Tuesday
Right on cue, Nick sits in Brenda’s chair in mid-morning and is increasingly convinced she’ll be mostly self-supported, at least for the near future, by lunchtime.
Yesterday he split between worlds and will do the same today, one way or another.
For now, Miss Brenda sits next to him as the defrag runs, now that a bad file had been weeded out and corrected, evidently due to a power hiccup. It turns out she works for Walt Bowers Insurance, who represents a variety of insurers and annuity providers. So it’s a nice setup in a small brick building with the fancier molding decor and Walt’s office in the rear, next to another office for an accounting-type, who’s not in at the moment.
“So you can set it up so I just type something to do this, cleanup…thingy?”
“Yeap, once a week or so should be plenty, before lunch maybe.”
“Oh cool.” Brenda had already expressed her perceived inadequacy with computers several times by now.
Nick is still casing the joint. “So, Word Perfect and, any thing else?”
“That’s usually where I live, my predecessor was…well, older, and so she used that typewriter over there.”
Off on a corner shelf was probably a workhorse tank IBM Selectric beneath a cover. Nick can’t resist,
“I’ll have to check that out.”
“Be our guest, I hate the <lowers voice> damn thing.”
Nick wonders why she lowered her voice since no one else is in earshot, but who knows, but picks it up,
“Is this thing any better?”
“Actually I’m thankful, and I feel better about it now. How did you learn all this stuff?”
Nick pauses, “Let’s just say curiosity kills the cat.”
“Ohh kay?”
“Well, it kills at lot of time at least.”
“You’re funny. So have you talked to Vance lately?”
“Not since the golf day I think.”
“Oh yeah, I forget you guys don’t talk a lot.”
He grins, “Well you gals usually do that for us.”
She taps his arm, “Hey now.”
The phone rings and she takes some notes. Nick realizes he’d never seen her in pants, always in a knee-length skirt, which suits her well, very confident long-limbed packaging. After she hangs up she continues,
“Do you see that Curt very often?”
Nick pauses to muse at her phrasing. “Not really, haven’t run into him at campus but then I’m not there so much these days.”
“Well, the girls gave me a hard time for staring at him that night but I just couldn’t believe…that cocky, but I wanted…well, April seemed to need some answers and…”
Nick doesn’t want to weight in, just a knowing, “Mmmmmmhmmm.”
She pauses so he looks over and she’s studying him.
After a few eternal seconds he prods, “Yes?”
“Well - I don’t mean to be a gossip, but…I don’t know, I’m rambling.”
“You’re fine.”
“Nick - do you think I have a chance with Vance? Oh God that was lame -”
He cuts her off, “If he knows what’s good for him then yes you have a chance.”
Silence.
He looks over and she seems pleased. “Thank you, Nick, I believe you mean it.”
“Alright look…he had a shitty time growing up, that cramped apartment, he deserves a good chance.”
She pulls her chair closer.
“A chance at what?”
Nick has to think. “Well, assuming you guys want the same thing…”
After a few breaths, “We’ve talked.”
Right then the defrag wraps up but he tries to stay on topic. After drawing a deep breath, “Well, good. That’s great, actually, and, all we really talked about was stupid shit, but…now that…well, seems he used to bring that up now and then, about marriage and kids, and I prollably changed the subject.”
“Prollably, huh? But that’s good to know.”
Nick acknowledges the defrag and exits it, then runs the defrag help command to see about building her a batch file.
“You seem to know all the secrets of this thing, I’m years behind.”
For once, Nick was ready, “Well, that phone call you just took, you wouldn't want to hear me do that, you’re so graceful.”
“Thanks, I try. Oh before I forget, how much do you need for this visit?”
Crap. Nick hadn’t really worked out a rate, but to base things on his salary at the school, which evens out around $12.50 an hour. At this point he was into a second hour and needed padding for the batch file, so,
“Is twenty-five ok?”
“Oh I’m sure it is, Walt’s in so we can get you a check.”
“Poifect.”
She giggles.
Evidently the hope is to share a calendar among all office machines at some point, but Nick doesn’t propose anything yet, too much going on for the moment anyhow. Also at the moment, this feels really…well, cozy, they’re really hitting it off with a common sense of purpose.
But then, almost on cue, someone walks in as Nick is studying the screen and before he can look up, Brenda greets the visitor,
“Mister Ted, got some juicy payroll for us?”
“Right here.” Nick recognizes the voice but keeps on typing, actually, he starts a dummy text file and types junk commands in it as his chest and ears start to warm up. He continues as she reaches behind him for an envelope or such.
“Well thank you sir.”
“Alrighty-dighty, see you in two weeks.”
After Ted leaves, Nick looks over at her with a wry grin.
She chuckles. “Umm, do you know him by chance?”
Nick sighs, then, “I think I, well, had to run him off a while back, he kind of interrupted a date.”
She laughs into her hands. “Hmmm…well I doubt he has many dates of his own to get interrupted.”
Nick just shakes his head and lets it float.
“I think he recognized you, usually he sticks around.”
“You’re welcome.”
She laughs some more. “Want any more coffee?”
“Better not, it’ll make me nervous about Ted returning.”
“OHHHH my.”
Just before getting up to leave, Nick realizes that Brenda has stayed out of his field of vision most of the time, and that she tends to keep her chair a few inches behind his for whatever reason, not that she has any reason to be self conscious. She’s every bit as attractive as the other gals in their circle, actually similar height to Noreen with a nice build, straight sandy blond, greenish blue eyes, and usually wears a skirt and always well presented. But unlike what he’s used to, Brenda is simply not one bit nerdy about anything, confidently outgoing when the situation calls for it, like when she had April break the ice for this visit. But she’s got the traditional female sensibilities, actually, more like his mother, and for that matter, most mothers, and for that reason now life makes a bit more sense.
* * * * *
Nick wound up at the campus for the afternoon to tie up some ends, then came home to a quick shower before Deej got there for a stolen nap and to help with some leftovers.
After they moseyed upstairs she wants to check out a new curiosity he’d wired up in recent days: a compact, entry-level Uniden mobile CB with origins he can’t recall, but seems he’d grabbed it at a yard sale in recent years thinking it would be fun in the Cordoba then let it get buried, or actually, thought too hard about mobile antenna options and left it to future inspiration.
As it turns out that inspiration came in the form of rigging it to the antenna tuner to use the dipole array and see what happens. As he understands it there’s few specific laws on antennas (other than free-standing height) as long as the radio itself is FCC type-accepted (i.e. certified) and you don’t exceed the few allowed watts (i.e. four or five, depending on how measured…).
Leave it to Deej to find amusement in this, she hadn’t heard CB in years since her grandpa had one and wanted to hear truckers from the highway.
Nick kept warning, “Nineteen is usually all butts and elbows but we’ll see what we get.”
Actually, the road channel wasn’t terribly busy, but right away there’s a female voice, “Sweet Squeeze, channel 17.”
Deej is sitting there in her work outfit, one of endless combinations that never cease to amaze Nick as her wardrobe doesn’t seem that big, yet she shoots him a puzzled look, which hits him within a daze of her full-day of sweet musk.
Nick has a hunch, “She’s prollably at the truck stop…”
Her eyes dance for a second, then go really wide as she draws a breath, just as the radio pipes up,
“Sweet Squeeze, gimme a hollar on 17”
Deej grabs the mic, “Hey fellas I hear Sweet Squeeze has a vein-er! So if ya really want a good time call Muffin Top on 21.”
Nick’s ears glow hot as the sun as she releases the mic and turns unimaginably red, shaking with silent laughter.
“Danielle!“ is all he can muster, just as Sweet Squeeze starts in,
“Honey I don’t know WHO the hell you are but I bet you can’t even sit on a bar stool yours is so loose…”
Nick peers at her in disbelief, “A VEIN-er?”
Deej starts to fan herself and can’t seem to take full breaths. Nick gets up to crack a window.
Sweet Squeeze presses on, “Yeah you BETTER stay quiet - BITCH! Don’t let even me find you around….”
Unsure what else to do, Nick flips the dial up to 21, where it’s thankfully quiet. But alas, as if on autopilot, he grabs the mic,
“How boutcha there Muffin Top you sound pretty damn sexy,” in the dumbest drawl he can muster.
Not to be outdone, Deej pulls it together and grabs the mic, “Howout you come ‘round behind the Hideway and find out for yourself stud?”
At this point neither one of them can stay on a chair and slide onto the floor, heaving with guffaws, as we say.
Once they both start to calm down just a tad, the radio pipes up, a male voice, “Where’d ya go there Muffin Top, you sound like plenty a woman to go around there a-commown?”
Eventually she pleads Nick to help her to the bathroom before it’s too late. Given the circumstances he forgoes the urge to offer an eraser as a cork.