I was pretty sure we were about to find out.
“It’s nice to meet you, Payne. I’m Master Thorin. If you’re ready to head to the cabin, we have some refreshments waiting. It’ll give us a chance to start getting to know one another and talk more about your needs and expectations.”
But.
But.
I was ready to jump right in.
“Yes, Sir,” I replied, having to work to keep the disappointment out of my voice.
Technically, I’d been unemployed for weeks while traveling with two people who couldn’t keep their hands off one another. With nothing to do but create new comic strips, one would think I’d have a stack of completed storyboards. Instead, I had two, neither of which I was particularly happy with. Slipping into a fantasy right now, letting my mind focus on chores and lists of goals to accomplish, that’s what I desperately needed in order to get myself sorted out again.
Only he was right. We should talk. Creating a fantasy was a lot easier when you knew the people you’d be creating it with.
Something happened on the ride to the cabin. Maybe it was because the UTV was too loud for conversation without yelling, or maybe it was because Master Thorin’s request for conversation had sent my brain spinning in a million different directions, but suddenly I had questions for them and ideas, so many ideas. I’d brought costumes, a whole suitcase of them. Knowing them better would help me choose which ones to wear and when, but more than that, I was curious to see if they already had plans and ideas in store for me.
Yeah.
Talking would be okay. It’s not as if I wasn’t a great conversationalist. Being on the road with Sterling, engaging with his guests, had gone a long way toward morphing the shy boy I’d been when my father passed away into the man who’d booked this trip. I was ready to embrace and explore all the desires that had been flitting through my head for the past few years.
And lucky, lucky me, I had a smoking-hot cowboy and a sinfully sizzling biker to help with that.
My cheeks hurt from smiling so hard when we pulled up to a gorgeously quaint cabin with a hammock swinging between two trees at the far edge of the yard. An actual yard.
I’d grown up in an apartment. The closest thing to a yard we’d had was the city park a few blocks away. This was private, secluded, and full of possibilities.
So many possibilities.
A scene beneath the stars popped into my head, and I had the perfect nighttime creature I could transform myself into for it. Ears, a tail, my imagination danced with glee. I almost leaped out and started skipping the moment the UTV stopped but managed to rein in my impulsiveness at the last moment.
“If you’ll join me at the table, Thor will go grab everything,” Master Wylde said as we got out.
A look passed between them—one I couldn’t interpret—then Master Thorin headed for the door while I followed Master Wylde to a black wrought iron patio table with a gray-and-white striped umbrella open above it. At least I had the answer to one question. Someone did call him Thor. Now I wondered if it was only Master Wylde who called him that. The chairs looked heavy and comfortable, with their plush seat cushions. They matched the umbrella and were just as cozy as they looked when I sank down into the one Master Wylde pulled out for me.
“So, comics and cosplaying seem like they go hand in hand. How did you get introduced to them?” Master Wylde asked as he took the seat beside me.
Interested and engaged. His eyes locked with mine, and I lit up from within, because he’d literally given me the opportunity to talk about two of my favorite subjects.
“From my dad,” I explained. “He was an animator with a small company that mostly did cartoon ads for businesses. My earliest memories are of him at his drafting table, head bent over a piece of paper while I lay sprawled out on the floor, coloring as I watched cartoons. Then one day he crumpled up a page and threw it at the trash can, but it was overflowing, so the paper bounced off and rolled, and I snagged it. When I uncrumpled it, there was a bear and a bee playing tug of war over a jar of honey.”
“Here we go,” Master Thorin said as he placed a charcuterie board and a pitcher of what looked like strawberry lemonade on the table, passed us each a plate, and started filling the glasses he’d brought out on the tray.
I wanted to be the one doing that. Serving them. Carefully pouring. Each offering on the board specifically selected because I knew they’d like it or hoped they would once they’d had the chance to try it.
But we had to talk first because that would give me a good idea of what to select for them if I wanted to see pleased looks on their faces instead of scowling, frowny ones.
“So, did you color the bear, the bee, and their honey jar?” Master Wylde asked.
“I tried to, but no matter how much I tried smoothing the paper out, there were wrinkles and lumps that kept messing everything up,” I explained. “So I tried drawing my own. It was awful, so I tried again. And again. And again. Until I liked it enough to color it. Then I dug out another of Dad’s crumpleddrawings and started back at square one with a new image. Dad would hang them on the refrigerator when I finished, until there were so many he had to take down the old ones to put up the new ones. He made me my first portfolio using the drawings he took down off the fridge, and when I was ten, he gave me my first drawing table. It was a miniature version of his, and I loved it. I even did my homework on it, though I probably snuck more drawings in than I did studying. He took me to my first cosplay event that year too. I got to dress up as my favorite character and everything.”
“Who was it?” Master Thorin asked.
“Paddington.”
“The bear?” Master Wylde asked.
“Yes, Sir,” I replied. “I loved all the books, but my favorites werePaddington at the ZooandPaddington’s Rainy Day, because I loved rainy Saturdays with my dad, drawing together, and I loved when we went to the zoo to see all the animals. I’d make up stories about what their lives were like, especially when there were no people around to see them. Everything just clicked for me from there. I knew that I wanted to use my drawings to tell stories, and as I got older and discovered the lifestyle, it started creeping into my images and the dialogue between the characters. Now I’m here, and I get to fully be a part of the lifestyle and create, envision, and immerse myself in experiences I’ve only gotten to dream about or see other people engage in.”