“The machine’s a little slow tonight.” I give him a polite smile tinged with apology. I’m sure he’s anxious to go make another billion. I turn to Zack and Jenna, who are whispering to each other but don’t seem to be making much progress. “Why don’t you let me do this?”
I pull out the stack of order sheets with all the drinks the VC people consumed and start adding them up in my head. It isn’t that difficult. Once I get a total, I add the tax as well.
“There,” I tell Jenna, handing her the paper with the final number circled.
“Is this right?” she asks, looking at the numbers like they’re alien monsters. She’s probably thinking she should run it through a calculator, except there are over twenty order sheets with tons of drinks on each for her to go through, which would take a while. And the VC folks are waiting.
“Let me see it.” The man extends his hand.
Jenna hands it to him. I’m confident of my math. And my memory. I just hope his is as good.
He skims the list. “Your math is fine. And the drinks look about right, too. But let’s check. What’d you serve that guy in the yellow shirt over there?”
“Three JD and Cokes, a boilermaker and a Stoli rocks with a lime wedge.”
The guy motions with a hand. “Hey, Brian. Come over here for a sec.” Brian walks over. “What’d you drink tonight?”
Brian frowns. “Uh… Not a lot. Couple of JD and Cokes and a boilermaker.” There’s a pause. “Oh, and a vodka.”
“A couple?” the man says. “Two?”
Brian squints at the ceiling. “Think it was three.”
The man looks at me. “Impressive. Okay, I’ll trust your numbers.”
“Thanks,” I say.
“Thankyou,” he says, handing Jenna a sleek corporate card.
While Jenna wrestles with the machine to accept his credit card, he turns to me. “I don’t see you here a lot. You work part-time?”
“Yeah. Although hopefully you’ll see more of me in the future.” I realize abruptly he has a wedding band on his finger, and I might be coming across as flirty. “You know, when I get more hours.”
“You seem pretty on top of things.”
“Just a have a head for numbers, I guess.”
His gaze slides to Jenna briefly, then returns to me. “Ever thought about doing something else?”
“Like what?”Careful, Aspen…I’ve had some asshole propositions before, although not usually this openly.
“We’re looking to hire an assistant. Why don’t you come in for an interview?” He pulls out a business card and a pen and jots down something on the back before handing it to me.
The thick rectangular paper feels expensive in my hand. On the front it reads:
Emmett Lasker
Director
GrantEm Capital
The name Lasker makes me pause for a second as an old pain pokes at me. It isn’t exactly a common name, but it isn’t super rare, either. Besides, Grant said if he could, he’d be a beach bum in Spain. Even if he ended up staying in the States, I can’t picture him in L.A. He probably graduated from Harvard so he could have the piece of paper that said he’d done it and then went off to God only knows where.
I jerk myself out of the reverie. Grant means nothing to me. It’s been fourteen years.
I flip the card and see a phone number.
“My direct number if you decide you’re interested,” Emmett says.
