Forever Yours
©2025 Elder Road Books - Lynnwood WA
Chapter 31: Jambalaya
THE TWO WEEKS leading up to final exams went by in a flash. Twice, Henry and Lisa decided to forgo planning a date out and just slept together. Henry loved sex with Lisa, but felt they were short-changing their relationship and decided to plan a special outing after their last final.
Each of the six exams he took brought him a step closer to the end of this stage of his life. He had to smile at the thought that he would not be taking classes over the summer and would have a lighter load in the fall. On Friday, when the last exam was completed, he and Lisa walked to the curb where Chastity met them in Henry’s car. She drove them straight to the airport and kissed them both goodbye.
“You know, I could really get used to Chastity’s kisses,” Lisa sighed as they made their way to the two o’clock flight to New Orleans.
“Yeah. Even with her ‘no tongue’ rule, she’s pretty hard to resist,” Henry agreed, wrapping his arm around Lisa.
“What ‘no tongue’ rule?” Lisa asked.
Henry looked at her in astonishment, but Lisa was serious.
“Oh. It’s ... just something between Chastity and me,” he said, wondering if Lisa was truly exempt or just hadn’t progressed that far.
The flight landed in Atlanta and they changed planes for New Orleans, but it was a short layover and they landed in New Orleans a little after six. Lisa’s mother was waiting at the exit for them. Henry hung back a little to let Lisa greet her mother first.
“You said you were bringing your boyfriend,” Mrs. Hartwell said, looking past Henry without recognizing him.
“Mom, this is my boyfriend, Henry Pascal. Henry, my mom, Jacqueline Hartwell.”
“Henry? You said he wasn’t your boyfriend!”
“That was then. This is now,” Lisa said.
“Well! Welcome, Henry,” she said reaching out to him.
“Thank you, Mrs. Hartwell.”
“Oh, no. That was fine when you were her landlord. Her boyfriend gets to call me Jackie. Are you living together, then?”
“Not exactly, Mom. Henry is still my landlord and we have our private suites. But he gets to visit sometimes,” Lisa laughed.
“I will never understand you!” Jackie said. She led the way to her car and they drove up to Baton Rouge where Lisa’s father, Bill, was checking on the grill to be sure it was ready.
“You won’t believe this, Bill!” Jackie called as they walked into the house. “Lisa’s boyfriend is her boss and landlord! It’s Henry Pascal!”
“Now that’s welcome news,” Bill said, giving his daughter a hug and turning to shake Henry’s hand. “Something tells me we have a lot of catching up to do.”
“I can tell you’ve got something on your mind,” Bill said when he and Henry were alone after dinner. Lisa and Jackie had gone to Lisa’s room to settle and chat.
“You’re very perceptive,” Henry chuckled. “Mostly, I just wanted to do something nice for Lisa after our term ended. The past few weeks have been good, but really stressful with finals and all.”
“Are you trying to tell me that you and Lisa are getting serious or that you are breaking up?” Bill asked bluntly.
“Um ... neither, really,” Henry said. “I like Lisa a lot. Maybe we’ll find out more about where the relationship goes this summer. I’m hopeful. But that isn’t the subject I wanted to talk about. It’s more business related.”
“Oh,” Bill said. He sounded a little disappointed, but brightened quickly. “Tell me what’s up.”
“Well, we got a substantial investment in March. It’s not the kind of investment that people put into a part-time effort. I was wondering how it was when you got started. I’m feeling unsure about whether or how I can continue school and handle the business full time.”
“Wow! That was not what I was expecting,” Bill said. He dropped his head in puzzlement for a moment. “You are a few steps ahead of where I was at your age. I had investment dollars waiting for me when I graduated, but everything I’d done before that was strictly on my own in a basement apartment with substandard computers. I didn’t have money that I could spend to take my girlfriend to see her parents.”
“Part of the investment was a substantial personal payment as well,” Henry hedged.
“Well, the reason we live in Baton Rouge is that it was a condition of the investment that Jackie’s father made in my business. They live just a couple of miles from here and you’ll meet them tomorrow. EZ Daze is still a fraction of the size of his shipping empire. But he and I are both pleased with the company we’ve built. It was good to have a savvy business partner when I made my first hire.”
“Unfortunately, our investment didn’t come with any wisdom on how to get it done. I have three partners and we have two contractors who work with us. I made my first full time hire and he’ll start the first of June. We’re moving into an office space on the first of July,” Henry said. “Uh ... In case you didn’t know, Lisa is one of our contractors. She’s been doing some great stuff with our UI.”
“So, your investment left you with full control of the business?”
“My partners and I were equal participants in the founding, but I’ve got a few more shares of the company because of the transfer of patents and other IP.”
“Hmm. So, you and your partners are all about the same age and trying to complete college while you get the business up and profitable?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Let’s chew on this a while. When you meet Lisa’s grandparents tomorrow, you might want to let Beau in on the questions. The man is truly a management genius. Might even be a future source of funding. Don’t go at it from that perspective, though. Test out the waters and see what you think of him. He taught me a lot, but he might not have the same style as you.”
“I’m always interested in advice that is more dependable than Pythia,” Henry laughed.
“Who’s that?”
“Well, it’s an app we’re testing. Here. Let me show you Lisa’s interface,” Henry said.
He booted his tablet and directed the browser to Pythia Speaks. Bill took it and immediately understood the concept of asking a question. ‘What does our business future look like?’ he typed. A few seconds later the answer popped up.
“Business is a meeting of minds. Its future depends on the minds involved.”
“Well, I can’t contradict that,” Bill said. “At the same time, I see why you would like more dependable advice. What’s behind this?”
“It’s an artificial narrow intelligence. The wall it was trained on was restricted to classical philosophy and oracular sayings. I’m surprised it understood the word business, but it’s learning from people’s questions. We’re getting over 1,500 hits on it a day.”
“And how will you make money with it?”
“Pythia is a testbed for an AI trained to know and understand a person’s life, independent of the complete body of human knowledge. General AI is being trained on as much data as possible. I’m trying to train an AI that will be able to respond as a specific person. Specialization, if you will. It takes far less power to train and is more dependable within the realm of that person’s life.”
“And that is why Lisa has asked Jackie and me to record our life stories,” Bill said. “The Singularity.”
“Yes, more or less. The development of AI has been focused on capturing the human capacity to think and respond as a generalist. Our development is focused on a specialist. No one knows your life better than you do. We learn a lot from general AI development, but humans have specialized. If we want our cars repaired, we take them to a mechanic. Few people these days have the knowledge or interest in fixing their own vehicles. So, we go to a specialist.”
“Fascinating,” Bill said, absently entering another question. “What do you need?”
“Well, I need to go to work in the company full time as soon as we get back from this little vacation. We have two applications in the market now and initial sales are good, but we need to keep developing both those applications and new ones. I’ve got ideas I can’t implement on my own and the investment capital is there to get some other smart people working on them. But I don’t think I can just hire other people and walk away. I think I need to quit school.”
“First decide the difference between what you want and what you need,” Bill said.
“Um...”
“I’m just quoting Pythia,” Bill laughed, showing Henry the screen. “But it’s a good bit of advice. Do you need to quit school, or is that what you want to do? Do you see the business as a shortcut to your goals? Are you cutting corners you will later regret? I realize I’m not giving advice that’s any more than what you can get from your little oracle here. But it is a good conversation starter.”
Henry and Bill talked for over an hour, continuing the conversation when Lisa and Jackie rejoined them.
“I’m having fun recording stories,” Jackie said. “I was just telling Lisa she should get her grandparents in on the game. Dad loves this kind of thing. You might want a video recording from the time you meet him. He’s full of stories.”
“We could do that, couldn’t we, Henry? I mean invite him to participate, not record him as soon as you meet,” Lisa said.
“I think it’s a great idea. I wish my grandparents were still around. I’d love to get to know them,” Henry said.
“You lost them?” Bill asked.
“My dad’s parents were kind of old when he was born. He was a surprise and was an orphan by the time he was a teenager. Mom’s parents were killed in an airplane crash before I was born.”
“That’s sad, Henry,” Lisa said, petting his arm. “I didn’t know that.”
“Maybe it’s what interested me the most about developing the singularity app,” Henry said. “My family doesn’t have a lot of lore.”
The evening was pleasant and relaxed. Henry enjoyed getting to know Lisa’s parents better and was looking forward to meeting her grandparents.
He was also pleased that his girlfriend’s parents didn’t object to the two of them sleeping together. They enjoyed some quiet loving after they retired, giggling about being quiet so her parents ‘wouldn’t know.’
Beau and Solange Benoit arrived Saturday afternoon and were sucked into the conversation immediately.
“Record my life story?” Beau asked in a booming voice. “When am I supposed to have time to do that? I’m not retired yet. Sollie probably has time if you can get her out of the Bingo parlor.”
“Don’t pay attention to that,” Solange joined in. “He sits in that big office of his looking over the port and tells stories to anyone who comes through the door.”
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