Page 21 of Semantics

“Cool. Thank you,” Monique replied and walked off, holding a can of lemon sparkling water.

Stella was glad that they’d been able to have Violet meet with both Monique and Tim on the same day because it might mean she was very close to getting her foot in the Russell umbrella. She hadn’t asked why Violet’s company wasn’t under it, at least not in anything she’d read online, but she might ask when they saw one another later that night. They were going to grab a drink at Buddy’s, but she still had no idea what had even had her bringing up her regular bar during a sales demo with her former enemy, if Violet could be called that.

“Hey, Tim, got a sec?” she asked when she landed at Tim’s open office door.

“Yeah. What’s up?” Tim said as he looked up from his computer.

“How’d that meeting go this morning? The one you took for Monique.”

“Oh, good. Their head of engineering is great. She understood everything and even gave me a recommendation for a product feature that could be badass if we do it. Their CEO played things close to the vest, but that makes sense. She’s the one paying for it. Us engineers are big nerds about this stuff.”

“Think she’ll sign?” Stella asked.

“Maybe. You might need to go down on the price. She brought that up about ten times, but they all usually do, so I don’t know.”

“Okay. Thanks. Are your notes in the system?”

“Yeah. And I sent over all the technical docs, too. She said she wanted to review everything and would get back to us about next steps or more questions. I gave her my email for those.”

“Great. Thanks.”

Stella walked back to her own office, feeling like maybe she’d managed to get her way out of the mess she had made with an email that could’ve cost her this job. Likely, it seemed like it wouldn’t now, but had Violet sent that to Stella’s boss and complained loudly enough, it might have, or they could’ve demoted her or, at least, not promoted her later due to her lack of professionalism.

When she got back to her office, she pulled up Violet’s account and looked at Monique and Tim’s notes. She saw that in the likely-to-sign section, Monique had put in that she thought they were about eighty percent likely, which was a great number to see after just a few demos. Stella decided that since she’d see Violet later that night, she wouldn’t send an email just yet. They could talk in person about what Violet wanted to do and go from there.

◆◆◆

When she walked through the bar’s door, she had a feeling that Violet would’ve arrived first, so she looked around the small space that was more neighborhood pub than happening hotspot for the newer types of customers moving into the city. That was why Stella liked it. She knew if she went to most of the other bars around, they would be catering to the younger people just out of college, at their first jobs in tech, and Stella usually only wanted a beer and a place where she could watch a game or hang out with a few friends.

She found Violet sitting at a booth by herself, with a martini glass in front of her and her hand around its stem, just resting there as if she was frozen in time and not actually going to take a drink. Stella had seen her on video only yesterday, but the woman was even more beautiful in person. Her brown hair was down and over her shoulders, and she was staring at the old jukebox where a few women were gathered. She looked contemplative, and it had Stella wondering what exactly Violet was thinking about.

“Hey,” she said when she walked over. “I thought I was supposed to buy you a drink.”

“You are. I asked the bartender if he knew you, and he said yes. I told him you were coming in and that he could put it on your tab.”

Stella laughed and replied, “Nice.”

“You’re late,” Violet stated.

“By two minutes. I couldn’t find parking, and I had a late meeting that ran long. Sorry.” She sat down across from Violet. “So, what did you get?”

“Just a martini.”

“Top-shelf booze?”

Violet laughed lightly and said, “No, I went with the well stuff. I’m not that much of a snob.”

“I’m going to grab a beer. Want anything else while I’m at the bar?”

“I’m all right. Thank you.”

“Be right back.”

Stella stood back up and headed to the bar, where she saw Buddy, the owner, and asked for her usual and told him to add the martini to her tab. Then, she glanced back at Violet, who was still looking over at the jukebox, and thought that she’d made a mistake. This was already pretty awkward, and she wasn’t sure if it would get any better, but even if she and Violet couldn’t put the past behind them, Stella wanted the account for Cerebral, so she’d hang in there until she got it. She turned around after taking her beer bottle off the bar and noticed three women in the booth with Violet now. It was only a four-person booth, so Stella had no place to sit anymore. She looked around and noticed an empty table with four chairs, so she went to it and pulled one over.

“Um… Hi,” she said, and as she looked around at the new additions to the booth, it hit her. “I know you.”

“You sort of know all of us,” the one on the left spoke. “Arlowe Romano.” She held out her hand for Stella to shake. “Amsterdam.”