Merriton

“So what’s your idea?” Sierra heard Kevin’s voice. She was in the kitchen, finishing up the final order from Junco resort. She had only been able to fill the order because Elvis let her milk his goats. The old coot still wouldn’t let her buy them, but he was willing to let her milk them. She couldn’t understand that old man.

“What idea?” Randy and Kevin were in the living room working on computers together. Kevin had been over almost every day since he moved to his house in Emigration because the house didn’t have Internet yet. Kevin was paying to have a T-1 line brought into his house, but that was taking longer than any of them thought it would.

It was nice to hear them talking. If Sierra closed her eyes, she could almost imagine that they were back home. Only the stench of cooking goats milk betrayed her. The room had been quiet for too long, and Kevin’s voice sounded uneasy. “Your idea to market my speed up the Internet thing. You said you have a good idea.” The room was quiet and Kevin continued, “I don’t want to bury Zaunter anymore. Since Jerry got canned, there’s no point. I can’t get Amazon S3 to even listen to me.” Randy was still quiet. Sierra knew that Randy had a business plan for Kevin’s idea, but it had been shoved away when Kevin shot him down. Kevin started talking again, “I miss working together on things. It’s kind of lonely doing this all alone.”

The pot started boiling over and Sierra turned the temperature down. She strained to hear the two of them talking in the other room over the noise of the bubbling goat milk. Randy was quiet, but she heard Kevin again. “Curly said that I should give you a chance.” She could almost hear Randy put his hand on his forehead and wipe his face in one big and slow movement. “You sure? Because once I start working on this, it’s going to belong to both of us. I know what it feels like to want to prove yourself.”

Sierra crept out of the kitchen, spying on them unnoticed. Kevin replied, “I’m sure.” Sierra saw Randy’s face light up. She could see the words building up in his body and almost smell the excitement on his skin. “Okay, the problem we’ve had before is that we’re trying to market your algorithm to specific companies. We need to think bigger.” He stood up and ran upstairs leaving Kevin behind. For a second, Kevin watched the staircase and then his eyes wandered, resting on Sierra.

“I’m seeing a lot of footprints in the Sno-Parks. Looks like two people, one of them has a tricycle or a wagon or something. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?” Kevin’s eyes burned right through Sierra’s skin. She could tell by the look in his eyes that he knew EXACTLY who one of the footprints belonged to. “No. Is it illegal to walk through the Sno-Parks? Are they only for cross-country skiiers?” Kevin shook his head. “No, but it gets pretty dangerous up there later in the winter.” Kevin locked eyes with Sierra. They stood in a deadlock without saying a word for sickening moment while Randy bounded down the stairs. The dusty blue folder packed with contact information for ISPs was in his hand.

Sierra quietly returned to the kitchen.