27 A Strange Request

Before Sam went home she gave Justin the run down on her conclusion of Brandon's character. "That guy was totally jealous of you! And had a superiority complex, a chip on his shoulder, and is plain rude. There's no way a girl like Emily would stay with a guy like that long term."

Those words gave Justin hope but he still wasn't going to interfere in their relationship. Whether or not Emily broke up with Brandon wasn't his business. That being said…if they did he would be there right away to pick up the pieces. He couldn't bear seeing Emily upset about anything. He learned that years ago.

So to continue staying out of their business he threw himself even further into work. He wanted to get as much done as he could before school started again. His workload was pretty standard stuff for a few weeks until he got an email from Rachelle.

'We received a strange freelance job request earlier today and I'm unsure how to reply to the client. If you could handle this one I'd really appreciate it. The details of the request are attached.'

Strange request? Justin scrolled further down the page until he saw exactly what was so strange. The client didn't propose any money up front, saying that the profits would be split 50/50 when the project became successful. This request came from an animation student at UCLA. She had an idea for a phone game and had even come up with the art for it but didn't know a thing about coding and needed someone to help with the technical side.

A proposition like this…if the app didn't get anywhere they wouldn't make any money at all. No wonder Rachelle hadn't known how to respond.

She was an employee of his business. Making money would be her priority. However, Justin's priority right now was distracting himself. Helping build an app could be an excellent distraction.

He emailed the student back in his role as the owner of the website, saying he was interested in the proposition and would send an employee who lived in the area to discuss details in person.

Two days later he dressed in a simple white button up shirt and slacks to meet with the student himself and headed to the coffee shop they had arranged beforehand. He sat down and waited for fifteen minutes before someone approached his table.

"Are you from Costa Coding?"

The girl appeared a little older than Justin and had short, bright turquoise hair. She wore a black tank top advertising a band he'd never heard of, ripped skinny jeans, and red sneakers. Her nails were dark blue. Well, she certainly looked like an art student.

Justin held out his hand to shake. "Yes, I'm Sam Carter. Mr. Costa was intrigued by your proposal and wanted to know more about the concept of the app you wanted to build."

He figured it was easier to use an alias. No one would believe that a nineteen-year-old was the owner of a lucrative business.

"I'm Alexa Stanhope," she introduced before taking a seat across from him. "I want to create an app where a ship is sinking and you, as the player, have to try and slow the damage until someone can rescue you. You would have different tools at your disposal and if you choose the wrong one the ship will sink faster. There would be different levels that get progressively harder to pass the higher you got. I'm thinking about calling it Sink or Swim."

Interesting. Justin had played a lot of games on his phone but he had never seen one like that. A lot of games these days seemed to be cheap knock-offs of ones that had come before but Alexa had an original concept. That might actually get somewhere.

"I'll admit that your concept is an interesting one. But why should Mr. Costa spend time and resources to help you if the game doesn't take off?"

The girl grinned slyly. "It'll take off. I happen to have a very popular blog on Blogr with thousands of followers. If I tell them to try it they will. I think the idea is revolutionary enough that it'll spread from there."

Justin's brow furrowed. So she was one of those people.

Most blogs he knew of only had a few hundred followers at most. But there were some blogs whose posts went viral and became Blogr Famous overnight. Everyone wanted to follow the people who came up with such sensational posts.

"I see. With such a convincing argument I'm sure Mr. Costa will agree. We've never had a request like this before so you'll need to provide reference artwork and ideas for each level beforehand so I'll know what I need to code. How long do you think it will take?"

Alexa thought about it a moment. "I already have rough sketches for the first five levels…I'm still not sure exactly how many levels I want to go for. I can get those polished in the next few days. How long will coding those levels take?"

"A week, maybe? Like I said, we've never done something like this before so I don't have a time frame reference. You can keep working on ideas as I work on those and then we can meet again to show each other what we have so far. How does that sound?" Justin asked.

He had never interacted with a client in person before but this project was too interesting to pass up. When he was younger he had dreamed of making his own video game. An app was close enough. This might actually be fun.

"That sounds great! Thank you so much for meeting with me. I won't let you down. Give me your email address and I'll get the stuff on the first five levels to you soon."

Ah. That wouldn't work. Sam Carter didn't have an email address because he didn't exist.

"You can go on and send them to Mr. Costa. I'm sure he'd be interested in seeing them before I do anything."

Alexa seemed surprised. "I didn't realize he was so invested in this."

Justin shrugged. "Sometimes he likes trying new things. A lot of the projects we get are pretty similar. This is new territory. Of course he'd want to be involved in some way."

"Oh, that makes sense. Anyway, it was nice meeting you!" She waved on her way out the door.

True to her word, a few days later the sketches and level concepts arrived in Justin's inbox. The art was actually really good. Translating it into graphic format would be the tricky part. The idea of something new excited him. Coding was so familiar to him that he could do it in his sleep. New challenges were rare in his business.

Justin spent the next week and a half hardly sleeping. Staying true to Alexa's art style was more difficult than he had imagined but after a lot of trial and error he managed. Once he was finished they agreed to meet up again and compare progress.

"Wow, this looks just like I hoped it would!" Alexa said with a look of wonder on her face. "You're a genius!"

The small sample from level one that Justin had managed to get on his phone was enough to convince Alexa that she had chosen the right company for the job.

"So now that you've seen the preview, what else have you got for me?" Justin asked.

Rifling through her bag, Alexa pulled out a sheaf of papers. "I have the concepts for levels 6-15 right here. I'm thinking of trying to go up to fifty levels, possibly creating a few mini games or bonus somethings. I haven't thought quite that far yet but I have a few weeks before you're caught up so I have time."

"Very ambitious for your first game," he commented.

She shrugged. "I don't do things halfway. Now that I've seen what you have, I can just email the next batch of ideas to Mr. Costa. Contact me if you have any questions."

"I will. Thanks, Alexa."

The rest of the summer passed very quickly as Justin devoted his entire being to creating Sink or Swim. He hardly even had time to think about what Emily and Brandon were up to. Focused so much on the game, even remembering to eat, sleep, or call his mom back was difficult. This was exactly the kind of distraction he needed.

Justin finished the game, including the bonus mini games, two days before the new semester started. Thank goodness, because if he hadn't there was no way he would be able to concentrate on school.

He released the app and immediately sent Alexa an email to let her know that the project was completed. Her contact information was linked to the app so whenever anyone bought it, she would be the first to know.

Satisfied with his hard work, he decided to treat himself to ice cream. Unfortunately, his trip wasn't destined to be a peaceful one. He ran into Brandon and Emily in line. He knew he should have gotten a smoothie instead but it was too late now.

"Hey, Justin!" Emily greeted cheerfully.

"Hi," Brandon said flatly. "What are you doing here?"

"I just finished a big project and wanted to celebrate."

"Congratulations! Not that I know anything about coding other than it's time consuming. It must feel really good to finish something after so long," Emily mused.

"Yeah, this one took me the better part of two months. I'm glad I finished it before school started. I'm going to have way too much homework to think about freelancing."

"So you don't freelance at all during the school year? How do you get by?" Brandon asked, despite Emily shooting him a look.

"I make enough during the summer to hold me over until the next break," Justin said simply.

That wasn't true at all. Most of his money actually came from the start ups he had invested in. He was doing well but wanted to help more people like Alexa meet their goals. He should really look into more promising start ups when he had the time.

Brandon looked highly suspicious but Emily cut him off before he could speak. "Oh, that reminds me, while you're here…I don't need rides this semester. Brandon has me covered."

Justin's heart lurched. Without giving her rides in the morning it was likely he wouldn't see her at all. On top of that, he hadn't messaged her as RoboCat the entire time he had been working on Sink or Swim. She probably hated him now.

He glanced at Brandon, who looked quietly triumphant. Sam was right. He really was jealous.

He had to keep it lighthearted. He wouldn't let this smug guy beat him.

"No worries! Thanks for letting me know."

Their attention was immediately captured by the cashier because they had reached the front of the line. After ordering Emily gave him a friendly wave as her boyfriend dragged her away.

Coming here had been a terrible idea. His coconut gelato may as well have been air because Justin was too preoccupied with what had just happened to taste anything.

He had completely lost Emily as Justin. All he had left was his fractured online friendship as RoboCat.

Could he even dare show his metaphorical face again after how rude he had been the last time they talked? Would Emily accept his apology and go on being friends like before? Or had he blown it permanently?