CHAPTER 16
“The kick-ass espresso machine can go here,” Arlowe said, pointing to a spot on the counter.
“We’re getting a regular espresso machine, not a kick-ass one,” Violet replied. “And now, suddenly, you’re all sorts of happy that we’re getting an office?”
“Not happy but trying to embrace some of the benefits. My office could be cool. For one, it’ll have walls, and you all will be on the other side of them.”
“Ass.” Violet laughed. “I need to ask Nancy about the lease on the furniture. I don’t love it, but if we can get a short-term lease on it while we find other stuff, I think we should keep it, especially if it’s cheap enough.
Not all of it, of course. We don’t need all sixteen cubicles,” she added and turned to leave the kitchen.
“So, what do you think?” Arlowe asked Gabi.
“It’s nice.”
“Can you see yourself working here?”
“I don’t work here.”
“But you kind of do.”
“It’s not the same, but I think it’ll be cool for you and everyone else. I’m going to go wait for you all out there in that lobby thing on this floor while you keep looking around.”
“Okay. Sounds good.”
Gabi walked out of the kitchen, thinking about how she had a kitchen very similar to this one at her job, but she found herself wishing that she was more than a contractor who had signed paperwork only because it meant that Violet and team didn’t have to worry about her doing work for them and later trying to take it with her because it would be owned by them.
She liked her new job, but she found herself wishing that she worked with her three roommates and their CEO and former roommate.
She had already started mocking up some ideas.
One was for a set of glasses. Another was for a watch.
She’d even thought up something for that necklace that Sarai had mentioned, which would need to be able to hear the words in one language and speak them in another, chosen by the person language.
Gabi could make it look halfway decent, too, but she wasn’t sold on it being their best option. It had been fun to think about, though.
Their best option was glasses, and they needed to work but also be stylish.
She’d thought about having a few different frame styles, which was something she hadn’t seen enough of in other wearables, and they needed to be small enough and not heavy because the big goggles that were available on the market were cost-prohibitive for most people and didn’t look great, which kept some people who could afford them from buying them because of it.
Gabi had always wanted to design something that could revolutionize an industry, but now, she also wanted to make something for this little company because she cared about the people who worked there and their mission.
“Hey,” Sarai said.
Gabi looked up and realized that she was now sitting on a couch in what couldn’t exactly be referred to as a lobby between two office suites, but she didn’t have another word for it, so it would have to do.
She didn’t remember sitting down or even leaving the office that the rest of the women were still touring, but she had her phone in her hand and had been making notes for the design, so it was likely that she’d just zoned out.
“Hey,” she said back. “Why aren’t you in there?”
“I saw all I need to see.”
Sarai sat down next to her but left some space between them.
Gabi understood why. Ever since the housewarming party at Violet’s, where Sarai had introduced her as someone who had just kind of shown up one day and taken Arlowe’s old room, she’d been a little upset, but since she’d heard Sarai bring a woman home that same night, she’d been even more upset.
Gabi had been extra petty, too. The next morning after the party, she’d gotten up very early and had waited for Sarai’s bedroom door to open, hoping to see the woman she’d spent the night with.
Unfortunately, though, her mother had never been any good with time zones, and she’d gone to Italy the previous weekend, so she’d decided to call Gabi at that very moment to tell her how her trip had been going.
Gabi had answered, and she’d even managed to get her mom off the phone quickly, but by the time she’d made it out of her room, Sarai had already been back in her own.
She’d checked the front window to see if she could still catch the car leaving the driveway, but there had been nothing.
She’d missed checking this other woman out, and Sarai hadn’t said anything about dating someone or even hooking up – or, at least, Gabi hadn’t overheard her say anything to anyone else since she hadn’t spoken much to Sarai.
“You don’t like it?” she asked Sarai about the office.
“It’s fine. It’s just an adjustment, so it’s weird.
They all drive me crazy most of the time, and I’ve wished for my own office forever, but I stood in one of the offices that could be mine, and all I could think was that I was alone in there, and if I wanted to talk to Arlowe or Enya, I’d have to either yell or go to their office, and that’s going to be strange for a while. ”
“The business is growing. That’s a good thing, right?”
“Yeah, it’s a good thing. It’s just a lot. I think changes hit Arlowe faster and harder, but for me, it’s a little more prolonged and, well, quieter. Why did you come out here?”
“It’s not my office, so I thought you should all have time alone in there. I’m really only here for the free lunch Violet offered.”
“Liar.”
“What?”
“It’s hard, living with us, isn’t it?”
“No, I love living with you guys.”
“You can love it, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy.
We’re a lot, I know. We’ve known each other forever, we’re around each other practically all the time, and we’ve never lived with someone who wasn’t part of the business, so it’s hard for us to remember sometimes that you weren’t.
Now, you technically are, so that’s good. ”
“I’m not really, though. It’s your company, Sarai.
Violet is only paying me pennies because it makes this whole thing legal, and so far, all I’ve got is some notes about a wearable that I’ve yet to even start actually designing.
I guess it can be a little awkward sometimes because I feel like I’m walking in on friends talking, but then, you’re all shifting gears to business talk, and I don’t have anything to add.
” Gabi leaned back on the sofa. “You know, it wasn’t always easy for me to make friends. ”
“No? Why?” Sarai asked, leaning back, too.
“Sarai, I was born here, but I moved to another country before school started. My parents had different positions in different places. When my dad was between postings, we’d come back here, yes, but I was seven, and I was the new kid in school.
I showed up that first day speaking Spanish because my previous school was in Spain, and I was made fun of until he got another job.
Then, it just kept going like that. I actually went to two different international schools.
There was the one in Paris, yes, but we’d lived in London before that, so I started high school there.
I stopped trying to make friends when I was young and got a little shy because it was easier to blend in than to try.
That’s why that gap year was so important to me. ”
“I don’t get it. You mean why you wanted to travel by yourself?”
“No, why I wanted to reinvent myself a little. When I met you and your friends in Amsterdam, I was still, I don’t know, warming up, but I wanted to come out of my shell. I wanted to meet people my age and have fun.”
“Did you?”
“Somewhat, yeah. When college started, I was making real progress. Then, my dad died, and everything changed.”
“You perplex me, Gabrielle Durand.”
Gabi laughed and asked, “How come?”
“Because you showed up in Amsterdam practically bragging about all that sex you’d had already.”
Gabi laughed again and said, “I did not brag.”
“Oh, yes, you did.”
“I wanted you to see me as an adult, Sarai. I could tell you saw me as a kid, but I wasn’t a kid. I might have only been eighteen, but I was a mature eighteen, and I don’t mean that because I’d had sex a few times.”
“How was it that you didn’t really have friends, but you had a girlfriend?”
“I didn’t say that I didn’t have any. I said that it was hard to make friends. I had a couple near the end of high school. One of them was that girlfriend.”
“You have friends now,” Sarai said.
“I do?”
“Yeah, of course you do.”
“You called me your roommate last weekend.”
Sarai sighed and replied, “I know. I’m sorry. I got a little tongue-tied. I don’t know why I said that.”
“You made it sound like I just stole Arlowe’s room and tossed you a crumpled-up rent check before I closed the door in your face.”
Sarai laughed and said, “I did not.”
“Pretty close,” she argued. “Made me feel like I didn’t belong at that party and should’ve just stayed home.”
“I’m sorry. For what it’s worth, I felt bad and told Jen and Haley the whole story later.”
“The whole story?”
“Yeah, about Amsterdam, then how we met again at the bar, and how you live with us now, but I used the word friend this time. I felt worse when you walked away with Arlowe, so I went inside and got a drink that I hadn’t planned on, thinking you could just drive us home.
I felt like shit when Enya told me that you and Arlowe had already left and that she was driving me home instead. ”
Gabi looked over at the bank of two elevators because she couldn’t look Sarai in the eye while asking her next question.
“What happened then?”
“What do you mean?”
“With Enya driving you home, because she didn’t.”
“What are you talking about? Yes, she did. Well, I drove her home, technically,” Sarai said.
Gabi turned back to her, confused, and Sarai looked the same way, which was odd.
“You didn’t get home until late, and I heard you come in with someone,” Gabi told her.
“I did. Enya. I had one rum and Coke. Enya had three glasses of this punch that Stella put out. She didn’t know there was alcohol in it, so I had to take the keys from her.
Then, I drove us home and tried to put a very drunk Enya to bed, but she was laughing and said she could handle it herself in, like, four languages. ”
Gabi swallowed and said, “You brought Enya home?”
“Yes. Then, I went to bed. Why? What did you think happened?”
“Nothing,” she lied, but Sarai’s expression told her that she didn’t believe her.
“Sorry if we woke you up. I was trying to keep her down, but Enya rarely gets drunk, and she was pretty funny. I did tell Stella to make sure to label that punch next time. I took a sip, and that stuff is amazing, but it tastes like fruit juice and not alcohol.”
“We were looking for you,” Violet said, coming out of the other door that they hadn’t used.
“Sorry, we were waiting for you to finish up,” Sarai said. “So?” she asked Enya, who followed behind Violet, with Arlowe coming out right after.
“It’s fine. Nothing fancy,” Arlowe replied.
“You’re Enya now?”
“I thought it was a universal question,” Arlowe said.
“It’s not fancy yet,” Violet explained. “Because we have to add our own personal touches. I’m thinking we’ll use our brand colors to liven up the walls.
We can paint them ourselves to save some money, and we’ll keep some of the rental furniture, but we can buy new stuff for our offices and maybe a couple of sofas, too.
We’ll just go to IKEA and not spend a ton of money. ”
“Violet, you want us to be fancy with IKEA furniture?” Sarai asked.
“I want it to look like our own office, but for now, that means being fancy on a budget.”
“Less cool, but whatever,” Arlowe said. “And where’s Nancy?”
“She’s still inside, talking to the building people about the furniture we want to lease. The suite lease would be for three years, but we won’t need that furniture for that long, so she’s checking on terms for that. I’ll get her down on everything.”
“Confident in your negotiation skills, huh?” Sarai teased.
“I got Stella to go down to fit within our budget, didn’t I?” Violet countered.
“You could’ve stopped that sentence at you got Stella to go down,” Arlowe said.
They all laughed then, with the exception of Violet, who only glared.
“I’m ready to go now,” Sarai said, standing up.
“I’ll go get Nancy while you all keep talking about IKEA furniture,” Gabi offered, standing up right after her.
“No need. Enya already did.”
Violet hooked a thumb back toward the door that was still closing.
“Where does she get her shoes? Is there a store for ninjas around here or something?” Gabi asked.
Sarai laughed. Then, Enya and Nancy came out to the lobby.
“What are we thinking?” Nancy asked.
“Lunch,” Arlowe replied.
“What she means is…”
Violet pinched Arlowe’s shoulder.
“Ouch!”
“That we’re going to talk about this over lunch, and I’ll call you with our decision.”
“Great. I left a voicemail about the furniture, so I hope to hear back soon,” Nancy shared.
“Thank you,” Violet replied.
“Of course. I’ll walk you all out.”
“Hey, do you want to maybe hang out tonight?” Gabi asked Sarai as they walked down the stairs.
“Tonight?” Sarai asked.
“Or not. It’s fine. I was just thinking that there could be a movie or something, and we could order those burritos.”
“I love burritos,” Arlowe said, turning around to face them when they hit the first floor. “What movie?”
“Oh, I–”
“Arlowe, you’re just hungry, so why don’t you leave a conversation that was between two other people and wait in the car for Violet to drive us to a restaurant?” Sarai told her.
“Well, now, I want burritos,” Enya added.
Gabi sighed as they walked out of the building.