Page 104 of Derivation

“So, what exactly did you do with Arlowe earlier?”

“Oh, nothing major; just helped her with a few lines of code. It had gotten corrupted somehow. We ran some diagnostics to find out what had happened and fixed them. No big deal.”

“You say that, and I say that there’s no way I would’ve been able to do that.”

“Well, there’s no way I could do what you’re doing for the launch. How is that going, by the way?”

“Harder than I thought it would be,” Sarai shared. “I had an old program that I’ve used before, but they’ve updated it a few times since, and it’s somehow more complicated.”

“You’re doing the animation yourself. That’s amazing, Sarai. I can’t do that.”

“I don’t want to use AI. It would’ve made it easier for me, I’m sure, but I think it’s important that something creative like this is still human-made, you know? The animation program is a good one, though.”

“Can I see what you’ve been working on so far?”

“I don’t know. It’s pretty early in the process. I had to write the commercial script copy first and plan the animation before I even got to start creating it, so I’m not all that far along.”

“You’re worried, aren’t you?” Gabi asked.

“It’s… a big deal. Violet gave me a lot of money to run this thing, and we only have one chance for it to land.”

“Babe, you’ve done the research. It’s going to work.”

“We really need downloads for the new version, Gabs. And we need to grow subscribers faster, too, not just downloads. We need to be able to show our investors an increase in paying customers.”

“I know. You’ll get them.”

“I was thinking about redirecting some of the budget and having someone else do the animation work to make it better. I know we bought the time already, but I can call the network and have that changed.”

“I thought it was important to have it run in the slot you picked.”

“It is, but it’s also really expensive. I can save us a little bit of money there and spend it with a real animator. I bet they can make it look better than–”

“Babe?”

“Yeah?”

“Have you shown anyone else what you’ve got so far?”

“No.”

“So, this is your brain trying to convince you that it’s not good enough?”

“Yes,” Sarai confirmed.

“Well, how about this… You let your team take a look at it, and if they all suggest you make those changes, you do, but if they tell you that it’s amazing, you keep things the way they are.”

“Do you still want to take a look at it?” Sarai asked.

“I’d love to, but only if you want me to.”

“Can I take a look at it on Monday and let you know?”

“Of course,” she said, squeezing Sarai’s hand. “Where are we going, by the way?”

“Remember those tacos and burritos?”

“Yeah.”