Chapter 43: Stanford
"Is it true you have an assistant manager interview coming up?"
Simon had heard it from Morgan first, then confirmed it with Chuck directly, arriving at the Nerd Herd desk with the specific energy of someone delivering news they found genuinely good.
Chuck looked mildly uncomfortable, which was his standard response to anything that might constitute good news before it was confirmed. "It's not official yet. The interview panel comes from corporate headquarters — could be next week, could be the week after. I don't know."
"Chuck." Simon leaned on the counter. "You're going to get it. You know the inventory better than anyone in this building, you actually fix things instead of pretending to fix them, and you're the only person on the floor who can explain a product to a customer without making them feel stupid. They'd be insane not to promote you."
Chuck was about to respond when a voice cut across from the sales floor.
"It's work hours." Harry Tang — head of the sales department, aggressively bald, with the specific interpersonal energy of someone who had been passed over for something important once and had decided to let it define him — delivered this without stopping or looking at either of them. "No socializing. And—" He paused. "Don't count your chickens. Public announcements about positions that haven't been confirmed are embarrassing when they don't come through."
He walked away.
Simon and Chuck watched him go.
"He heard," Simon said.
"He's been standing twelve feet away for the last five minutes," Chuck said.
"His feelings are complicated," Simon said. "Congratulations in advance."
Chuck's expression did the thing it did when he was trying not to be pleased about something and was losing. "Thanks. Maybe."
"Speaking of which—" Simon glanced toward Big Mike's office. "Is Mike in a good mood today? I need to put in for a few days off."
"Fall break?" Chuck guessed.
"Stanford and UCLA. Meg wants to look at Stanford for herself, and I need to do the same with Westwood." Simon paused. "Application season is coming up and I haven't actually walked either campus."
Chuck was quiet for a moment at the mention of Stanford. Something moved through his expression — brief, contained, the particular look he got when something touched the part of his history he didn't discuss at the Nerd Herd desk.
"Mike's been reasonable today," Chuck said. "Good time to ask."
"Thanks." Simon started toward the office. Then stopped. "Chuck."
"Yeah."
"Stanford's a good campus. I've heard that from people who went there." He said it simply, without context, and walked away.
Chuck was quiet behind him.
Big Mike approved the days without difficulty — a function of Simon's commission numbers, which had been making Big Mike substantially happier with the world since Simon's first week on the floor.
Casey accepted the information with the professional equanimity of a man who had recently had to be rescued from a hotel room in his undershirt and was not in a position to be difficult about scheduling.
"If something comes up," Simon said, "call me. I can be back in six hours."
"We'll manage," Casey said.
Simon looked at him.
"Go," Casey said. "Before I change my mind."
Fall break arrived with the particular relief of a calendar event that everyone had been working toward without quite saying so.
Simon picked up Meg at seven AM in the Mustang — first real road trip in the new car, which served the dual purpose of visiting the schools and putting the first phase of modifications through an actual extended test.
The changes from the initial build were already audible: the cold air intake had given the engine a more purposeful induction sound, and the tune had unlocked a noticeably different throttle response. The car wasn't finished — it wouldn't be finished until spring — but it was considerably more honest about what it was than it had been when it rolled off the dealer's lot.
Meg got in and looked at the dash. "It sounds different."
"Different good or different concerning?"
She listened for a moment. "Good, I think. More serious."
"That's the goal," Simon said, and pulled out.
The drive from Los Angeles to Stanford was supposed to take seven hours on a normal day.
Simon did it in three and a half.
This was partly a function of the Mustang being considerably faster than advertised, partly a function of the Californian highway system being cooperative on a Tuesday morning, and partly a function of Simon's driving style, which Meg had long since accepted as a fixed environmental variable rather than something to negotiate about.
She read her application materials for the first two hours, napped for forty minutes somewhere in the central valley, and woke up when Simon exited the highway.
"We're here?" she said, looking out the window at the familiar Northern California geography.
"Twenty minutes out," Simon said.
She straightened up and looked at the passing landscape with the specific attention of someone who was beginning to look at things as potential homes rather than scenery.
Stanford's campus in late October was doing everything it was supposed to do.
The Spanish colonial architecture under the warm California light. The palm-lined main quad. The football week energy that had turned the campus into something between an academic institution and a very organized outdoor festival.
The Cardinal and the Bruins were playing that weekend — Stanford vs. UCLA, the kind of rivalry that both schools treated as a major event and that the students of each treated as a referendum on the fundamental superiority of their institution.
Every fifty feet there was either a tailgate setup, a merchandise booth, or a cluster of people wearing cardinal red who were expressing strong opinions about the upcoming game.
"This is great," Meg said, walking beside Simon with the open, receptive attention of someone cataloguing a potential future. "It's exactly what I was hoping it would look like."
"It photographs well," Simon agreed. "The question is whether it works for what you need."
"The criminology faculty is—"
"Third best program in the country," Simon said. "I looked it up. The forensic psychology track specifically is well-funded and has a good placement record into FBI behavioral positions." He glanced at her. "Which is why I think it's the right choice."
Meg stopped walking and looked at him.
"You researched it," she said.
"Of course I researched it."
She studied him for a moment in the way she sometimes did — as though she was trying to read something that was slightly out of focus.
"You're supportive of me going here," she said. "And you're going to UCLA. Which are—" She did the geography mentally. "Six hours apart."
"About that," Simon said.
"You're not going to try to close that distance."
"Your program is here. My program is there." He kept his voice even. "I think you should make this choice for the right reasons. Not for logistics."
Meg was quiet for a moment.
"I know you're keeping things from me," she said. Not accusatorially. Just stating a fact. "Things that are real and significant. I've known for a while."
Simon said nothing.
"And I've decided," she said, "that I'm going to trust you until you give me a reason not to. Because you haven't yet." She looked back at the campus. "So I'm going to look at this school, and I'm going to decide whether I want to be here, and I'm going to make that decision based on the school. Not based on you."
"That's what I wanted," Simon said.
"I know." She started walking again. "It's also a little annoying."
Simon walked beside her and let the campus do what it was doing.
They spent the morning covering the main quad, the psychology building, the law campus, the library system. Meg asked good questions at every stop — the kind that suggested she'd done her research and was now verifying it against reality.
By noon they were in the outdoor food area, where the game-week vendors had set up alongside the regular options, and the campus had the particular energy of a place celebrating itself.
They found a table, ordered food, and sat.
"Well?" Simon said.
"I like it," Meg said. "More than I expected to, actually. The psychology building has a research lab that's better equipped than anything I've seen at a high school level." She thought about it. "The campus is beautiful and I could see being here. The program is the right fit." She looked at him. "You?"
"It's a good school," Simon said. "You should apply."
"Are you ever going to tell me what you're actually doing?" she said. "At some point. Not right now. But eventually."
"Yes," Simon said. "Eventually."
She accepted this and went back to her food.
The afternoon was lighter — they followed the game-week energy through the campus, picked up a Cardinal pennant from a vendor that Meg said was ironic and then didn't put down, and ended up in the book section of the campus store where Simon spent twenty minutes reading the dust jackets of textbooks he didn't need.
They were moving through the outdoor market area near the south entrance when a figure came out from under a vendor table at speed — scrambling, off-balance, clearly not someone who had planned to be on that trajectory.
Simon's body responded before his brain completed the threat assessment.
He stepped left, pulled Meg behind him with his right arm, and planted his left leg.
The figure — moving too fast to stop — hit Simon's extended arm at chest height and went sideways and down onto the grass in a controlled-enough landing that was primarily the result of Simon's redirection rather than anything the figure had intended.
It took about one second.
Meg made a sound.
Simon looked down at the figure on the grass.
The figure looked up at Simon.
"...Chuck?" Simon said.
Chuck Bartowski was lying on the Stanford campus grass in a slightly rumpled button-down, looking up at Simon with the expression of a man reassessing his morning.
"Simon," Chuck said. "Hi."
"Why," Simon said.
"I can explain—"
"Are Casey and Sarah here?" Simon said.
Chuck's expression answered that before his mouth did.
A familiar voice came from behind Simon. "Well. Small world."
Simon turned.
Sarah Walker was standing six feet away with a cup of coffee, looking at the situation with the contained amusement of someone who had seen Chuck end up on the ground before and had made her peace with it as a recurring event. Casey was beside her, arms crossed, wearing the expression he wore when things had developed in a way he'd anticipated and found mildly tedious.
Simon looked at all of them.
Then he looked at the campus around him.
Then he looked at Meg, who was watching this reunion with the expression of someone who had long since stopped being surprised by anything but still found the specifics interesting.
"Why," Simon said again. To no one in particular.
"There's a situation," Sarah said.
"There's always a situation," Simon said.
"This one's—"
"Don't." Simon held up a hand. "Give me five seconds."
He turned to Meg. "How do you feel about the campus so far?"
"I love it," Meg said.
"Good. That part of the trip is a success." He looked back at the three people who had followed him to Northern California. "Okay. What's the situation?"
"Not here," Casey said.
"Of course not here," Simon said.
Chuck got up from the grass and brushed himself off. "Also — sorry about—" He gestured at Meg's general direction. "I wasn't watching where I was going."
"It's fine," Meg said. "Are you hurt?"
"I'm used to it," Chuck said.
Simon looked at Casey. "There's a coffee place across the quad. Give us ten minutes."
Casey looked at his watch. "Eight."
"Ten," Simon said, and took Meg's arm.
They walked back toward the main quad at a pace that was not particularly hurried, because Simon had decided that whatever was happening could wait ten minutes, and the campus was genuinely beautiful in the afternoon light, and Meg had found a school that was right for her.
Some things were worth taking their time with.
Even here.
[Support Goal: 500 PS → +1 Chapter]
[Support Goal: 10 Reviews → +1 Chapter]
Your review helps the story grow.
P1treon Soulforger (20+chapters ahead)