His new girlfriend wasn’t exactly the target audience, although she did wear black lipstick, so maybe she was into the horror element.
He sent back a thumbs-up emoji.
I shuddered and pushed my phone onto the desk. Kat was beautiful; no doubt about that. But did he have to get all romantic about her in my virtual presence? I’d already caught them making out on our home security cameras.
I spritzed my hands with sanitizer to scrub off the memory of their tryst and whatever layer of funk was on this guy’s laptop.
At least my little brother and Kat stopped pawing each other in the living room when I reminded them about the cameras. Now, they usually went to her place. Which was fine. Good for them. Who wanted to share space anyway?
I stabbed the escape key. What next? I had to call that middle-aged jerk back to pick up his laptop. Call. Not text. I double-checked my onboarding notes. Yup, I had to follow their selected preference. Surely, it was more efficient to text. Or email. No one answered unknown numbers anymore. Hopefully, that meant I could just leave a message.
I twisted my headphones on one side and fitted the receiver to my free ear to dial nine for outside calls. I plugged in the customer’s number. A buzzing motor flew closer, drowning out the ringtone. What if he answered? Or worse, what if he called back? Would it come to me or the store in general? Was I supposed to answer? And how? What if he called again? And again. That guy… He wanted my name. He probably got kicks out of handing me his naked woman, game-breaking shit. I didn’t want to talk to him. Bile sparked up my throat, and the drone show outside elicited more childish, high-pitched shrieks. My brain sizzled with panic.
I jammed the phone into its cradle.
No. I wasn’t going to call a creep and invite him in. My job was to fix shit. Not talk to customers.
“I’m going on break,” I called.
My boss glanced up from her tablet, but kept pitching the newest model to the customer. I’d take that to mean it was fine.
I secured my headphones and beelined into the mall. Victor should be at the theater. He could find me a safe space or call that fuckwad customer for me. As I typed an S.O.S. message to him, a breeze fanned my face. Why would a vent be in the middle of a hallway?
A muffled shout joined the background buzzing.
Was my boss calling me?
I twisted around, and a winged motorized being zoomed right by me.Threat incoming.I shrieked and backhanded the damned thing. It spun, then smacked into the glass wall of True Tech with all the grace of a cannon ball.
Cracks shattered across the source of impact. The drone sputtered, then fell. Smoke curled out in a spiral above it. Some guy in an orange, button-down T-shirt holding a controller ran toward the crash. He gestured wildly, his shouts garbled.
I slowly lowered my headphones. Dread thudded through my brain: liabilities, insurance claims, and lawyers. My brother was going to be so disappointed. Day one of normal human interaction and I already had collateral damage.
The pilot slumped over his drone’s husk, then widened his cartoonishly big eyes. “Well, fuck,” he said.
Fair assessment. I wasn’t sure how, or if, I could fix this.
2
Crack
The drone pilot pushed out his palm with excess drama. “Don’t worry, I’ll grab the fire extinguisher.”
“But then you’ll ruin the engine,” I said.
He gave me an incredulous look and gestured to the smoking, cracked components. “I’m pretty sure you already did that, sweetheart.”
Sweetheart?
