Crazy For A Geek Girl: A Lesbian Romance Read online

  CRAZY FOR A GEEK GIRL

  A Lesbian Romance Novella

  Nicolette Dane

  Copyright © 2016 Nicolette Dane

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. All romantically involved characters within this book are consenting adults over the age of 18 and are not related by blood. All rights reserved.

  About The Author

  Nicolette Dane landed in Chicago after studying writing in New York City. She flitted in and out of various jobs until she decided to choose herself and commit to writing full-time. Nico most enjoys writing about young sapphic love. Her stories are realistic scenarios of blossoming lesbian romance and voyeuristic tales meant to give you a bit of a peep show into the lives of sensual and complicated young women. Be sure to check out Nico’s Amazon Author Profile for more lesbian romance!

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  Table Of Contents

  Crazy For A Geek Girl

  An Excerpt From: Chef Cutegirl

  An Excerpt From: Sweetheart Starlet

  You May Also Enjoy...

  Psst... Look Back Here

  CRAZY FOR A GEEK GIRL

  *

  MY NAME IS Annette and I work too much. I know that it’s nobody’s fault but my own, I know that if I just planned things a little better, maybe stuck up for myself a bit more, perhaps learned how to say “no,” I could achieve a better work/life balance. I could hit the gym, I could keep my condo nicer, and maybe I could even find myself in a relationship. Ugh. Relationships. Sore subject with me, actually.

  I don’t mind telling you. Maybe you’re a lot like me.

  I work in a pretty corporate environment. Don’t get me wrong — it’s not a beige-walled, windowless hell. Far from it. I work for a very successful financial services firm that manages multiple billions of dollars for some pretty large funds. University endowments, pension funds for large corporations, the personal wealth of some of America’s richest people. I mean, our client list is pretty damn impressive and I’d certainly wow you with it if I wasn’t sure I’d get fired for sharing that information with you. No, I won’t really get fired. The company is employee-owned. If you’re here long enough, work hard enough, and show your commitment to the company, you get made a partner. And I was well on my why to that.

  So yeah, because we manage so much wealth and make so much money ourselves, we’ve got a very nice office. Top floor of a newer Chicago skyscraper. We’ve got the entire floor and it’s all windows, looking out to the beautiful cityscape. The Loop, the lake, the river, and beyond. You can even see Wrigley Field from our office if you squint a little bit. I’m lucky to have such a great office.

  But it can still be a corporate slog sometimes. And one of those little corporate nettles in my ass has to do with my relationship stuff.

  See, I work in marketing and client relations and I have to deal with a lot of rich men. I’m a pretty young woman, sliding into my early thirties — not to toot my own horn or anything — and these rich men like to do the flirty dance with me and I, unfortunately, have to flirt back. It’s part of my job, sadly. And none of this would be that bad if I actually liked men. But I don’t. I like women.

  Romantically, that is. I like women romantically. I’m a lesbian.

  But because I’m kind of girly, a lot of people don’t see it. I try not to judge them for any of that. People are a product of their culture, especially older people who are more set in their ways, and as much as I’d just like to be accepted for who I am, I’m also not an idiot and understand that progress comes slowly. Many of the people I work with know that I’m a lesbian. I told the president and founder of the company, Levi Gravonsky, about it and he had some thoughtful words on the subject.

  “You’re lesbian?” he reiterated after I told him. He made a scrunched up face, like it wasn’t important to him, and he shrugged. I mean, Levi was a Latvian Jew and came from a history of persecution. He was born after World War 2, but he might not have been if his parents hadn’t escaped the German occupation.

  “Yes,” I said. “I just wanted to get that out in the open because of my position.”

  “Netty,” he said with a knowing smile, using my nickname that so many of my coworkers had grown accustomed to using. “I know it is unfair, but many of our investors are from an old school world. They may say things to you, perhaps sexist things, because you are a pretty girl. But do not let that faze you.”

  “Okay,” I said, nodding along with his advice.

  “Instead, let it bolster you,” Levi went on. “Stay strong, stay stoic, as you can control nobody’s feelings but your own. Just know that any troubles you endure in our world because of your sexuality will be rewarded tenfold, financially speaking.”

  “I understand,” I said.

  “Nobody in this company will care or judge your sexuality,” he said. “We are a meritocracy and you come with a lot of merit.”

  “Thank you, sir,” I said.

  “The world will continue to progress,” said Levi. “And when people your age are the age of our investors, all of these perceptions will have changed. More acceptance.”

  “I sure hope so,” I said. He smiled.

  “Do what you can,” he said. “And don’t let anyone bring you down.”

  So this is all a very long and convoluted way of saying that I have some difficulty in getting into a relationship. I don’t meet very many lesbians in my line of work, I work a ton and don’t really do the bar scene, and I was burned on the whole online dating thing a couple years back. I’ll just say that it’s far too easy and alluring for people to misrepresent themselves in their online profiles.

  My goal as the new year has rolled in: work less and still be successful. Which, I hope, will lead me to a fulfilling relationship. I could sure use it.

  *

  Sitting in my office, the clock nearing 7PM, I sighed and held my head up with my hands, elbows on my desk, starring into a spreadsheet on one of my monitors, an investor database program running on the other monitor. Many of the lights were already out throughout our large office and the cleaning crew was beginning to start their evening job. I was the last one in the office on a Friday, still working, still trying to get my job done.

  As my eyes remained trained on my screen, my brain beginning to fizzle, feeling my productivity drop, I heard a soft knock at the metal frame of my open door. Looking up from behind my computer setup, I spotted a pretty young woman, probably late twenties. Her long, brown hair hung loose around her head, flowing down over her shoulders. She wore a v-neck t-shirt, the neckline and sleeves a bit loose and wavy, along with dark blue matchstick skinny jeans. Over her face was a large pair of dark-framed plastic glasses. She smiled at me cautiously.

  “Hi,” she said. “I’m Henrietta — or, um, Henry — and I’m with your IT firm. Did you see the email today about our project tonight?”

  “Oh shit,” I said. “I’m sorry, Henrietta. I totally spaced on that. I’m Annette.”

  “It’s okay,” said Henry. “There are a couple other machines in this part of the office I can do before yours. We’re
doing a full virus sweep of the entire office.”

  “I did get the email,” I said. “I’m sorry that I’m still here. Just so much work to do.”

  “That’s fine,” she said. “Why don’t you just holler at me in the next office over once you’re ready?”

  “You know what?” I said, pushing back from my desk. “It’s Friday. I should just go home.”

  “Oh no,” said Henry. “I’m not trying to kick you out. We have plenty of time.”

  “No,” I said. “This is a great excuse for me to leave this stuff for Monday. Come on in,” I said, waving her in. “Henry?”

  “Yeah,” she said. “People call me Henry.” She stepped in further to my office, her hands slid into the back pockets of her tight jeans. “You guys have a really nice office here.”

  “Thanks,” I said, smiling at her. I couldn’t help myself. I found her really attractive. She was geeky and it was endearing. Kind of like a hipster geek, you know? And it was really refreshing and cool to see a young woman as an IT computer consultant. I hadn’t seen much of that in my time in the corporate world. “How come I’ve never seen you around the office before?” I asked, easing back into my desk chair and looking up at Henry.

  “I’m usually not assigned to your company,” she said. “You probably see Matt and Tim more often.”

  “Oh yes,” I said. “I see them all the time.”

  “Our entire group is here to do the virus sweep,” she said. “It’s a lot of computers and it just goes fasters with us all here.”

  “Makes sense,” I said. “Does my computer have a virus?”

  “No,” said Henry. “Probably not. I haven’t found one yet in the computers I’ve done. But we do it just as a precautionary measure because of the sensitive data you guys work with.”

  “Great,” I said, standing up now from my chair. “Do you want to take over?”

  “Sure,” said Henry, sliding around my desk and navigating into my chair.

  “Sorry about the shoes,” I said. Underneath my desk I had put together a nice collection of footwear.

  “I see it all the time,” said Henry. “I’m not offended.”

  “Good,” I said with a smile. As Henry saddled up to my computer, she inspected the programs I had open and then looked up to me.

  “Mind if I close all this stuff out?” she asked. “I’ll save any unsaved work.”

  “Okay,” I said. She quickly and expertly went ahead, closing out my various windows, clicking save, shutting down my email, taking us back to my empty desktop.

  “I love how you only have a couple icons on your desktop,” said Henry with a smirk. “You wouldn’t believe how many people have a desktop totally full of icons. It’s a mess.”

  “I’ve seen that,” I smiled. “I can’t handle that kind of mess. I’m too orderly. It would drive me crazy.”

  “Me too,” said Henry without looking up. She clicked around on my computer, bringing up a couple of programs, choosing options, clicking checkboxes. It was like she had done this a thousand times before because she most likely had. After a minute or so of navigation and choices, silent but for the clicking of the mouse, a window appeared on my computer indicating that a scan was in process. Once the scan window was up, Henry sat back in my chair and smiled at me. “Now we wait.”

  “That’s it?” I said.

  “That’s it,” she said. “If this thing finds anything, we’ll run some deeper scans. But if it comes up empty, we’re done.”

  “Not bad,” I said. “Pretty easy job.”

  “This is the easy part of it,” she said. “It can get rough sometimes.”

  “I can imagine,” I said. I stood there next to my desk, silence falling over the two of us as we’d sort of already exhausted conversation about Henry’s purpose for being there. I wasn’t ready to leave just yet, as I was eager to talk further with her and find out if, you know, she was like me. “Tough that you’re working on a Friday night,” I said, immediately unhappy with my conversation prompt. But it was already out there, so I had to run with it.

  “Nah,” said Henry. “I mean, I’d probably just be gaming or something otherwise.”

  “Gaming?” I asked. “What do you mean?”

  “I don’t do the whole Friday night afterwork party thing,” she said. “I usually get together with a group of people online and play a game.”

  “Really?” I said. “What game?”

  “Battle Guildstrike,” Henry said, somewhat bashfully. “It’s an MMORPG — er, a massively multiplayer online role-playing game. Super nerdy, I know.”

  “I think I’ve heard of it,” I said. “It’s a pretty big deal, right?

  “Yeah,” she said. “It’s fun. You get to build a character and play a basically never-ending game with millions of other people all over the world.”

  “So that’s how you spend Friday nights?” I asked. “You don’t go out with friends, or like, a boyfriend, or something?”

  “No,” she said, her eyebrows shifting upwards at me skeptically. “Not my scene, really.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to imply anything.” Though, you know, I pretty much did. Just digging, that’s all.

  “That’s all right,” said Henry, looking into the computer monitor, clicking a few windows with the mouse, checking the various status indicators. The look on her face made it seem like she was almost done with me.

  “Look,” I said. “I didn’t mean to pry about your personal life or anything,” I said. “I just don’t get out much either. I work all the time. Isn’t it apparent?” I hung my arms out, indicating that obviousness as I was still at work on a Friday night.

  “Yeah,” said Henry, her face turning toward me once more. She offered me a knowing smile.

  “Maybe since you’re here working and missing your usual game night,” I began. “And I’m still here, wrapping up my work, maybe we could go catch a drink downstairs when you’re all finished up and just, I don’t know, talk to another person.”

  “I don’t really drink,” said Henry.

  “Neither do I,” I said. “It’s just a thing people do. I was going to have a ginger ale.”

  “How about tea?” she said.

  “What?”

  “I know of a good teahouse that’s open late,” she said.

  “Tea would be great,” I said happily. “I have a car and can drive us.”

  “Cool,” said Henry with a soft smile. “Let me finish up a few more computers and it’s a date.”

  *

  We got a parking spot on the street directly in front of the teahouse that Henry had recommended. She had remarked about how nice my car was, a Mercedes SUV, and I felt a little self-conscious about it the entire ride. I know I shouldn’t have been embarrassed about making money, but Henry and I were from different worlds. Despite the fact that she worked for an IT consultancy that serviced corporate clients like my company, she was still a little bit counter-culture in her geeky hipness. She was just getting started in her career, and I was beginning the rise to the top of mine.

  After rushing from the car to the teahouse, braving the January cold, the two of us busted into the door and were hit with a comforting warmth. The teahouse was casual and laid-back, comfortable couches and cushions, red tapestries and flowing drapes abounding in the cafe. It was a long space, looking as though there were two rooms in the teahouse. There were other people there, but by no means packed on this wintry Chicago evening.

  Henry ordered tea for both of us and then lead me over to some cushions on the floor, separated by a low table. I honestly felt a little out of place in my corporate casual attire, while Henry fit right in looking relaxedly bohemian. After taking her wool coat off and letting it slide to the floor against the wall next to our seating area, she let her scarf remain around her neck and adjusted her glasses with a smile in my direction.

  “Do we have to go up and get the tea?” I asked. “Or should we just sit down?”

  “W
e can sit,” she said, sitting down onto the cushion. “They’ll bring the tea over.”

  And it wasn’t much longer until the tea was delivered by a young guy with a thin beard and long hair twisted up in a bun. The two of us smiled up at him as he squatted to place to the tea on our table, thanking him.

  Henry poured our small cups from the white ceramic kettle, being careful not to spill.

  “This is dragon pearl jasmine,” she said. “It comes in little hand-rolled pearls. Very floral and sweet.”

  “I have to say,” I said, picking up my cup and taking a small sip. “I didn’t expect to end up at a teahouse after work on a Friday. But I’m happy I’m here,” I said with a smile. “It’s good.” I lowered my cup back to the saucer on the table.

  “Yeah, it’s one of my favorites,” said Henry.

  “So don’t be offended,” I began, tilting my head to side and wondering if I should actually say what I was about to say. “Are you, like, a geeky hipster type girl?” Henry laughed.

  “Yeah, I guess,” she said. “I’m just who I am, though.”

  “I know,” I said. “I don’t mean to try to fit you into some box. I just don’t get much social interaction these days so I’m a bit out of touch.”

  “It’s cool,” said Henry. “I’m not mad. But it does prompt me to want to ask you a question.”

  “Go for it,” I said with an accepting grin. “Ask away.”

  “How old are you?” she said. “That’s not rude, is it?”

  “No,” I said. “That’s fine. I’m 34. How old are you?”

  “I’m 27,” said Henry. “Not that far apart.”

  “No,” I mused, the tea and Henry’s demeanor warming me up. She looked really cute sitting across from me in her thin little t-shirt and scarf. I couldn’t help but give a bit of a blushing smile as I looked at her.