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The party guest list includes a wide range of interestingnesses of rich people. There's a fellow who sits on various boards of various faceless corporations; there's two who started startups and swept up a few million dollars that way; there's a small handful of professional philanthropists, who have oodles of money from various sources and make a hobby of distributing the interest to worthy pet causes; there is a congresswoman, and a state senator, both from New York but apparently willing to travel to the West Coast on occasion. There's also a lot of dull old money who do this sort of thing and nothing but all the time, but they still concentrate a lot of financial leverage, and Bella would rather have ins with them than not, as long as she can.
She bikes up - speeding shamefully, hexing herself radar detection, and cutting the trip in half from its estimated time to just eight hours on the road. Tegu can go very very fast.
Alice made her a new dress for the occasion - this one's autumny, mostly a dark red-brown, with leaf patterns in deep gold and burnt orange swirling up around and soft ruffles in the same colors around her knees and puffing out over one shoulder. It stands out more than the little black dress - which is fine. She would like attention, and just being the hostess's son's girlfriend will not quite get her there at a rich people party, she thinks.
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self_composed
edgeofyourseat
Arthur follows, taking one for himself.
"Junior's what his family calls him," he says. "Or it was last I checked. See what I mean? I can't keep up."
"Junior's what his family calls him," he says. "Or it was last I checked. See what I mean? I can't keep up."
self_composed
"Check again," Bella recommends. She turns to a nearby Startup Lady and fakes enthralled surprise. "Holy cow, are you Marisa Page? I just missed your speaking engagement three weeks ago. Someone from my class on operating systems went, but I had a conflict."
edgeofyourseat
Marisa smiles. "Why yes I am!" she says.
"You're a very rude young lady," Arthur remarks to Bella.
"You're a very rude young lady," Arthur remarks to Bella.
self_composed
Bella gives Arthur one wide-eyed look of affected hurt, then huffs audibly and takes a step towards Marisa. She will get mileage out of being a rude young lady if that is what it takes to disengage from him. "I got a copy of the handout, though." And looked at it for exactly one second. "My classmate wanted to ask you why you're using Common Lisp instead of his favorite implementation, but there wasn't time. He'll flip if I tell him I met you and got to ask."
edgeofyourseat
"And what's your classmate's favourite implementation?" asks Marisa, smiling some more.
Arthur scowls at both of them and wanders off.
Arthur scowls at both of them and wanders off.
edgeofyourseat
"Well, your classmate might be disappointed with my answer," says Marisa, "but the truth is I'm just more comfortable in Common Lisp."
self_composed
"I'll tell him," Bella says. "He might email you. I think he might have been planning to do that anyway. I'm all about Python myself."
edgeofyourseat
"To each her own, I guess," says Marisa, with the air of one who definitely does not believe herself.
self_composed
"Well, I know Lisp, I just get sick of staring at parentheses after a while," says Bella. "I'm trying to be versatile though."
self_composed
"Freshman at Stanford," Bella says. "My dad lives here, though, and also there's Laney, so I'm going to be up for the occasional weekend, and a party's a decent excuse for it to be this weekend and not another."
edgeofyourseat
"Well, come talk to me if you change your mind about parentheses in the next four years, and there might be a job interview in it for you."
edgeofyourseat
"Well, I like helping out my friends," she says. "And my friends' friends. And my friends' sons' friends, apparently."
edgeofyourseat
"Knitting," says Marisa, "believe it or not. I met her at a local stitch'n'bitch in New York a few years back. She didn't stick with knitting for long, but she stuck with me."
self_composed
"Nice," Bella says approvingly. "My grandmother taught me to knit once, or tried. Couldn't remember how to cast on after I got home."