by KB Winters
“Mr. Christiansen?” She always called me that when at the office and although, I didn’t correct her, I missed hearing the way she said my name.
I shook away the dark fantasy and waved her into the room. “Come on in. Take a seat.”
She sat down and laid the portfolio on the desk. “Did you get a lunch?”
“No,” I answered, an edge of irritation creeping into my tone.
She didn’t press me for the reason why. “I got your email. I brought the sketches you asked for.”
“Good. I know it seems early, but we need to start working on next year’s product line. Normally, this is pretty straightforward. All it usually takes is offering new finishes, different links or offering a new type of material for the band or the face, but this year, I want to think outside that box. With the changes we’re making on the marketing side, I think we need to think about revamping the Shock Watches line altogether and leave the more basic changes for the other lines.”
She nodded but I could see she wasn’t following me entirely.
“Anyways, I emailed to have you bring those sketches because I think you’re really onto something and I wanted to see if we could brainstorm a little further on those.”
“Sure. That sounds fun, actually,” Megan replied, her expression brightening with obvious relief that made me stop and wonder what she thought I’d called her into my office for. Without hesitation, she opened the portfolio and unpacked all the pages that were bright with the colors from all the sketching she’d done. I was struck by her sheer talent, not for the first time, as she pushed them across the table at me, giving me her ideas and inspiration with each new design.
“Have you ever thought about doing a line of Shock Watches for women?” she asked. “I think it could go over really well, especially with the fitness community which is a perfect target audience.”
“Do you have a sketch?”
A slow smile spread across her face and she took two final pages from the portfolio and passed them over to me. They were slimmer and sleeker than the other designs, with more vibrant, jewel tones.
“I think if we did them out of Titanium, or I don’t know something that’s super tough and durable, but shiny and pretty too, we could have a real winner. Especially, if there was a way to incorporate a timer or something.” She stopped speaking and dropped her hands to her lap, waiting for my feedback.
I studied the pages and the drawings came to life before my eyes. Suddenly, they weren’t just sketches made with pens and pencils, they were alive, real. “They’re beautiful.”
She squealed and clapped. “Okay good, because I want one.”
I laughed and set the pages down. “I’ll have something made custom just for you, then. Maybe it can have a coffee bean pattern engraved on the face.”
Megan looked surprised by my joke before she laughed out loud, a sweet and melodic sound that filled the room and did something deep inside my chest.
“Not just a suit,” I added with a wink.
A look of bemusement settled on her face, as though she’d just stumbled across something and wasn’t quite sure what to make of it. “No, you’re not, are you?”
I set the pages down. “Is that a real question? Do I really come across like some stiff around here?”
Megan sucked on her lower lip for a beat, before answering, “I don’t know. I’ve been trying to figure you out since the day you walked up to me at the symposium.”
“I see. Well, let me help you. What’d you want to know?” I relaxed my shoulders back against my chair, making a concentrated effort to not look like I was on pins and needles waiting for her reply. Even though, I felt a coil of anxiety inside.
She cocked her head to the left slightly, considering me. “Are you happy here? Doing all of this?”
Her question was an instant gut check that I hadn’t expected—although, I should have known. Since the beginning, Megan had been, in a word, unexpected.
“Sure,” I answered, hoping it didn’t sound forced.
“Then why don’t I believe you?”
“Timeless Timepieces was started by my grandfather, it’s my duty to carry it on.”
She wrinkled her nose. “Duty hardly seems like a passion. What do you really wish you were doing? If not here, then where would you go?”
It was a question I didn’t let myself ask. From the time I was born—my father’s only child—it was not so much a question of if I wanted to take over the family business, but rather a question of when.
“You know what, forget I asked, I’m sorry,” Megan said, waving her hand as though erasing it from an invisible chalkboard.
“No, no. I’ll answer. In addition to my duties here, I have a venture capitalist business. You probably already knew that.”
She nodded. “I did my Googling.”
I smiled. “Right. So, if it wasn’t for Timeless, that’s what I would do full time.”
“How come?”
“Well, I like the process of helping others see their dreams and achieve them. It’s deeply satisfying and no two businesses or ideas are ever the same, so it’s a constant puzzle. I never get bored because each company and start-up requires a new set of skills and problems to solve.”
“That sounds exciting, but scary too. What happens if you don’t know what to do? Or, a problem gets too big?”
I shrugged. “It hasn’t happened yet. I keep a handpicked group of like-minded people around me, and we all work together.”
“Hmm.”
“What about you? I know you’re an artist, and a damn good one,” I said, gesturing at the pages between us. “But what’s your long game?”
She sighed. “I don’t know. It’s tough because of my family.”
“How so?”
“Well, like I dumped on you the other day, it’s just my dad and my brothers. My dad works his ass off as an accountant and helps me and my brothers, but if he gets laid off, he’s going to burn through his savings and then what? My brothers aren’t going to take care of him if that happens. I mean, I love them, but they’re pretty selfish. Other than Sam, my oldest brother.”
I nodded along as she was speaking, trying to imagine my life if I was in her shoes. I’d always lived a privileged life. I never had to worry about my family’s finances, or about retirement accounts and savings. All of that was taken care of. And, even though my dad was gone, my mother had more money than she could ever spend, and I didn’t need to worry about her care. I wanted to keep the company alive for tradition and legacy, but if for some reason, it disappeared off the map tomorrow, the next three or four generations of Christiansen’s would still be well off.
Megan continued, “So, I want to do art and pursue that, but some part of me feels like it’s the most selfish and irresponsible thing I could do. I need to be more practical and build a career on something solid.”
“But, Megan, this is solid,” I spread my hands over the designs. “You’re not like some hack doing shitty art and peddling it at coffee shops or something. What you did here is worth thousands, hundreds of thousands.”
“Really?” she asked, gazing over her sketches with a new expression.
“Yes, really. I’m going to see that you’re fairly compensated for every sketch you do,” I said, my voice firm to get the point across to her. “I know this isn’t exactly what you were hired to do, but it’s a valuable skill, and one that I need. So, if you’re game, I’d like to take this to the next level.”
Her eyes roamed back across the desk once again before meeting mine. “I’m game.”
Something about the way she said it vibrated through me, and I had to reign in my wandering mind before it jumped too far off the rails.
We moved to the conference table in my office so that we could spread out, and for the next few hours we brainstormed ideas, concepts, and Megan furiously scribbled as we talked, working on an entire new set of sketches. By the time we came up for air, we had an entire new line drawn up to not only ev
olve the current line, but also a trio of female watches to launch an entire new line. Excitement bubbled up more and more with each new attempt, and when we finished and Megan set down her pen, we both sat back and marveled at the array of designs on the large table.
“Wow,” Megan breathed, echoing the statement in my own thoughts.
“Yeah. This is incredible.”
I cast a sidelong look at her and watched the way her face lit up as her eyes flitted from one drawing to the next. She’d just birthed an entire product line and was admiring each as only a creator could. Her eyes lifted and met mine. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For letting me, be me, I guess. I feel like all my life, people have been trying to get me to be something I’m not. You’re the first person—well, besides my art teachers, I suppose—that really understood my talent and channeled it into something like this. I mean, look! This is amazing!”
I smiled so hard my face felt stretched but I didn’t care. Every word she said was like a gift to me.
“What are you doing tonight?”
Her gaze faltered but then steadied again. “I don’t really have plans.”
And in that one answer, an entire new world of possibility opened up before us both.
“Excellent.”
Chapter Ten — Megan
Grant’s eyes sparked and something in the air shifted as he led me out of his office. Some part of me knew that I should have said no, I should have told him that I was meeting friends or going to a movie. Anything. The thought had crossed my mind when he’d asked, but my mouth worked faster than my brain, and I’d ended up agreeing to dinner with him.
“We’ll take my car,” Grant said, ushering me with a subtle touch to the small of my back as he steered me towards the elevator bank down the hall from his office. The office lights were in power saving mode and made the hallways dim and shadowy. We passed a cleaning cart and Grant nodded at the woman wearing a pair of rubber gloves as we passed by. Other than the cleaning staff, the building was vacant and silence enveloped us.
My chattiness in his office had melted away; my mind was too busy tangled up with thoughts of where the night might lead, to worry about filling the silence. We stepped onto an elevator and Grant punched in a code on the keypad.
“Do you like Thai food?” he asked as the elevator doors closed.
“Sure,” I answered.
I was trying to think back to the last time I’d had Thai food, but it was hard to think about anything other than the fact that Grant’s fingertips were still firmly pressed against the small curve of my back. I was wearing a short sleeved jacket that was fairly thin, and I could feel the heat of his hand radiating through to my skin. I was glad that I was standing a half step ahead of him and he couldn’t see my cheeks flush.
The elevator slid to a smooth stop and the doors opened with a quiet whoosh of air. Grant stepped to my side and offered me his arm. I wrapped my hand around his bicep, biting back a squeal at the firm muscles underneath my fingers. Suddenly all thoughts drained away, and all I could think about was wondering what Grant would look like without a shirt. Sadly, in all of my research of him, I hadn’t stumbled across a shirtless picture of him. Every photo I ran across was him looking more like he’d stepped out of one of Timeless Timepieces ads — a crisp black suit, slicked back hair, intense eyes, and of course, a flashy watch on his wrist.
“I didn’t even know there was a garage down here,” I said as he led me down an aisle of slick, shiny cars—all of which likely cost more than I would ever make in a year.
“It’s a secure lot—you have to have a key code to access it.” Grant pulled a small disk from his pocket with his free hand and some kind of exotic looking sports car flashed its headlights. “That’s us.”
Us. God, my mind rolled that around a few times.
What would it be like to truly be an us with someone like Grant? Unlimited money, fancy houses, cars, vacations. Expensive gifts, designer clothes, and chic friends. It was so far from my reality that I couldn’t even begin to wrap my mind around it. Although, as I slid into the passenger seat and looked up into Grant’s eyes as he held the door for me, I had to admit, I wouldn’t mind trying it out.
Grant whisked me across town to a secluded restaurant, tucked away in the heart of a neighborhood. It was obviously the kind of place that only true locals knew about. It wasn’t fancy, but it was warm and inviting with authentic decor and a sense of calm that radiated through the whole place. And, the food was amazing. Grant and I struck up an easy conversation that started with talking about the food and meandered to talking about Grant’s travels, my art, and shared experiences of time spent on campus.
“What would you say to going to an art gallery after this?” Grant asked, his eyes gleaming in the low lights of the restaurant.
We had just polished off dinner and were working our way through the second half of a bottle of wine when he asked.
“I have a policy to never say no to art galleries,” I replied.
“Good to know.” Grant polished off the contents of his glass, his eyes never leaving mine as I sipped at my glass. I marveled at how much more relaxed I was being around him. The hours spent in his office collaborating on the watch designs, ad ideas, and exchanging childhood stories had built some kind of bridge between us and carried us away from the awkward start of our relationship, and while the kiss was still burned into my memory, I no longer felt the stain or embarrassment when thinking about it. In fact, it was quite the opposite. During dinner, I couldn’t seem to tear my eyes away from his mouth as he spoke about his unruly college years, wondering what it would be like to taste the wine on his lips.
Grant signaled for the server to bring us the bill and he handled it discreetly.
“Thank you, this was delicious.”
“I’m glad you enjoyed it. This is one of my favorite spots.”
His answer surprised me. For some reason, I’d been imagining Grant wining and dining at nothing but the city’s top ten hot spots. I wondered what other things I’d pre-judged that weren’t actually true. The more I learned about him, the more I realized I was wrong in my initial reaction to him.
Once the server returned with his card, he stood from the table and reached down for my hand. I hesitated for a moment, but then took it and let him help me out of my seat. He released my hand and set his back on my back as we exited the restaurant. Grant nodded goodbye to the host and hostess as they held open the doors for us.
“We can actually walk there, from here,” he said as soon as we stepped out onto the sidewalk. The night sky was clear, stars twinkling against the black velvet backdrop, and although it was chilly, it wasn’t too cold.
“Okay.”
Grant took the outside of the sidewalk, and kept me on the inside, making sure to lead me with his hand on my back around any obstacles. There was something about being with him that went beyond relaxed, and halfway to the gallery, I realized that he made me feel safe and secure. It was like I somehow knew that as long as I was with him, nothing bad was going to happen because he would keep me safe. It was a feeling unlike anything I’d ever experienced before. I hadn’t dated a lot, but the few guys I’d gone out with never made me feel this special and treasured, especially not with something as simple as the way he led the way down an all but deserted sidewalk.
Maybe it was the wine talking, but the entire evening was spread out before me like the start of a fairy tale.
I shook my head slightly, chiding myself for even letting my mind go there. Grant was just a nice guy, nothing more. He probably didn’t even think about what he was doing—it was just bred into him. As the child of a wealthy family, surely he’d been through manners classes or something that explained away his chivalry.
“This is the place,” Grant said, bringing us to a stop in front of a small boutique art gallery. It was tucked into an old, vintage looking building and just from the outside…I couldn’t wait to get inside. It wa
s exactly the kind of place I would stop in, if on my own, exploring the city.
I looked up at Grant, and wondered for the millionth time how it was that he made me feel as though we had known each other for so much longer than we actually had.
He opened the door for me and we stepped inside. The walls were stark white with large, abstract paintings in vibrant colors providing the light and warmth of the room.
“Sorry! But we’re closed!” A voice rang out from near the back of the gallery.
My heart sank, and I hurried to look around to try and see as much as I could before we got the boot.
“Essie, it’s me,” Grant called out.
A tall, willowy woman appeared from out of nowhere, her arms filled with a large canvas. “Grant!” She stopped to lean the blank canvas against the wall and launched herself into Grant’s arms with a joyful squeal. “What are you doing here?”
When she stepped back, she looked over at me and then back to Grant.
“Essie, this is Megan Sinclair. She’s an art student at UCLA and the genius behind my upcoming line,” Grant introduced.
My heart sank slightly at the way he introduced me, but then, what had I expected? I had no idea what category the night fell into. It felt like a date, but Grant was my boss. So, maybe it was more of a business thing? Although, it definitely didn’t feel like it. So, was it a date? A night out with a new friend? I didn’t know. But, even if it was a date, that wouldn’t change anything. I wasn’t his girlfriend.
“Nice to meet you,” Essie said, extending a hand to me.
“You too. Your gallery is beautiful.”
Grant smiled at Essie. “We were in the neighborhood. Would you mind if we stayed for a look?”
Essie retrieved the canvas and waved him off, as though telling him he didn’t even need to ask. “Of course! Anything for you.”
Grant steered me to the far wall so we could start at the beginning, and Essie disappeared into the back room. We started looking from piece to piece and after a few minutes all of my questions faded to the background as I lost myself in the beauty on the canvases before me. Each piece told a story, and I didn’t leave one piece until I’d sorted it out in my mind. Grant never hurried me, seemingly content to wait and watch me take it all in.