“True.”
They stopped by the front door. A pair of students came in from outside, looked at them, looked at each other smiling, and scampered on, tittering. Great.
More rumors.
She pushed herself from the door post. “I should be getting back. I've got hours of work ahead of me.”
He nodded. “Sure.” Ask her.
She beat him to it. “Can I text you if I get struck on some science term?”
“Sure. Anytime.”
She smiled. “Never know when I might need some more science pointers.”
He nodded. “Good. I'll be here.”
They stood silent for a moment. “Drive you to your car?” Peter said finally.
She gave a short curtsy. “Thank you, kind sir.”
“Don't mention it.” Peter edged around her to get the door.
They walked together through the front doors and out into the sunset. The rain had stopped, but fast-moving clouds scudded across the sky. A few leaves rustled at their feet.
“Just like the old days.”
“What's that?” he said.
“When you used to walk me home from school.”
“It was a lot closer then. Be about a five-mile run from here.”
“True.” They shuffled along silently. She held her purse in both hands in
front of her, kicking leaves as she went.
He thought of something someone told him once, or maybe he had read it.
You remembered the bad things about the past and forgot about a lot of the good.
Right now, he was thinking about Kate the little girl, walking her home from school, her purple My Little Pony backpack bouncing on her shoulders. The Kate he had grown close to, not the one he had drifted apart from in high school.
The one he was wondering if he had lost, or if maybe he'd been given another chance to find.
They shuffled on. He started kicking leaves with her, smiling.
Just like the old days.
Chapter Fourteen
Frank Madsen looked up from Kate's report on his laptop, peering at her over his
reading glasses. “And this is the extent of the report so far?”
Kate fussed with the collar of her shirt. The conference room seemed
awfully warm today. “Yes, so far. It's just the preliminary report. Nitrovex is turning out to have a more extensive reach than we—than I thought.”
Madsen nodded slowly. The three other senior members of her group
continued to shift through the thin stack of papers that made up her report. None
of them were smiling.
That's it then, back to the business cards. She wondered if the KwikCopies
on the corner had any job openings? She waited for someone else to speak, fingers laced together.
She'd spent the trip back on Sunday with the radio off, a yellow-lined notepad and a pen on the passenger seat beside her. Thinking, driving, taking notes. More notes once she got to her apartment, Then a quickly made slide presentation when she'd hit the office this morning. She hated doing things so last minute, and she was annoyed with herself for feeling so out-of-her-depth.
The talk with Peter had helped. She'd pursued the Nitrovex problem from a
different angle, a more personal angle, and had managed to cobble together some
new ideas for her proposal. Enough, hopefully, to convince the group that she could finish the job. Which meant another trip back to Nitrovex and Golden Grove.
And Peter?
