Beautiful Code (4 page)

“I think you misunderstand Mariana,” Lisa had said.

Amelia looked at Lisa. There was something deliberate and serious in Lisa’s tone. Was Lisa talking about Mariana, or about herself? Either way, Amelia respected Lisa’s assertiveness and agreed to write the first draft of the paper.

When they met to review the paper the following week, Lisa had basically rewritten Amelia’s draft, fixing the broken prose and circular logic. It was a lot better. Amelia was a little embarrassed.

“You did a really good job,” Lisa offered, “I love this part.” She pointed to the one section of the paper she hadn’t changed.

“Shakespeare isn’t my thing,” Amelia deflected.

“If I had your talent, it wouldn’t be my thing, either.” Lisa smiled.

They sat in silence for a moment. Amelia hated to admit it, but Lisa was incredibly sweet, and she was actually starting to enjoy their meetings. No one had ever really explained English to her, or forced her to take ownership of her opinions about a character. Even if her attempt at the paper had sucked, it was the first time she had written an essay she hadn’t hated, and seeing Lisa’s improvements made her respect her partner’s ability to understand this stuff.

“I’m sorry I’ve been a pain of a partner,” Amelia finally said.

“It’s okay. I wouldn’t have wanted to work with me if I were you, either.”

More silence.

“For what it’s worth, I really care about Adam. A lot,” Lisa finally said.

Amelia looked at her over her glasses.

“It’s complicated,” Lisa said. “I have an obligation to Sundeep.”

“I’m not going to break my brother’s heart,” Amelia said. “It’s up to you to tell Adam, but you ought to do it soon.”

That had been two months ago, and Adam was still in the dark. Amelia had never told him about her project partner, but she had made up her mind to do it after the conference. That would give him winter break to recover, she reasoned, and start the New Year fresh.

CHAPTER 3:

Get To Know Me

T
. J. saw Adam and Amelia step off the elevator and gave a big wave to them, excusing himself from the tiki table where he was sipping a mojito with two hot, blond club promoters who had just promised him a VIP table that night at Timba, Maui’s hottest celebrity nightclub. The party theme was “Santas and Snowbabes,” which was code for hot girls in skimpy fur-trimmed costumes.

“Hey guys!” he said cheerfully, shaking Adam’s hand and giving Amelia a kiss on the cheek. “How’s the room? Was your flight okay?”

“Yeah, it was cool,” Adam said in his best frat-boy, chill accent. Amelia tried not to roll her eyes, embarrassed for her brother. But T. J. didn’t seem to notice the way Adam tried so hard to be like him. “And you, Amelia? Feeling good?”

“Yeah,” she smiled. “This place is amazing.”

T. J. looked genuinely pleased. “Wonderful! Listen, the press is having a conference that starts in about ten minutes. They’re all dying to hear from you, but I didn’t want to commit you if you weren’t feeling up to it.” He looked at Amelia questioningly.

“Oh, sure. I feel up to it. Adam, are you okay with it?”

“Great!” T. J. clapped his hands without waiting for Adam to answer. “Let’s go get you ready, then.”

T. J. led Amelia and Adam to a large meeting room that was set up like a post-game sports conference. There were a hundred or so seats for the press that faced a stage with a long table and three chairs, each accompanied by a bottle of Fiji water. Behind the table was a white board covered in the logos of conference sponsors and, behind that, floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out onto a veranda leading to the white sandy beaches. The press corps was starting to file into their seats, and T. J. gestured to a man with a headpiece and a clipboard.

“Are these the Dorys? Are they up for joining the panel?” The man smiled at Adam and Amelia.

“Yes! Mike, meet Adam and Amelia Dory. Mike is the press organizer for the conference.”

“We’re thrilled to have you,” Mike said as he shook both their hands. “We’re going to get started in a few minutes. Shouldn’t be any difficult questions. No one’s going to be drilling you on technology or funding or anything. They’re just here to get to know the entrepreneurs.”

Mike smiled at them both as he snapped his fingers at an assistant, gesturing for her to put two more chairs on the stage for Adam and Amelia. Then, responding to something broadcast in his headpiece, he ran off.

“Wow.” Adam turned to Amelia and T. J. “This is so official.”

T. J. smiled. Back in Palo Alto, Adam and Amelia had done a lot of one-on-one interviews with tech bloggers, but nothing on this scale. T. J. had spent the last six weeks networking with the press, raising excitement for Doreye and making sure that Adam and Amelia had a seat on every high-profile panel.

T. J. understood that great technology was only part of the formula for a really successful start-up. The other part was about image and perception, making sure users and influential thinkers promoted the brand the way you wanted them to. And this was the part where T. J. really hit his stride. He was determined to guarantee that, when it launched, every cool kid in America was chomping at the bit to download and own Doreye.

Besides, Amelia had the potential to become an absolute media darling. Sure, at first he’d written her off as awkward and uncool. But then he realized how much America loves a rags-to-riches tale, and what could be better than a foster-kid-turned-successful-entrepreneur story? Not only that, but there weren’t many successful female tech geeks. The more time he’d spent with Amelia, the more he’d started to see past her second-hand clothes, unkempt hair, and chunky glasses. She was actually pretty. Her slim waist and long legs were kind of hot, and with contact lenses and a little mascara, her eyes could be stunning.

But it wasn’t time for that just yet. People would take more to her now while she was still awkward and poor. Once Doreye started to take off, they’d do a makeover and guys would buy into Doreye because they wanted to sleep with her, while girls would buy into it because they wanted to be her. The only thing people loved more than rags-to-riches, T. J. thought, was ugly-to-hot, and he was planning to accomplish both with Amelia.

Mike’s assistant led Adam and Amelia to two seats at the middle of the table and adjusted their microphones. In the other seats were two venture capitalists and the CEO and founder of PocketFun, a mobile gaming company worth $2 billion. They smiled as they introduced themselves to Adam and Amelia.

“You’re with Tom Fenway’s incubator, right? I’ve heard such great things about Doreye,” said one VC. “I can’t wait to see the demo.”

Amelia smiled politely. Adam grinned. “We’ll be sure you get a front row seat!”

Mike stood on the side of the stage and coughed into a microphone to get the attention of the press, who started to quiet down. He introduced the panel and opened the floor for questions. The journalists immediately focused on Adam and Amelia, hardly asking any questions to the venture capitalists or the guy from PocketFun.

“Did you come to Stanford expecting to start a business?” a woman in a blue dress asked.

“Not at all!” Adam answered. “We didn’t even know what we wanted to major in, much less whether we would start a business.”

“But then Tom Fenway found you?”

“That’s right. Tom spotted Amelia at University Café and the rest is history.” Adam smiled. He was totally in his element with all these people hanging on his every word.

“What is the dynamic like in Tom Fenway’s incubator?”

“It’s great. We all get along really well, and there’s always plenty of free food.” The audience laughed and Adam glowed.

“Amelia, we haven’t heard much from you,” a young, slender redhead in a white dress piped up from the back. “How are you enjoying Hawaii?”

Hearing her name startled Amelia. She had been studying the chandelier hanging from the ceiling—a thousand tiny crystals refracting sunlight into the spectrum of visible light. It was absolutely beautiful. Amelia liked when Adam answered the questions and she could just listen. This was the part he loved, and she was happy for him to take care of it.

She looked at the woman and sat up to speak into the microphone in front of her. “Oh, it’s just wonderful,” she said, thinking about the beauty of the chandelier. “Then again, I’m happy anywhere I can code.” The room laughed lovingly. There was something surreal and comforting about sitting in a room full of people who were so captivated and supportive.

The woman smiled, but her face lacked the warmth of the other journalists. “Does that include juvenile detention?”

Amelia blinked. What had she said? Suddenly the chandelier looked like it was going to fall. How could it be suspended by such a thin little cord? “That…” she started, not sure if the word had actually come out. How long had it been since the woman had asked the question? Everyone was staring at her. “That’s not…public information,” Amelia stammered.

No one was smiling anymore. The woman tilted her pretty head and glared at Amelia. She was gorgeous and terrifying.

“How did breaking through bank firewalls and embezzling money inform the creation of Doreye?”

Amelia felt like the chandelier had crashed down on her, like the gold cord had snapped and the shimmering crystals were shattering around her. She looked over at Adam for help, but he was as dumbstruck as she was.

“They didn’t inform it at all, actually. Doreye is the pure creation of a brilliant and promising young entrepreneur.” T. J. was leaning over Amelia’s shoulder, speaking into the microphone. His hand rested on her back and he smiled charismatically at the audience. “And we, as the Doreye team, are thrilled to give you all the first view of our app at this weekend’s expo.”

Amelia nervously lifted her eyes back to the crowd. They were nodding and smiling, looking at T. J. with encouragement.

T. J. continued to speak. There wasn’t the slightest hint of worry or embarrassment in his voice. “And now we’re going to go set up the Doreye demo booth so that we can enjoy this beautiful beach before we show off the technology to you tonight. It’s Adam and Amelia’s first time in Hawaii, and I want to be sure they catch a few waves while they’re here.”

The journalists beamed. Adam and Amelia left the panel in stunned silence, grateful for T. J.’s quick save. With a single sentence, he had turned them back into the poor, pathetic foster kids that the journalists loved to write about.

As they filed out of the room, Amelia glanced back for the beautiful redhead who had asked about juvenile detention.

But there was no sign of her.

CHAPTER 4:

Is This Seat Taken?

A
cross the lobby, Mr. and Mrs. Hawkins, Patty, Chad, and Chad’s parents and sister were gathered in their hiking gear, waiting for their driver to arrive and take them to a nearby waterfall for a sunset hike.

Shandi had opted for the spa over the hike, worried that she’d get mosquito bites or some other ailment that might threaten tomorrow’s perfect day.

Patty wanted a drink. She’d had to finish three exams and a fifteen-page research paper in two days in order to catch yesterday’s flight to Maui. To reward herself, she’d spent the day recovering, lying out on the beach, reading all the gossip magazines she’d neglected during the last two weeks of studying. She couldn’t believe how much she’d missed!

She’d made the mistake, though, of coming in at one o’clock in the afternoon to jump in the pool. While she was ordering a pineapple smoothie at the pool bar, she had run into Chad’s kid sister, Molly, who hadn’t left her alone since. Even when she’d put her headphones in (a clear signal that she didn’t want to talk), Molly had poked her to ask what color nail polish she was going to choose for their mani-pedis tomorrow morning. Patty had sucked hard on her smoothie straw, trying to be polite and wishing she’d had the bartender make the smoothie alcoholic.

Molly was going on about which Harry Potter movie was her favorite when the driver pulled up in a Land Rover.

“We ordered a passenger van,” Chad’s mother insisted, her tanned arms crossed over her perky chest. Chad’s parents, Mr. and Mrs. Bronson, were Nantucket chic: both ultra tan, blond, and always wearing solid pastel colors, like they’d stepped straight out of a Ralph Lauren advertisement. “There are six of us.”

I don’t have to go! Patty thought, sensing an opportunity to escape Molly’s chatter.

“We can squeeze in,” Chad’s father insisted. “Molly can sit on Chad’s lap.”

“Ewww!” Molly squealed. “I am thirteen years old and absolutely not sitting on my brother’s lap for the next half hour.”

Mrs. Hawkins consoled her. “Don’t worry, dear. Patty can sit on Chad’s lap, right guys?” He looked at both of them. Patty wondered if her cheeks were as red as they felt.

“Of course,” Chad smiled at Patty as they walked out to the car.

Patty blushed as she crawled onto Chad’s lap. She grabbed the headrest behind him for support, but doing so caused her breasts to brush against his face. He pretended not to notice. When she was finally seated, the small of her back pressed into his arm. She tried to balance her weight onto her heels so she wasn’t too heavy on his thighs.