A brief pause ensues before Conrad Hale, the man who had bought my first video game, clears his throat. He brushes a strand of gray hair from his forehead and stares right at me.
“Mr. O’ Connor, what do you plan to do about the artificial intelligence? There’s a severe lag in response time.”
Scratching my jaw, I take a second to compose myself. I’m not even sure how to answer his question. After days of digging through lines of code, I have hit a wall. My team looks to me for answers that I don’t have for them. I have coder’s block, completely stuck and have no clue how to shake this funk.
“I’m still working on it, Sir.” I shove my hands in my pockets to still my nervous hands. “My team has been working around the clock to fix the delays.”
“We were assured the product would be fully operational by today. I see that is not the case. I cannot sell this game in its current condition.”
“No worries, Conrad,” Mr. Conway says, pushing his chair out from the table, the legs screeching along the hardwood floor. He stands up, and the rest of the men at the table follow suit. “O’ Connor and his team will get everything working by the end of the week.”
“Two days,” Conrad says, “You have two days to turn over the game. We have investors waiting for this product, which gives us very little room for error. I cannot afford to lose sponsors over an issue with the tech. This game is not much different from the last one your team had developed for us.”
“Well, actually—” I attempt to interject to tell Conrad the technology is not the same, but Mr. Conway pushes his hand out in front of his body to dismiss me.
“Your services will no longer be needed, O’ Connor. You and your team can go back to your desks and await further instructions.”
With one look, I know not to challenge him, even though I want to tell him he’s an asshole. He doesn't know a thing about this game and even less about technology. He’s just some rich kid, whose Daddy handed him a company. His father was a brilliant coder. Unfortunately, they are nothing alike.
When I had accepted this job, it was his father, who recruited me, only to retire a few years later. Maybe Charlie was right about breaking away from this company to start something new on my own. But where would I begin?
Mr. Conway takes over the conversation, shutting me down, as he escorts Conrad and the crew from TGS out of the conference room and to his office. The only time I ever get an invite is when he wants to yell at me for something that I did wrong. I will never be part of his inner circle no matter how hard I work. No matter what I do it will never be enough.
And I’m completely fucked. I have two days to figure out how to make this game work the way we had intended, or I will have lost everything.
After drowning my sorrows in a six-pack of beer and a large pizza, I stagger into my home office, drunk off my ass and desperate for a solution. I called Regan again. She changed her voicemail to say, If this is Jameson, the caller you have tried to reach is unavailable. Please do not call back again.
Her message only made me drink more when I should’ve been working on the game. I hate myself for leaving Regan stranded at the restaurant. But I hate myself even more for not putting her first.
Opening drawers, I search for something that will provide me with some form of inspiration, coming up empty handed. After wasting time that I don’t have, I decide to waste even more. The computer monitor comes to life as I move the mouse. Every time I am stuck on a project, I go back to The Fallen, the first game I ever created.
I showed it to Regan once. She sat on my lap, wearing a pair of panties and a tight tank top with no bra, her nipples poking through the thin fabric. The longer we’re apart, the more I miss her. She hates my fucking guts, and she has every reason to feel that way about me. I was an asshole and so unlike the man I am. Or at least the person I try to be.
Tapping on the keys, I think of Regan and her smile and the way she would look at me as if I was her entire world. She was mine, too. If only I had shown Regan how much she means to me while I had her in my life. I miss her so fucking much I can’t stand it. All the calls sent straight to voicemail and texts left unanswered make me sick to my stomach.
I change the name of a player on the screen to Regan. She’s the queen of the realm in this world, just as Regan was mine. Of course, since I’m a nerd and it only seems fitting, I have to change the knight to Jameson, because I plan to win her back. But how? What could I possibly say to get Regan to change her mind about me? I want to be her knight in shining armor, the man who she can depend on.
For years, I had been that man for Charlie. And I’d never let her down—not even once. So, why was it so hard for me to prioritize my relationship with Regan? I never missed a single bridal shower meeting with the girls or a chill night with Charlie, yet I allowed work to get in the way of my anniversary with Rega
n. What is wrong with me?
An hour into playing my game, I have a moment of clarity. The Fallen has the same artificial intelligence as what TGS had contracted our company to write. I already own the code. Except there’s no way in hell I’m handing it over to Mr. Conway, not after he humiliated me for the thousandth time in front of the client. In front of my goddamn team. He can go fuck himself. Or better yet, I should fuck him over.
But how can I get around his non-compete agreement? There’s only one person I know who can help me with this problem. And if Charlie can’t help, then I’ll go to Mickey. My enslavement by Conway Development needs to end if I ever want a normal life. And I want that life to involve Regan.
Three weeks have passed since I last saw Regan. And in that time, I had put my job before her, proved that I’m no different than the other guys that have disappointed her in the past. She still won’t return any of my calls or messages. I can’t get up to her apartment without an access card, and the same goes for her work. I have no way to apologize in person. That’s why I need to convince Alex to let me take his place tonight.
“How set are you on meeting the event planner?” I ask Alex, speaking between bites of pepperoni pizza.
Alex sets the pizza in his hand on the plate and narrows his eyes at me. “Why?”
“I thought maybe we could exchange places. You could stay here, and I’ll go with Charlie.”
“Jameson,” Charlie says, annoyed. “What are you up to now? Alex is coming with me. This is our wedding.”
Leaning my elbows on the island in Charlie’s kitchen, I hunch forward, giving her my best puppy dog eyes. Or at least whatever I think might sway her to let me come with her to the Wells Fargo Center. “I need to see Regan. I have no other way to get to her.”
She sighs and wipes her mouth with the napkin on her lap. “Maybe you should let her go. If she doesn’t want to see you, there’s nothing you can do about it. You left her stranded in a restaurant, alone on a Friday night, and on an anniversary, of all nights. I would be pissed if Alex did something like that to me. I doubt we’d be sitting here right now if he had stood me up.”