Page 66 of Cash

TWENTY-TWO - Cash

Jennifer saton the loveseat across from us with a mimosa in her hand. After a long study of Kimberly, she shifted her eyes to me.

She took a drink. Then, another.

“What?” I asked.

She shook her head. “You two make me sick.”

“Why?” Kimberly asked.

She kept her eyes trained on me. “How long have you been here?”

“On earth? Thirty-one years.”

“No, you big dumb dork. Here. At her house?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“Too long,” she said. “That’s how long.”

Kimberly gasped. “Jennifer!”

She looked at Kimberly. “Well. He’s cutting into our time.”

“Spend more time with Tito,” I said with a laugh.

“I spent time with him last night. He came by to fix my computer.”

Kimberly leaned forward. “He did what?”

“Fixed my computer. He’s a computer tech. A good one, too. He cleaned all the viruses I got from those porn sites, fixed the hard drive, and now I’m up and running.”

Kimberly looked at me. “Tito fixes computers?”

“He’s good at anything to do with computers,” I said. “He got a scholarship to MIT, but didn’t go.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah. He even got job offers from the government to hack into the hacker’s computers, but he didn’t accept them. He just does his own thing.”

“Wow. That’s incredible.”

“What’s incredible is that you’re still here,” Jennifer said in a snide tone.

I gestured toward her flute of juice-laced champagne. “Who drinks at ten in the morning, anyway?”

She waved her hand toward Kimberly. “We used to. Now I do. Alone. You’ve changed things. That’s why I’m here. It’s time for you to go home, Dolla.”

“Quit calling me that. My name’s Cash.”

“To me, you’ll always be Dolla Bill.”

She finished her mimosa in one gulp, set the glass aside, and then covered her face with her hands. “My life is over.”

“What’s wrong?” Kimberly asked.

“I’ve got to beg him to come over. I think he’s embarrassed about his mouth. Jaw. Whatever. All the wires.” She lifted her head and looked at me. “If it wasn’t for you, I’d be riding your buddy’s dick right now.”