What Goes Up?
Chapter 3

 

The next week flew by as I prepared to start going to work with Dad — fortunately I only needed to be dressed in a nice shirt and pants, but Dad had asked that I kept a clean shirt and a couple of ties at the office in case a client was to show up unexpectedly.

We had the school district and the city government contracts already, so dad briefed me on what we had done for them over the past dozen years. No wonder Dad could afford to send me to college, he was doing well!

I eagerly started working on the new AutoCAD Landscape Add-on, practicing with our own house — even with only rough estimates of the dimensions I had something to show Dad in an hour. I used the intercom from my office to his, asking him to come in when he had the chance. He walked in and I spun the monitor around, showing off a little.

"My god, Robert — that took me maybe 6 hours to do my old-fashioned way — you are going to be a remarkable addition to Moore Designs Incorporated. How does Moore and Moore Designs sound to you?"

"Dad, are you shitting me, putting my in the name of your business, my god — thank you! There is something I need to talk to you about when you have the time, OK?" I asked.

"Sure thing Robert, I have a couple of phone calls, maybe 30 minutes?"

"OK," I replied.

He walked out.

From the last week at home, I could tell that Mom hadn't said anything to Dad about Jenna and me. Only that they were going to respect my request to knock on my door, before barging in.

Back when I was 15, they both had come into my room as I was jerking off — Dad had simply said, "oops," and closed the door — Mom had opened the door and loitered a bit too long as I didn't cover up as quickly as I should have.

They probably think I wanted the door closed for that purpose again, although Mom certainly was worried that I might be despoiling her little girl.

I hadn't yet, but not for lack of trying!

We had a visit — from the ladies. Mom and Jenna fixed us lunch and Jen had browbeat her into them coming to visit as well.

Dad said, "Lunch Break — Jen, your 'boyfriend' is down the hall."

I saw this vision of loveliness bounce into my office.

"Oh, Robby — you got your own office, isn't that cool?" she said.

"Not nearly as cool as it is to see my 'Girl, '" I answered. I walked around to the chairs in front of my desk, and she handed me my bologna and peanut butter sandwich.

"I made them myself, Robby — I hope you like them."

"Thank you, beautiful — just what I needed. I'm talking to Dad about us a little later."

"Ooh, what are you going to tell him, exactly?"

"It's still forming in my head, but I had a plan that I hope will work," I said as I took a bite of the delicious looking sandwich. We stopped talking and had lunch together. I need to get a little fridge for this place, to keep water and soda for clients. We were done and walked out together — she took my hand and we caught Mom and Dad making out a little.

They broke up laughing, as I said, "Dad, that discussion I wanted to have — since Mom and Jen here, can we have it now?"

"Sure, what's up?"

"You remember that speech I gave about a week ago, regarding Jen and I dating ... well, I lied - and I want to set the record straight."

I saw Mom's eyes get buggy and Jen bit her lip a little.

"What exactly did you lie about, Robert?" dad responded.

"I said all of that to get a reaction from the two of you. Mom said that both of you were confused about what I'd said, and why I'd said it."

"I am in love with my sister, Jenna — and she is in love with me as well. We've had a discussion with Mom, who gave us a number of reasons why we shouldn't pursue this..."

"Karen, do you know what the hell your son is talking about?" dad responded.

"Let him finish, Stephen — please!"

"Dad, just listen for a minute more. Back when I was leaving to go to college, every time I saw Jenna, she was on the verge of crying. She never told me why — I never had the time to talk to her. I only recently found out that she cried every day for a month, because she thought I'd left her, left her behind. She's as deeply in love with me as I am with her. Before you ask, 'No we have not had sexual relations, ' besides kissing on the lips a dozen or so times."

Jen gave out a nervous giggle.

"I know that you're probably disappointed in both of us, but I've heard you say, 'You can't always know who you might fall in love with.'"

"Stephen Moore fell in love with Karen Kowalski, they dated and got married and had two remarkable children..."

Mom and Jenna both laughed, Dad even chuckled a little.

"I'm not saying we're getting married and having kids, at least not right away — and if you want to fire me for this, I really do understand. But the chance to learn about life and love from my old man would be so wonderful," I said, having broken down and cried into my sister's shoulder.

Dad stood up and walked towards me, motioning me to stand as well. I was ready for a slap, a punch to the gut or to the face.

He put his hand out to me — I looked over to Mom, then Jenna — then I took his hand and shook it.

"I've been waiting for you to fess up to this since we got home from picking you up from college. I saw something in your eyes that said 'I'm in love' and I recognized the look in your sister's eyes as well. I've been waiting, especially after that 'Mr. Moore speech' you gave.

Mom got up, giving him a kiss, and then explained her two rules, with Dad agreeing.

"The Men need to get back to work now, OK?" he said.

Jenna went over to him and gave him a warm kiss on the cheek, then came over to me and gave me a warmer kiss on the mouth. Dad and Mom gave each an equally warm kiss, and then the ladies giggled and left.

"Are you able to work or are you going to think about your sister all day?" he said with a grin on his face.

"Oh, I can multi-task Dad — remember, I graduated 5th in my graduating class of 2,187 people. That didn't happen just because of my good looks, you know."

"Get back to work, you slacker!" dad said slapping my back, "Oh, would you and your sister like some alone time — I could take your mother out to dinner tonight and not come home til late?"

"That would be great Pop," I said, probably with too much vigor as I headed back to my office.

I cleaned up the lunch mess and went back to looking over AP's or Architectural Plans for the two contracts that Dad had done. What precision he has, beautiful print work and technique. It's almost not fair that the computer can do it so much faster.

I had a number of classes along the way that included doing much of the work with the old T-square, and mechanical pencils. His work area was behind me in its own room. I went back there and it reminded me of the smells that I recalled swirled around Dad when he came home from work each night.

I saw what he had been working on, after reading his notes about it, I started in on it, using the T-square, protractor, six-sided pencil and 24 inch metal ruler.

He came in to tell me it was time to go for the day. He came around to see what I was doing and he leaned on my shoulder and said, "Well, Robert it appears you have the 'old skills' as well as the new. I'm going to start the paperwork on Moore and Moore LLC tomorrow."

 
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