Page 3 of Convergence

The four of us were silent as he pointed out the address of our house on the handbook and directed Daisy to lead us to our temporary home. I stretched out my legs under the long table as we all started packing up our belongings. My right knee had been injured in the accident and had required a few screws to be placed. It rarely bothered me, but it required some warming up before walking or running.

Hoffmann watched as we packed up our stuff. Everett and Nathaniel were both quiet as they stood, though Nathaniel looked me and Daisy over. I blushed under his gaze and stood with everyone else.

2

Igrabbed my overnight bag and followed everyone out of the room. We all said goodbye to Professor Hoffmann, who led us out of the building. Daisy gave the guys directions to keep their cars parked in the lot they were in for now, as we could walk to our house from here. They had parking passes in their handbooks to park in one of the nearby student lots.

“How will we get to and from the facility?” Everett asked her as we walked down the sidewalk in the opposite direction of where my hotel was last night.

“That is one question I do know the answer to!” Daisy said proudly. “A golf cart!”

“A golf cart?” Nathaniel questioned with a chuckle and looked at me incredulously. I smiled back and shrugged good-naturedly.

“Yeah! I totally got to pick it out and decorate it for you. Your lab is on the edge of campus and your house is pretty close. Like maybe two or three blocks from the facility and off campus. It's mostly college owned or student rented houses over there so it won’t be too weird to see a golf cart. There’s like a hundred on campus during the day. Before I was a student here, like back when my parents would have gone here, it became really popular to use golf carts so they ended up making little parking lots and widening the sidewalks,” Daisy said as she walked a step in front of us with her hips swaying. “Everyone decorates them. It’s part of our campus culture.”

Our house was a ten-minute walk, and we looked up at a well-kept bungalow on a street of other, almost identically built, but varying in color and landscape, bungalows. Ours was a pale gray, recently painted, with dark gray shutters and trim, black metal address numbers, a black Edison style outdoor lamp, and perfectly trimmed green boxwood hedges. It looked like the cover of a magazine. A little matching shed was at the top of our short driveway, instead of a garage, and Daisy used a key Professor Hoffman had given her to open it. Inside was a golf cart, decked out with little battery-operated lights. They looked like Christmas lights in blue and white, but upon closer inspection they were little test tubes. A plush tiger head wearing a Truman College hat was dangling from the ceiling where a rearview mirror would go in a car. A fuzzy blue and sparkly steering wheel cover was in place and looked like something out of the early 2000s.

Despite not knowing how to drive, I smiled at Daisy while both guys groaned at the decked-out golf cart. “You better take care of her. Her name is Marie Curie, but you can call her MC for short,” Daisy said and sat on the back bench in an effortlessly sultry way.

“We will honor her,” Nathaniel said in a serious tone, with his hand on his chest and head bowed.

Daisy giggled and showed us into our home for the duration of the project. She explained she would not be living with us for the project, but based on our projections and isolation periods, we would let her know when she can come see us in person other than using Facetime. “I’ll be your contact with the outside world while you’re in isolation. Me and Professor Hoffmann will be your only other people you see, even during those less restricted times. But don’t worry, I’ll take care of you.” She winked back at us as she led us up the side entrance stairs.

“So, if you look down there, it’s a basement. There’s a bunch of space down there, but it’s basically one big room for storage and your laundry,” she said, pointing down the dark stairs. “It’s mostly finished, only empty in case you have a lot of stuff to store. Up this way is the kitchen slash dining room, through that doorway to the right is the stairs to upstairs, further is the living room and the front door, then there’s a bedroom, an office, and a full bathroom. Oh, my gosh, I feel like I’m on HGTV! Anyway, upstairs there are two bedrooms and another full bathroom. Everything has been painted and updated for you three. You’ll have to fight over who gets which room.”

We looked around the place and Everett volunteered to take the first-floor bedroom. “I’m an early riser,” he explained in his light Southern accent.

I was also an early riser; I had been jogging almost every morning since being in physical therapy for my knee and spine. Not only because excess weight put strain on my reconstructed joints, but because it was a good way to keep my muscles warmed up to avoid strain. I ended up loving the quiet morning runs and kept up with them.

When we were upstairs, Nathaniel volunteered to take the first bedroom to leave me the one with the most sunlight streaming in. It felt like a kind gesture, so I thanked him and smiled. Daisy helped the guys go get their cars parked in the right places and I sat my overnight bag on my new bed and looked around. The walls of the room were bright white, but the afternoon sunlight had them glowing yellow. My windows looked out the front and side of the house, so I saw the guys and Daisy coming back on the golf cart after I got started unpacking my overnight bag. I’d have to send for my other clothes and a few other things once I got more settled.

I went down to meet them when they came in. Daisy left us to go back to her dorm for the evening, though she gave us a little pout about leaving her new friends. Everett offered to have her stay for dinner, but she sighed and declined. She said she had a date to get ready for. I walked her out when she left and thanked her for all her help.

“It’s no problem. It’s actually part of my job, silly,” she giggled. “Though I am sorry to have to go on a date with someone else. Had I known I’d be meeting three hot scientists, I’d have ghosted him last week.”

I giggled with her but felt a creeping warmth climb up my chest and I broke eye contact. She waved as she headed off down the street back the way we came from the meeting.

“Did she just hit on you?” I heard Nathaniel’s friendly voice behind me.

“I think maybe?” I said, my voice cracking from the nerves.

“Because I thought she was hitting on me earlier. She was definitely hitting on John Wayne over there, but you, too?” Nathaniel joke whined.

Everett sat at the kitchen island with his handbook and smirked at Nathaniel. “Do you not enjoy competition, Nathaniel?”

“You can call me Nate. And yes, I love competition, but it’s not exactly an even playing field. I mean, you look like a fucking movie poster,” Nate laughed.

“What about Eva?” Everett asked, his eyes smiling more than his minutely smirking mouth.

“Well, that’s alright because then that just means she likes what I like. Now, who’s down for ordering pizza from the top three yelp reviewed places in the area and comparing them?” Nate opened every drawer and cabinet looking in them. Each one was stocked with clean dishes, pots, pans, mugs, glasses, and silverware. He came across a mostly empty drawer that held only a few take-out menus and pizza flyers. He rifled through the pizza ones and slapped them on the kitchen island in front of me and Everett.

“Sure,” I agreed. “I’m not a great cook.”

“I am a good cook, but I still want pizza,” Everett said and stood to open the new stainless fridge. It was stocked with beautiful, fresh ingredients I admittedly could do little with.

We agreed to order both a standard pepperoni pizza and the best-selling specialty pizza from each of the three places to decide who had the best slice. With a smile on my face, I took three slate blue plates out of the cabinet, found napkins, and sodas for us. It was nice to be around ‌like-minded people. People who loved science and were as dedicated as I was to my education. Not to mention it didn’t hurt they were both attractive, but I would not linger on that thought. It also didn’t hurt they were stuck with me and had to talk to me.

We set up to eat at the kitchen island and Nate connected his phone to a Bluetooth speaker bar he set on the counter. His taste of music leaned more towards the emo rock bands of the 90s and 2000s. I wasn’t surprised by his preferences one bit. Everett cast one disdainful look at the speaker but didn’t make a comment about what was playing.

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