Thanks to Xenitha, Max2013, Caranath (a pie shop just opened in a town near me; I think I'm in trouble…), Guest (sorry the updates take so long), bhar, j, and LazyPanther. The good news is I got my son Dragon Naturally Speaking to help with his homework, so I won't be needed to type his stuff anymore and can(hopefully) spend more time on my own. I'd apologize for the updates taking so long, but I can't seem to get them done any faster. That said, I will not abandon this or any other story I write. Onward!
Kara sat at the small, round table her feet up on the chair to her left, knees bend to show a laddered rip going from her right knee up to her hip. He right hand was wrapped around a nondescript, white porcelain mug of coffee while her left threaded a purple-tipped lock of hair through her fingers. She lot out a slow breath, her eyes flickering toward the clock over the counter.
It's only been twenty minutes, she thought, stifling a groan. Why does it feel like twenty hours? She lifted the mug to her lips and sipped cautiously. The last time she had tried to drink from the mug she had burned her tongue.
"You have to watch out," a voice said over her shoulder. "They super heat the water here. It makes me wonder what they're trying to kill off."
Kara tipped her head back and caught a glimpse of a tall girl with short-cropped red hair and chunky, black-framed glasses framing large, hazel eyes. The girl walked around to the front of the table, shuddering slightly. "Although, on second thought, I don't think I want to know." She nodded a greeting. "Mind if I join you?"
"It's a free country." Kara shrugged and shifted so she was sitting upright in her seat.
"I spend a lot of time here," the girl said, "and I'd remember seeing you." Her eyes swept over Kara's ripped jeans, black aviator jacket over a neon pink shirt, and hair tied back with a pair of shoelaces. "And from the attention you're getting," she glanced over at a table with four boys, all of whom immediately looked away, "I'm guessing you're new. I'm Alice McIntyre."
"Carrie McAllister."
Alice took a swig from her mug as Kara gaped. The girl laughed. "I threw in two ice cubes before I walked over here. It's the only way not to end up with third degree burns down your throat." She took another sip. "So, what's your major?"
Kara snorted. "Am I not allowed here if I don't have one?"
"Undeclared? You a freshman?"
"Un-enrolled is more like it." Kara stuck her pinky in the mug, then licked it off, testing the temperature of the contents. It was now pretty much safe to drink.
"You don't go to school here, and you're hanging out in the student union?" Alice's eyebrows had drawn together. "I don't get it."
"It was someplace to go," Kara said. "There's not that much to do around here, you know? Not like back home."
Alice nodded her head in agreement. "You got that right. Where's home? I mean, you don't sound like you come from around here, but..."
"Boston." Kara exaggerated her accent to make it come out as Bah-stahn and was gratified to see the other girl's eyes widen.
"And now you're stuck out here?" Alice looked almost queasy as the words left her mouth. "Why?"
"My dad was concerned that my stupid brother was," she made air quotes with her fingers, "falling in with the wrong crowd." She twisted her hands and pretended to examine her fingernails, making sure she could see the other girl's expression.
"What was he doing?" The other girl was leaning over the table, her mug forgotten.
"Nothing really terrible." Kara shrugged and stirred her now cooled coffee with her index finger. "At least, not in my opinion, but instead of him getting in trouble, I got sentenced here."
Alice laughed. "It's not that bad."
"Really?"
"Of course not," the other girl said, twisting her hands at the wrist with a flourish. "Not now you've met me!"
Kara smiled. She was finally getting somewhere.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
"So, one last question."
Frank sighed loudly, and drummed his fingers on the table. "You said that, like, the last three times. Do I get the job?"
Chuck put his hand up. "This'll be the last one, Zack. Really," he added as Frank rolled his eyes. "The first day you came in here, Randy and Matt were arguing about Batman and Superman..."
"An' I said Zatanna would wipe the floor with them both. So what?" Frank leaned back in his chair and started tapping his foot against the table leg in counterpoint to his drumming fingers. He watched with interest as Chuck's jaw tightened, then was forced to relax just the slightest bit. Nice to know I'm not the only one who gets annoyed by Joe's fidgets, he thought. This could prove useful.
"So," Chuck leaned forward. "What about the time Batman did beat Superman?"
Frank tipped his head to one side. "Never happened." He made sure to drop the 'r' at the end of the first word as he put a note of disdain in the second.
Chuck opened his mouth to speak, but Frank leaned forward, pushing his index finger toward the other man's nose.
"Miller's alternate universe all the way," he continued. "That book was just a one-off – okay, a two-off if you count the shi… the crappy sequel, which I don't – that laid out a dystopia where Bats would have to be able to beat Superman for the premise to work. I respect the man's work with Daredevil, but he never should have messed with the Bat." He slumped back in his chair. "So, do I get the job or not?"
Chuck's mouth formed the word 'dystopia', then he closed it and swallowed, blinking once or twice. "I never really thought about it that way… Most people looked at it as a whole new..." He shook his head. "Uh, yeah, the job's yours. When can you start?"
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
After two weeks at Quest Star, Frank had discovered several things. First and foremost was that Chuck not only knew the entire inventory of the store – he had written the software for it himself, and Frank suspected it had originally been used to catalog Chuck's personal comic book collection – he also seemed to have memorized the names and preferred titles of every single one of his regular customers. That many of them were students at the University, which at over twelve thousand students was almost four and half times larger than Frank's alma mater, made this feat extremely impressive. The dismal accounting program the store used, however, more than balanced those facts out.
"Jesus," Frank said to Chuck one night at closing as he watched the other man scoop bills and checks without counting or organizing them into a zippered bag, "do you even have any idea how much we made today?"
Chuck waved a hand in the air. "I'll print out an inventory report at the end of the week and figure it out from there. It's all good."
It made Frank want to grind his teeth. As did the fact he still had no idea what was going on behind the locked door at the back of the store. Matt was in a few days a week either looking at comics or joining in one of several board games that seemed to go on for days at a time, but Randall was there every afternoon, sauntering down one of the aisles and disappearing out back.
"What do they do?" He asked Matt one afternoon while he was putting the new issues out for sale. "Other than take up space I could for storing these things, I mean."
The boy shrugged. "Randy doesn't talk about work," he said. "He had to sign some kind of, what do they call it… non disclosure agreement. All I know is it has to do with computer documents. Randy's really good with computers."
Frank watched as he sauntered over to one of the game tables and started talking to a few of the other regulars. Documents. Good with computers, he thought. Well, Randy's not the only one who's good with computers.
The next day, Frank showed up at work and shoved a crumpled paper bag into Chuck's hands. "Here. I'm sick and tired of the labels you make us wear. We look like idiots."
Chuck's eyes widened as he tore open the bag. Professional looking name badges spilled out and fell onto the floor. He knelt down to pick them up, counting them as he did so. "There's one here for everybody. Zack, where did you get these? I don't have money in the budget for stuff like this."
Frank stared at him for a minute, channeling his inner Joe, before answering. "You have a budget? That's news." He bent to retrieve the last one and flipped it over and under his fingers. "I made them. And usually people say thank you when someone gives them something nice."
"You… you made them?" Chuck swallowed. He picked one up from the counter and examined it carefully. "I saw something like these in a catalog last week. Getting enough for all of us would have cost hundreds of dollars." He looked up at Frank's sullen glare and stepped back. "Uh, thank you."
There was a long pause. "You're welcome." Frank turned toward the stock room, sliding his jacket off his shoulders.
"Zack, hold on." Chuck's eyes were back on the ID in his hand. "Why are you working here?"
"I needed a job."
"No, if you can make something like this," Chuck held up the badge, "why are you wasting your time making minimum wage in a comic book store?"
Frank raised an eyebrow at him. "You're a smart guy. You figure it out." He strode into the back room, making sure to keep the door open enough to see as Chuck looked from the ID in his hand to the door at the back of the store.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
Kara spent her days hanging around campus, getting to know Alice, her roommate Jessica, and a few of the other students the girls hung around with, and listening to the conversations going on around her. The students here were like students anywhere, a mixture of idealistic individuals who wanted to change the world, practical people who worried about their grades and wanted a good job after they graduated, and slackers who were only concerned about their next party. The musings of the last group were both the least interesting and most most informative. While they spent an inordinate amount of time talking about parties and how wasted they had been, they also sprinkled their conversations with interesting tidbits about where under-aged drinkers could go to find alcohol, people to buy alcohol for them, or bars where the under twenty-one set could get admitted without an ID. A common complaint was the lack of places to get fake IDs as the sole manufacturer of the contraband had been arrested the previous semester on a drunk driving charge.
And the sad part is they don't see the connection, Kara thought, stirring the contents of her mug. She wasn't sure if it made her more sad or angry.
"… but there's a new dude in the area making them," one girl said to a table full of interested listeners. "Jack got one last week, and he says it's really good."
Which could mean one of two things, Kara thought as she sipped her coffee and scanned the table to see if any of them admitted to being Jack. Either Jack has no idea what a good fake ID looks like, or our guy is really here. She frowned at the table. And if it is our guy, why isn't he flooding the market with the things? That's been his M.O., and he's certainly been here long enough...
"Hey, Carrie. You okay?"
Kara looked up to see Alice looking down at her, concern written on her face. She blinked a few times before answering, giving herself a moment to come up with a reason for the scowl she could feel on her own face.
"Yeah. Issues with my dad."
Alice's expression became sympathetic. "Parents can be so annoying." She sat at the table and launched into a rant of how unreasonable her own father could be. Kara nodded and pretended to follow along, all the while wondering how Frank managed to keep his true self so separated from the role he played that it never showed and trying not to sigh in frustration.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
"How was work, son?" Frank looked up from the door to see Vickers sitting on the floor in the living room, a half-stained chair set on newspapers that were spread out in front of him.
He watched mesmerized as the agent dipped his brush into an open can of stain, wiped the bristles on the inner lip of the can once or twice, then firmly dragged the brush along the chair's seat.
"Uh, work, yeah. It was okay." He shut the door hard enough to make the door frame shake, then shook his head to clear it. "I think they're starting to trust me. The name tags went over well. Not that it's getting me behind that other door. Yet." He followed the brush in the agent's hand as the older man gently guided it along the tapered legs of the chair, leaving the finish as smooth as glass. "Where did you learn to do that? Sir."
Vickers chuckled softly. "My grandfather was a cabinet maker. When I was a kid, I used to get commandeered to help with the construction, only I wasn't very good at it." He paused and stretched his arm out, rotating it from side to side. "My sister was the builder in the family. He had her on the staining table, and she hated it. When Grandpa would leave to deal with customers, we'd switch places. She'd build, and I'd smooth and stain. Took Grandpa years to figure it out." He slid over on the floor to the back of the chair. "When he retired he left her the business, so I had to find another line of work." With a flick of his wrist, he finished smoothing the brush over the last leg, examined the chair with a critical eye, then nodded and rose to his feet, the stain can and brush held tightly in one hand. "Looks like I'm not the only one with experience in the family business, hey?"
"You know my father, sir?" Frank crossed to the kitchen and filled a glass with water from the tap.
"Our paths have crossed a few times." Vickers took a hammer and tapped the lid back on the can. "He's a good man. Professional." The agent chuckled. "We tried to get him to come work for us at one time, but your father said he enjoys his independence too much to want to take orders from one of us."
Frank choked on the water he was swallowing. "Dad said that?" he asked when he could breathe easily again.
"Not in so many words, but we got the message." Now Vickers was cleaning the brush. "Why?"
"That's pretty much what I told Agent Malone about my brother when she suggested both of us should join the agency." His eyes turned to the door as the handle turned. "And speaking of..."
He watched as Malone sashayed into the living room. "What is that stink?" she asked loudly before slamming the door shut.
Vickers tilted his head toward Frank. "I'm thinking Carrie won't be joinin' the family business," he said, a twinkle in his eye before turning back toward the girl. "And how did your outing go?"
"It was okay." Malone unwound the long purple shoelace she was using as a headband from around her head. "I still need to work on not letting myself show when I'm supposed to be Carrie." She heard Frank's sharp intake of breath. "But it was fine." She glanced at Vickers, avoiding Frank's eyes. "I blamed you, sir. Turns out parents are the universal reason for being out of sorts."
The agent chuckled. "Glad to be of service, my dear." Anything new?"
Still looking only at Vickers, she outlined what she has learned that afternoon.
"Good." Vickers nodded at her. "Looks like we're getting a good start. Now, whose turn was it to make dinner?"
"Mine," Kara said. "I hope pasta and salad is all right." She walked past Frank not looking at him as if intent on starting their meal but still felt his eyes on her.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o
The following Saturday, Frank went to work early and started installing the accounting program he had been working on since his first week at the shop. Merging the data from Chuck's inventory program took more time and concentration than he had expected, so he didn't hear the owner's approach until he was almost in the door. Instantly, Frank leaned back in the chair, slouching and leaning his head on his right fist.
"You're late," he said as Chuck stood in the doorway gaping at him. "I thought you got here at the crack of dawn or something. Maybe even lived here."
"What the hell are you doing?"
Frank swiveled the chair around to face the other man. Chuck's mouth was open, and his face was turning red. He shook his head and turned the chair back to the monitor. "You're gonna have a heart attack if you don't chill out. Take up yoga or something."
"What are you doing in my office?" Chuck slammed his metal Incredible Hulk lunchbox down on the desk next to the computer keyboard.
"Dude, that's vintage," Frank said, putting a note of offense in his voice.
"Damn it, Zack! What's going on?"
Frank let out a long breath, then rolled the chair away from the computer so Chuck could see the screen. "I've been complaining about your computers system since I started here, and you weren't doing anything about it, so I took matters into my own hands." He stood, put his hands on Chuck's shoulders, and pushed him down into the chair before rolling it back in place. "Problem?"
Chuck scanned the screen, then reached for the mouse and started clicking a few fields. "What is this?"
"What does it look like? It's a huge, freakin' spreadsheet. It links to your inventory database and might keep your accountant from killing you when tax season rolls around." Frank snorted. "If you're lucky…"
"Why did you do this?" Chuck looked from the computer to Frank and back again.
"Bored, sick of watching you trying to figure out how much money you've made each day." Frank shrugged and lowered his head, letting his hair fall over his eyes. "Take your pick."
Chuck turned the chair around to face Frank. "And I'll ask again. Why are you working here?" He waved at the screen. "You could make a lot more money working as a programmer. Why are you cooling your heels here?"
Frank made his face freeze. "Look, if you don't want me to do this shit, I won't."
"That's not… No, of course not. I'm grateful," Chuck stammered. "I just don't understand why you're selling comic books instead of working on computer programs."
"Not a lot of those kind of jobs out here in the sticks, are there?" Frank moved back to the computer, bent over the keyboard, and hit a few keys. "And if you're asking why, you didn't run a background check on me."
There was a knock on the doorframe. Matt stood in the doorway, a faint blush shading his cheeks. "Guys, I hate to interrupt, but there's a girl here looking for Zack." He looked at Frank. "She was pretty insistent. Sorry."
Chuck looked at Frank. "Thank you for this. I appreciate it."
Frank followed Matt out of the office. "A girl?"
"Yeah. She's over there." Matt pointed to the back of the store where the gamers had started gathering.
A small crowd was surrounding one of the tables near the wall. As Frank and Matt got nearer, the group of boys parted to show Kara sitting on one of the tables
"Jesus, Carrie, get your ass off the table." Frank grabbed Kara by the arm and dragged her away from the gamers. "Why are you even here?"
Kara wrinkled her nose. "I can see why you work here. It's got you written all over it. Ow." She tried to shake her arm out of his grip. "Zack, let go."
Frank could see Matt sidling up on his right and dropped Kara's arm. He turned to the boy. "It's cool. She's my sister. Carrie, Matt. Matt, Carrie's just leaving. Aren't you?"
"Just as soon as you give me money. Dad says I hafta do the grocery shopping, and he's short, so he told me to come here and get some from you." She stuck tongue out at him and held out her hand. "So..."
Frank pulled out his wallet and gave her some bills. "Now get out."
"Gladly. I've had enough geek contamination for one day." Kara sauntered to the door, swinging her hips lazily from side to side.
"That's your sister?" Matt was again standing beside Frank, his mouth open slightly.
"Yeah. And not one word."
Matt shook his head. "Wow, I thought the attitude was just you. She's something else."
Frank raised an eyebrow. "A pain in the ass is what she is, but she's still my little sister." He turned to the gamers gathered around the table where Kara had been sitting. "And she's off limits. Got it?"
They all nodded then went back to their games.