Page 22 of Semantics

“Right. You and Violet used to hang out.”

Stella shook Arlowe’s hand.

“Still do.”

Arlowe pointed at Violet as if that were obvious because they were currently sitting in the same booth. That drew Stella’s eyes over to Violet and then to the woman next to her.

“You’re…”

“Enya, yeah.”

“And I’m Sarai. I was in a couple of classes with you.”

“Right,” she replied. “You all met then, didn’t you? You weren’t friends first, I mean.”

She sat down in her chair and set her beer on the table.

“No, we weren’t. We met in the program,” Arlowe answered.

“And you all still hang out? That’s pretty cool.”

“We all work together,” Violet explained. “That’s why I invited them. Arlowe is the head of engineering. Enya is the genius with languages. And Sarai is our head of marketing and sales.”

“Ah,” she said.

Part of Stella was glad because that meant that she had the whole leadership team of the company sitting right there, which meant that this could be a business meeting that might end with her signing a new account. It would be a small account to Cerebral, but it came with the potential for one of their largest ever. The other part of her was disappointed because she hadn’t asked the entire group to go for a drink. She’d hoped that she and Violet might be able to talk about what had happened in school and get some closure on that time in her life before they could move on. With three other women sitting there, that wasn’t likely to happen, and Violet had to know that, which meant she hadn’t accepted the offer for a drink with the same intent as Stella.

“So, I met with Tim today,” Arlowe said.

“I heard. How did it go?” she asked and took a sip of her beer.

“Good. I have a few more questions. I sent them over before we came here, but so far, so good.”

“That’s great,” she replied. “I spoke to him earlier, and he spoke very highly of you. So did Monique. They were impressed with your knowledge.”

“Violet won’t let me build our own stuff.”

“Why not?” Stella asked, looking over at a very quiet Violet.

“Because it would take too much time, and she has other things to focus on that are more important, considering the fact that we can buy a tool to do this.”

“Makes sense,” Stella agreed.

“So, what have you been up to since Amsterdam?” Sarai asked.

“When Arlowe’s questions get answered, I’d like to talk price,” Violet said before Stella could even open her mouth to answer. “You’re a little higher than I think what we’d be paying for, and Arlowe would be doing a ton of heavy lifting for the implementation, it sounds like.”

“Uh… Yeah, we can do that,” she said. “Do you want to see a sample agreement with the discount I can offer?”

“Yes, that would be great. I still have more demos to do, though.”

“I get it,” she replied with a polite smile and watched Violet take a drink.

“So, this is… awkward,” Enya pointed out, making her laugh a little.

“We didn’t really hang out back then, so yeah, I guess so,” Stella agreed. “I don’t know you all that well, but maybe we can start with tonight. None of you have drinks yet. On me. What can I get you?”

“I’m good,” Arlowe said. “I actually want to get home to get some work done.”