Chapter 27: First Kiss

"Seventy five dollars?" Raven asked dismayed by the amount of money the driver was charging.

"That's right, lady," the taxi driver said pointing at the meter.

"That's highway robbery," Raven said.

"No. That's what the meter says," the driver replied pointing over at the meter.

Raven opened her wallet and looked through it. She only had fifty dollars in cash. There was no way that she was going to be able to pay the fare with cash.

"Will you take a check?"

"Do I look like a bank?" the taxi driver said.

"Do you take plastic?"

"Of course I do," the taxi driver answered.

Raven pulled out the card she used when shopping thinking that she was going to have to talk with Sue Ellen to reimburse the video company for the charge. She'd hate to get fired for misusing the food credit card. She handed it over to the driver and waited while he applied the charge. She added a ten dollar tip to it before signing the slip.

She got out of the car holding the laptop in one hand and her purse in the other. She watched the driver speed off thinking that he hadn't been the most polite man she'd ever dealt with. He'd spent a lot of time looking in the mirror at her. It made her think about how polite Andrew was in dealing with the women on the project.

The office building was four stories tall and nondescript looking. She went in and took the elevator to the second floor where Dave had his office. It was just a little before lunch time and she had hoped to catch Dave and Sue Ellen in time to have a little lunch.

Only Dave was in the office when she entered it. She stuck her head in the door and said, "Knock, knock."

"Hey, Raven! Come on in," Dave said.

He reached over to the stack of paychecks. There were several of them for her since she didn't come by very often to pick them up. He flipped through the stack pulling out the envelops intended for her.

"Here you go," Dave said.

Raven looked at the three envelopes knowing that each one contained a check for a little over six hundred dollars. Somehow, she had to run by the bank and deposit them. Once again she wished for a car, but she didn't have the money to afford one that would last a long time.

Raven said, "Andrew wanted me to come here, but I don't have a means of transportation, yet. I'm afraid that I had to use the food debit card to pay the taxi to get here. It was seventy five dollars with another ten dollars as a tip."

"Don't worry about it. Since Andrew asked you here, I'll just say that your visit here was company business," Dave said.

"Thanks," Raven said in relief.

"How are things going?" Dave asked getting into his protective mode.

It was going to take a long time to convince him that the women in this project weren't being exploited and abused. The fact that the women were so desperate for money suggested to him that they were being exploited and that didn't set well with him. Of course, the alternatives could have been worse and that was the crux of his moral problem with what they were doing. He hated the idea that the project was the best of bad alternatives.

"They are going well. I think I'm going to ... try to ... you know ... Saturday," Raven said.

Even as the words came out of her mouth, she realized that tomorrow was Saturday. Just the thought made her stomach tighten with fear. If asked, she couldn't have told what it was that she feared. Was it the act itself? Was it the degradation that she would feel from having sold herself? Was it a fear that she'd be no good? In a way, it was all of those things.

"Oh. Are you sure?"

"Not really," Raven answered honestly.

"Don't force yourself into doing something you don't want to do," Dave said.

"I won't."

"Just keep in mind that you shouldn't ever feel like we're forcing you to do something. If you want to walk away, I'll help you however I can."

"Thanks. I was hoping that you and Sue Ellen would be free for lunch," Raven said.

"Lunch? Maybe. Let me call her and see," Dave said thinking this was the first time that any of the women in the project had suggested going out to lunch like this.

Raven added, "We'd need to stop off at my bank so that I can pick up some cash."

"No problem," Dave said.

It only took a minute for Dave to talk with Sue Ellen and for her to agree to go to lunch with them. They stopped at the bank where Raven deposited all of her checks but one which she cashed. Flush with cash for the first time since moving in with Andrew, Raven paid for a nice lunch at a chain seafood restaurant. It made her feel good to play the hostess.

Raven followed Sue Ellen into the office area Andrew rented. She was surprised at how plain the waiting area was. She didn't think that any customers would be particularly impressed. Entering the building, she had seen that there were other office areas with glass doors, plush carpets, and big corporate logos on the walls. That was more along the lines of what she expected to find.

Andrew came out of his office upon hearing Raven and Sue Ellen come in. He said, "Go in my office and set up the laptop. I want Ken to see what you've done."

"Okay," Raven replied.

She wasn't sure why Andrew looked so excited about her animations and wanted her to show them off to others. To her, they were just fun little things to do while passing the time.

He walked over to Ken's office and said, "Come over to my office. I want you to see something."

Raven watched Ken enter Andrew's office. He was walking kind of funny. It took her a moment to realize that he had been significantly injured. Her eyes settled on his artificial hand. She wondered what could have caused that extensive of an injury.

Andrew said, "Show him the ogres."

"Sure," Raven said loading the file.

The first frame of the animation she had showed Andrew appeared on the computer screen. After touching a couple of keys, the animation started playing.

"That's good. That's real good," Ken said approvingly.

Andrew smiled. "Play the trolls."

Raven did as Andrew asked. Ken couldn't believe what he was seeing. He thought the trolls were so life like that he could almost smell them.

Sitting up in his seat, Ken said, "I'm impressed. I'm really impressed. That's incredible."

Andrew said, "You haven't seen anything yet. Show him the elves."

Raven played the animation of the elves. Ken stared at them open mouthed. Elves were supposed to be an attractive race. She had brought it to a level that defied his best ability to imagine. Her elves were more than people with pointy ears. They had a slight stretch to their build with proportions that were not quite naturally human, but weren't so far off that they looked ridiculous. It was exactly the right balance.

"My God!"

"What do you think?" Andrew asked.

"I wonder if they are too good," Ken said.

"What do you mean?" Andrew asked.

Ken said, "That level of detail will increase the computational overhead of rending the images as well as consume more memory resources."

Raven said, "The details are in the skins that I overlay on the frames. I started with the same base frame and modified it for the different builds of the characters. The frames have the same number of points, so the details here aren't that important. I don't know about memory."

"I'm impressed," Ken said.

"So should we hire her?" Andrew asked.

"You better," Ken said watching the animation loop for the fourth or fifth time.

"Hire me?" Raven asked looking at Andrew and wondering if she'd heard him correctly.

Andrew said, "Go back to your office and I'll take care of bringing her aboard."

"Bring me aboard?" Raven asked confused by the exchange.

"Okay," Ken said.

He turned and walked out of the office. Raven was staring at Andrew wondering what he was talking about. She already had a job on the project.

Once Ken had left the room, Andrew closed the door and turned to Raven. He had a huge smile on his face.

"What's going on?" Raven asked.

Andrew answered, "We're making a computer game here with lots of fantasy characters. One of the problems we've been trying to solve is coming up with the animations for the characters of the game. This has been a real issue of concern for us. A lot of the game companies spend more on the animations and graphics than they spend on writing the game engines. If you have bad graphics, your game isn't going to sell."

"I can see that."

"Your animations are good. In fact, they're the best I've ever seen."

"Thank you."

Andrew said, "I'd like to hire you to do our character animations."

"Are you talking about a real job?"

"Yes."

"Wow."

Andrew wrote down a figure on a piece of paper and slid it across the desk to her. He had an idea that she'd like the amount he was proposing.

He said, "That's what we can afford to pay you."

Raven picked up the paper expecting to see something like ten dollars an hour written on it. It was a six figure number. She stared at the figure scrawled on the piece of paper open mouthed realizing that it was a salaried position she was being offered. No one had ever even talked about her working for a salary in the past.

Voice breaking, she asked, "Is this for a year or what you'll pay me over the next ten years?"

"It's for the year."

"Wow."

"It's not a bad salary."

"It's incredible," Raven said.

With that kind of salary, she could afford a car and a house. She didn't need to be involved in the project any more. That thought had her giving a sigh of relief.

Almost as if reading her thoughts, Andrew said, "You might consider leaving the project since you'll have a real job doing something you enjoy."

It was funny, but not in a humorous way, how that suggestion made her feel. She had made promises upon joining the project, but she hadn't kept them. While Cat have voiced her objections, Andrew and the unnamed investor hadn't complained. Despite the lack of criticism, she felt guilty about it. Although she wasn't all that thrilled about getting paid to have sex on camera, she didn't want to leave the project without fulfilling that obligation. They'd spent a lot of money without getting anything in return.

"I suppose," she said.

Andrew asked, "Will you take the job?"

"Yes," Raven said.

"Should I tell Dave that you're quitting the project?" Andrew asked.

"No. I'll talk to him," Raven answered.

Andrew said, "Would you like to shop for a car tonight?"

"Why?"

"Well, you'll need to get to and from work," Andrew said.

"I guess I better get a car," Raven said. Based on the salary he had quoted she could afford car payments now.

"Okay."

Raven asked, "Where will I be working?"

"We have an office here for you," Andrew said.

"I'll be working in an office," Raven echoed numbly as if she couldn't believe it.

She'd been a checkout girl in a supermarket, a waitress in a diner, and worked the register at a taco place. The whole idea of working in an office was strange. That was something that professionals like engineers and businessman did. She wasn't an engineer or a businessman. She wasn't even a secretary to one of them.

Then it dawned on her that she had stopped thinking of Andrew as a participant in the project. He was a little more than that to her. He was a friend. She liked him. She liked his family. She could easily entertain ideas about a more substantial relationship than existed between them at the moment. She paused and admitted that she loved him.

The more she thought about it, the less sure she was that she wanted to leave the house. It would be pretty lonely living alone. She'd gotten used to having Andrew and Cat around every night. She visited with Maria when she came over to clean the house.

Andrew said, "I'll tell Sue Ellen that you're coming here to work and Dave will help you with the paperwork we need to hire you."

"Great," Raven said numbly.

She was still having a hard time getting her head around the whole idea of having a real job like this. She was emotionally confused, not knowing whether to be happy or sad or a mixture of the two.

"I'm going to have to get clothes."

Andrew asked, "Why?"

"I have to dress properly to work in an office," Raven said.

Andrew said, "I'm sure that Cat would love to go shopping with you."

"Yes," Raven said.

"You can go tomorrow," Andrew said.

"Okay."

Andrew said, "Let me show you where your office will be."

"When do I start?"

"You can start today if you want," Andrew said. "It will probably take the rest of the afternoon for you to fill out the paperwork, get office supplies for your desk, and get settled in."

"I guess I can do that. We'll have to eat sandwiches tonight," Raven said.

Not expecting to be busy that afternoon, Raven had not prepared dinner for that evening. Suddenly, her afternoon and evening was filled with activities.

"Why?"

"I haven't prepared anything for dinner," Raven said.