Quick Study - By Gretchen Galway Page 0,18

Bonnie smiled. Her dad had been a great guy. He had driven her mother crazy, not caring about striving and succeeding and looking good the way she had—just being. Luckily for him, he’d inherited a fortune that had made happiness with her Type-A mother possible, since being rich was something she valued.

Poor mom. She had been happy, so happy, with her father, but never seemed to realize it. Standing on green grass and envying the patch of gravel next door.

Bonnie pulled into the parking lot outside Starbucks, crowded even on a Friday night, and found a parking spot. As she stepped out of the car, she smelled KFC wafting through the strip mall and her stomach growled. Then she thought of Thai food, and what Paul had said about wanting to talk in addition to other things, and how hot he made her feel even from the other side of the rusted gate of her apartment building.

Shoving those cravings aside—or deep down, where her body ached for him—Bonnie opened the door of the coffee shop and scanned the crowd. She took a deep breath and got in line at the counter behind a young woman who was hiding a punked-out miniature dog in her purse. Her first subject, from her self-description in an email, unless there were two punked-out purse-dogs in the place.

“Nice shades,” Bonnie said to her, pointing at the purple goggles the dog was wearing.

The woman grinned at her and turned her body away from the counter to show off her pet. “They’re called doggles. Aren’t they sick?”

“Very,” Bonnie said. The dog had a sweet face, behind the faux-piercings, and Bonnie scratched behind its ear with a gentle finger. “I’m Bonnie, here to interview people for my Master’s at State. Are you Carmen?”

The woman hesitated, but after scanning Bonnie from head to toe, must have decided she was legitimate, or at least harmless. “You’re buying? Just to fill out your questionnaire?”

“I’ll even throw in a muffin.”

Carmen bit her lip. “Caramel Frap,” she said, tucking her dog more deeply inside the bag. “But could I have a protein plate instead of the muffin?”

“Absolutely,” Bonnie said, smiling at her. They reached the head of the line and Bonnie ordered and paid for both of them, then led them both to a table near the door. She took out her folder and handed Carmen two sheets of paper. “I should warn you, some of the questions are pretty personal. You don’t have to say them out loud or write your name or anything. Just leave it blank if—”

Carmen frowned and took the paper. “I’m sure it’s fine,” she said, reaching for a pen. “I put all kinds of personal stuff on my blog.” Sipping at her Frappuccino and passing globs of peanut butter to the little creature in her purse, Carmen bent over the paper, read silently, and began to write.

Bonnie took a deep breath. This might not be so bad. But suddenly, the woman handed over the paper and got to her feet. “Gotta go,” she said, gathering the free food and drink in her arms, then fleeing out the door before Bonnie could ask her any follow-up questions.

“Thanks,” Bonnie called after, then looked down at the paper in dread. That had been much too quick.

“Get a life, you perv,” the woman had written, then, “Thanks for the Frap.”

Bonnie stared at the paper, blinking in surprise. She hadn’t answered any of the questions—not even the basic age and gender checkboxes at the beginning.

Snorting to herself, Bonnie shoved the unfinished questionnaire into her bag. I wouldn’t want to know about your sex life anyway, she thought, then looked around the coffee shop and realized that applied to everyone else, too.

Only two more people and she could go home, content that she’d followed through at least that far. She settled back into her chair and finished her tea, then had to get up for another pot when her second appointment didn’t show.

Forty-five minutes later, and fifteen minutes after her expected third volunteer, she felt a tap on her shoulder from behind.

“Excuse me?” A guy in his mid-thirties, head-to-toe REI with short hair and light brown eyes, was leaning down to talk to her. “Are you the girl interviewing people?”

Bonnie studied him and decided he was the self-described “venture capitalist,” which given he was trolling Craig’s List for freebies, meant “unemployed.”

He might be more desperate than Carmen, but she should warn him and save them both their time. “My first volunteer got offended