CHAPTER 2
“Hey, can I bug you for a favor?” Harlow asked.
“How about a, ‘Hello, Samantha. It’s nice to see you. How have you been in the past – oh, I don’t know –yearssince I’ve seen you?’ Then, we cantalkabout a favor.”
“I saw you a year and a half ago, getting gas in your car when I was driving by. Doesthatcount? I texted you.”
“You’re the worst.” Samantha laughed. “One of the reasons we’re no longer together. What do you want, Harlow?” she asked and looked back down at the laptop in front of her.
“One of these amazing conference rooms; a few times a week, for an hour or two. I don’t know yet whether it’ll be a few times a week or just a few times overall.”
“What? Why?”
“I need them for a friend.”
“You need aconferenceroom for a friend?”
“We could use the library study rooms, but they have an hour limit, and we will probably go over sometimes. They’re always hard to reserve because the library is busy, and you’re also supposed to be relatively quiet there. I don’t think we’ll get loud or anything, but–”
“Library study rooms? This is for Larissa, isn’t it?”
“She’s working on a book and needs space to interview people for it, yes. We really don’t want to do it in a public place.The library is an option, but it’s not ideal because the people she would be talking to aren’t students or faculty, and that’s a whole thing. She’s not teaching this semester, so she doesn’t have an office on campus, and I thought about this place.” Harlow leaned over the desk in the co-working space lobby. “I thought there was still a good chance you worked here.”
“You know how you could have known for sure? You could’ve called or texted me.”
“I was on my way home and passed by the building, so I thought I’d check in person. Come on. Can you hook me up with the friends-and-family discount?”
“We’re not friendsorfamily. We dated for two months a million years ago and text, like, once a year or something.”
“I’m thirty-two years old. If we’d dated a million years ago, I–”
“Harlow, come on.”
“How much are these rooms to rent if I don’t have a membership?”
“It’s cheaper if you do.”
“But I don’t need one,” Harlow argued. “This’ll take a month at most, probably.”
“Then, buy a membership for a month.”
“Why would I do that when I can just rent the rooms?”
“God, why are you this frustrating?” Samantha grunted. “I make a commission when you rent from me. Can you just pay me the three hundred bucks it costs to have a membership?”
“Holy shit! That’s expensive.”
“If you get the annual membership, it’s cheaper.”
“You’re a very good salesperson,” Harlow teased. “But how much are the rooms to just rent them?”
“Forty bucks an hour, and you get access to the Wi-Fi.”
“We’d need at least eight hours, if not more. We’ve only planned a few interviews so far,” she said, mostly to herself.
“You’re helping Larissa with something for school?”
“Not school specifically. She’s writing a book, and I’m helping her with the interview piece for part of it.”
