Bananapants: A Bonkers Romantic Comedy
Bananapants: Chapter 16

“One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well.”

― Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own

Other than my mom and maybe Grandpa Eugene, Alex Greene was the only person on the planet I trusted completely. I trusted him more than my mom in many ways because he was a stark realist, whereas she was an optimist.

For the record, I didn’t trust Natalie. And for good reason. Case in point, group chat. I rest my case.

Alex’s office had always been difficult to replace, and I think this was by design. He used to move offices at random intervals and without prior notice in order to piss off Uncle Dan. Unfortunately for me, Alex must’ve moved from the last spot I thought it had been. Then again, my memory was a little fuzzy around the edges from the age of twelve to eighteen.

I wasn’t lost. I knew where I was in the building and on the floor map. I simply didn’t know where Alex was. I ended up having to text him using a messaging app we’d developed together a few years ago, during his free time and while I’d been recovering from a broken femur.

Des: Where are you?

AG: At work

AG: Have you eaten?

AG: Viola is here. But she’s leaving

AG: She says hi

Des: I’m at your office location from the last time I was here. Where’s your current office? Hi Viola

I assumed Viola was Viola Winston. She was related to Aunt Shelly’s longtime partner, Beau Winston, and lived in Tennessee. She was a niece of theirs, the daughter of one of the Winston brothers. I know, I know. Lots of people to remember.

The important thing to know about Viola is that, according to Alex, she possessed mad hacking skills. Also, she was eleven.

Staring at my phone screen and waiting for his response, I wasn’t surprised when he sent through his longitude, latitude, and elevation above sea level. Even as exhausted as I was, it made me smile.

Coordinates in hand, I strolled through the Cypher offices without being questioned, glasses on my face, random folder in my hand, phone out. Pro tip, if you want to go unnoticed, put on glasses. Superman knows what’s up. Humans are less likely to look at another person’s face or make eye contact if they’re wearing glasses. And since my attention appeared focused on my phone screen while I navigated the halls, everyone believed I knew my way around and belonged here.

Alex’s current location was down a nondescript hallway with no doors except his, at the very end of the twenty-foot narrow expanse. Boxes had been piled to one side about halfway down, obscuring the door and making it a tight fit, almost as though he’d placed an obstacle course between himself and the rest of the company.

As I cleared the boxes, Viola Winston emerged from the door. Her curly brown hair was in two braids and had grown longer since the last time we’d met. She glanced up and smiled when she spotted me, showcasing a mouth full of braces. The bands on her braces were black.

“Hey V.” I took off the glasses, tucking them into my pocket for later use. “Is it summer break for you?”

“Greetings, Desmond.” She gave me an arching wave, starting from the side of her face and ending at her leg, her hand cupped. “And it is summer break for me. An astute observation,” she said, her Tennessee twang making me smile despite my dark mood.

She hiked her backpack higher on her shoulders. It looked heavy, especially for her small frame.

“That looks heavy. Do you want me to carry it?” I reached to take the bag.

Still grinning, she twisted her body away. “Not at all. But thank you. I’m stronger than I look. When you grow up on a farm, that happens.”

“And how is farm life?” I let my hand drop.

“Oh, you know.” She shrugged. “Excessively farmy.”

That made me laugh. “I don’t know. I’ll have to take your word for it.”

“Or you could come visit.” Her eyes grew wide. They were a strange shade of bluish purple. “Aunt Shelly brags on you constantly. We talk about your last visit all the time.”

Another smile, pulled out of me forcefully at the mention of Aunt Shelly and my visit to her place in Tennessee two winters ago. My aunt had visited my family in Chicago often, and she’d come up to Boston while I lived with her parents—my grandparents—during my later teenage years. Nat and I had spent some summers in Tennessee with Shelly and Beau before my ninth birthday.

“How often do you get together with Aunt Shelly these days?” I made a mental note to call my aunt. Out of everyone in my biological and extended family, only she and my mom seemed to consistently speak my language and didn’t always need my motivations spelled out for them.

Well. That’s not precisely true.

I thought back to the barbecue a few weeks back and how Ava had simply accepted my explanation for stealing things. Technically, it had been a lie. She’d asked why I’d stolen things as a kid. The answer I’d given her at the picnic table addressed why I was a thief now, not then. If we ended up dating, I would tell her the truth. But it had been too complicated and heavy of an issue to discuss over sandwiches on a sunny afternoon when I thought that day would likely be the last time we’d speak.

“Aunt Shelly and I meet often. My dad says she is in possession of life skills that will come in handy should there be a robot uprising. This summer she promised, since I’m eleven now, she’d show me how to cast car parts in her studio. You could come and learn too. You never know when you’ll need to make your own car parts.”

“True. True.” I tried to remember which of the Winston brothers was Viola’s dad. There were so many of them and they all had beards.

“Well.” Again, she hiked the backpack higher. “Best be on my way. Sandra is coming with the twins and we’re going shopping.”

“For . . . ?”

“Beetles.”

“Beatles?” I wasn’t sure I’d heard her. “Like, the Beatles? You’re looking to buy some albums, or⁠—?”

“Beetles like the group of insects that have a hard exoskeleton and wings. Specifically, weevils. It’s for a bug box.”

“A bug box?”

“One of my spring break assignments for school is to collect as many kinds of beetles as possible, and then pin and label them in the box. They’re hard to come by in this city, even ladybugs. So we’re going shopping. They sell bugs here at the store. Back home they can be found in the yard.”

“This is for school? That sounds awesome.” Maybe I’d make a bug box. I bet Ava would be up for making a bug box. We could turn it into a date.

I considered it, a day in Grant Park searching for bugs. Were there bugs in Grant Park? Maybe we’d go camping instead. Did Ava like camping? We’d never camped together as kids, her dad didn’t like tents or sleeping outdoors.

Would Ava even be interested in making a bug box?

A small frown took over my face. I knew fifteen-year-old and younger Ava better than anyone. Fifteen-year-old Ava would’ve loved making a bug box with me. But current Ava? I honestly had no idea.

You don’t know her, not anymore. And that’s your fault.

“Oh!” Viola reached in her pocket and pulled out a phone. “That’s Sandra. I got to go. Bye!” She started jogging as she spoke and she waved as she jogged, a huge grin on her face. “And Desmond! Think about coming this summer, okay? Oliver, sadly, passed away last winter. But she has a new parrot. This one quotes scripture.”

Scripture? That was a change. Aunt Shelly’s old parrot—Oliver, a rescue—only cursed.

“I’ll think about it,” I called after her. And I would.

Even with her giant backpack, she navigated the box obstacle course with no problem. I waited until she disappeared and then walked into Alex’s office, stepping inside the door Viola had left ajar. Shutting it after me, I wasn’t surprised to discover it auto locked at the handle and had three dead bolts.

Alex’s back was to me. He sat in front of a big desk covered in machine and computer parts. On the left side of his huge office was a wall of shelves filled with boxes and coiled cables. An efficiency kitchen with a fridge was next to the shelves. On the right side was another giant desk. Above the desk, the wall was paved with monitors. All the monitors were off.

“Hey,” he said, not turning around. His elbow was up like he was hand screwing—or unscrewing—something. “What’s up? What do you need?”

Unlike my sister and Ava, I didn’t call him Uncle Alex. Not anymore. We’d dropped the “uncle” when he’d introduced me to Sue five years ago and gave me the start-up capital for my business.

“Don’t work for Seamus or anyone else,” he’d said at the time. “Work for yourself, then you get to define what you’re willing to do or not do. But that also means there’s no diffusion of responsibility, no one else to shoulder the blame. You make mistakes or you’re a bad guy? You hurt people? That’s on you. One hundred percent. You have to live with it.”

He’d been correct. Knowing I was entirely to blame when my work choices hurt innocent people had kept me from taking certain jobs, even if those jobs had paid ten times my typical fees. It had forced me to adhere to certain standards. I took pride in my work. My reputation belonged to no one but me, and it mattered.

I owed Alex a lot, and not just money. I’d tried to pay him back the start-up money so many times but he refused. He’d saved more than my life. Not to be overly dramatic, but I think he saved my soul.

Crossing to the desk with the blank monitors, I took off my jacket and hung it on the back of the office chair. “Did Ava come see you yesterday?”

“Not sure.”

That meant yes. We played this game. If either of us said no, that meant no. If either of us said anything else, that meant yes.

“Did she tell you what happened to her?” I undid my tie and hung it over my jacket. “At the Harding Building?”

“Don’t . . . remember.” He grunted, the screw finally coming loose.

I leaned to the side, trying to figure out what kind of machine he was disassembling. It looked like a seamless black box to me. “What about me?”

“What about you?” Alex glanced up, peering at me from behind his black horn-rimmed glasses.

I knew he was forty-five or forty-six, but he honestly could’ve passed for low thirties. He had a full head of inky black hair, no gray, and he’d never been an outdoorsy kind of guy, so his skin was pale. He wasn’t big on talking or smiling or worrying, so his eyes and mouth were free of associated wrinkles. But he was fit. For exercise, he swam laps every morning, and was the person responsible for me taking up swimming a few years ago.

I’d needed a release during breakthrough hypomanic episodes, a way to focus the excess energy. Swimming was perfect as it required I concentrate on multiple things at once: breathing, form, stroke length, power, speed. Unlike fighting in the ring at the gym, swimming made it nearly impossible to injure myself, or someone else, by taking things too far. And swimming was exhausting.

“Did you tell Ava anything about me? Answer any of her questions?” I unbuttoned the cuffs of my shirt.

“No.” His attention moved over me. “You’ve been forgetting to eat. I have hard-boiled eggs in the fridge. Also cut-up avocado. Go eat.”

I sighed, frustrated with myself. He was right. I’d forgotten to eat. I often forgot and then would wonder why I felt like crap. If I felt crappy, I had a list of questions for myself: Did you take your meds? How much water have you had today? How much sodium? Did you eat? Did you accidentally consume sugar or caffeine?

Usually Sue would remind me to eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner during jobs. I hadn’t talked to her since yesterday.

Strolling to his fridge, I asked, “What did Ava ask?”

He turned his attention back to the mystery machine on the table. “I’ll have to check my notes.”

That meant he wasn’t inclined to share.

I opened the fridge and found a container of OJ, four hard-boiled eggs, and a glass container with cut-up avocado. It had turned brown from oxidation but looked relatively fresh.

He also had yogurt and cheese sticks. Above the fridge was a giant bag of trail mix.

“This isn’t your lunch, is it?” I turned from the fridge, carrying the avocado and eggs to the desk below the monitors.

“I can order out. I know if you don’t eat now, you won’t eat later. Eat. And drink the juice.”

Sitting at the desk, I swiveled the seat so I faced him and opened the food containers. “I’ll order your lunch. And I can’t have the juice. It messes with my ADHD meds.”

“Order me an Italian beef on your way out,” he said, flipping the device and placing it on his lap.

I took a bite of egg, chewed, and swallowed. “Hey. Does my dad know about Wickford and Ava and what happened?”

“No.”

“How about Ava’s mom? Does she know what happened at the Harding Building yesterday?”

“No. Ava told me she wanted to tell her mom herself.” Alex glanced up, his eyes narrowing behind his glasses. “Eat.”

“I am.”

He gave me a long look, then returned his attention to the item on his lap, pressing the screwdriver against it.

“You assigned her guards, right?” I finished the egg in one bite and then picked up another one. I didn’t particularly like the taste and texture of eggs, but I knew he’d make me eat all four. It was my own fault for coming here without eating first.

“Can’t say,” he said.

“I had them checked out. You did a good job.”

Alex dipped his head to the side in acknowledgment, struggling with the screwdriver. “She’s important.”

We sat in relative quiet for a while, him disassembling the mystery cube and me eating his lunch. I didn’t check my phone, I knew it wouldn’t work in his office.

Lost in thought, I parsed through my options regarding Ava, how I should approach her, what I should buy her, but most importantly, how could I get to know the person she was now? Would she let me?

Alex broke the silence. “Why did you go see your dad this morning?”

I looked at him. The thing he’d been disassembling had been set to the side, its guts were spread out on the table. He’d successfully opened it and now he was staring at me like I was next.

I sighed quietly and responded with, “Let me check my notes.”

He shook his head, like my answer wasn’t going to cut it. “If it’s related to what happened to Ava yesterday, you will tell me. Otherwise, I’ll be mad.”

Fair enough.

Finished with all four eggs, I opened the container of avocado and picked up the fork that had been tucked inside. “I have a friend. His name is Hareem and he’s an engineer, graduated from MIT. He designed this incredible device. I don’t understand the science behind it, but—and this is going to sound unbelievable, I have the schematics if you want to see them—it turns atmosphere into a replacement for natural gas.”

“Holy shit.” Alex sat back in his seat. “Send me the schematics.”

Setting down the fork, I unlocked my phone and opened the secured folder where I kept the details of Hareem’s patent, passing it to Alex. He’d probably make a backup of my phone because he couldn’t help himself. That was fine. I trusted him completely.

“He’s brilliant. His family is in Nigeria and he went to undergrad there, came to the US for grad school. But he designed it before college. The first iteration hooked up to a gas cooktop and provided a flammable alternative to natural gas, pulling oxygen out of the air but doing something to it in order to keep it stable and localized.”

Alex frowned at the schematics. “I don’t understand what I’m seeing. Do you mind if I make a copy? This is right up Greg’s alley.”

“Make a copy, but share it with no one. Not even Greg.” It’s not that I didn’t trust Ava’s dad. I’d learned to involve as few people as possible in my line of work. Once the contracts were destroyed and Hareem’s invention was on its way to being manufactured, I might ask Greg to take me through the science behind the device. Hareem was too brilliant to explain things in lay terms.

“Obviously, I will share these with no one.” Alex pulled out his phone and placed my phone on top of it. “So what’s the problem? Why haven’t I read about this incredible invention?”

I leaned back in my chair and absentmindedly watched as Alex made copies of the patent paperwork. “Hareem signed an exclusive manufacturing and nondisclosure agreement with the Wilcox Group, which should’ve been fine.” A pang of guilt had me cringing, so I clarified, “The lawyer I recommended told him it should be fine.”

“The Wilcox Group is solid. Why wasn’t it fine?” He handed me back my phone.

“The lawyer missed the fact that the Wilcox Group could sell the contract to someone else.” I placed my phone on the desk and picked up my fork again.

“Ah.” Alex nodded, expression unchanged. “And how is this related to Wickford and what happened to Ava yesterday?”

“Do you know Henri Wickford?”

“Of Neptune Natural Gas and of black-market AI drone peddling. Yes, I know of him. Matt and I have messed with his AI a few times, set them back in their R&D.” Alex’s lip curled slightly. “Ava filled me in on how she met him originally. She also told me how he asked her boss to send her to the Harding Building, using the last name of Quail. She doesn’t know why his security team opened fire on her though. Do you? Did they think you two were in on the heist together?”

I didn’t want to worry Alex with my theory that Henri might consider Ava a threat and/or working with Raziel—it was possible, however unlikely—so I said, “They’re inept. Simple as that.”

“Of course. Ineptitude.” He nodded, like this made complete sense. “Ineptitude is not just underestimated in depth and breadth, it is more dangerous to society than bad intentioned competence, I’m afraid.” Alex’s attention dropped meaningfully to the fork I held and the container of avocado I hadn’t yet consumed. “You can talk and eat. What does all this have to do with your friend Hareem and his miraculous invention?”

I speared several avocado pieces with my fork. “Wickford bought the contract. He’d actually put the Wilcox Group up to the original acquisition. He already had a deal with them to buy it as soon as Hareem signed the paperwork, and wanted everything in paper copy. Wickford has no plans to move forward with manufacturing. He’s buried it.”

This was all perfectly legal and Hareem had no recourse, according to society. But what I’d been doing to fix it? Illegal.

I ate the avocado while Alex digested this information.

“So,” he eventually said. “Wickford buried the manufacturing because this device would tank his legitimate income source. Hareem can’t talk about it because of the NDA. If there’s a clean, safe, renewable, and cheap alternative to natural gas, why would we need natural gas? If we don’t need natural gas, how would he make the money he uses to launder his other money? When does the patent expire?”

I had to swallow a mouthful of avocado before responding. “Wickford has other sources of legal income, but I agree. Patent expires in eighteen more years. Why?”

“I want to know when natural gas will become obsolete. So this is what you asked Quinn to help you with? You want to expose Wickford’s illegal activities? Send him to jail as retribution? That seems right up your dad’s alley.”

I tilted my head back and forth as I chewed, considering how best to answer. “No. That’s not what I asked him for. I don’t care about retribution. I want Hareem’s invention to be manufactured. That’s it.”

“Really?” Alex’s eyebrows jumped, then slowly lowered, his gaze growing thoughtful. “That makes sense, actually. You’ve never been a vengeful person. Then how do you plan to bring Hareem’s device to market?”

“I want to destroy all copies of the contract, like it never existed. That’s why I came to see my father today.”

Alex’s eyes narrowed. “How do you plan to do that?”

I took a bracing breath, knowing I needed to finish the whole container of avocado but the texture was making me gag. “I think I’ve already destroyed or erased all copies but one.”

Alex’s attention moved between my face and the half-eaten container. “You don’t have to eat any more if you don’t want. And this is where I tell you there’s no such thing as erasing a digital copy.”

Breathing a sigh of relief, I set the avocado aside and covered it. “You know that’s not true.”

“I do?”

“Yeah. And the last copy—or what should be the last copy—is at a compound in the Caribbean. My biggest problem is that Cypher’s microarray wireless protects the place.”

Alex leaned back in his seat, the chair tilting, his chin coming up. “Well. How about that.”

“Right.”

“And you wanted your dad to help you get past the system.”

“No.” I shook my head. “All I wanted was the client pitch, not the specs. It’s not publicly available and you guys keep that shit locked up tight. The client pitch would be enough and would give Cypher plausible deniability if things go south and I’m caught. I plan to go in quiet, leaving no trace. Ideally, he won’t even know the system was breached, he’d think the contract was misplaced or thrown away accidentally.”

“Ah. So when are you going?”

I picked up the fork and placed it on top of the closed food container. “I don’t know. I still need to figure out how to get past the microarray.”

“I thought you said you could get past with the client pitch?”

“I can. But my dad said no.”

Alex leaned forward, nonplussed. “Wait. What? You told your dad all this and he didn’t say yes?”

“He wouldn’t let me speak. He just said no.” I placed my elbows on my knees.

“I see,” Alex said slowly. Frowning, he chewed on his bottom lip for a time, then gave his head a quick shake. “I don’t doubt you, but I’m replaceing this hard to believe. Your dad is not like this with anyone else but you, you know? He’s not so black-and-white usually. Or ever. When I met him, I was on probation, and he did a lot more than bend the law to help me out. His rigidity with you makes no sense.”

“Oh? Really? Lucky me.” I dropped my face into my hands, rubbing my eyes with my fingers. Tired, my shoulder hurting, I needed to change the dressings on my other wounds. Yet, in a way, I felt thankful for the aches and pains of my injuries. They were a good distraction from what had happened between my father and me in his office.

I didn’t want to think about our latest shouting match. I’d wait to process it until my next therapy appointment, having learned over the years that any attempt to process thoughts and emotions about my father without professional help to contextualize “normal” was like being stuck on a Ferris wheel.

“I don’t understand what he’s thinking, why he’s being this way with you. Especially since . . .” Alex seemed to be voicing his thoughts in a stream of consciousness and didn’t finish whatever he was about to say. Eventually, he said, “How about you and I go in and talk to him together. I’ll make sure he listens and I’ll back you up.”

Glancing at him from between my fingers, I shook my head. “He trusts you. I’m telling you, he won’t listen to me. I have zero credibility with him. He sees me as no different than my aunt Jem.”

The severity of his frown increased, two lines appearing between his eyebrows. “That’s not true. Quinn doesn’t⁠—”

I straightened in my seat. “That’s one hundred percent true, and we both know it.” I didn’t want to talk about this, and I suddenly felt too restless to sit. Picking up the food containers, I walked to the fridge and placed the avocado inside. “Do you want me to throw the fork away or wash it so you can use it later?”

“Put it in the compost. It’s compostable. I have more.” Alex also stood. “And you are wrong about your dad. He’s shit with words. I mean, he’s worse than me, and that’s saying a lot. He’s a—what did Sandra call it?—an acts of service person.”

I huffed a bitter laugh and nodded, but bit my lip so I wouldn’t start recounting out loud my father’s acts of service since I’d gotten sick. Instead, as I washed the container that had held the eggs, my brain recounted his acts silently. Just for me.

At nine, he’d turned me in—to the police station—for shoplifting and paid for the shopkeeper’s lawyer. He’d done the same each time I’d stolen during a manic episode and made me plead guilty each time, which was why I’d been sentenced to juvenile detention at fourteen. He didn’t want to post my bail and had been adamantly against my mom bailing me out when the charge had moved from misdemeanor to felony due to the number of prior convictions.

She’d posted my bail. I’d been afraid to leave the holding cell because I didn’t want my dad to be upset with me. Meanwhile, during all this, I had either undiagnosed, untreated, or unstable bipolar. But, as a kid, I still trusted my dad to do what was best. So when he insisted I take responsibility and plead guilty, I did that without question. I didn’t want to let him down more than I already had.

And, you know, I was lazy. And defiant. And not trying hard enough. Whatever.

Turning off the sink and drying my hands, I told myself to calm down. I found I had to swallow and blink a few times because my eyes stung. My heart beat too fast and my neck felt hot. Find something blue.

Twisting at the waist, I searched Alex’s office for something blue. My jacket was blue. Navy blue. Almost black. It still counted.

Alex exhaled loudly and I looked at him. He had his hands on his hips and was currently glaring at me. “You’re wrong. But I’m not going to push this issue with you because I can understand why you’d think that, given what you know. And what you don’t.”

I shrugged, not really paying attention as I scanned his clothes for something blue. He wore all black. No help there.

“I’m leaving. Thanks for taking care of Ava. And for the food,” I said, replaceing a coiled blue cable on the heavy-duty shelf next to the fridge. I crossed to my blue jacket and pulled it on. Tucking the tie in my pants pocket, I retrieved the glasses and set them in place on my nose.

“Say hi to Ava for me.” Alex yawned and stretched his arms over his head, then huffed a laugh. “I can’t believe she kissed you like that.”

My steps faltered before I’d made it to the door and I turned, gaping at him, disbelieving what I’d heard. “I’m sorry, what?”

Had Ava told him everything about yesterday? About what I did? About kissing me? About⁠—

“She’s crazy.” He grinned with his eyes and the corner of his mouth, like being crazy was a good thing, then said words I never thought I’d hear from him: “You two make a cute couple.”