“No,” she said defensively. “That’s not what I mean.”
“I know,” I laughed. “Don’t worry, I’m not offended.”
It was most people’s gut reaction anyway, when they found out I liked to draw comics. I’d been sketching Marvel and DC characters since I was six years old. Creating entire worlds and landscapes for my own group of heroes and heroines, somewhere around age nine or ten.
“This one’s amazing,” she swore, lifting up one of my more detailed pieces. In it, some grizzled interplanetary warrior stood over a defeated army of crushed cyborgs, to the rising backdrop of a shattered moon. “I mean wow, Roman! Just… just…”
“Wow?”
“Yes!”
I turned even redder now, at an immediate swell of unwanted pride. She was being too kind, of course. Telling me exactly what any new girlfriend would say when seeing my work for the first time.
A girlfriend…
My brain suddenly froze, mid-thought.
Is that was she is to you?
I hadn’t thought of it, really. Or maybe I’d thought of it, but I’d pushed the thought away initially because it seemed so… so…
Unlikely.
Yes, that was it. Unlikely. Absurd at first, maybe. But now, after spending even more time with her—
“So is this what you want to do?” Savannah asked abruptly. “Because damn, Roman. You so should be doing this!”
A strange elation washed over me; vindication in the form of outside influence. Because yes, this was what I wanted to do with my life. So very, very badly.
Only it wasn’t what I was supposed to be doing.
“I’m here for business management,” I admitted sullenly. “If everything goes as planned, I’ll get my BA in the spring.”
She could tell by the tone of my voice something was wrong. Probably the lackluster way I so casually mentioned my major.
“You don’t strike me as a business manager,” Savannah offered.
“It was my mother’s idea,” I shrugged. “It’s sorta what she wanted.”
My beautiful redheaded date fell ass-first onto my bed. Even the way she pulled off her boots was sexy.
“Gotta admire a man who likes to please his mother,” she said. “Even so…”
“I minored in art design. Figured if anything, it could get me into marketing.”
“But you’re drawing comic book stuff,” she said.
“And comic books.”
I opened a drawer, and tossed my latest work into her lap. My pulse quickened a little as she picked it up.
“Is…” Savannah’s mouth dropped open as her eyes went wide. “Is this…”
“Yes.”
The cover I’d been working on depicted a flowing, red-tressed goddess, standing amidst the ruins of a crashed starship. She had a laser pistol in one hand. She also wore a skin-tight jump-suit, torn over one shoulder to reveal a di
stinct, starburst-shaped scar.