by Holly Rayner
My stomach rumbles unpleasantly, and I sigh. Although Ian hasn’t been ordering me to skip lunch, I’ve been doing it so I’ll have a chance of getting off work before the delivery restaurants start to close. I order dinner every night these days, so exhausted am I when I come home from work.
I check my watch. Perfect timing. I gather up the day’s finished projects and deposit them in the wall-mounted inbox outside of Ian’s door. Then I return to my desk to gather my things, my mind already miles away from the office, considering what pizza toppings I’ll get. Maybe just extra cheese. That’s indulgent, but why shouldn’t I indulge a little, after the day I’ve had?
“Heading home?” Robert asks.
“Yeah,” I say. “Promise you will soon?”
Robert, probably due to his fear of losing his job, works even harder than I do. I know for a fact he’s staying at the office until ten or eleven p.m. some nights, and it worries me. It can’t be good for him.
“I’ll be done in about half an hour,” Robert assures me.
Just then, our office secretary jumps to her feet and scurries over to the door. I’m expecting her to hold it open for someone important—a new client, maybe—but instead a small drone flies in. It’s a boxy model with four rotary blades whirring on top and a camera the size of my fingernail on the bottom, and this camera now scans the room, clearly looking for something or someone.
A murmur goes up as, one by one, people notice the robotic visitor in our midst. It’s clearly a delivery drone; that much is obvious by the colors it bears and the painted logo on its side. But what would a delivery drone be doing here?
“What do you think this is all about?” Robert wonders aloud. “It must be something really important if someone commissioned a drone for it.”
“Hey, guys,” a voice comes from behind me, and I whirl around.
It’s Aimi, of course, her dark, pixie haircut barely sticking up over the cubicle wall. Aimi is adept at sneaking up on people, and I know in part it’s because of her tiny stature and the fact that she’s a trained dancer. But she must be doing it at least a little bit on purpose, too. I think she gets a kick out of watching people jump when she surprises them like that.
Robert clutches at his heart, as he always does when Aimi startles him. “Woman, you’re going to put me in an early grave.”
“You’ll be fine,” she says, laughing lightly and swatting him on the wrist. “Did you two see the drone?” A silly question, as it’s moving closer all the time, and its blades are whirring loudly, but never mind. “So cool. I love those things so much. One of them brought the new TV I ordered just this weekend, and I swear, I was as excited about the drone as I was about the TV itself. I wish I had one.”
“We were just talking about what it might be doing here,” Robert says. “They usually carry valuable things, right? People don’t use drones for their everyday mail delivery.”
“Hmm, you’re right,” Aimi agrees. “Although rich people probably do. So maybe the item it’s carrying is valuable, or maybe it’s just that the person who sent it is wealthy. Either way, I wonder what it’s doing here? I mean, it’s got to be for Ian, right? He’s the only one here important enough to receive a drone delivery. But what could it be bringing him?”
“That little drone isn’t carrying anything at all, guys,” I join in. “If it had a package, you’d notice. So it’s probably here to take something out, not to bring something in.”
“Do you think so?” Aimi asks.
Unfortunately for me, it’s hard to think right now. Because seeing the drone has reminded me of something. Well, someone.
Magnus.
After the Vipers’ Nest competition went awry, every tech magazine and news site ran articles about it. Magnus Johansen had received the backing of the billionaires to launch his drone delivery service.
At first, as I read about it, I felt sure there had been some mistake. After all, I’d spent time with Magnus. I’d seen his drone. And he had told me that wasn’t his project, that it was just a side venture he was working on. Why would he lie to me? But as I read the story in magazine after magazine, I was forced to conclude that, although I could see no reason for him to do it, Magnus had lied.
Meanwhile, his drone delivery service was meeting with tremendous success. As much as I didn’t want to pay attention, it was impossible not to watch it grow. Drones were all around me, making deliveries, and everyone in my life was excited by them. All the while, I sank further and further into my terrible job and tried to forget that the very air was now buzzing with the tech that had usurped my opportunity and ruined my life. I tried to forget about Magnus Johansen and his winning smile, his soft hair, and his thick, hard muscles. What did it matter what he had done and continued to do? He was nothing to do with me. I had my own life to live.
“Leah,” Aimi says, “It’s not going to Ian’s office. Look. I think it’s coming this way.”
I follow the drone with my eyes, as much as I don’t want to acknowledge its presence. Perversely, it feels like letting Magnus win to take notice of this thing. I can’t ignore it, though, when it swoops its way into the cubicle space I share with Robert. It circles his head once, reminding me of a large gnat. Robert looks distinctly uncomfortable, and I get the impression he wants to swat the thing away.
After a moment, the drone seems to decide Robert isn’t its target, and it moves on to Aimi. She giggles as the camera pokes its lens into her face like an untrained puppy trying to meet a stranger. Aimi clearly isn’t bothered by the drone at all—she finds it funny, even cute. Whoever’s operating the drone must find her cute too, because it does a little dance with her, darting back and forth playfully in front of her face, before flying away from her, too.
And now the drone arrives in front of me, hovering in midair. The camera scans my face. I want to turn away—this feels invasive—but the sooner it realizes I’m not the person it’s looking for, the sooner it will go away. I stand still and allow the camera to take in my features, allow the person on the other end to make whatever comparison he or she needs to make.
The drone comes to a landing on my desk and powers down, the rotors coming to a gradual stop.
“What the hell is this?” I ask no one in particular. Then I turn and speak to the drone itself. “You’re not here for me,” I tell it. Maybe the camera operator is still watching. “You’ve made a mistake. Get out of my cubicle.”
“Leah,” Aimi says.
“What?”
“Your name is on that note.”
I hadn’t seen it at first, but she’s right. There’s a folded-up piece of paper in a clear envelope on top of the drone, tucked under the rotors. “Leah Simmonds” is scrawled in untidy handwriting on the paper. But who would send me a note this way? It’s not a formal document, that much is certain. The paper looks like it was ripped out of a notebook.
Of course, I can think of one person who sends notes this way.
This whole situation is giving me uncomfortable flashbacks to that night at the bar, the night I met Magnus. I avoid drones as much as I can, and now here one is trying to give me a personal note, just like Magnus did.
I don’t want to take it.
Aimi doesn’t give me a choice. She darts forward and pulls the note from the drone.
“This is so weird, Leah! What is this? Did you know it was coming?” she asks while waving the note around in the air.
“Of course, I didn’t.”
I hold out my hand for the note, but Aimi dances back out of reach, teasing me. Unfortunately for her, Robert is still standing there, and she runs right into his broad bulk. He catches her gently by the upper arms so that I can pluck the note out of her hand, and I take it back to my desk and turn my back to them to read it.
Dear Ms. Simmonds,
I would like to speak to you at your earliest convenience about a matter of personal significance. Will you please call my secretary to arrange an appointment? I look forward to reconnecting with yo
u.
Yours sincerely,
Magnus Johansen
Magnus Johansen!
I feel my blood start to boil. After all these years, after the lies and the opportunities he took away from me, he has the nerve to contact me like this and ask me to meet up with him. It’s outrageous!
I’m not going to call him, of course I’m not, and I’m half inclined to smash his drone, too. I won’t, of course, but only because I don’t want to get a reputation around the office. I’m trying to keep a low profile around here.
“Magnus Johansen?” Aimi squeals.
Damn. I shove the paper into my pocket, but the damage has been done. She’s hanging onto my arm now, having read the note over my shoulder, and jumping up and down.
“Magnus Johansen, Leah! I can’t believe it! What’s a billionaire doing writing to you?”
“He’s a billionaire?”
What?
I knew Magnus was successful, of course, but I wasn’t aware that things had gone that far.
The realization is infuriating. How is this fair? He lied and cheated the system and was rewarded with success in the field and a ridiculous amount of wealth, and meanwhile, I’m here in this cubicle, stuck at a job I hate. It’s twisted.
“He wants to meet you!” Aimi continues, her voice in a register that probably only dogs could make out fully. “Why on earth would Magnus Johansen want to meet you, Leah?”
“We’ve met before,” I say. “We were on Vipers’ Nest together. Or, we would have been on it, I guess. You know what I mean.”
“But that’s amazing!” Aimi says. “You’re old friends! Of course. He wants to get back together with you and reminisce about old times. This is so exciting! I bet he’ll take you out to dinner somewhere ridiculously fancy. What are you going to wear?”
“Hang on, Aimi,” I say. “Slow your roll. I’m not going to go to dinner with him.”
“Why not? Money isn’t anything to him, Leah, and clearly he wants to spend time with you if he’s asking you to call him after all these years… It’s practically romantic, is what it is.” Her whole face lights up. “Hey, you don’t think he could have feelings for you, do you?”
“Definitely not,” I say. “And I’m not going to call him, Aimi. The guy’s a jerk. He’s the reason Vipers’ Nest never aired. He’s the reason I never got an opportunity to pitch my app back then.” I feel like saying he’s the reason my life is such a trainwreck, but I hear in my head how melodramatic that sounds. I can’t blame Magnus for everything. It’s not his fault Gran died, after all.
“Leah!” Aimi says. “You have to call him. He went to all the trouble to find you, to send you this drone with the note… What if he’s not a jerk at all anymore? People change, and it’s been years since the contest. Maybe he’s trying to apologize. Don’t you want to find out?”
“No,” I say. “Magnus Johansen is nothing but an unpleasant piece of my past, and I’m leaving him there, where he belongs.” I ball the note up and toss it into the garbage can. “I don’t know what he was thinking trying to get in touch with me now, but he’s obviously crazy—in addition to being a jerk—if he thinks that after everything he’s done, I’m going to fall into his trap.”
“I’m sure it’s not a trap,” Aimi calls after me, but I’m done talking about it. I scoop up the little drone in one hand, carry it to the door it came in through, and toss it out into the atrium. The rotors whirr to life as it’s falling and it rights itself in midair and zips away, exiting much more quickly than it entered and giving me the vague impression that it’s fleeing.
I storm back to my desk, where I’ve left my purse, trying not to notice the curious stares of my coworkers—I’m sure I’ll be the subject of gossip for the next several days thanks to the drone’s arrival.
When I get back to my cubicle, Robert is facing his screen again, headphones on, deep in concentration. Aimi is gone. But the note from Magnus Johansen has been pulled out of the trash and smoothed flat on my desk, and a pink sticky note on the top of it bears her handwriting.
Call him.
Chapter 7
Leah
I cannot believe I’m awake and out of the house by nine in the morning on a Saturday. Sleeping in on the weekend is one of my greatest delights in life, and what with work being as hectic as it is at the moment, Saturday mornings have become more of a blissful respite than ever before. I must have been crazy to agree to this. I don’t know what I could have been thinking.
Actually, I can pinpoint exactly the factors that brought me to this point. It’s more that I can’t believe I was stupid enough, and weak-willed enough, to let them sway me. I’m years beyond too old to fall victim to peer pressure, and yet that’s exactly what happened.
I should have seen it coming when Robert and Aimi called me and pestered me to come out for drinks last night.
It wasn’t the first time the three of us have gone out together, which is probably why I fell for it. We’re semi-regular drinking buddies. But this deviated from the usual pattern. Ordinarily, if we’re going to go out, we make plans in the office, before we’ve left. Getting home, changing into my pajamas and cuddling up with Dragon…all of that was part of a different pattern, the one that meant I was in for the night. When Aimi persuaded me to go out, it meant getting back into day clothes.
She was unsympathetic when I tried to argue this point.
“You would have had to change anyway,” she said. “You don’t want to wear your work clothes to the bar. Come on, Leah, you never dress up. Pick out something pretty. Do you want me to come over and help you get ready?”
“No,” I said firmly, and agreed quickly to the drink, mostly so she would stop pushing for the makeover portion of the evening. The last thing I wanted was for Aimi to come over and play dress up with me. I haven’t bought any new clothes in years, and I can only imagine how aghast Aimi would be if she truly saw how little I was working with. She’d probably be on me to spend my Saturday at the mall.
I dressed in a pleated black miniskirt and a tight red sweater, finishing the look with chunky lace-up boots that gave the outfit a bit of a youthful vibe, and met my friends at our usual bar. Aimi had already ordered three dirty martinis, one of which she slid across the table to me. I took a long drink, eager to leave both the stress of work and the mild discomfort I always felt at bars behind me.
Aimi watched me. At the time, I attached no significance to the knowing expression on her face. I should have known better.
She waited until I was three drinks deep to broach the subject of Magnus. She’d copied down the phone number, it turned out. Of course she had. I should have seen something like this coming. Robert, who had had plenty to drink by this point too and was in the perfect frame of mind to egg on any action he saw without much caring what it was, became Aimi’s cheerleader.
Of course, I should call him! They’d urged. If I didn’t want to go out with him, I could give him a piece of my mind, read him the riot act for what he’d done to me all those years ago. Didn’t I want to call him out? Not just for my sake, but for the sake of the other Vipers’ Nest contestants, all those hopefuls who’d thought their dream had a chance of coming true?
I don’t remember being convinced, exactly, but I remember that suddenly the phone was in my hand, pressed to my ear, ringing.
“Hello,” a harried-sounding woman answered. “This is Mr. Johansen’s office.”
“Is Magnus—I mean, Mr. Johansen—available?”
“I’m sorry, he’s gone for the night. Would you like to leave a message?”
Perfect. I could tell Magnus exactly what I thought of him without ever having to speak to him.
“Well, this is Leah Simmonds, and you can tell Magnus that—”
I was cut off by the secretary before I could finish.
“Leah Simmonds?” the woman said. Her tone was different now; friendlier, almost obsequious. “My goodness, you should have said so. Mr. Johansen is expecting your call. He’s a
sked me to bring you in personally…are you available tomorrow?”
“Am I what?”
What was I agreeing to here? I was confused, the martinis swirling in my brain. How did this woman know my name? Magnus must have told her…had he really been so sure I would succumb to curiosity, that I would call him just because he’d asked me to? He must be so used to getting his way. My respect for him slipped a little further.
“How about tomorrow at nine thirty?” the woman asked. “Mr. Johansen has an opening in his schedule then. I can put you in. Now, we’ve just moved to a new office. We’re on Eleventh Street. It’s the big glass-fronted building, number 2029, you can’t miss it, and Mr. Johansen is on the fifteenth floor. Have you got all that, dear?”
“Fifteenth floor,” I echoed dumbly, astounded at how quickly the situation had swept beyond my control.
Now, of course, in the cold light of day, I can see a dozen places where I could have stopped things. I didn’t have to go out with my friends at all last night. I didn’t have to keep drinking the drinks Aimi placed in front of me—this morning, my throbbing head and churning stomach are stark reminders of why I don’t ordinarily drink like that. And if I was going to drink, I should have issued a firm no on the suggestion of a call to Magnus’ office. Looking back, I can see that I wavered. It was almost as if some part of me wanted it to happen.
Today, though, no part of me wants this to be happening. The secretary I spoke to was correct in telling me that there was no way I’d be able to miss the building—even if it weren’t for the giant number 2029 over the door, I would have known right away that this was it. It’s the most beautiful building on the street, and it’s clearly brand new. Seattle has plenty of well-designed buildings, architectural feats, but this one takes my breath away. Absently, I pay the cab driver who brought me here, marveling at the fact that I actually have business inside this gleaming structure.
The inside is just as breathtaking. The lobby is all marble, with a reception desk that seems to have grown up out of the floor naturally and a beautiful fountain that sends a melodic trickle of water over a deliberately arranged pile of rocks and into a gleaming pool at its base.
