Criminal?

“Criminal?” you ask. “Or criminally brilliant?” You put on a pouting face and Athena laughs. Then she sighs, looking at her notepad. She taps her pen against the paper.

“Think about it,” you say, rubbing her knee over the blanket. “Nobody’s doing time over vibrators.”

“Girls join CCL and go to college because they have goals. Having a criminal record does not help with goals,” Athena reminds you gently.

You shake your head. “That’s too narrow. Having a criminal record for something like this in Gurlberg won’t help you get a job at Fox News, but it will help you anywhere that matters. The types of places that girls who put CCL on their resume go. Where are you going when you graduate, Athena?”

She hesitates. It’s kind of a personal question, but she meets your gaze.

“I’m going to try to get an internship with Warmer.”

Warmer is a major media group. Athena’s aiming high.

“And?” you say. “Would Warmer care if you’d gotten busted selling vibes in Gurlberg.”

“No,” Athena admits. “Not in general, and certainly not for the division that I’ll apply to.”

“Local police won’t come after us that hard,” you assure Athena. “CCL isn’t universally loved, but it’s still a fixture of this town. I’m not from around here. Are you?”

“No.”

“Then you know that Gurlberg’s only known for one thing, and it’s not the food.”

Athena nods with a little smile. “Let’s go over the numbers again.”

OK… you were not trying to turn tonight into a serious business meeting, but your pitch has worked a little too well. Athena can’t stop thinking about it. So you gamely dial back your flirty snuggling and help her get some of the essentials onto the page.

Athena listens to your estimates, gives her input, and scribbles some numbers. Then does it again. No matter how you run it, even if you go with your lower estimates, you can have CCL in the green within a year. That’s before Athena even graduates. She’d get to see this plan come to fruition. And if it goes really well, you’d get to see all that much sooner.

You start to worry as you watch her gazing at the pad with a serious expression.

Then she puts it on the table and slides out of bed, looking distant.

“Athena?” you say to her back.

“Huh? Oh. Give me a second,” she says, and pads quietly out of the room.

The house creaks as you sit in Athena’s warm bed for several long, agonizing minutes. You twitch as you hear a noise from downstairs. What was that?

You can deal with business instead of pleasure, but you’re worried about how Athena’s acting. Is she threatened by your big ideas? Does she actually think that you’re coming for her job?

She returns, and you’re startled by what she has in her hands. It’s an open bottle of champagne in one hand, and two glasses in the other.

“Oh, hi,” you say, relief and something warm and fuzzy flooding through you. Athena wants to celebrate. She likes your plan!

But Athena’s frowning and looking over her shoulder.

“What’s wrong?” you ask.

She shakes her head. “Nothing. Someone left a window open downstairs.” She returns to the bed and hands you the glasses, then slides in with the bottle. Cozy beside you again, she pours and you clink the glasses together ironically.

“We start tomorrow,” she tells you.

Wow. But… it’s not that she loves your plan so much; this means that things really are that bad. She’s ****. That’s OK. You are happy to rescue her.

“You really want to be in charge?” she asks. “Because you can have it.”

You laugh and take another sip, firmly shaking your head. “Nope. Never.”

“Then why do all this?”

You shrug. “Helping’s easy. Being responsible and being the leader… that’s more than I need.”

“You’re smarter than I was when I was a Freshman,” she says, leaning closer to you and stroking your hair. It’s the first hint of romance you’ve seen from her tonight. So the way to her heart is business. Who knew?

You tilt your head up for a champagne-flavored kiss.