“Golightly” was my pet name for it—a pair of glasses I’d started dreaming of years before the technology caught up with my imagination. One Friday night, when I was about twelve, my mom introduced me to Breakfast at Tiffany’s and Audrey Hepburn’s iconic character, Holly Golightly. I watched that movie dozens of times, mesmerized. I’d never seen a woman more beautiful. And although I missed much of the story in those early years, I caught the drama, the ukulele, and the sunglasses. I’d made my own ukulele out of cardboard and string, and now I’d moved on to the sunglasses.
They weren’t as glamorous as Hepburn’s, but mine did more than shield the eyes from UV rays. My Golightly glasses were self-contained augmented virtual reality glasses that embedded interactive 3-D images. They rivaled Microsoft’s and Apple’s offerings in an even slimmer format—at least that was the goal. Every prototype had failed—one exploded—and each one took something within me with it.
I walked past Nathan—my version of running away. “Back to batteries for me.”
Two strides and he caught up. “What’s wrong with batteries?”
“Nothing, except I didn’t think my world would be dominated by them. I’ve been dreaming of these glasses for years.” I stopped. “You wouldn’t understand.”
“Then tell me.”
“There’s no point.” I shook my head. “You know what drives me nuts? Out-of-the-box thinking used to be lauded around here. But now . . . no more risks? No innovation? I needed this one, Nathan. I can do it.”
“I know you can.”
I studied his face. “But not anytime soon . . . She cut funding, didn’t she?”
He didn’t reply, but one blink said it all.
“It’ll be too late, you know,” I said. “We can’t circle back. The market will move on.”
“I know that too, and I’m sorry.”
We walked on in silence. I looked up in surprise when we reached the building again.
Nathan held the door’s handle but did not pull it open. “Are you going to be okay?”
I pinched the bridge of my nose. “My allergies are horrible this fall.” I lowered my hand and caught Nathan’s expression—sympathy encasing pity. “Of course I’ll be okay. Easy come, easy go, right?”
He narrowed his eyes. It felt like some offering, some connection, had fallen between us because I hadn’t held it.
He accompanied me back to my desk and perched as he had before—as if we’d never taken a walk and he’d never delivered the blow to Golightly, and to me.
“Craig mentioned you had an advancement for the IR battery.”
Back to batteries.
“I was playing around with Golightly . . . Double insulate it and we can cut the space between components. Everyone wants smaller devices. See, Karen doesn’t get that; we need some ideas to generate others. Without—” I pressed my lips together. “Never mind. The lab is testing the battery now.”
Nathan picked up a small wire elephant sitting on my desk and handed it to me. “Please don’t let this derail you, Mary.” He stood. “I’ve got another meeting with Craig. Will you be around later?”
At my nod, he was gone . . . and my afternoon was suddenly free.
Chapter 2
Easy come. Easy go.” One swipe of my hand and six months’ worth of wire animals skidded across my desk and onto the floor.
Moira leaned over the wall. “Easy? There was nothing easy about all that work, and stop killing your animals. They’re wonderful.”
I bent to pick them up, and one by one repositioned them at the edge of my desk. Duck. Giraffe. Two horses. A tiger complete with contrasting stripes. “It’s embarrassing there are so many. Shows you how stymied I’ve been.”
I picked up the last one, an elephant made of black 18-gauge electrical wire, and crushed it in my palm. “I was so close to the answer. I can almost see it. But . . .”
Moira snapped her fingers. “Then answer something else for me.”
I pushed back from my desk to give her my full attention. “Shoot.”
“Why haven’t you grabbed that boy and kissed him already?”
I shot up and scanned the room, noting that most cubicles were empty. “You can’t yell stuff like that. You can’t even think stuff like that. What if someone hears you?”
“Then we’d all get somewhere.”
“Now?” I sat back down. “You want to talk about my love life now?”
“Seems a more fruitful topic.”
I could still smell the coffee at that morning meeting when Craig first introduced Nathan to the team.
“He’s thirty-two, so most of you may feel the need to call him sir, but listen to him anyway. He got his MBA at Harvard and he’s brilliant at running a business. So while you keep pushing the limits, he’ll keep our lights on and get WATT running smoothly as we grow—’cause that’s what we’re doing around here. We’re taking this whole thing to the next level. And as soon as I hire another CEO to manage this beast, I’ll get back to playing with you lot.”
Craig rubbed his hands together, then slapped Nathan on the back. Everyone gathered around, a few called him sir, and then most drifted back to work. I stood frozen—overcome by a simple, clear awareness that something about him spoke to something within me. And we hadn’t yet exchanged two words.
In the eleven months that followed, that feeling had only grown.
Nathan was smart, patient, clever, quixotic, and kind. He was a completely analytical consultant, ready to tear your business apart, who also quoted romantic movies, remembered everyone’s birthday, and crooned ballads to our sixty-five-year-old office manager. He was a mystery and infinitely intriguing.
Moira interrupted my reverie.
“You knew Golightly was dead the minute Karen became your boss. You’ve had three months to digest it.”
“She’s going to fire me.” It was the first time it felt real.
“Karen won’t fire you. I run the numbers; you’re too valuable.” Moira walked around the divider between our cubicles and I twisted in my chair to face her. “And let’s get back to the subject. Everyone can see the way Nathan looks at you. Why do you give him the Heisman every day?” She thrust one arm straight in the famous football pose.
I had to laugh at her attempt to cheer me up. Moira, dressed in four-inch heels and a tight skirt, knew nothing about football.
“He doesn’t look at me any differently than he does you. And I don’t give him the Heisman.”
“If he looked at me that way, I might break my engagement. You’re either a liar or a fool.”
“I’m pragmatic. Besides, one: he’ll be gone soon, and two: he’s dating someone.”
“He told you that?”
“He’s mentioned Jeffrey’s and Sophia’s. Those are date restaurants.”
Arms crossed, Moira drummed the fingers of one hand against her skin. “Nice assumption, Sherlock, but this isn’t the sixth grade. Talk to him. Ask him.”
“It isn’t the sixth grade, but it feels like it . . . and I hated the sixth grade.”
She pushed herself upright. “Invite him to Crow Bar tonight.”
“Right. Look, it’s already been a rough day and—wait. Tonight?” I scattered through the chaos on my desk to find my phone. “How’d it get so late? I’m meeting my dad at Guero’s for dinner.” I gathered my notes, my computer, and my second computer and shoved everything into my bag. “I’ll never make it to South Congress on time. MoPac will be jammed.”
“Nathan? Crow Bar? Call him and see if he’ll meet you there after dinner.”