“Thanks. It’s meant many things to me throughout my life, but I am grateful to call it home.”
“I would be, too.”
The most beauty I’ve seen in one place is currently standing in front of me, and I’m perplexed. How could a person be so perfect in every way? She’s worth looking at as long as possible. I don’t think anything could do her justice because nothing compares to such a woman. She notices me looking at her, and her lips turn up into a grin that matches the one already on my face.
“Ready?”
“I have stuff in my car,” she trails off, glancing over to her back seat piled high with things that would probably take a while to sort through before she even found the stuff she wanted to bring inside.
“We can get it tomorrow. Espie or Olive will be more than happy to let you borrow something from their endless supply of clothes. Hell, they’ll most likely try stuff on you like a barbie doll.” She nods, and I hold out my hand for her to take. The moment she does, I feel as though I had won something, but I didn’t know I was vying for anything.
My body responds like I’ve eaten chocolate cake. Her skin against mine makes me weak for her, wanting more and more until we’ve consumed one another. Perhaps, her coming here with me will mean that. It wouldn’t be the end of the world not getting to have sex with her. I’m no idiot and know it will complicate things. Still, I can’t imagine anyone else I’d rather quench this burning desire with. Mainly because I can’t imagine feeling this way for anyone else.
Before I can read into that too much, we’re already inside, and Espie and Olive are giving us a rather excitable welcome. Espie’s asking questions about how my tech worked tonight, and Olive is trying to get me to tell her that she’s right about it failing. I don’t even know how she would know that, but she’s trying to dominate the conversation. At the same time, Espie grows noticeably more annoyed by Olive’s ability to trample over people in a conversation to get her point across. A great debate strategy, but not so great when someone is trying to hear both people.
They round-about mention the woman I’m with in their own way, but that’s all I can make out because they’re talking over each other far too much for me to understand. I’m usually really great at getting what they’re saying, but I don’t speak this special language ofgirl. It’s more like chatter. I can sense Scout getting nervous, so I calm them down and proceed to introduce everyone.
It's pretty quick, introducing them, and then Olive and I accidentally get caught up talking about some invention that Espie said could be cool when we hung out the other night. Espie is an ideas girl who doesn’t know the technical terms of anything but has a good understanding of how things work in general.
Olive thought it was brilliant, and now we’re gabbing on about it for too long. I know it’s too long because Espie interrupts us again to try to move the party to the dining room. It becomes clear that she has no idea that Scout is staying with us.
“She’ll be staying with us for a bit,” I explain.“I was hoping you might have some clothes for her or—”
“Oh! She can stay in the room right next to Espie’s and mine,” Olive exclaims before I can finish, and then they’re already wanting to take her away with them. I barely get a chance to actually ask how Scout feels about the arrangement before they grab her by the hands and pull her away from me with gleeful chatter.
I try to apologize as she looks back at me like she’s trapped, eyes slightly wider than normal. She only grins a little as they reach the second floor, and then Vince calls me. I turn and head down the hall where his voice came from to see him sitting in the dining room on the other side of the second foyer.
“Come, sit.” He takes a sip of his coffee, invested in a book he’s been reading whenever I see him around the house. “Let’s chat.” He adds when I’m at the table, nodding to the seat across from him.
“What’s up?” I ask, but I know exactly what’s up. He’s about to chew me out for having such a horrible failure happen tonight, and I’m not ready for it. Vince has never yelled at me before. His temper runs thinner with my other siblings for numerous reasons, but with me, he’s always been very tame.
I clench my teeth and fists, preparing for the blow, but it never comes. Instead, he just sits across from me in silence until he finishes a page of the book he’s reading. He marks it with a bookmark and shuts it, laying it down on the table before looking me squarely in the eyes.
“So, tonight was not a good start to your inventions.”
“No, but—” he raises a hand for me to wait, and I do, relaxing my shoulders as I sit back in my chair.
“I need to know now if there is any cause for concern.”
“What do you mean?”
“With your team, of course. Any weak links we need to replace?”
“My tech team?” He stiffly nods.
“No. They are all quite capable. It’s the weirdest thing, as if their coding was messed up, but I don’t know how that’s even possible.” He listens to me in full, pausing to think about my words. He’s being careful with me, and a part of me feels guilty that he is. I’d rather him be mad and take his anger out on me because at least then I’d get what I deserve for such a colossal failure.
“Well, Tito, we’ll have to do another test run to ensure you’ll be ready for Italy in two weeks. I won’t send you there to look stupid. What you have is a great idea, and I want to give you the best chance possible. We could wait a year if that’s what you need—”
“A year?” My heart rate picks up.
“Yes, just to ensure this is going to work.”
“No.” I shake my head. “This will work. Something happened. Something corrupted my devices.” I don't understand why I’m saying this because the thought hadn’t fully crossed my mind until it came out of my mouth just now.
“What would have done that?”
“Anything could have. I just have to run some diagnostics tomorrow, and I’ll get back to you.”