London Harmony: Small Fry (12 page)

I checked the time and stretched and rubbed my arms to make a little heat friction.  Then I grabbed my things and headed out toward the campus showers.  I stepped out of the Archives and took two steps and came up short when I almost ran into a woman in a well pressed pantsuit.

A familiar voice said, “Well hello there.  I didn't know you worked here too.”  I took a step back and started bunching up the sleeves of my jacket as I took in everything about the woman.  Everything about her was immaculately groomed, and her gorgeous black hair was pulled back into a ponytail.  Everything inside me was screaming that I recognized her voice, but I just couldn't place it.

The confused look on her face didn't help.  I loved the middle eastern caramel tone of her skin.  She did a self-chiding chuckle and her expression softened and she said, “Sorry, I forgot.  Paya Doshi.”  I almost did a face palm, duh.  Paya from the last Thursday Night movie on Tabitha Romanov's houseboat.  She had such a fun personality.

I smiled in embarrassment. “Yes, of course.”  And shook her offered hand. “It's good to see you again.”  I didn't address her assumption I worked at the Royal Library Archive.

She held up a large manila envelope and said, “I was about to slide these into the drop slot for Fran on my way to breakfast with my beau.  I promised her I'd drop them by...”  Then added after a second. “For you I would suspect.”

I looked at the envelope she was offering me, then her, as I accepted it in confusion.  She smiled and said, “I'm sure there is a program we offer for your situation, if not, just ring me and we can discuss it.  We are still fairly new and are extremely flexible.  My number is on the paperwork.”

I looked back at the envelope and she laid a hand on my arm and gave it a gentle squeeze.  “This is the part where you say 'thank you Paya, I'll look them over.'”

I glanced up and had to smile at her grin as I mumbled out, “Thank you Paya, I'll look them over?”

She winked and said, “There's a girl.  Now I'm off.  It was nice to see you again Tasha.”

I caught myself waving like a bloody git as she retreated down the walk to her vehicle.  That was a confusing encounter if ever there was one.  Curiosity was killing me as I slid some papers out of the envelope as I walked toward the campus.  I stopped dead when I saw the logo for the Flotilla Project at the top of the pages, and I remembered where Paya worked.

I blinked at the paperwork that listed housing and placement programs for homeless young adults.  My guts wrenched and I felt angry tears welling in my eyes.  Fran had told her?  But I had trusted her... and she betrayed me.  How many others did she share my shame with?  I told her I didn't want anyone to know, that my situation was only temporary and I would handle it myself.

Why would she... Then I got it.  She was ashamed of me.  She had been in my situation before and she knew how low a person had to fall to be here.  My feeling of betrayal gnawed at me and stoked my anger.  The woman I loved was...  Bloody hell, I had loved her hadn't I?  Fran was embarrassed by me, I was a charity case to her.

Max chuckled at me as I hummed to the music as I prepped for the day.  “Girl, you've got it bad.”  I just grinned at her because I couldn't argue the fact.  She smiled and shook her head as she left our room with her workout gear slung over her shoulder in a bag. “See you tonight, looking forward to that movie thing.”

I shook my head, she knew darn well it was called Thursday Night by my family. I called out as she the door closed, “Bye brat.”

I chuckled at the muffled, “Rubber and glue, Frannie, rubber and glue.”

I grabbed my books to study as I ate breakfast.  I couldn't wait to have lunch with Tash, I grinned and texted that to her.  After a couple bites of cereal, I glanced at my cell and furrowed my brow.  She was usually an instant responder with some sort of sarcastic but cute comment.  She must be in the campus showers.

I absently wished it was my Monday-Wednesday-Friday schedule today, then I'd get to see the imp in my first class.  I texted an “I miss u” to her before heading off to Chelsea.  God I was hopeless, but I had never been around someone before that made me feel this way.  It was so exciting and confusing and I felt like my entire body was tongue tied when I was near her.  June explained it in a Sean Connery voice that I was “Schmitten by the kitten.”

Today was going to be exciting for another reason.  Tim says that he had cobbled together a clunky proof of concept unit that used the scans we had done on Saturday.  There was a lot of refinement to be done, and a user interface needed to be programmed, but this would satisfy the goal requirements for the first quarter the school had laid out for me already.  I absently touched my bag.  I had some rough sketches I had been working on all week for the user interface.

June had some studio time set up for me to make some better recordings of me introducing the SmartCanvas v3.0 units and their function.  To my protest and embarrassment, our little group of collaborators had deemed that I would be the voice for the music applications of the units like Brandye was the voice for the artwork end.

The sample voiceovers I had recorded on my iPad were just temporary placeholders for the ones we would do using the sound rooms in London Harmony.  Even though June and Mandy had pledged the catalogs of their studios to the project they were still making me write individual letters to each artist, and to hundreds of other artists and studios, asking if they wanted to be part of the project.

There was so much to do, I felt like it was a third job, and I had classes too.  I was so busy, and I cherished any minute I could get alone with my girl.  Then I thought of Tim.  For how busy I felt, I wasn't the one who actually had to build and program the units, and the man already had a basic working proof of concept?  Good lord, he was either a genius or a worko-holic.  Possibly both.

I remember the stories that circulated about how the man had built in just one day, the iconic steampunk looking prosthetic foot that Skylar Roth had worn on the final day of the first Karaoke Queen competition.  It is displayed in the London Rock and Pop Museum, in the Satin Thunder exhibit.

I grinned at that and cued up ‘Snowflakes’ by Satin Thunder on my cell and put my headphones on and almost danced through the campus, shooting smiles to all the people I passed that were looking at me like I was a loon.  I didn't care, I was in such a great mood, and, as they say here, the song is 'brilliant'!

I dropped by the conference room which had a temporary sign on it that read, “Private Project Lab, Consult Dean's Office For Admittance”.  It was space the college had set aside for the collaboration of my project between myself, Phearson Robotics, and London Harmony.  The glass wall that faced the hall had white crepe paper covering the inside, giving it the appearance of frosted glass, that gave us the secrecy and privacy that the project required.  It was our 'headquarters' until the project was complete.

The part that made my head swim was all the contracts that June's lawyer was sifting through for me about the commercial and retail uses of my idea fused into SmartCanvas, management and ownership rights.  We all thought it was quite fair and generous of Brandye and Tim to offer a thirty-three percent stake in SmartCanvas v3.0 if the project is a success.

I found out how their original fifty-fifty partnership worked. Brandye funded SmartCanvas and was in charge of signing new museums and private art collectors to allow their works to be scanned and included.  She also did all the voice-overs.  Phearson provided all the manufacturing, programming, shipping, and maintenance of units.

I had asked what I could possibly contribute to warrant an equal share.  They both looked at me like I was daft.  Brandye had simply said, “One, this brilliant use of SmartCanvas for bringing yet another kind of art to people who could not fully experience it before, is your idea.  Two, you have far more contacts in the music world than even I do.  Three, you have to manage the music end of our endeavor.”

I had blinked realizing that if this actually worked, I was creating my very own career.  Then I couldn't stop my smile since it was all for Natasha.  I wanted her to experience a part of music that her, and people with afflictions like hers, or even people with hearing or sight disabilities, could never do before.  It was a surprise to me, the wide range of people the project would benefit.

I unlocked the door and stepped through, making sure it locked behind me.  Then I turned to see Tim already there, he didn't look up, lost in his tinkering.  “Morning Tim.” I said as I pulled some papers from my pack and set them on the little card table I used as my desk.  I grinned at the card table next to mine, obsessive compulsively neat and organized.  Zilrita kept it as tidy as her desk at London Harmony.

Zilrita and June would be joining us later that day when Tim demonstrated the monstrosity he was working on.  He grunted acknowledgment.  I turned to head off to class and paused when he said,  “Finger.”  I stepped over and he was trying to solder a wire to a contact, but the wire was popping up out of the little raceway and getting in his way.  I grinned and put my finger on the wire to hold it down and he soldered the contact and set the spool of solder down and put the hot soldering iron in its cradle.

Then he playfully slapped away my finger and shooed me away.  “Class.”

I chuckled. “Yes father.”  He didn't look up from his work, but he did grin in spite of himself as I turned to head to class.  The man is a stickler for education.  He has repeatedly enforced the fact that knowledge is not a gift, nor is it a right, it is something you earn, a privilege not to be squandered.  So he makes sure the project never makes me late for any of my classes.

Then he finally looked up. “Oh, and good morning.”  I smiled as I left, it always takes him a minute or two to catch up to social conventions when he is in mad scientist mode.

What a spectacular, magnificent, sensational, and remarkable day.  I stepped up to the History 101 lecture hall.  I saw Tash standing there with her arms crossed across her chest grasping a large envelope she was looking at the people walking into the room intently, paying more attention to the blonde women.  I smiled knowing she was looking for me.

As I arrived, I hopped up to her side with a toothy grin on my face.  “Hi!”

She did her quick confirmation it was me even though I knew that she couldn't mistake my voice for anyone else's.  Then I noted her eyes were puffy and bloodshot.  Before I could ask what was wrong, she shoved the envelope she was grasping, into my chest.  “How many others did you share my secrets with?  Putting my life on display for everyone else to see my failures.  I'm not some charity case Fran!  If I embarrassed you, then you should have had the guts to say it to my face.  Bloody hell, I can't believe I trusted you!”

I stood there, stunned, as she let go of the envelope and it fell to the floor.  What the hell was going on?  I reached out for her hand as she started to walk away.  She yanked her hand away and hissed, “Don't!  Just stay away from me.”  I didn't know what to do and I stood there in shock as I watched the woman I was damn sure I was in love with, march off.

I could feel tears welling in my eyes as I squatted to retrieve the envelope from the ground.  Written on it in loopy script that I did not recognize was my name.  I glanced around to see that the scene had apparently caught everyone's attention.  I slipped into the lecture hall, wanting to shrink away into nothing.  I normally sat in the front row in History 101, but I tucked myself into the back corner seat and stared at the envelope, wondering what evil it held to make Tasha so mad.  I sent her a quick text asking what I had done and that I was sorry for whatever it was.  To please talk to me.

Then, as the lecture began, I gathered the nerve and opened the envelope.  A sheaf of papers slid out and I looked at them.  They were from the Flotilla Project.  Outlines of the various programs available to the homeless, and special young adult programs, as well as sign up forms for the different programs.

This is the stuff Paya had promised me she'd deliver to me so I could approach Natasha with them when the time was right.  How did she get these?  I had never told Paya who I was asking for, she was just way to smart and observant and had guessed.  I would never have consciously told Tash's secrets.  I knew how fragile a person's pride can be when you feel as though you have dropped as low as you thought you ever could but then more things are piled on that make you sink even deeper.

I lived it and witnessed my sister refusing it from June.  But I felt what Vannie did when June didn't turn away.  Hope.  She brought this tiny burning candle into the darkness.  Then we finally accepted the hand she had offered to pull us into the light.  She never made us feel as though we were less than people.

I had hoped I could show Tasha what I had learned from that experience and help her take the various hands that were offered to her, judgment free.  But now she felt betrayed, and that is one of the most bitter poisons to someone who feels bereft of their last shred of dignity.

I was on the verge of a breakdown as tears started flowing down my cheeks.  I stood and ran to the door.  The professor paused and I looked back in apology for interrupting the lecture and slipped out the door to run as fast as I could to the woman's restroom to lock myself in a stall.

I sat on the lid of the toilet and looked at the papers I was grasping in my fist so hard the paper was tearing, and broke.  I sobbed until I couldn't catch my breath.  Then I panicked as I tried to get air into my lungs, but could only get little frantic gasps of it.  My vision was dimming.  I concentrated on calming and taking long slow breaths and eventually I succeeded.  Was it possible for your heart to hurt so much?

I tried to stand on wobbly legs and gave up and sat there on the toilet lid staring off into space before I realized who would know what to do.  I dialed Vannie and it went straight to voicemail.  I hung up and cut back a sob, I should have known better, Vanessa rarely ever has her cell on while she is working.  So I hit speed dial two.  On the first ring, June answered and chirped out happily, “What's up Small Fry?”

I tried to calm myself and I heard a small, shaky voice, coming from me. “I don't... she... I... want to come home.”  I closed my eyes tightly to stop the crying.

Her voice was full of alarm and compassion as she said firmly, “We'll be right there!  Meet us up front.”   I nodded at the cell like she could see me and I hung up.  I told myself to just breathe and I did.  I just focused on the lock on the stall and thought of absolutely nothing, I didn't want to think.  I took long deep breaths, trying to get the adrenaline and other toxic chemicals out of my system.

I finally stood defiantly and wiped my tears away on my sleeve and stepped out of the stall.  There were a couple girls near the restroom door, staring at me with concerned looks on their faces.  I gave a weak smile, shrugged and as I walked past them I said, “Girlfriend troubles,”  Any other time I think the surprise on one girl's face and confusion on the other would have made me chuckle.  Not now, though, with my world crumbling around me.

I got outside and looked across the courtyard to see June's SUV already idling at the curb.  She must have broken every traffic law to get here so fast.  I got up to the vehicle and her face was creased with concern as she nudged her chin toward the back seat.

I opened the back door to see Vannie, who put an arm out and I slid into the back seat and closed the door as she engulfed me in a tight hug.  June pulled us into traffic as I started sobbing into my sister's shoulder.  I had though I was all cried out, I was wrong.

She just held me and shushed me until I could control myself again and I pulled back and wiped the tears and snot from my face.  She smoothed back my hair from my face and gave me one of her sisterly smiles she reserved only for me.

June was watching in the rear view mirror.  “What happened Frannie?  Who's ass do I need to kick?  I have a shovel and duct tape in the trunk.”

Even through the darkness and gloom in my head I had to smile, partially because it was such a June thing to say, she and Van would always be my protectors, and partially because she might even be serious.  You never mess with the people June loves.  God, I loved my new sis.

The only person scarier than June when she is in protective mode, is Samantha Roth's wife, Abbey Jacobs, one of June's infamous June's Eight.  June has told me stories of Abbey kicking the asses of three men at once, without ever hitting them.  I could believe it too, the woman has a certain dangerous surety to her.