Page 4 of Five Alarm Love
Tuli peered out toward sporting goods but didn’t see the top of Lou’s head.“You could try harder.”
Mav set down the coffee cup on the counter.“Or you could try harder.”
“First of all, you’re leaving a wet ring on my glass.”He brandished the cleaning cloth at Mav until he removed the offending beverage.“Second of all”—Tuli wiped away the ring and prints—“it’s complicated.”Only he knew why.
Tuli didn’t have enough to offer someone like Lou.Not yet anyway.He had to raise his stock price in the present to make up for what he lacked from his past.He wanted to be enough to provide what she needed.
However, accomplishing that task required that Lou tell him—or anyone—what she needed.He slung the cloth over his shoulder.
“Since when do you hide details about your personal life?”Mav snorted and shook his head.“Never mind.My opinion?It took you long enough to start looking in her direction.”
“Huh.”His friend was wrong about the hiding part and the looking in Lou’s direction part, but damned if Tuli would mention it.“I had a lot of things I needed to focus on lately.”
“Like getting your best angle for the website?”
“It’s a social media page, and yes, angles are an important part of content creation.What’s more important is the content creator, aka, me.”He smiled and fake-batted his eyes.“But no, I meant the accident last spring.”
“That’s fair.It did slow you down for a few months.”
His friend had no idea the extent of the injury.No one did.Tuli needed to be whole before he moved in Lou’s direction.He needed to make up for the broken pieces.
So, for now, Tuli pretended, like he always did.“It took a while to get back on track after the injury.I know that I look like a specimen now, but it took a lot of work to get this ripped.”He needed to compensate with muscle and money for what he no longer had.What he never had.
“You’re such a humble guy.”
Tuli fake buffed his nails on his aproned chest.“I’m told humility is my greatest quality.Makes me more photogenic.”
Mav groaned.“Man, you’re pretty wrapped up in this Real Alaska page stuff.”
“Up to a hundred thousand followers and growing.”
“Is that good?”
“Heck yeah, it’s good.”He stared at the ceiling for a second.“Not as good as sports figure or music star numbers, but good enough to become monetized.”The increase in followers had been a recent development, thanks to his spring video documenting the arrest of that crooked speculator.That one video bounced Tuli from ten thousand up near fifty thousand, and his account continued growing in the months since then.
“Huh?”
“Now that I have a large audience, brands pay me to mention their stuff in a post, and I get bonuses for clips that perform well.”
“What if you don’t like the brand?Or their stuff?”
“Then I don’t have to post about it or accept their money.”
“Mr.Big Time.You must be rolling in money.”
“Not yet but hopefully soon.I want to make this my primary income stream or at least heavily supplement the fire chief job.I’m leveraging the account to bring attention to this area and our home.”He also wanted to prove his value and erase his past.
Mav upended the cup with one last sip, walked around, and threw the cup in the trash can behind the deli counter.“Well, your site really helped me and my sister, getting the word out about our lodge.All of your followers amplifying the information made a difference.Did I tell you that we’re nearly booked for every available weekend through the end of the year?”
“That’s great.”
“I should pay you for more posts like that.”
“For friends and family, I’ll boost for free.It was fun to get back at that nasty speculator who tried to sue you out of house and home.Justice was delicious.”
“That was pretty awesome.Then Lee pretty much KO’d the guy by using the medical record against him, which was also satisfying.”
“Yep.”
