so much. It’s mine.”
“And you think A.I. takes away from that?”
“I think… The need to create is human. It’s something only we get. So yeah.”
I raise my eyebrows. “Well then. Sorry I asked. Mark away, I’m sure the poses you make will be good.”
“And I’m sure you think so,” She laughs, shaking her head. “But I need references first. Clean ones. From multiple angles.”
I tilt my head. “You could just… watch me practice.”
She pauses.
