Wednesday
Full of smokey barbecue, creamed corn and a roll, Nick heads to Eastern High School. Notice he skipped beans to avoid distractions while talking turkey.
The confab with Chuck Tuttle had gone well and Nick’s certainly glad he’d gotten Dean to clarify why they need that Token Ring when he provided the complete inventory. There’s a sixth system that acts as a file server, running Xenix. This discovery had given him a brief moment of alarm. Either he would have to upgrade that hardware or finesse an Ethernet card into an OS he’d only messed with a few times.
But then his mind took a quick inventory of what he understood of the school’s lab backend, and it seems most things were moving to OS/2 which is the smarter cousin of DOS that hits the gym on a regular basis. Goody confirmed this, the faculty had been granted file space on the OS/2 servers and they had an experimental mail system, mostly just for fun.
And that’s what his client mainly needs is mail and a central calendar. Nick would have the luxury of time at home (or at the school) to get all the boxes staged, actually, the entire network, once the hub arrives.
So enough about that, Deej was right, Tuttle is 100% good ole boy and politely grinned off the Gateway option.
“Son if I didn’t throw ol’ Fred the business he’d bust my beanie-weens, hell, borrow that truck out there if you need to.”
“I shoulda known you go back a few.”
“Oh I got stories, but <wink> we’re in mixed company.”
This was pretty ripe stuff with Dean seated right there beaming his way through some cake. Nick just shook his head and would have to see what Fred had to say about them there stories. But for now they shake hands and sign the papers. Tuttle told Dean to set up an account with Fred to get things started, there should be little if anything on the BOM he can’t track down, otherwise it would mean combing through the 14-pound ComputerShopper books stacked in Nick’s office.
After the lunch meeting Nick stuck around a bit to get his bearings and answer questions, then Dean asks if he could go pick up Sam while he gets things set up, and whips out a fin and blessing to stop by the dairy stand.
And so now he joins the growing row of picker uppers along the curb without buses then gets out to stand inside his open door and flag her down. It ends up a few minutes watching kids these days, a world so foreign and distant even after just two and a half years. Pretty soon a blond mop in a skirt emerges with a backpack and male companion alongside who seems to do all the talking. She scans around for a familiar car and seems to see him with disbelief. So Nick grins and makes a whimsical wave to which Sam excuses herself from the - conversation? - and hurries over.
“So you’re my dad’s errand boy now?”
“I can just leave you with that kid -”
“NO, get me outta here!”
They both get buckled in quickly as if in a desperate getaway.
“Mmmm hmm. Well look at you morphing into a pint-sized beauty, keep this up and you might get asked out one of these days.”
She lights up, “So where are we off to, dahhhhleng? The Ritz? The Riviera?”
“Howbout the dairy stand?”
“Oooohh, it’ll spoil my supper, cool!”
“Actually there’s leftovers at the office.”
“I hate the office.”
“I get the feeling your dad knows that.”
She sighs, but smiles.
They proceed on, it’s only a couple miles, but she muses,
“You should get a convertible, dahhhleng, my hair would flow in the breeze.”
“And the bugs would stick in your teeth.”
This gets a laugh.
They pull into the stand and get in line, she prods,
“What can I get?”
“Anything you want, dear.”
She looks at him point blank, “I have to know, did he give you money.”
Nick can’t find a way out, “He slipped me a fiver, happy?”
She smiles, “I’ll get a shake.”
“Yeah same here. OOH mocha, don’t see that often enough.”
Sam somehow gives him three dirty looks at once, then goes back to the twisting and grooving she does in idle mode.
They get situated without much more dialog then take a seat at a vacant table, thankfully the weather stayed nice enough.
“Did Deej survive the night OK?”
“I…guess, her door was closed, we try to keep each other from getting sick.”
“Yeah we do in my house too, hopefully we talk tonight.”
Sam looks at him and smiles between slurps.
“Oh, I got a tuner for that guitar, I’ll send it with you.”
She hops and claps, then slurps.
“Umm, I used to hate getting this question, but if you wanna answer, how was school?”
This gets a look, best he can tell it’s purposefully blank, but from her every look has a charge.
“Yeah that was a turd. Have you ever thought of going into comedy?”
Now this gets an expectant look, so he has to elaborate.
“Like writing comedy or doing standup?”
“They’d throw vegetables and soup at me.”
“You’re right, that was another turd.”
She looks the other way and giggles and slurps.
They go on slurping, then finally she asks,
“You took April out last night, right?”
“Yeah, we had a good talk.”
“I miss her.”
“Yeah she’s a sweetie.”
Sam slurps, then, “So, they asked me to do music at the home group.”
“Oh, you’d play along with my mom?”
“Yeah, I guess, she plays piano?”
“Since before I was born.”
Sam gets a pensive look.
“Are you wanting to?”
“I want to help out.”
“And be a good kid?”
She half smiles, “Yeah.”
Nick pauses. “Um, do you…believe in home group?”
Sam smirks.
“Sounds like you just want to help out.”
This gets a bigger smile.
Nick has a hunch, “So who asked you, was it Mom?”
She looks the other way and takes a slurp.
“Sam?”
Slowly she looks over, “Okay, you got me. I shouldn’t have said it that way.”
“You would like to be asked though.”
She scoots up right against him.
“So this is having a kid sister.”
For this he gets a very quick, very cold, wet peck on the cheek.
“Good enough. So I should talk to my mom?”
“Would you?” with a little girl’s wistfulness.
“Yeah, but it would be better if you would.”
“Can you bring it up first?”
“Sure.”
“Thanks, Nick,” takes a slurp, “maybe you could join us sometime?”
“I’ll think about it.”
“Yes, you will” in a growl as she turns with an evil look.
Nick just chuckles and takes a sip, then, “For a second I thought your head would keep spinning,”
This gets a laugh, then, “So do I really remind you of Noreen?”
“Funny you should ask, you just did, just now.”
“I’d like to meet her.”
“You could take her class if you go to the U.”
“OH, yeah, what does she teach?”
“English…lit, comp, that stuff.”
“God, English lit, just what I need.”
“Ever read Chaucer? He’s hilarious.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, tales of merry olde England. It’s bloody medieval poetry.”
“Oh.”
“Are you really that much of a reader?”
“I’d rather write, but really rather draw or paint or play music.”
“My kinda gal. So are you gonna make wall art for the living room at home?”
“Well, the wall is the canvas, I’ll sketch it out in pencil then paint it in.”
“Can’t wait.”
Sam leans on his shoulder and slurps up the last slurps. “If you tell anyone I kissed you I’ll rip your fucking head off”
“Why would I want to admit to that in the first place?”
This gets the show-ending laugh and they proceed back to the plant, the highlight of which is seeing Tuttle try to engage Sam in a conversation and her struggling to not squirm, poor thing deserves better. But the deal is inked and Nick is set to turn Fred loose on the materials, after which he’ll turn himself loose on the goose. Whatever that means.
So with another round of handshakes he’s ready to head out, then sees Sam dig into homework in the break room and remembers to grab the tuner from his car, at the sight of which she transforms into a devious hand-rubbing state. What a day.
As he gets into the Celica he figures he might as well see if Fred is busy and gets there right before closing time. Fred is on his office phone but can stick around a bit to go over it, and before long confirms that Tuttle is pulling his leg about any old stories,
“Forget it Nick, we met at summer camp so you heard it allllll before, the rest is just double dates, golf and some bass fishin’.”
And so it goes. But most of the desktop parts he already has on hand and can have ready in a couple days, not surprising the server and hub will be a week or two. Fred can also have someone take the monitors and other things out to the plant, or something like that.
So another handshake gets that in motion and Nick heads home for supper and a settle in. He had almost expected a message from the school but evidently nothing came up, seems most things can easily wait a day or two.
Ned drills him first, “How’s our consultant?”
“Tired, that was a lot of talking, oh, Fred sends his best. But I took Sam for ice cream which was a nice break.”
“She’s a good kid.”
“She’s a something.”
This gets a laugh.
“Oh Mom, she wants to play guitar along with you in home group, she’s being shy but I told her I’d break the ice before she asks.”
“Of course she can, I’d love it.”
So they eat and Nick relates an earful of Mr. Tuttle, how he calls everyone into lunch with come jump on the Chuck Wagon, then his folks remember him running for state office a while back,
“You boys were still little, but his campaign didn’t go well because of things he said and - pretty sure he was divorced by then, kinda dated around and rumors of babies popping up.”
Then Ned hints his group might be close to hiring but is starting to think Nick would be bored doing the same thing all week.
Nick surmises, “I’m lucky to have options.”
Ned drives it home by pointing a fork, “Don’t ever forget it, bub.”
So after a soak it’s either try Deej or wait, but it seems better to try, so he does, and she answers, not sounding any better.
“How’s the patient?”
“Patient is hogging the couch watching TV with the mom. Sounds like you had an interesting day.”
“That Tuttle is a classic, you were dead on.”
“I aim to please,” then coughs a bit juicer than last night.
“Sounds like it’s moving through you like a freight train.”
“Yeah I don’t ache as bad but hot, cold, hot, cold, sleep, can’t sleep,” then coughs some more.
“Well I won’t keep you.”
“It’s okay, you talk.”
So Nick recounts everything, gets a laugh at what Tuttle said, more coughs,
“Oh you can probably imagine company parties, the picnics were nice, but at Christmas he’d get drunk and they would literally start sneaking us kids out, it was bad.”
“Yeesh,” then he tried to discreetly relate the Sam conversation without drawing retribution from the younger, then on to Fred’s, dinner conversation.
Naturally big sis zeroes in on the one part, “Sam stood a few feet away and smiled her way through every second of the trip, she’ll never forget that hon, said you rescued her from a sophomore dork.”
Nick laughs, “Yeah I could tell he wasn’t her favorite.”
“He won’t leave her alone, he’s harmless but she needs to stand up to him and be a...frickin’ senior.,” no coughs this time but her voice cuts out.
“You’re losing your voice dear, are you tired?”
“After this show I’m going to…<yawns>...shower and go to my room.”
“Well you do that, we’ll talk tomorrow, for me it should be a normal day for the most part.”
“I’m hoping this breaks up soon and I can at least leave the house this weekend.”
“Well keep resting and the juice and soak if you can, I already did.”
“Did you think about me?”
“It’s more of a trick not to.”
Silence.
“Alright hon, get rest and feel better.”
“Love you.”
“Love you nite.”
She squeaks out a nite then hangs up. Poor thing.
Pretty soon he flips on the classical and that’s it.