“You don’t know what you’re doing here, Claire. I could sue you.”
“Yeah, that’d look really good, wouldn’t it? ‘Showrunner sues teenage fan over Twitter hack.’”
He clenches his jaw. “Give me your phone right now,” he says and starts marching down the aisle toward me.
I whip out my phone, and, walking backward, I send the first saved tweet.
“First tweet published. Want me to keep going?” I say, and he stops marching and pulls out his phone to look at it.
The tweet reads, I love all the Demon Heart fans, and I can’t believe I’m so lucky to get to spend these conventions with you. Thank you for your outpouring of passion and support.
The likes and retweets are flooding in. He lets out a noise that approximates a growl.
“What are you going to do?” I say. “Tell people you’re hacked, that you didn’t mean that, that you would never tweet something like that?”
He throws his hands up. “No, of course not.”
“Because you wouldn’t. Tweet something like that. I know you wouldn’t because I’ve met you and you don’t really seem to like us all that much.”
He glares at me.
“Okay, so what do you want, Claire. What are your ‘demands’?” He puts air quotes around demands, says it like he’s talking to a child.
“I just want to talk this out, that’s all.” He’s being an asshole, but I knew he would be. How did I expect him to act, considering how I lured him here? I just hope that by the time I’m done, he can see where I’m coming from. I can feel the adrenaline pumping through my body, and it helps keep the anxiety away. Remember that Tess said you were the most confident person she’s ever met. Remember that.
“You think this is the right way to open a dialogue with me? Blackmailing me?”
“You didn’t leave me much choice, did you? I’ve been trying to ‘open a dialogue’ this entire trip; where have you been?”
“You literally have no idea how any of this works, kid.” I bristle at being called kid, but press on.
“So tell me.”
He starts down a row of chairs, away from me, but I don’t think he’s trying to leave. He can’t leave without getting what he came for. Good. Let’s have this out. “You think I’m solely to blame for everything you don’t like about Demon Heart? Do you know how many people work on this damn show?” he calls over his shoulder.
“You’re the showrunner, the buck stops at you,” I say.
He snorts and chooses a chair out of the thousands to plop down into. “Not even close. The buck barely touches me as it whizzes by. Being showrunner means you’re just the guy tasked with keeping everybody happy. From the very first meeting it was made clear to me that I was there to do the network’s bidding. And the studio’s. And the stars’.”
He leans back on his chair’s rear two legs to stare at the ceiling. “God, the ‘stars.’” More air quotes. Then, in a sneering, mocking voice, “Rico Quiroz from Star Command wants to do your show! What a get! Congrats, bud!” He rolls his eyes. “I should’ve known right then.”
“Wait…” I try to keep up. “What are you saying?”
“That some old-ass C-list actor from a space show on SyFy wasn’t exactly my first choice to lead my show? Yeah. But apparently you can’t do a series these days with two white leads or you get yelled at on the internet by people like you. So you make sacrifices, and you do what it takes to get your show made.” He looks directly at me. “And you finally find two leads that all the execs can live with who are racially diverse, handsome enough for primetime, in our price range, look the part, and, hopefully, can actually act. Then the people on the internet yell anyway because they aren’t also gay.”
I’m floored that Rico wasn’t his first choice for Heart. He’s so perfect in the role, it’s difficult to imagine anyone else… and straight-up impossible to believe that Jamie wouldn’t like him in the part. Rico is Heart.
“Look, this isn’t the only compromise I’ve had to make on this show. Every single script needs approval from the suits at the studio and the network, and they always have notes. ‘Make it less enigmatic, spell it out. Think NCIS, not Mad Men.’ Then I get yelled at by production in North Carolina that what we’ve written is ungettable, and we need to cut five pages, oh and also we’re running over by a hundred grand. Then I get actors calling me telling me that they’d never say this thing or that thing and I’m trying to tell them I know it’s unwieldy, but the network wants it spelled out. Think NCIS, not Mad Men. But what do the actors care about the network? They just want critics to love them. And then after all that, by some miracle, we make a pilot and put it on the screen and get a full season, and everything’s supposed to finally be clicking into place except now the fans, the very people who are supposedly obsessed with the show, are hollering at me that it’s actually not quite up to their standards. Well, please, pile on.” Jamie runs his hand through his hair and then carefully plumps it back up to its proper volume.
“I know you think everything that ends up on-screen is intentional,” Jamie says, looking over at me, “a perfectly crafted story that sprang whole from the writers’ minds into reality, but it’s just not like that. Half of it is compromise, the other half is just happy accidents.”
“Which half is SmokeHeart in?” I ask.
He starts to respond, then catches himself. I wonder what snarky thing he was about to say. He tries again. “SmokeHeart,” he says slowly but firmly looking me right in the eyes, “isn’t real.”
I sigh and click a button on my remote control. At the front of the room, a screen descends with a buzz.
“Oh goodie,” Jamie says drily, “visual aids.”
I hit another button and a video comes up. It’s a clip from episode six. Heart is confronting a minion of the Commander, and trying to get information out of him before he kills him.
“Oh god, this guy was such a nightmare to work with,” Jamie says as the clip comes up. “Wanted to be paid extra because of the prosthetics. Like, excuse me, you’re a dayplayer. I can find a hundred guys to replace you.”
I ignore his commentary and let the clip play out. On the screen, the minion—a skinny guy with a prosthetic forehead made to look demon-ish—is squealing that he already told Heart’s partner everything he knows. Heart doesn’t understand; he doesn’t have a partner. I look at Jamie for this part because the important line is coming. The minion scowls at Heart and says, “You know, that pretty little boyfriend you run around with.” Heart frowns and says, “Smokey?” The minion nods. And Heart shoots him through the chest. Scene over.
The screen goes dark. Jamie shrugs. “That’s it? Because some meathead nobody called them boyfriends, now it’s canon? It was a joke, dude.”
I hit another button, play another clip. In this one, Smokey and Heart wrestle over ownership of the Bowl of Holding in a biker bar. As they smash into barstools and dartboards, one bar patron wolf whistles at them, while another says, “Get a room!”
The clip ends. Jamie sighs deeply. “That’s also a joke.”
Another clip. An unnecessarily sexy lady-demon tells Smokey that if he really wants to get information out of her, she’s open to bribes, especially “biblical ones.” Then, when Smokey hesitates, she says, “I knew it! You got a hard-on for that demon of yours, don’t you? Richard owes me fifty bucks….” Smokey gags her and tortures her for the information instead.
Jamie throws his hands up. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”
“I want you to say these are shitty jokes. I want you to say you knew that the fans were shipping your two lead characters, and you thought, ‘Hey, we’ll throw them a bone.’ But you had no intention of actually following through. I want you to admit—”
“That we were queerbaiting?” Jamie asks.
I stop short. I didn’t expect him to know the term. Because if he knows what it is, why the hell is he doing it?
“Yeah, I know what queerbaiting is. I get ac
cused of it about every other day on Twitter,” Jamie says bitterly. “And okay. Yeah. Fine. We were queerbaiting. We knew what you fangirls like, and we were never gonna follow through, but we thought it was fun to joke about it. Aren’t you glad we did? Because otherwise you would never have loved our show. The only reason you liked it in the first place is because we were queerbaiting you.”
Oh my god, why am I not filming this? I want to put that admission on YouTube and have it go freaking viral. He just admitted they were playing into it on purpose. I knew we weren’t crazy! My brain is racing a million different directions at once. I pull my thoughts together into a coherent sentence.
“How could you intentionally layer in gay subtext and then go out there and call us crazy for seeing it and asking about it?” My voice is shaking I’m so frustrated right now.
“I think you’re confusing me with Forest,” he says, leaning forward in his chair. “I never called you crazy. Or if I did, it was for a totally legitimate reason, like how you hacked my fucking Twitter account.” He stands up, getting agitated again. “Are we done now? Can this be over? Is that all you wanted to hear?”
“It’s not that easy,” I say, and with my heart thumping in my chest from anger and adrenaline, I open Twitter, and post the second tweet.
He grabs for his own phone to see what I’ve posted. He stares at it, then looks up at me.
“Where the hell did you get that?”
FOREST’S FACE FLUSHED hot as he stepped into his trailer and turned around to see every wall, every surface, every chair, table, window, covered in the same photo of Jasper Graves’s square-jawed, heroic face.
Behind him, still standing outside in the dying light, he could hear Rico cracking up. Forest wanted to light a match. Send the whole trailer up in flames. He reached out and tore down a picture. Then another. Then a whole swath of them.
“Hey, hey!” Rico complained, climbing the stairs into the trailer two at a time.
“What the hell is this?” Forest waved a crumpled handful of pictures around wildly.
“You said you liked him,” Rico said.
“So you thought you’d…Goddammit, Rico—” Forest ripped pictures off the couch, Scotch tape sticking to everything, little pieces of Jasper Graves fluttering around. Forest’s stomach was tight, hard, screaming at him to get these down before anyone sees.
“Relax, Forest, man,” Rico said, “I’ll get Lynn to take them down.”
“Did she see these?”
“Yeah, she helped me put them—”
“Did anyone else?” Forest interrupted.
“Just Lynn,” Rico said slowly, calmly. “Hey, have a seat, relax.”
Rico started helping Forest pull pictures off the wall, a small blank area growing as he worked. Forest let him take over, falling onto the couch and dropping his head into his hands. Rico paused to move to the door and make sure it was closed (it tended to stick) and throw the dead bolt, just in case. Then he crossed back to the wall and continued to take pictures down.
“I’m sorry,” he said, “I didn’t know it would upset you. You said one time that you had wanted a Jasper Graves poster as a kid. I just thought I’d make Li’l Forest’s dreams come true.”
“Yeah, well.” Forest breathed into his hands. “What I never mentioned is I got that poster.”
“You did?”
Forest nodded miserably. He hated this story, but he needed Rico to understand. “I bought it myself from the cool record store downtown. Brought it home and hung it up in my bedroom. It stayed up for all of three hours. And then my dad came home…” He trailed off.
Rico put down the pictures he was holding and turned to look at Forest, his brow furrowed in concern. Forest raised his head but didn’t make eye contact yet; he just twisted to one side, lifted his shirt, and showed a portion of his back—smooth pale skin punctuated by long, angry, raised scars.
“Forest…” Rico whispered.
Forest swallowed hard as he lowered his shirt. “Yeah.”
Rico moved to sit next to Forest on the stiff trailer couch. He put his hand on Forest’s arm, a soft, sad touch. “I’m sorry.”
Forest felt dumb then. He hadn’t shown Rico for pity; he had wanted him to understand. Now his birthday party had become a mope-fest. But Rico didn’t move his hand from Forest’s arm. And feeling it there, warm and solid, Forest thought of that text he had wanted to send Rico. Now was his chance to tell him, away from everyone, everything he wanted Rico to know.
Well, maybe not everything—not the thoughts that crept in after Forest had had a few, or late at night on the precipice of sleep, when he would imagine a warm body next to him, keeping him safe, telling him it would work out.
No, not just a warm body. Rico. Rico, with his strong hands, his easy laugh, his effortless confidence in Forest. Rico with the deep brown eyes that held on to you tight and didn’t let you pull away, even when everything in you begged to walk away. Those eyes were on him now, waiting for him to talk, pulling honesty out of him. Forest couldn’t meet his gaze, so he focused on that hand on his arm and spoke to Rico’s fingers.
“I know I don’t… go out that often. With you guys,” Forest started.
“Yeah,” Rico said. “That’s okay.”
“I wanted you to know, that it’s not personal, I’m just more of a one-on-one kind of a guy,” Forest said. Out of his peripheral vision, he could see Rico nodding, but he kept his eyes on the sharp curve of Rico’s hand, still touching him. His hands were brown and limber and deft with a pair of chopsticks, he knew, but he wondered what else they were capable of. No—not that, he thought, pushing the image aside, but then admitted, Yes, also that. Of course that. Wasn’t that what all this fear was about? “When I came to Demon Heart, I was still pretty green, so I wanted to thank you… for helping me out…” Shit, this wasn’t what he wanted to say. This wasn’t a damn exit interview.
“Of course, yeah. I’m really glad we got to work together.” Rico patted Forest’s arm, then let go.
Goddammit, Forest thought angrily, why can’t I just say what I mean?
“Yeah, and…” Forest started. He scrunched his eyes closed and spit out the next words. “And you’ve been wonderful I couldn’t have done this without you and I wanted you to know how much Iloveyouisall.” He slowly reopened his eyes and peeked at Rico, who watched him with amusement. “So… thanks,” Forest finished limply.
Rico’s eyes flashed with delight as he let Forest dangle in the wind, waiting for his response. “A one-on-one kind of a guy, huh?” Rico said, and Forest flushed red. Rico laughed, “Forest, relax, man. I never thought you hated me because you didn’t come out with us. I just figured you were one of those people who needed recharge time.”
“Yeah.”
“Truth is, I always had half a mind to call you after those things, but I was afraid of pressuring you into something you didn’t want to do, or making some big dumb gesture and screwing it all up.” Rico waved around the trailer. “For example.”
“No—” Forest started, but Rico cut him off.
“Yeah, no, I know when I’ve screwed up; let me own it.”
“I wish you had called me sometime,” Forest said, growing bolder. “I would’ve liked to.”
“To what?”
Rico looked at him carefully and Forest silently begged him to read between the lines; understand what Forest was saying. It’s okay, it’s okay, I want you to, Forest thought, and willed the words toward his mouth. It would be so easy right now to break eye contact, to stand up, make an excuse, and leave. To never allow himself to get into this position again. Every single instinct in his gut told him to run, to scream, to look away.
But Forest didn’t look away.
Forest looked at Rico’s lips.
Rico cocked his head, reading the signals, following instructions, and leaned closer.
His last chance to back away disappeared as Rico’s lips met Forest’s, warm and concrete, and real, and any misgivings ev
aporated as Forest’s mind emptied of everything but the taste and smell of Rico. Forest opened his mouth and let him in.
MY HEART RACES in my chest. I want to slam the laptop closed and toss it across the room, but I need to know what else she put in here about me before it ends. I scan the remaining pages. Just a few paragraphs later, I’m stroking the place behind Rico’s ear. After that, Rico is unzipping my pants, then he’s giving me a blowjob, then I’m “slotting our dicks together” and fucking my fist, I mean, Jesus Christ what the fuck, Claire? By the end, we’re happy and satiated and we eat our melted parfaits, naked and snuggling, and I want to scream at her to leave me out of her little fantasies. I want to call my lawyer and have it taken down. I want it erased from the memory of every one of the thousands of people who have already read it. But I can’t make that happen and I feel so helpless that I want to hit something or cry or both.
Fanfic is one thing. But this is different. This is targeted.
She knows me. And she wrote porn about me. Using information I told her that I didn’t tell anyone else. She implied that my dad hits me, which I don’t even want to talk about how offensive a leap of judgment that is. And she dragged Jasper Graves into it, which is…
I grind my knuckles into my knees. I will end this. And I will end the reign of heart-of-lightness.
JAMIE IS STARING at me like I just personally went to his house and paged through his old yearbooks. Relax, Davies.
How did I find this? “I’m a fan, I can find anything as long as it’s on the internet.”
Ship It Page 22