Kyle misinterpreted her lingering silence as a sudden refusal to participate in the running ‘date’ joke they had been telling each other since the day before. He tried to walk it back so he could resume her good graces. “I know, I know, it’s not a date. I was making a poor joke.”
Aubrey contradicted him. “Actually, that’s not what I was going to say at all.”
“Then please excuse me for speaking for you.”
“Thank you. What I was going to say was… any girl would be proud to be on a date with you because you look really handsome.” She gave Kyle this compliment without feeling guilty afterward about Walter.
Kyle dropped his head. Overcome by embarrassment, or pride, or both. “Thank you, Aubrey. You look beautiful yourself.”
Aubrey rolled her eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous. I know you see the towel wrapped around my head.” Even though she was sure his comment was reflexive, it still thrilled her to be told she was beautiful. She couldn’t remember the last time Walter said that to her. To be honest, she couldn’t remember the first time he said that to her.
“They say beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” Kyle said to cover his prior remark. “And, for the record, I know what my eyes are beholding.”
Greta set a plate full of eggs, bacon, and toast in front of Kyle. “Behold the breakfast I have made for thee.” She wanted in on the fun as well. She was not afraid to wax archaic to get an invitation.
Kyle nodded his appreciation for the food to Greta. When he realized that was not going to be enough, he added, “also a beautiful sight, ma’am.”
“You remember what your father used to say, Aubrey.” Greta returned to the stove where she began to fix herself a plate. “No sense arguing with fools and true believers.” She returned to the table and took a seat beside Kyle.
“Which one is he,” Aubrey asked.
Greta took a big look at Kyle trying to decide which one he was, “too early to tell,” she said. “The more time you give me to study him, the better answer I’ll be able to give.” Greta turned her attention to Aubrey. “Now, you be sure and provide me with a ten-minute warning before you’re done putting yourself together, that way I can have breakfast ready when you’re ready.”
Aubrey demurred. “Mom, you don’t have to do that.”
Greta filled her face with false mortification. “Aubrey Everheart Wilson, I know what I do have to, and don’t have to, do without needing any help from you.”
Kyle devolved into a huge grin. He directed his comments toward Aubrey. “Don’t worry, she busted out my middle name first thing this morning too. Right after I told her I could wait in the truck until you were ready.”
Aubrey shook her head. “You guys are too much. I’m going back upstairs to finish getting ready. I’ll also be pretending none of the last five minutes actually happened while I’m up there.”
As Aubrey walked the stairs to her room, she realized she meant what she said about Kyle looking so handsome. There had never been any denying the magnitude of the attraction between them. But this morning, with that suit, and the way he’d combed his hair and trimmed his beard, she almost kissed him right there over a plate of her mom’s thick cut, extra-crispy bacon.
What about that other thing also? The thing she only said to herself. The thing she dared not say out loud. She knew she was right about that too. There was no way Walter would ever be bothered to get dressed up and make an effort for something she needed. He also wouldn’t drop everything in his life to accompany her on a business trip so she could have a friendly face with her. Walter was no Kyle.
The longer she thought about it, the more certain she became Walter never did anything specifically for her. It was like her life with him was perfectly symbolized by the cappuccino machine she only used when he was around and solely to make him feel justified in buying it for her. Was it more ridiculous she continued to pretend she liked a present she hated, or was it more ridiculous he continued to pretend he had her in mind when he bought the thing? Which one of them was the bigger fool? It was obvious neither was a true believer.
She entered her room while circling a new decision in her mind. Before this day was out, she would call Walter and ask him why he hadn’t gotten her anything for Christmas this year after he knew how much it hurt her when he hadn’t gotten her anything the year before. She would ask him why he asked her to marry him when he only thought of her as an accessory to his perfect law firm life. She couldn’t tell, in this moment, if she wanted to break off the engagement, but she did know she wanted answers. If he couldn’t give her anything satisfactory in return, then maybe she did want to break the engagement.
Aubrey looked in her closet for the business outfit she brought with her to Virginia. These thoughts about Walter caused her to view the suit with disappointment. The Countdown to Christmas Calendar in her room was telling her there were only two days until Christmas and here she was about to put on a suit that had no hint of Christmas spirit. Beyond that, why had she even brought the suit in the first place?
That was a question in need of an answer at least as much as her hypothetical question to Walter about why he hadn’t gotten her anything for Christmas. Maybe she should present herself with the additional challenge of asking Victoria a question. Why had she thought it appropriate to bring a power suit to her mom’s house when her only goal in coming here had been to comfort her mom on her first Christmas without her dad? Why in heaven’s name would she need a business suit for that?
Aubrey put the clothes on slowly and with a little sadness. In the mirror, she admitted the white shirt and matching black pants and jacket flattered her, especially when she buttoned the jacket at the waist. She looked pretty and professional. It was just that this version of Aubrey which stared back at her from the mirror had nothing that spoke to who Aubrey was other than an acquisitions analyst for a mid-tier private equity firm. Is that all Aubrey was? Did that description sum her up?
Aubrey left her room for the second time that morning. She went to the head of the stairs and called to her mom that she would be down in ten minutes, as her mom instructed her to do. From there, she went back to the bathroom and spent a few minutes adding layered hints of makeup to her face. Aubrey’s motto when it came to her cosmetics routine came straight from the lips of her mother… ‘less is more’.
Ten minutes later, Aubrey appeared in the kitchen. Kyle was in the middle of making small talk with her mom. He came to a full stop in the middle of his sentence as he caught sight of her again. His eyes couldn’t resist traveling the full length of her, which made her glad she buttoned her jacket at the waist in the way she thought flattered her.
“What?” Aubrey asked, even though she knew the answer.
“You look…” Kyle lost track of his words and couldn’t finish his sentence in a meaningful way.
“That bad?” Aubrey would keep provoking him until he gave her the compliment she wanted.
“No, you look amazing.” Kyle tried again because he hadn’t gotten it right with amazing. “Stunning.” Somehow that didn’t feel right either. “Beautiful.”
Aubrey laughed. She decided to stop him before he embarrassed himself. “You had me at amazing.”
“I think it was the other way around.” Kyle didn’t care whether he embarrassed himself. Aubrey was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. She had him at amazing wasn’t quite right either. She had him as soon as he laid eyes on her again at the airport in Charlottesville.
Greta, whose timing when it came to food had already been established as impeccable, set a hot plate of breakfast on the kitchen table for Aubrey. “You better eat something before you go, Aubrey. You’ll be wanting to keep your energy up.”
Aubrey sat down at the table and tore into her eggs. “I am starving. Thank you, mom.”
“You’re welcome. I hope you have a better appetite than Gumby over there.”
Kyle looked at Greta with concern over being the subject of the Gumby insult. “Just so
you know, Aubrey, I ate three eggs, two pieces of bacon, and two of you mama’s sourdough biscuits with heaping spoons of her homemade blackberry jam.”
Greta dismissed this inventory as insignificant. “Oh Kyle, that’s barely enough food to be polite.”
Aubrey explained, “unless you need help standing when you get up from a table mom has set, you haven’t eaten enough.”
Greta looked at Aubrey with confusion in her eyes. “What’s wrong with wanting to feed your family? It makes me happy to take care of my family. People should do what makes them happy in life. Am I right, or am I wrong?” Greta asked.
Kyle noticed how Greta looped the Wilson Family Circle directly over Kyle’s head. He decided to say something quickly to ensure the moment cemented. “Next time I come over for breakfast, I’ll be sure and skip supper the night before.”
Greta was pleased, even though she knew he was joking. “It’s the least you could do.”
Aubrey took her plate to the sink, rinsed it, and put it in the dishwasher. “Are you ready to go, Mr. Morgan?”
“Well, I have been waiting for nearly two hours.” Kyle pretended he was miffed at waiting so long for her but couldn’t muster the straight face to pull it off.
Aubrey swatted him on the shoulder. “A girl cannot be held responsible for making her date wait two hours when her date had the audacity to arrive an hour and a half early. If we had more time, I’d go back upstairs and change my hair so you would have to wait longer just on principle.” Aubrey looked to her mother for support and mimicked the form of Greta’s last question in order to entice her mom into agreement. “Am I right, or am I wrong, mom?”
Greta might have looped Kyle into the family circle but that was the extent of the pot stirring she was willing to do today. “I hate to admit it, but I’m with Aubrey on this one, Kyle.”
“Well, in that case, I suppose we should get going before somebody calls me Gumby again.” Kyle stood. He crossed the kitchen space and gave Greta a warm hug. “Thank you for feeding me breakfast for a second consecutive day. If you’re not careful, I may let you adopt me.”
Greta laughed. “You come on over here anytime, Kyle. I will be sure to take good care of you.”
Aubrey wrapped up the revelry by snapping into business mode. “Kyle, I’m going to run into the living room to get my laptop and my winter coat, then I’ll meet you in the truck.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said as he stood.
*
Aubrey sat in the passenger’s seat of Kyle’s truck with her laptop out and plugged into the receptacle in Kyle’s console. She scrolled through an open file with a perplexed look on her face. She resembled a person translating a document written in something other than her native language. Suddenly, Aubrey shut the lid on her laptop. ‘Shut’ didn’t describe the action Aubrey performed on the laptop. In fact, she all but slammed the lid closed. She seemed unconcerned with whether or not her actions caused any damage to the device. She looked at Kyle who was mouthing the words to the Christmas song which played at barely audible volume across the speakers of his truck.
“What’s the matter?” Kyle asked.
Aubrey’s mind was wound so tightly in that moment, she didn’t need any other invitation to let loose her ideas. “This thing my company is about to do.” Aubrey cut herself off as she tried to figure out how she wanted to say the things occupying her mind.
Kyle tried to help her along with a conversational crutch. “Yeah?”
“It’s completely wrong.” Aubrey lapsed into an old habit she and Kyle had developed when they were in high school and he would help her practice for her debate tournaments. They fell into it without consciously realizing they had done it. Back then, she would dole her thoughts out in half-measures while Kyle tried to guess where she was going with the thread of her conversation. It had been a brilliant way to prepare because it allowed Aubrey to see how another person would respond to her arguments. It allowed her to stay a few steps ahead of her competition. She often thought Kyle deserved as much credit for her trophies as she did.
“You mean you won’t make any money off the deal?” Kyle subconsciously recognized what she was doing and easily slipped back into the old habit.
“Oh no, my company would make several fortunes off this deal if it went through.”
“Then how could the deal be wrong? Sounds like the classic example of a winning situation to me.” Kyle wondered if he had been in the mountains for too long. Maybe that was why he didn’t understand how making several fortunes could be completely wrong to a girl from the big city.
“I’m sorry, Kyle.” It clicked in Aubrey’s brain what was happening between them. “I’m doing that thing I used to do when we were in high school and you would help me practice for debate.”
“You mean that thing where you argued for a point you hadn’t made yet?” Kyle took a shot in the dark.
“No, I mean that thing where I use your brain as the whetstone against which mine gets sharpened.”
“Wow.” Kyle was impressed. “Can I write that down? I could put it on a coffee mug and sell it at the shop.” Kyle pulled a pen and a pocket notebook from the storage compartment in the driver’s side door and handed them to Aubrey. “Actually, I’m driving. Can you write that down for me?”
Aubrey immediately transferred the pen and pocket notebook into the storage compartment on the passenger’s side door. “Quit being silly.”
Kyle wasn’t ready for that yet. “Speaking of silliness and the debate team, do you remember that sentence Mr. Jackson had you write on the front of your notebook?”
Aubrey and Kyle look at each other. They read one another’s minds and then began simultaneously reciting the debate teacher’s mantra for Aubrey. “I will not give any premises for an argument I have not yet introduced.” They broke out in laughter over another shared reminiscence.
Kyle brought the conversation back to Aubrey’s job. “So, you were going to explain how this deal, the one that will make your company several fortunes, is actually bad for your company.”
Aubrey realized why Kyle struggled to keep up with her. She had broken Mr. Jackson’s mantra several times since she slammed the lid on the laptop. She left out one of the premises he needed to understand what she was saying. “Right. And the reason that doesn’t make any sense to you is because I wasn’t talking about my company when I said the deal was completely wrong. I was talking about Mr. Clarke’s company.”
“Oh okay, that does make a bit more sense. But why is it wrong for his company then?” Kyle also wanted to ask why she cared about Mr. Clarke’s company, but he thought it best to process one missing premise at a time.
Aubrey summarized her complaint the way a professional acquisitions analyst would. “Because Clarke’s Department Stores owns all their properties. Their debt to income ration is the best I’ve ever seen in any company with more than 700 stores.”
If Kyle had also been a professional acquisitions analyst, he might have been able to bridge the gaps. As it was, he thought he was doing pretty good just understanding the words Aubrey threw at him. “There must be a surprise twist coming at the end that makes all of this wonderful information somehow bad.”
Aubrey laughed. She knew this comment about the twist was Kyle’s way of telling her to get to the point. “The twist is this, my company plans to leverage the property the Clarke’s own to run up the value of the new company we form after we take over. We’ll sell investors on the billion dollars in ‘improvements’ we’ve made since the buyout. After that, we’ll sell off the parts of the company for ten times the value of the whole. The deal is so sweet, it might even single-handedly get Victoria on that Forbes list she’s so obsessed with.”
“Sounds like you’re about to get rich.” Kyle said without jealousy. Money was a means to an end for him.
Aubrey winced as a number of competing ideas merged in her mind. “I will… if I can convince Mr. Clarke to accept the deal he already agreed to. If I can’t I
may be out of a job altogether.”
“Slam dunk then. Convince the old guy to sell his company. Right?” This stuff seemed easy to Kyle.
“Maybe.” Aubrey was non-committal.
Kyle loved being in the presence of Aubrey when her mind started working hard. “Aubrey, you’re going to have to break it down for me like we were back in first grade and I am still trying to pull your ponytail, because, for the life of me, I can’t see what the issue is.”
“Here’s my problem. I’ve met Mr. Clarke, at least ten times. He’s an extremely smart business man.” Aubrey left space in the argument for Kyle to fill in the last missing premise.
Kyle still didn’t get it. “Seriously, Aubrey. Like… we’re… in… first… grade.”
Aubrey laughed again. How was it that Kyle made her laugh so effortlessly? “The question, the two and a half billion-dollar question is… Why is he doing this?” Aubrey wanted to make sure she was being properly clear for once. “And by he, I’m referring to Mr. Clarke. I mean, yes, his company needs to spend a significant chunk of change updating its digital infrastructure, but even that is a win.”
Kyle loved seeing her be passionate. He couldn’t resist asking her more questions just to egg her on. “You lost me again. How is having to spend a ‘significant chunk of change’ ever a win?”
“Because they have zero presence on the internet right now. They’re still a geographically localized business with no web exposure.” Aubrey explained.
Kyle put it together. “You’re saying if they make these digital investments, their sales are going to go up, not down.”
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