by Jamie Knight
Beth Lamden, the contest coordinator, suddenly appeared in a corner of the screen.
“Good afternoon. I’m very sorry to hear about the emergent situation’s impact on your travel plans today. The Netthing.Net offices will be closed in response, temporarily. However, the complex does maintain a number of guest rooms on the premises for the occasions that staff members pull double shifts, or the for the occasional freelancer works for us in house. I will try to find out if I can authorize accommodations for those of you who may be stuck in the city this week.”
“Are businesses shutting down due to this crisis?” Mahira asked.
“We are having people work from home until we know what’s going to happen. I am already home in Connecticut. People are self-quarantining all over the city, hoping to stay safe from contracting the virus, or potentially spreading it.”
Dan stood up and walked from his seat so that Beth could see him as he spoke.
“Are we going to be able to order food and have it delivered if we stay here?” he asked.
“Certainly. I’ve briefed security. As a matter of fact, any of you staying tonight should place a dinner order along with the security team’s order because the cafeteria staff is not on duty.”
“Thank you,” Dan said and sat back down. “If this is gonna suck, at least I want dinner.”
He folded his arms on the long table and rested his head.
Tory wondered how he could be so demanding at such a time as this. She was just glad she had somewhere to stay and someone looking out for her.
Chapter 7
Harlan Dawes gazed listlessly out over the city from the company helicopter as warm dusk light played over the city. Travel restrictions in place, Harlan’s pilot turned back from La Guardia where Harlan had planned to catch a connecting flight to Boston.
The Coronavirus was changing everything, but he wasn’t willing to let it stop him from making the deadline on the iGo account, even if it meant redesigning the app’s icon himself. The adversity almost excited him. Alone, he was free of the expectations and constraints of others. There was a liberation in solitude he always enjoyed.
The idea of a self-imposed quarantine of sorts wasn’t strange to him at all, having spent countless weeks in seclusion with his work. Not exactly a workaholic, Harlan didn’t separate lifestyle from work. The executive suite was part office, part gym and recreation center. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d spend weeks at his office, just the first time he might be practically alone.
After lightly touching down on the helipad, Harlan said goodnight to the pilot and left him to shut down and secure the small helicopter.
The emptiness of NextThing.Net’s offices struck him as he walked the route to the elevators that usually would be crowded with people going home.
Stepping down into the sunken lounge outside his personal office, the Smart TV brightened and greeted him. He put his bag down as the phone’s tone alerted him of a call. He shot the phone in its base and the call came through on the TV’s screen.
Beth Lamden’s face came into sharp focus as she smiled at him.
“Good evening, Mr. Dawes. Sorry to hear about your plans. I have some news of similar scenarios for some of the young people we had in town this week with the contest. Some of them have been turned away by their airlines. They are in your conference room right now. I don’t know what you think about this, but I thought I’d run the idea by you.”
“Yes, Beth. Please, tell me what you’re thinking,” he said.
“Maybe we can let them stay in the guest rooms. Give them access to the rec center and food delivery. They could be here a few days.”
“Actual contest winners?”
“Yes.”
“Rec Center, huh?” Harlan asked, brows arched. “How many?”
“Just a few,” Beth replied. “Less than a handful, Sir.”
“I guess it’s alright as long as they keep to themselves.”
“With this virus going around, that shouldn’t be difficult at all. Thank you.”
“Thank you for letting me know. I’ll be here working for the rest of the week. Feel free to call me if anything else contest related comes up. Take care of yourself. Good night.”
“Have a good night yourself, Mr. Dawes.”
After her face shrank to a tiny dot and disappeared, Harlan prompted the smart TV to mirror the security feed again.
“Conference room camera 2,” he said, as another box expanded and gave him a birds-eye view of the narrow room.
He saw Tory talking on her phone.
“Tighter,” Dawes demanded, and the camera zoomed in closer to Tory’s pretty face.
“That’s perfect.”
He wasn’t happy to see that she had been stranded, but he couldn’t help feeling glad that she was still here in the same City as he was.
Chapter 8
The tall double doors opened and a uniformed security guard in a medical grade mask entered and looked at the small group.
“Victoria Stadler,” he announced through the mask, “follow me.”
Tory waved at Mahira, who was on her phone, took up the handle to her bag and rolled it out ahead of her until she was out the doors and scurrying to catch up with the security man who was already more than ten steps ahead of her.
Inside an elevator, he passed a yellow plastic card over a sensor and made an entry on a keypad. Seeing him wave her over, Tory stepped into the elevator and rode up one level before stepping back out into an empty corridor. Walking along, she noted the swimming pool on one side and a spacious gym with a view of the city below.
At a row of doors, the security man paused. He waved an orange card over a sensor in the door and it unlocked.
Tory stepped inside and marveled for a moment at the minimally appointed room hung with huge, bright Mondrian prints on three of four walls.
“This card will give you access to the pool, the Recreation Center and cafeteria downstairs,” the man in the mask said as he put the card down on a small desk/vanity molded into the prefab wall. “The dinner order should be in the cafeteria by 7.”
He turned and walked out, leaving Tory to collapse on the bed, considering the turn of events.
***
As bright minimal music from Steve Reich and Phillip Glass played from a hidden audio system in the Cafeteria, the three contest winners sat at great distances from each other as they each peeked inside the warm bags of their dinners. Dan Ennick took his mask off and ate hungrily.
“Lincoln’s parents found him a private charter to Toronto. He’ll fly to Taiwan from there,” Mahira said loudly, as Trace Linder walked in.
Must be nice to be rich, Tory thought.
“Hello, I heard about what happened,” Trace said. “It’s awful. You’ll be fine here. The building is fitted with a number of different air purifying and filtration systems. There are creature comforts. Better than most hotels.”
“Why are you still here?” Mahira asked.
“As you may have heard, the design team is revamping the iGo icon. Mr. Dawes and I are both staying on to finish up the work. No wet market virus is going to slow us down at NextThing.”
Tory paused letting a plastic fork full of brown rice fall back on her dish. Satisfied with the arrangement, for the time being, she did not anticipate being anywhere near Harlan Dawes. Despite being two tables away from Mahira, Tory could read the obvious sudden interest merely in the position of her body.
“You mean Mr. Dawes is staying here. With us?” Mahira asked, quite excitedly.
“The big dog,” Dan mumbled, with food in his mouth.
“He has his own private suite upstairs and by the way this pandemic is looking, we could be here for weeks,” Trace said.
Tory’s mind began to race as her mind immediately began to construct embarrassing scenarios that could easily play out if she didn’t wake up from the schoolgirl-like crush she had begun to develop after catching a glimpse of Harlan in person. Fear and anticipation
took hold of her. She loved the idea of meeting Harlan but worried about making a fool of herself if she couldn’t keep her imagination at bay.
She knew she was not the kind of glitz girl that was usually seen on Harlan’s arm and despite the traffic stopping curves she hid on a regular basis, her virginity always made her hesitant in expressing her desires which at heart were bound in enigmatic duality. She had no practical experience in social maneuvers that let her find the freedom held in acquiescing to the intent of another.
In fantasies, she could boldly exact what she wants of men, yet has never found that same boldness effective in life. Men had treated her with caution or if they were interested, had expectations of much more sexually forward action on her part, which genuinely turned her off and made it so that she had no sexual interest in them at all.
Hearing Mahira laugh just a little too loudly at whatever Trace was saying grounded Tory in the moment. She packed up her meal and stood up.
“I’m going to finish this later. Going to have a look around,” Tory said, as Mahira grinned at her.
“Trace was just telling me the pool is heated. Maybe we should take a swim later?” Mahira suggested to her, then looked over to Dan, who gave a thumb’s up.
Chapter 9
After sitting in her room picking at her food while scrolling publicity photos and scanning articles about Harlan on the internet, Tory decided to have a look at the Recreation Center. She took her key card and slipped out of the room.
Drawn to nighttime lights of the city she walked towards the huge window at the end of the corridor. Passing the gym, she saw someone moving. It was Harlan. In a bright polo shirt and a slim black swimsuit, he was working with a pair of gleaming chrome dumbbells.
Hearing the elevator’s arrival tone, Tory took one last look at Harlan switch position to burn his triceps before ducking out of sight. Trace came out of the elevator in a bold cable knit sweater and bright red trunks from another era. As soon as Trace entered the Rec Center, she dashed over to the elevators.
Back in her room, Tory paced the small distance thinking then would pause to look at every item of clothing she had with her laid out on the bed. Her mind flashed again and again on the idea of wearing the sexiest things she had with her, just in case but it would never be mistaken for actual swimwear. In no version of her indulgent projections did she see herself strutting into the pool or Rec Center in panties and pumps like a prostitute if Trace and or Dan were around. Pacing ensued once again until there was a knocking at her door.
Very much as she did back at the W, Mahira barged right into her room the moment she opened the door. She had a shopping bag with her.
“You went out?” Tory asked.
“Yeah. So did Dan,” she told her.
“What’s it like out there?”
“Bargains and deals,” Mahira said, pulling three different swimsuits out of the bag.
“Oh my god. You’re insane,” she teased.
“Right, you’re not standing here wondering what you’d look like in a sports bra and a thong”
They laughed a moment.
“Choose your weapon,” Mahira announced, holding up the bright latex swimwear.
***
The pool was not only heated, but it was also lit from within. Bouncy blue light was thrown all over the modern white room, lending its somber hue to the partially translucent glass partition separating the pool from the corridor and the gym.
When Mahira and Tory walked in, they froze for a practically imperceptible moment as they noticed Harlan Dawes at the opposite end, setting up a stand for his tablet near the pool’s edge.
He turned and saw Tory. He waved politely at them then set up the tablet on its stand. With a touch the tablet brightens. Harlan pulled off a brightly hued polo shirt displaying a ripple of tanned muscle before lowering himself in the water nearby. Harlan exhaled then sipped something from a mug near his shoes and shirt as he glanced up at the series of icon designs advancing in Slideshow.
As the young women watched him, Mahira stripped down to a white one piece, in striking contrast to her tan skin. She jumped in with a bold splash, then lapped the pool.
Harlan didn’t look up from his work. Mahira called Tory to join her. Tory seemed hesitant. Harlan noticed. He finished his drink and submerged.
Under the water, he swam to the other side where Tory waited, hardly able to breathe as she watched him approach. Harlan came up from the water, glistening.
“I’m Harlan Dawes. This is my pool. As soon as this the COVID thing started, I ordered twice the chlorine be put in this water. Nothing could live in it,” he assured her with a grin.
Tory took off her glasses and loosened her hair. Out of modesty, she turned away from Harlan, lifting her oversized shirt over her head and didn't notice his jaw practically drop as he gazed upon the faintest blonde fuzz above her tailbone.
Mahira swam up to him and put her hand on his shoulder as she introduced herself, but it was clear to her that Dawes had become transfixed watching her new friend adjust the slightly small top over her very ample young breasts.
“She’s from Wisconsin,” Mahira said, as Harlan turned to her for the first time.
“Yes. I know. I’ve taken an interest in all the contest winners, Ms. Shah, and I’d like to take a moment to apologize to both of you for missing the award ceremony. We had a number of issues that sprang up here that required my personal attention,” Harlan explained while looking directly at Tory as she lowered herself in the water.
Tory’s eyes seemed to glow in Harlan’s attention, Mahira thought, or perhaps it was the light in the water. A warm fuzzy sensation embraced the trio as pheromones danced magnifying the intensity of an agreeable silence between Haran and Tory that immediately made Mahira very envious.
For Tory the real world crashed down upon her enchantment as Dan burst through the door, clearly intoxicated, before leaping in up into the air with enough buoyancy to yell “Cannonball!” before landing in an awful, percussive belly flop that not only drenched everyone but sent the water lapping up over the edges of the pool on both sides.
Dan emerged from the water face first and spat a burst of water out his mouth as if trying to mimic a whale surfacing to clear his blow hole and began to giggle until he saw who was with the women.
“Oh, I uh, Mr. Dawes. I um,” Dan stammered in embarrassment.
“That was the worst cannon ball I ever saw,” Harlan said, beginning to laugh as he plucked his sneaker out of the water.
Mahira splashed at Dan as he retreated in a backstroke. Tory was fixed on Harlan’s smile until he caught her gaze and returned it. Unable to offer anything witty, Tory submerged and began to swim away, towards the far end of the pool. Taking advantage of the playfulness in the air, Harlan pursued.
The door opened and Trace Linder took a peek inside before entering, then slipped in with a mix and match six pack of craft beers. Mahira climbed out of the pool and strutted towards Trace in her bright swimsuit before grabbing a beer. Tory rose from the water at the opposite end, catching his eye.
“Come and join the party?” Mahira offered, as Trace gazed across the room to see Harlan climb out of the pool.
“I’ll dip my feet in. Who is that with Harlan?”
“Victoria,” Mahira explained, as they watched Harlan wrap his towel around Tory’s shoulders.
Trace tempted Mahira with his selection of fancy beers and she nodded them away.
When Harlan turned to them, he waved Trace over. With an uncertain look on his face, Trace approached, walking along the pool as Dan did a lazy backstroke in the opposite direction. Trace could see the light of sudden enthusiasm on Harlan’s face and wondered if it was related to the images he’d just finished or the excited looking young beauty he had clearly overlooked.
“Did you have a chance to look through the latest from this afternoon?” Trace asked Harlan, while still a few paces away.
“I was just looking at them again, as a matter
of fact, when I got a really great idea,” Harlan said, smiling widely.
“You’ve met Trace Linder, right?” Harlan asked Tory.
“Hi,” Tory said meekly.
“I found myself on the verge of talking shop with Stadler, because, as you know, I truly suck at small any form of small talk, when it occurred to me that we have a group of very talented young people in house for the duration.”
“Well, yes…” Trace concurred.
“Some fresh eyes on the icon design couldn’t hurt,” Harlan clarified, as delicately as possible, sensing Trace’s unease.
“We still have more than a week, plus Brian and Janis will start working from home on Monday,” Trace offered.
“I know. But you know how it is,” Harlan remarked, turning to include Tory as well before continuing, “Part of a deadline’s span must include what we like to call acceptance time, around here. So often, we come up with something we think is great, then wonder if it is great, then doubt its greatness, then repeat the cycle.”
Tory laughed. Harlan grinned in awe, upon seeing how the beauty of her face when she let herself go, clearly disarmed Trace Linder.
“That’s, well, yes but, Ok. Let’s give it ago,” he stammered, no longer able to find the logical threads of any argument he could make against working with her as Mahira walked up within earshot.
“What are we giving a go?” Mahira asked, excitedly.
“I was just telling Trace that I am inviting all the contest winners to come into the design studio tomorrow and give us their take on how to update the iGo App Icon. It will be like an internship. Or temporary employment, so to speak.”
“Oh my god, That’s amazing! We are going to work at NextThing.Net! You’ve just turned our resumes into gold, Mr. Dawes, Gold!” Mahira said beaming, then called out across the pool, “Dan!”