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Chapter Nine: We Still Don't Have a Medium


When I got home, I immediately logged onto WOW and searched for Princess Neryls in hopes of catching her and getting to talk to her about the rondevous and let her know I had her name tag and schedule. I wanted to try again to find out exactly what had gone wrong because I couldn't think of a single thing that had gone wrong - other than the deliberation over the size drink to order, and that she'd said she understood.

She didn't log on all night.

I woke up the next morning on the couch, my computer balanced on my chest, still no sign of Princess Neryls. I glanced at the clock and got up and got dressed and made my way to Fresh Oasis, standing outside the front door at 6:55am with a girl in fitness pants that kept huff-puffing and jogging in place, glancing at her wrist watch. At exactly 7, Becky came out to the front door, still tying a yellow apron around her waist. She spotted me through the door as she pulled the key out of her jeans pocket. She raised an eyebrow, unlocked the door, and held it open. Huff-Puff jogged inside and up to the counter as Becky stepped out and lowered a crank-style awning that hung over two tiny metal tables sets that were chained to the front of the smoothie shop.

"Hey," I said.

"I didn't think I'd see you here again," she said, heading back inside.

"I didn't really get a chance to talk to you yesterday," I said.

She went up to the counter, rounded it, and ignored me, focusing instead on Huff-Puff. Huff-Puff ordered some protien whatever whatever thing that sounded ridiculously healthy and Becky made it for her, and flecks of green spackled the front of her apron and she handed off the small juice to Huff-Puff and she jogged out of the shop. Becky took her time washing the blender, then turned to face me. She stared at me for a moment, took a deep breath. "What can I get you?"

"I don't want anything."

She stared at me. "You have to order something or else you should go."

"I have this." I held out her name tag. I'd kept her schedule though. Just in case. She took the name tag. "You dropped it on the ground yesterday, Princess," said.

She magnetized it to her apron. "Thanks," she said. "I guess you know then that everyone in the real world calls me Becky, not Princess Neryls."

"I was rather disappointed that you weren't really named Neryls of Hatteras," I replied dryly. I grinned. She stared at me with those big wide eyes of hers. The door behind me jingled and some new people walked in.

"Seriously order or leave," she said.

"Acai wheatgrass smoothie," I ordered.

"We still don't have medium," she cautioned.

"Large."

"So decisive today."

I shrugged. "I have my reasons." She turned to make my smoothie. The people that had walked in got in line behind me as the blender rumbled. She turned back to me a moment later with the smoothie. It was a gross purple-green color, almost brown. "Think about the quests and the experience points," I said, popping the wrapper off the straw.

"Nate, just drop it." She turned to the next customer. I stood there a couple feet down the counter from the register, watching her make the next two smoothies. I sipped my drink. When they left she glanced over at me, then grabbed the blenders and made a huge production of washing them off and ignoring me.

"Just -- please, explain why you ran off yesterday," I said.

"Can't handle the idea that a woman would run off from you, huh?" she said sarcastically, "No matter how ugly she may be?"

"Ugly?" I laughed. Becky put the cleaned blenders back on their cradles and cleaned down the counter. "Look, c'mon, I think we could really make a good team. You can't tell me that you seriously could tell from like the thirty seconds that our rondevous lasted yesterday whether I'm a good WOW player or not."

"That's not what this is about," she replied, and she disappeared through a beaded curtain into a back kitchen area.

I leaned against the counter, "What is it about then?"

"I don't wanna talk about it," she called back out.

I sucked on my straw, then called, "C'mon, you gotta tell me what the hell I did wrong."

Becky returned holding a box of grapes. She put the box on the counter and started pulling grapes off the little tree thingies they come stuck to, tossing them into a little covered bowl. "You didn't really do anything, Nate," she replied, "It just was -- it was just painfully obvious we weren't on the same page and -- I couldn't take it. That's all."

"What page were we not on together?" I asked.

Her face flushed. "Can we please just let this go?"

I waved a hand in front of my face, "This is not a face that lets things go easy," I said.

"I just felt so stupid. Like there's even a chance that a guy like you would... ugh. I can't believe I even told you that. Nate, can we just please pretend none of this ever happened?"

"What? A guy like me would what?" I creased my brow.

Becky shook her head, "Forget it."

"A guy like me would what?" I persisted.

"That a guy like you would go for something like--" she waved her arms to indicate herself, "--this."

"What's wrong with that?" I asked, eyeing her, trying to spot a flaw that had been overlooked the day before. The only thing I noticed this time that I hadn't the day before was the small nose ring on the left nostril. "You're gorgeous," I said, "Why the hell would you say something like that?" And I wasn't really lying. I mean maybe a little. She wasn't like a supermodel, I mean. She was typical, average, I guess. Her hair was gorgeous. It hung in long soft curls around her face and her dark eye make up made her big eyes look even bigger, almost animae-like. And sure she could use to lose a couple pounds - maybe even ten to twenty - but she wasn't like fat...

"Please. If I was gorgeous you would've noticed me yesterday before you realized I was Princess Neryls."

"I noticed you," I argued, "We held a whole conversation."

"And in that whole conversation you never once looked at me."

"I looked at you," I said defensively.

"You looked through me."

"I looked around you."

"That's crap. You're a man. It doesn't matter if you were waiting for someone, you'd still notice if a - " she did quotations in the air around the word, "gorgeous woman came over to your table."

"Maybe I'm not like most guys," I argued. She was right, normally I would've noticed her, but I really was just focused on waiting for Princess Neryls to show up at the shop. My distraction really wasn't a reflection on her looks for once. Honestly, if I'd been paying attention, and she hadn't turned out to be Neryls and everything, I probably would've hit on her and planned to come back to tie up Chris's score or something. Which reminded me. "I hit on you, remember? I ordered a you flavored drink," I said.

She rolled her eyes, "You hadn't even looked at me when you said that. It was an automatic response."

"Nuhuh!" But I couldn't remember if it had been or not. It probably had been. I ordered waitresses on buns all the time at this burger joint Chris and I frequented. I always made the you on the rocks joke to sexy bar tenders. It wasn't the first time I'd made a comment like that on auto-flirt.

"Besides, you looked let down or something when you came over," she said. "I didn't miss the look on your face."

"I wasn't let down..."

"Yeah you were. I know I'm not hot like my avatar is but --"

"I wasn't let down," I said, "It's not like I had incredibly high hopes to begin with or anything," I added. "I thought you were gonna be a 57-year old man. At least you aren't that." She blinked at me. I realized that came out wrong. "I mean that in like a good way..." I said.

Becky sighed. "Look, Nate I'm not an idiot, okay?"

"I know."

"You were let down, period. The end of the story. No more conversation." She turned pulled a drawer open, silverware and kitchen tools clanged loudly.

"I wasn't let down, okay, I was scared shitless. I thought you were gonna rip my balls off for not ordering one size or another. I thought I'd blown the chances of you wanting to start a clan with me, okay?" I don't know why, even when I was saying the words, being in a clan with Princess Neryls was so important to me.

"Just... go, okay? Please?" She turned and started sweeping the tile behind the counter.

"Becky, I don't see what this all has to do with the WOW clan idea," I said, "I mean --"

Becky's face was all but neon. "Okay look I thought -- I thought yesterday was a -- a -- you know, a date," she replied.

"A date?" I said, surprised.

"I know, it's ridiculous," she said, rolling her eyes, "God. I can't believe I was so stupid. And then whenever it turned out that you were you..." she shook her head, "I just can't." She stared at me for a long moment, like she was daring me to say something. And I wanted to say something, but I didn't know what to say. No words would come. Then she headed for the beaded curtain, headed back out to the kitchen. "You better be gone by the time I come back out," she said.

I watched the beads swing until they hung still behind her. I imagined myself sitting at a table and putting my feet up, waiting defiantly for her to come back. But I wasn't sure what I'd say when she did.

So I left.