“Hey!” Chloe smacked Julianne on the shoulder in excitement.
“Hey what?” Julianne asked, rubbing her shoulder.
“Let’s look up your new favorite project manager!”
Chloe laughed, putting quotes around “project manager”
and deepening her voice.
“Ew! No!” Jules squealed, giggling. “I am adopting a strict ‘no bringing work home with me’ policy from here on out.”
“Oh, c’mon!” Chloe wheedled, using the camp counselor voice that suckered Julianne in each and every time.
Jules folded. “Okay, you do it though. It’s your idea.”
Julianne got up and surrendered the cushy rolling chair to its rightful owner. Chloe slid into the computer corner and pulled her laptop closer to her. She selected search and typed in “Remi Moore.” Julianne tried to contain her nervous laughter.
“Jackpot!” Chloe burst out. “There are seven pages of Remi Moores. There are literally dozens of them. Who knew so many people shared such a weird name? Let’s put our detective hats on. If I were an obnoxious project-managing, land-destroying hipster, where would I be?”
Julianne laughed as they started clicking.
About six pages in, Chloe stopped clicking and excitedly poked Julianne. “Found him! This is so totally him!” Julianne leaned down and squinted at the computer, momentarily wishing that she wore glasses.
“What does his headline say?” Julianne asked.
“Pompous land-hog seeking non-sustainable relationship,” Chloe answered.
“Wait, really?” Julianne whipped her head around and squinted at the screen. As much as she wanted to dislike Remi, that didn’t seem right at all.
“No, of course not,” Chloe fessed up. “But I think it would be much more apropos than ‘He who awaits much can expect little.’”
“Is that actually his quote?” Jules asked, her eyes wide with disbelief.
“Mmm-hmm,” Chloe confirmed.
“That’s Gabriel García Márquez. I love that quote,”
Jules murmured, impressed. Why did he have to be so smart? Couldn’t he just be the weaselly jerk Chloe thought he was? It would be so much easier.
“Well, unfortunately, there’s no rule that great authors are the exclusive domain of those who don’t suck, so I guess he’s entitled.” Chloe yawned, lazily twirling her hair with one hand as she clicked around the rest of Remi’s profile. “Oh, check out his pictures! This is hilarious!” Chloe had flipped right to a picture of Remi in costume for some sort of campus party at UW—
dressed as the Mona Lisa.
“Well, with the wig … and when he tilts his head that way … I guess I can see the resemblance.” Julianne laughed. Although she didn’t want to admit it, she was amused by Remi’s costume, even more than she was amused by what an awkward-looking woman he made.
They flipped through his other photos: Remi and his friends after a tug-of-war. Julianne had to pinch herself to stop from swooning at how cute he looked in his sweat-soaked T-shirt with mud-streaked cheeks. Remi and his dad at the top of a mountain. Remi at a micro-phone, sound-checking for someone’s band. Julianne’s heart caught in her throat when they flipped to a picture of Remi with his arm around a pretty redhead in front of the Space Needle. Then she caught the caption: “Sophie visits Seattle. How many Moores can one city handle?”
Ah. Sophie Moore— a cousin, perhaps? Julianne was a little taken aback by how hard she’d been hit by jealousy before she read the fine print. She reminded herself to play it cool—maybe she’d find something in the profile that would prove once and for all that he was actually a bad guy. But as Chloe clicked through, picture after picture registered for her as neutral to positive. Finally they came back to Remi in his Mona Lisa getup.
“Never in my life have I seen someone look that much worse as a drag queen!” Chloe howled with laughter. “Let’s see—what else can we find out about Mr. Moore here?”
Jules read from the screen “Status: single. Here for: networking, friends. Hometown: Seattle. School: University of Washington.”
“C’mon, get to the good stuff!” Chloe urged.
Julianne might have felt the slightest pang of anticipation. “Okay, okay, here goes. General interests: architecture, music, movies, building things, politics, soccer, surfing, screen-printing band T-shirts, guitar, hiking.
Music: the Killers, the Gossip, Mates of State, Sufjan Stevens, Common, Mos Def, Sinister Urge.” Julianne had to hand it to the guy—pompous jerk or not, he had pretty awesome taste. His hobbies, his favorite music, his favorite books, they were all really cool. Stop it, she reminded herself. That’s not the point. “Heroes: Frank Lloyd Wright, Olmsted, Gandhi, my dad.”
“Wow, so he’s totally got a hero-worship situation with his dad, huh?” Chloe asked.
“Maybe he’s like a little dad-bot—a clone or something!” Julianne laughed, happy to find something to criticize. Even as she said it, though, she felt a smidge of guilt. She knew what it was like to feel that way about a parent—even if she’d never admit it publicly.
“Hey, Jules, how’s this for a crazy idea,” Chloe began thoughtfully, as she got up from the rolling chair. She steered Jules toward the chair by her shoulders and, once Julianne had plunked herself down, swiveled the chair back toward the monitor.
“Uh-huh,” Julianne responded, enjoying the change of view but not quite sure what Chloe was thinking.
“You should stalk him!” Chloe said brightly.
“Um, Chloe, hate to break it to you, but that’s exactly what we’re doing right now. We’re total stalkers,”
Julianne reminded her with a laugh.
“Hold on—let’s think about this,” Chloe suggested.
“What if you really did it?”
“What? Stalk him?” Julianne was incredulous.
“Not like actual stalking—no restraining orders required or anything. Maybe ‘spying’ or ‘personal information recon’ is more like it. You know, like, ‘know thy enemy’?”
“Something about that just doesn’t feel okay to me,”
Julianne countered hesitantly.
“Jules, you’re going to spend all day with him, all summer. In an environment where talking about building is the norm. Aren’t you the least little bit curious to find out what else the Moores plan on conquering?
With the surveyors and the gates? What better place for someone to casually mention his or her home improvement plans than at a contractor’s site? They’re never going to be up-front with Dad—it would take away
