Chick Flick Read online

  Todd clinked my glass.

  “Here’s to getting our technology in the works. I am starting to see how we can spin all of this to our advantage.”

  “Spin away, Todd.”

  We sat at the bar for a little longer, happy to relax together in the glow of our nascent plans and the warm lights hanging above us. Todd, checking his watch, started to gather his things.

  “I gotta get home,” he said. “Already missed the kids’ bedtime. That’s a big no-no in our house!”

  He apologized and left despite my saying I wanted to stay a little longer. I never have a night away from the lab, I thought, might as well make the most of it. I traced my fingers along the bar, daydreaming about all the amazing opportunities that could open up for us if our application became the bargaining chip in what had the potential to become a very expensive battle between major players in the poultry industry.

  A hand rapping on the bar next to me broke me out of my reverie. I turned to see a handsome stranger on the stool next to me, leaning in closer as he made a play for my attention. His eyes hummed with electricity, a cool green in the low light of the bar.

  “I couldn’t help but overhear some of your conversation,” he said.

  I tried to balance my competing emotions: anger at him for snooping and bashfulness as a result of his handsome visage. I wanted to immediately crawl away and out the door back to the safety of my lab when I spat out a reply that hedged too much into the realm of the self-defensive and sarcastic.

  “I’m sure you could have, actually,” I said.

  To my surprise, and relief, he laughed, not so much with his mouth but more with his eyes.

  “That’s fair enough,” he said, nodding and extending his hand. “I’m William.”

  I extended my hand to shake his. It was warm, dry, and confident. I hoped mine wasn’t too clammy.

  “Scarlet Struck,” I said.

  “It’s nice to meet you, Scarlet.”

  I paused, encouraged by his friendliness and my pleasant evening buzz. He seemed harmless enough, even though the hard line of his jaw was drawing my attention. I blushed.

  “So, since it was my conversation you were so interested in, do you mind sharing what it was that you overheard?”

  “Oh, you know. Chicken things,” he said with a wink.

  “Do you have anything to do with them?”

  He paused thoughtfully.

  “I try not to overdo it,” he said. “Cholesterol and all that. But I mean, who can resist a good omelet?”

  I blinked and stared blankly. What a beautiful, strong voice, I thought. I must have looked peeved, because he quickly rushed to correct any ill impressions. He put his hand on my shoulder and my heart spiked into an arrhythmia.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “That was in poor taste. I’m a journalist, sort of. A blogger, I guess. Internet only.”

  I nodded encouragingly. “That’s not a bad thing.”

  “Well, I’d prefer to be pounding the pavement and returning at the end of my beat to an old-fashioned newsroom,” he said with a smile. “I’m an old-fashioned kind of guy. In any case, I couldn’t help but hear you and your business partner talking about some technology you’re developing. Can’t break the habit, stories are all around me.”

  “So that’s how you get your stories? Eavesdropping?”

  He shrugged. “I always assume that if a conversation is truly private, it would be held behind closed doors,” he said.

  “That assumption is a mistake.”

  “Maybe.” Another devilish smile. “Maybe your assumption of privacy is your mistake, though.”

  I assessed the situation, wondering if Todd and I hadn’t been extremely naïve to talk so openly, particularly in regard to such proprietary technology in such an early stage. Whether he intended to or not, William was doing me a favor, causing me to question the very basic assumption of privacy. Even though we were in a big, bustling city, it was true, coincidences and acquaintances were everywhere.

  “Besides, what could be so private as to preclude your trusting a newsman?” he teased.

  “I’m full of secrets and hidden passageways, Mr. William,” I said, in my best hushed, dusky voice, trying to match the secretive tones that he’d set up for our bar-side flirtation. If that’s what it was, anyway. I wasn’t sure.

  “I bet you are.”

  “I’m a scientist,” I said. “An inventor.”

  “Ah. Beautiful and brilliant,” he said.

  “Have you ever tried it?”

  “Inventing? I’m afraid I haven’t,” he said. “I wouldn’t even know where to begin.”

  “That’s too bad,” I said.

  “Enlighten a curious newsman?”

  “I like to start with what I call negative thinking,” I began.

  “That seems counterintuitive.”

  “Hear me out,” I said. “It just means trying to think about what any given moment is missing. Us, sitting here right now, drinking our beers, what do we need to make our life just a tiny bit more comfortable?”

  He nodded.

  “You know how people always talk about things being almost perfect, but if they could just have one little tweak, it would be even better? Whatever those gaps are, those are the inspiration for invention.”

  “Ah. I see what you mean.”

  “People who see everything like it’s already a perfect, puffy pink cloud will never be able to invent anything. You’ve got to be able to see what’s missing. Hence, negative thinking,” I said.

  “I’m no scientist,” he said, “Much less, an inventor. I trade in facts. But I see some similarities in writing.”

  “Oh?” I smiled, easing into my posture a little more. We were finding common ground, the conversation, taking its own turns. I’d never experienced this with anyone before, much less, a nosy stranger I’d met in a bar.

  “Yeah. A lot of stories and books come about because of painful, life-altering experiences. Or totally joyful ones,” he said. “I think most people write when they are either quite sad or really happy. That’s when inspiration creeps in, when they’ve got something they just have to say.” He leaned closer, and the scent of his cologne collided with that of his Guinness. “It seems to me like you have something you really want to say.”

  I couldn’t risk opening myself up any more at this point. More accurately, I didn’t want to. Tonight was supposed to be my night off, and I’d just gotten myself all worked up thinking about all the missing pieces that Spells could correct if all went well. My thoughts began a dance in a thousand directions, and it was all I could do to stop myself from starting “to do” lists and brainstorming questions on bar napkins.

  “You’re right,” I admitted, leaning back to make a little more space between us, the ever-shy girl that I am, squaring my body off toward the bar, rather than toward him. “But I don’t want to talk about that tonight. Tonight I want to talk about anything else. The weather, even. What do you think of it?”

  “I love this season,” he said.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I could do without the heat. But it’s nice after the rain, when everything seems wiped clean. Even the air on the beach is a little more breathable.”

  “I can almost smell love in the air, actually. Can you?” He teased.

  I wasn’t falling for it, not tonight anyway.

  “Actually, I smell apple pie. With cinnamon,” I said.

  He sniffed, holding up a finger as if to signal a brilliant idea.

  “You know, I think we can purchase some of that,” he said, opening a small menu and pointing at it. “Yes, yes, we can.”

  “Can you grab a waiter and ask him to bring us over a piece? I’m going to find a table where we can continue this conversation. It’s getting a little too crowded here at the bar,” I said, and watched him smile from ear to ear as he surveyed the empty landscape of the barstools. We were the only ones at the bar, but I wanted to settle in and get comfortable for a while. I nee
ded the company.

  I waited for him at a booth in the back of the room, where it was quieter, away from the speakers blaring music and the crowds that had started to gather at the front of the pub. Everyone was showing up for dinner. As he approached, I admired his tall physique; I have a weakness for tall men.

  He slid into the booth and asked me, “Are you in a hurry to get home . . . to anyone?”

  I chuckled. “Nope. I’ve got no one to answer to. Not even a cat. Had a cockatiel for eighteen years, but he flew away, unfortunately. And I work my own hours, being an independent inventor and all.”

  “That’s what I like to hear,” he said. “I keep pretty late hours, since I work only in front of a computer, and usually at home.”

  “Why the late hours?”

  “I just like to write at night. There’s something about the quietness of the night. I feel like the night watchman, making sure everything is safe outside on the street where I live,” he said. “In fact, there haven’t been any robberies on my street since I came to live there eight years ago. My light’s always on. I like to think I scare ’em off.”

  “So, a watchful night owl. And you sleep during the day?”

  “Usually in the wee hours. I wake up around afternoon for lunch.”

  “And what does my mysterious night-owl friend write about?”

  “I’m a technology freak, actually. So I appreciate the spirit of negative thinking that leads to inventiveness,” he said. “My column is called ‘The Buzz,’ and it’s all about the new gadgets that everyone is blogging about. I wrote a web-crawler code that crawls technology blogs and highlights what the latest buzz is about.”

  “So you publish what people talk about?” I asked. “No wonder you’re such a good eavesdropper.”

  “Like you, I like to think I’m doing a public service,” he said. “A conventional news reporter seeks out new technologies and somehow makes his own decision about what’s in and what’s out, which seems unfair to me. Arbitrary. The news I report comes from the masses themselves, according to what they blog about,” he continued, making an expansive gesture to the bar, raising his glass to everyone who was looking in his way. Funny guy.

  “That’s fascinating,” I admitted. “I wish it were a little more helpful to me, though. Nobody blogs about what I’m up to!”

  “Sorry ma’am, no can do,” he said. “I only do consumer tech. Not really much for biotech.”

  I felt myself looking a little crestfallen. It surprised me how disappointed I was that this wasn’t going to be the big break. Not for me, but for Spells.

  “Why the long face?” he asked.

  “Ugh, just a potential investor I met,” I admitted. “He made a snide remark about my technology. Said it was low-tech, not high-tech.”

  He shrugged. “He’s a jerk. Just skip him. On to the next.”

  “I think I take potential investors’ comments a little too seriously,” I said, looking down at the scratchy booth.

  Luckily for the mood, the fresh slice of apple pie arrived at the table just then, its warm cinnamon smell wafting up to our noses. The waiter had brought two forks. I noticed how polite William was to the waiter. I should probably get out of the lab more often, no, DEFINITELY, I thought, taking a heaping bite of the pie.

  “I don’t blame you,” he said kindly, dividing up the melting vanilla ice cream on top so that we’d get equal shots at it. “It’s hard not to take criticism too harshly, especially if you work largely alone, like we do. When the nagging voice is the loudest in the room, there’s a good chance it’s also the only voice in the room.”

  “Depends on how much you talk to yourself,” I said, and feeling my good humor return, I gave him a sly smile. “I read that people who talk to themselves are masterminds.”

  We talked a little more, but then finished the pie in an amicable silence. It was getting late, and I was looking forward to sleeping in tomorrow. We said good-bye, not even exchanging our last names. Somehow, I felt it wouldn’t be hard to find him again.

  Todd had his mind set on finding us an investment as soon as possible to free us of our monetary concerns related to our research. His research on local biotech players was fruitful; we had a meeting set with Lilian Gerit, a high-powered exec with some great connections in the field.

  I’d been thankful for Todd from the moment that he’d signed on, but watching him stride, confident and handsome, into the conference room to greet Gerit and her associates, I said a little thank-you to the universe that I’d found such a consummately professional partner.

  “It’s wonderful to meet you,” he said, flashing her a warm smile. Whatever tension had hung in the clean-lined corporate air was starting to dissipate.

  “Thank you for taking the time to talk with us about our proposal,” I added, taking my seat beside Todd, my mouth as dry as the desert. I plucked a bottle of water from the neat pyramid sitting in the center of the table, looking at the various professionals as they thumbed through copies of our work. Gerit didn’t move to introduce them; they would remain anonymous and incidental, and she clearly ran the show.

  Todd opened up with our introductions, and I gave a brief overview of the application as well as the need for in ovo differentiation of chicks. On Todd’s advice, I kept it short and sweet, the bird’s-eye view. I was also hesitant to get too far into the biological nitty-gritty; I didn’t know much about business, but I knew enough that protecting my intellectual property was going to be important.

  Gerit nodded, appraising what we’d brought.

  “I’m impressed,” she said, adding that, if successful, she wouldn’t be surprised if our start-up valuation ran from $5 to $15 million. “You stand to gain quite a bit, even if you’re acquired outright by an existing company.”

  Her well-manicured fingers twirled an expensive-looking pen.

  “Tell me, have you secured a patent?”

  Truthfully, these were beyond the scope of questions I was prepared to answer. I was out of my element, and I felt the room begin to close in on me a little bit. Had I made a mistake in venturing into shark-infested waters? I was a bench scientist, not a power broker. I wasn’t ready to hand off the idea to a big company and lose control of the project. I wanted to be in on the excitement from the ground up.

  Still, I could see that Gerit’s interest was piqued. She had quickly arranged a meeting with another biotech start-up she had worked with recently whose work had just been acquired by one of those big players in the game.

  “If they like your idea,” she hinted, “you might not have to worry about incubating. You might just have to worry about where you’re going to put your payout.”

  The meeting she arranged was nothing short of a disaster; it became clear to me very quickly that when Gerit intuited we didn’t have a patent, she was trying to set our ideas up to be poached. They wanted to see results, gels, detailed information—the works—all without any indication that they’d be willing to sign any kind of documentation to protect our proprietary work.

  I don’t know where I got the strength to resist the pressure, the pull of easy money, but I continued to hold my cards close to my chest, even when I was being berated by executives as they were kicking me out the door. One of them even suggested sitting with me to explain how to present biological results, as if that was my issue.

  Needless to say, I was furious. Still feeling the flush in my cheeks as I rode down in the elevator with Todd, I was getting a taste of what lay ahead; what had seemed such a simple, elegant solution to the barbaric practice of the poultry industry was not so pure to the other players. Business was business, and where there was money to be made, there were also people to walk all over on the way to the payday.

  “Why would those people think I was going to share our secrets with them?”

  “I’m just as confused as you are,” Todd said, shaking his head. “They were unreasonable, and rude to boot.”

  I could sense that he was uncomfortable, like there
was a small rock in the shoe of his psyche. He opened his mouth to speak, then thought the better of it.

  “Do you think we did the right thing?”

  He stopped walking, exhaled, and took a good look at me. For all his business acumen, the thing I valued most about Todd was his honesty. I knew he wouldn’t mince words with me.

  “I don’t know, Scarlet,” he admitted. “It would have been pretty easy money to sell our ideas to them.”

  I bit back my anger; Todd was just looking out for our financial interests. He wasn’t like me, glued to the bench, studying the solution on the most detailed level. He was just helping with what I’d asked him to. Steadying myself, as if to remind myself that he was my friend and true ally, I put my hand on his shoulder.

  “Todd, there are no freebies in life. I’m willing to work hard, and I think you are too.”

  He nodded, and that was the end of that conversation and the beginning of a more perfect partnership.

  But that first set of meetings hadn’t been a complete waste of our time. Now we understood what to prepare for, what would be expected of us when we walked into some of these boardrooms. Gerit may have been trying to take advantage of us, but she also tipped her hand; we knew now that we would need to apply for a patent. Once we had that patent, we could feel more secure about opening up to potential partners in discussions without fearing that they were trying to steal our precious secrets. I wasn’t thinking of the money first and foremost; I wanted to solve the problem that was inherent to the manual method of chick sexing and destruction. But I knew deep down that these secrets were worth a good deal of money; and beyond that, I was young, and idealistic. But I am proud to say, I was not foolish.

  There is a famous story about a great Russian mathematician who was once asked to be the arbiter of a quarrel between two students. One student claimed he had solved a problem that his friend had stolen and published. The professor advising the two students asked this great mathematician to intervene. The professor asked that the mathematician listen to the two students and decide who, in his opinion, was the one who had really done the work. That student would receive the final credit.