Chapter 25: Excitement

Jaime and Keira and Emerson

JAIME AND KEIRA were both a little cautious about going to Emerson’s house on Monday. They were simply going to try out Jaime’s vocal impression software, but Emerson had been pretty explicit in her thoughts regarding her desires for the two of them. Still, they figured they’d be safe enough if it was the two of them with a classmate.

Emerson’s house was impressive. The neighborhood didn’t look all that different than either Jaime’s or Keira’s, but the houses tended to be taller. Jaime’s house had just a main level and a lower level family room plus garage and small office. It had two bedrooms on the main floor plus kitchen, dining room, living room, and bath.

Keira’s home had a similar design, though it was slightly larger than Jaime’s. Compared to Emerson’s house when they went inside, both houses were tiny.

“Your home is beautiful, Emerson,” Keira said.

“Thanks, Keira. I know it’s kind of ostentatious. I seldom have anyone come over. It’s all my mom’s fault. She’s the executive director of Mercy Medical Center and decided her family needed a home suited to her status. Even my little sister never invites anyone over. It’s embarrassing.”

Jaime could peek into Emerson’s mind, which seemed always to be open to him, and tell that while she was a little embarrassed about showing her wealth, she was also rather proud of her home and that was why she’d invited Keira and Jaime to do the test there.

They walked past the Christmas tree in the living room and through the dining room to get to the stairs down.

“I can give you a tour of the whole monstrosity, but I don’t want you to think I just invited you over to get you in my bedroom. We’ve got a pretty big family room and space to work downstairs,” she said.

“We can wait for the tour,” Keira said. “We should probably focus on the real reason for getting together.”

To try to seduce the two of you, Emerson thought.

“Right.” Emerson led them downstairs and into the large room that included a television roughly three times the size of Jaime’s, a game table, a computer room, and even a mini-kitchen. “Would you like a soda?”

“Thanks,” Keira answered for the two of them. Jaime began unpacking his laptop and the microphone and headphones. While he did, Keira took the opportunity to survey Emerson’s mind, as well as checking out her really stellar body. Other than the last week of the term, she hadn’t seen Emerson dressed so casually elegant.

She was barefoot with carefully pedicured toenails. Her jeans looked like they’d been painted on her legs and round butt.

Angus would love that, Keira giggled to herself.

On top, Emerson wore a sweater that ended in a ribbed band tight beneath her boobs and left her belly enticingly bare. It had a neckline that allowed it to fall off one shoulder. Keira figured it would also afford some nice views down the front if Emerson leaned forward a little. Between her look and the thoughts Emerson had, Keira could tell she was braless. Her light brown hair, normally tied back or up in school, fell in casual curls below her shoulders.

I’m not going to make any moves on them, Emerson thought firmly—as if she was trying to convince herself. If they happen to be enticed to get close to me, I just won’t object.

Two can play that game, Keira thought. She was planning to spend the day with Jaime, so she’d conveniently forgotten a bra herself. The room was plenty warm, so she removed her jacket and made sure Emerson noticed the thin T-shirt she wore. She’d chosen it specifically based on the image Jaime had shared of Emerson looking in the mirror just before she removed her T-shirt. Of course, Keira wasn’t soaking wet but the points were made.

Jaime caught bits and pieces of the two girls’ thoughts and did his best to ignore both of them.

“So, all you need to do is read this passage,” he signed to Emerson, positioning the mike where she was seated. “I’ll record it and we’ll feed it into the synthesizer. Then you can work the controls to vary your tonality until you find one you like.” Keira interpreted the signs as he went to make sure Emerson understood the assignment.

“I sat with my back against the last standing oak tree at Westwood High, a book resting on my knees. It was my favorite reading spot. I was off behind the football field, far enough away for privacy, but not totally isolated. I could still see morning practice and the members of the football team who were running around with their shirts off. I guessed even if it was twenty degrees colder, they’d still be shirtless. There was a crowd of girls on the other side of the field.”

“Did you choose this, Zip?” Emerson said, looking up from the page. “Am I really going to read a chapter from a teen romance novel?”

Jaime nodded toward Keira.

“I chose it. I looked around for something that would allow a gentle and sometimes emotional reading,” Keira said. “Jaime had chosen a passage from Shakespeare! If you read Juliet’s speech from the balcony, your recording would come out all stilted. It just wouldn’t be natural. I thought a romance would work well.”

“Right. Okay. You did say you had the computer read the entire Dark Love series for your voice. Do I need to read it all?” Emerson laughed.

“Not for this,” Jaime signed. “Just a page to test the system. It won’t have your entire vocal range captured, but should be enough for you to play with the adjustment filters.” Keira interpreted.

“I’m glad you’re here to interpret, Keira,” Emerson said. “Sometimes Zip signs so fast I just can’t catch everything. You interpret so fast, it’s almost like you’re reading his mind!”

«Maybe we should slow down a little, » Jaime said to Keira.

«Good idea. I didn’t mean to jump ahead like that, » she answered.

Emerson went back to reading the passage and then they played back the recording in her normal voice.

“Does everyone hate the way their voice sounds when they hear it recorded?” Emerson asked.

“I had the same response when I tested mine,” Keira answered. “I don’t know if everyone hates the sound, but it’s a real surprise that it doesn’t sound anything like what you think it does.”

“It’s partly the acoustics and mechanics of digital recording,” Jaime signed. He carefully fingerspelled ‘acoustics.’ “Now, you can play the passage and use the sliders to adjust various properties of the soundwaves.”

“Okay, so I just hit play and start sliding these? Do I have any idea what they’ll do?”

“Have to experiment,” Jaime signed.

Emerson clicked the play button and then started experimenting with the sliders. One changed the overall pitch of her voice and ranged from a deep bass to a squeaky mouse.

“Oh, cool!” she said. She chose a vocal range that she liked, which she noted was a few intervals lower than her normal voice. “That sounds kind of smoky,” she said. Then she went on to other sliders that controlled things like the smoothness of the voice. ‘Gravelly’ to ‘buttery’ was the way Jaime had labeled the ends of the slider.

Emerson continued to play with the sliders until she had a voice she generally liked.

“How do I make this the voice I want to use?” she asked.

Jaime showed how to save the settings and then had her read another passage. This time he played it back with her saved settings.

“What do you think?” Keira asked.

“I think it’s amazing. I listen to it and think, ‘Who is this sexy girl?’ I want my voice to sound like that.”

“Okay,” Jaime signed. “Put on the headset.” He handed her the earphones and set the computer to play as she read.

She began reading a passage and her eyes popped wide open.

“It’s changing my voice as I’m reading!” she said. “It’s like if I talk into the app, people hear me differently! This is really amazing, Zip!”

She reached out and wrapped an arm around him, pulling him close for a hug. Of course, he was standing and she was sitting, so that pulled his hips right against her face. Jaime dropped his hand to Emerson’s bare shoulder.

«Thank you, Emerson. But we’re not going to go that way.»

Emerson jerked away from Jaime and looked up at him.

“Did you...?” She shook her head. “Uh ... Sorry about my exuberance. No offense for hugging your boyfriend, Keira.” She reached out to hug Keira as she had Jaime, holding her breath to see if Keira was going to send her a message.

Nothing.

Just my conscience warning me to back off. This isn’t Paris.

Jaime and Keira

«Did you hear that?» Keira asked Jaime after they’d left Emerson’s house. They’d stayed another hour, running further tests on Jaime’s voice synthesizer and then Keira ran a few tests on Emerson’s color picker. Jaime had left a copy of the app for Emerson to play with.

As soon as they were away, though, Keira had to talk to Jaime.

«It’s the skin-to-skin contact!» Jaime said. «It has to be! She heard me!»

«She was this close to getting another surprise. As soon as you touched her, I nearly ran my hand down the front, inside her gapping sweater. I caught myself as you spoke to her, » Keira said.

«But she heard!» Jaime said.

«Yeah. But she thought she was crazy, remember. She assigned what you said to her conscience. Thank goodness! Just imagine, though, if she went to school thinking you talked in her head, or that someone else had given her a command.»