Artgirl

18// young at heart

"Good." We stood outside the store. Neither one of us wanted to go in. "I feel a lot better."

"Happy to hear that, love."

I earned a big eye roll. "I swear to God," she mumbled. "That damn love."

"What?"

"Nothing," shaking her head, she let a small blush appear on her cheeks. "Let's go in, Jess is waiting."

"Adrian didn't come?"

"No, he's working."

The store's lights were dimmer than usual. If anything, Jessie's excitement was the only source of light in the room. Her hair was disheveled as always, but she was sitting at the counter in front of a laptop, with glasses and a look that was set on destroying whatever got in her way. A big cup of steaming coffee was beside her; I doubted she got much sleep.

"Okay, so this is the current situation," Zoey sat beside Jessie and in front for me. "We're going to call NASH and make a deal with Georges Nass."

"Nass?"

Jessie nodded. "Nass sounded better than Nash. I came up with it."

"Damn right you did," Zoey high-fived her. "Let's call him."

The phone rang for a few seconds before a robotic female vice answered. Zoey cracked her neck and put the call on speaker. "Me first," mouthed Jessie.

"Hello, this is Jessie Curtis, calling for Georges Nass."

The woman seemed confused. "Mr. Nash, you mean? Do you have an appointment?"

"For a call? No, darling. Transfer him to us, please."

"I'm sorry, miss Curtis. Mr. Nash is a very busy man."

"Listen, we're from Elisa, the antique store he wants to buy. I'm sure he can make time for us. Unless you want us to pop by and tell him that you've come in the way of him making a deal?"

Her voice got jittery. "Just a moment."

A moment later, we heard: "Georges Nash speaking. You're the owners of Elisa, correct?" He sounded like he'd been making fun of them.

"Correct," Zoey said, just as Jessie was shoving her middle finger onto the phone. "We want to talk to you about a deal."

"A deal?" He laughed, "The only deal I would like to talk about is the one where you sell your store to me, for a great price."

"Well, your deal was refused. We're making a new one. It's the only one you're getting."

"You're not asking for more money, I hope? I didn't know greed was a part of your values, Miss Hunter."

"Well, Georges. It isn't. One of my values, though, is Elisa. And I'm guessing one of yours is money. Paying us to give you the store won't work. How about a challenge instead?"

Georges hummed, amused. "A challenge? I thought that I was dealing with adults and not children?"

Zoey clenched her fist and gave the phone on the counter a glare. Jessie whispered: "We thought we were dealing with an adult and not an arse, but we were both wrong."

"What was that?"

"Nothing," Zoey smiled. "Listen to us. Since you think that our store isn't worth having around, we're proposing this. If Elisa makes more than NASH in the next month, you leave us alone. From March 1st until April 1st."

He stayed silent for a moment, then followed the girls' train of thought."And if Elisa wins, I leave you alone? And my business gets run over just because of your little deal, correct?"