Avian laughed. “Your boyfriend might too.”
It was the first time she’d heard Elias referred to as her boyfriend, and she liked it. Eri doubted either of them would get jealous, even in other situations, because they were far too confident, and neither she nor Avian would give them a reason to be.
Avian got up and went to the mini-fridge to grab a bottle of water. “I think one more time, and I’ll be confident in the routine.”
“You just want to keep grinding on me,” Eri playfully jested. “But I’m for it.”
Avian laughed before taking a drink from the bottle, bringing a second one to Eri.
“Everything’s coming together,” Avian said two hours later as they sat on the couch. “The venue has been chosen, and there are a ton of vendor and participant applications.”
Eri had to agree. Even with her and Avian researching almost half of the vendor applicants so far and deciding not to allowsome of them for one reason or another. There were still a lot of them. The chosen venue was a large outdoor space, but it wouldn’t be wise to overcrowd it with vendors and risk making it uncomfortable for people coming out to move about freely.
“Once we finish researching all the vendors that responded, we can further narrow them down by avoiding similar vendors. I’ve seen four different barbecue places sign up, and we definitely don’t need all four of them,” Eri pointed out.
“Agreed. I also would like to include more small businesses that are just starting up too,” Avian responded, writing on her tablet.
Eri liked that idea. They would have a good mixture of businesses known throughout the city. The event could also serve as a springboard for new businesses or smaller side businesses for some.
“Are we assigning them spaces?”
“I was thinking more about assigning areas for different categories of vendors. Have all the food vendors in one area, maybe all the apparel vendors in another, and handmade items in their own area. Then have signage or give out little maps when people arrive so it’s easy to find everything when it’s in a designated spot,” Avian responded. “What do you think?”
“That works. We can go after class and take a look to get a feel for where everything will go, and I’ll make a map. We can have hard copies and a QR code for them to scan if they want a digital one.”
Marco and Avian had both been to the venue, and she could pull up pictures of it. Still, Eri needed to see it in person if she was going to make a vendor map. It would also help decide where they should be placed.
“Does Thursday work for you before I go to work?”
Eri nodded. “Yeah, we can go right after my last class. It shouldn’t take long, and it gives us plenty of time before you have to get to work.”
“I feel like time has flown from the time we were first talking about this in October till now.”
“It has,” Eri agreed.
Avian put her tablet aside and turned towards Eri. “I’ve been trying not to ask, and I know you said the two of you talked, but did you tell him?”
Eri didn’t need her friend to elaborate on what she was talking about. “No. Not yet. I told him I got overwhelmed and that my last experience of being intimate with someone wasn’t great, but I didn’t tell him why it wasn’t.”
“Ah, okay. I was just wondering. I’m happy you worked it out because I was close to putting hands on him if he kept it up. Well, that or telling his mama.”
Eri laughed. “I believe you. Thanks for having my back, but still pointing out that we were both wrong.”
“Always. I can support you while being honest with you.”
Eri stayed with Avian for another hour before heading home. She was in her kitchen, taking out ingredients to make dinner, when her phone rang. She saw the name flash across the screen and couldn’t help but smile.Gosh, what am I? Twelve?She wondered before answering the phone.
“Hey, babe.”
“Hey, Amate. How were your classes?”
“Boring, honestly. While getting all my assignments done was a good idea, I might have shot myself in the foot because I still have to go to the lectures. It feels tedious. How was work?” she asked, and Elias groaned. “That bad?”
“No, not really, but Vince came by the shop today with the sole objective of getting on my nerves.”
Eri hummed. She’d only met Vince once, briefly, when she’d gone to Marco’s that first time, when they were celebrating the motocross client Elias got. She didn’t know him personally, but from what she heard from Avian and Elias, he didn’t seem like someone she wanted to be around for extended periods of time.
“Other than him bothering you, everything was good?” she inquired.
