Chapter Twenty-eight

Bram and the driver were talking about which store to stop at for the devices. He laid out detailed reasons why she could want either, then handed her his phone to go through. It was all Greek to her. She looked at a lot of what was on his phone, and it was all note taking and scheduling apps. She opened his photos, and though there were a bunch with Devon in them, there weren’t any pictures of him or anyone else. The quality on the photos was amazing though.

“This is your personal phone?” She asked, looking up at him.

“Yeah, why?” He looked down at her before waving his hand, “Let’s just go to Electro-Buy, they’ll have something for her.”

“Yes, Sir.”

“There’s nothing personal on it. It’s all meetings, documents, and schedules. You have five contacts.”

“I’ll have six soon.” He smiled, putting the phone on the seat. Devon was rummaging through the mini fridge in the back of the car and pulled out an apple juice.

“Your parents are in your phone.” She peeked at him, wondering about that.

“I never said they were dead, and they’re only in there so that if they call, I can make sure to avoid them.” He stopped smiling and paid attention to Devon, who was giving his lion stuffy some juice.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have asked.” She looked out the window, it was mid-morning, and the sun was already up. It would be a warm day. Pulling up to the front of the store, the limousine stopped. Bram stared at the store through her window. There were a ton of people already pouring in and out of the front doors.

“This is going to be fun.” His voice was flat.

“Oh,” she noticed how tense he’d gotten once the car stopped, “are you okay? I can go in myself if you’d prefer to stay here. Devon can still come with me, he’ll help select a good right, sweety?”

“Yeah!” He jumped up from the seat, pulling his lion under his arm. “You should get them all in matching colors.”

“Yeah, right. You’ll come back with some refurbished piece of garbage because it cost less.” He huffed. “Just roll down the windows and give me a moment. It’ll be fine.” The driver didn’t question it, he simply had all the windows going down the moment the words left his boss’s mouth. Bram closed his eyes, breathing deeply.

Devon bounced into the seat between them. “You should get ones that are good at playing games. Maybe we can get a new x-gamer that you can set up in the spare room, then we could play online together too.” He wiggled in the seat next to her, and was clinging to his arm.

“Devon, relax. We don’t need to buy the entire store today, you hear? We’re getting Izabella things to help take care of you. You can’t have a nanny without a phone.” Bram started to scootch toward them and waved his hands for them to get out of the car. “Come on, the sooner we get in there, the sooner we can get out.”

Devon grabbed her hand and tried to run through the doors, but Izabella reigned him in this time. “We’re not running through a crowded store. You either stay with your father or I, and behave. If you want to look at something different, you’ll have to wait until one of us can go with you.” Devon pouted at her rules but nodded all the same.

Entering the store, a person in a bright yellow shirt greeted them. “What are you looking for today, ma’am?”

“Oh, I’m looking for a phone, I guess.” She turned to Bram, but he’d already been caught by a pretty little thing who, ‘accidentally’ bumped into him, and was now pushing her number into his hand. He wrinkled the paper up and dropped it back into her hand, walking away. Great. He was already annoyed. They hadn’t even made it into the store yet. “Sorry, yes, new devices.”

“Of course,” the guy turned, pointing toward the center of the store, “Go all the way to the back. There will be a number of isles, but you’ll run into the phones first, then tablets, going up to computers. You’ll find any device you need right in that same area.” He smiled, but his face became stiff as he looked up at Bram who was wearing a steady glare now.

“Thank you, very much, Brad.” She waved, walking past him and the other greeters, toward the direction he’d pointed them in.

“Do you know him?” Bram asked, his voice lower than usual.

“No.”

“You called him by his name.” He cocked a brow at her, looking as if he didn’t believe her.

“Seriously? He was wearing a name tag, Bram. I can call any of the employees here by their first name.” She made a face at him, but this at least got a smirk from him. He seemed better once they reached the device area, it was more open here, with tables instead of shelves, and there were as many bodies to contend with. He relaxed a little more.

He didn’t bother looking down at the tables and looked around him. All the salespeople were already busy helping other customers, so Izabella started picking up different devices to check them out. “I like the color on this one, it’s like a peach.” She smiled up at him. He scrunched his nose at her. “You don’t buy a phone for it’s color. You’re going to put a case on it anyway. Did you even turn it on?”

“No. Bram, I’ve never had a phone before. No matter which one I get, I’m going to have to learn to use it and it’s not like I have expectations right now.”

“Maybe I should just get you the same device I have. It’s custom and would take some time though. But I don’t think you need that much memory. Something that can transfer any and all data to your other devices may make things easier too. He lifted a funny looking device that was folded in half. He chuckled at it as the glass like sides opened. “Going back to the flip phone and making it new again, huh.” He opened it and started to play with the buttons. “Interface is fine. I like that it folds and is smaller than the one I have. He started looking at the details, “This one’s neat, what do you think?”

“I think the first time I drop it it’ll shatter. Is it supposed to be all glass?”

Just then a woman rested her hip against the table they were standing at, smiling at them both. “It’s state of the art plastic, actually. I could throw that across the room, and will be more likely to hurt one of our guests than that phone. It does fold in, but the compress that created the seal between both pieces is as sturdy as steal. The one complaint we get is that it shows fingerprints all over it, so we’re offering free cleaning tissue, carry case, and solution as a package to go with it.”

“Can I get higher specks on it?”

“Of course. We can always get bigger specs on our devices. Those usually need to be special ordered, but if you don’t mind waiting, I’m happy to place an order.”

Izabella leaned into him, “Do you really need something bigger?”

“Yes, I do.” He squinted his eyes at her. “You want one of these? It’s actually pretty neat. I wonder if this is the one Tyler recently replaced with. I’m going to go call him. You, figure out which one you like.” He walked away from her, and she made a face behind his back.

Devon was now admiring the phone he’d just put down, “This is so cool! Is it good for games?” He looked up at the blond sales lady.

She shook her head, “No, if you wanted something for gaming, I would get you over to the tablets we have. The interface and availability of games is best on the Pear products we carry.” She leaned in close to the little boy, “Though I have a feeling your daddy won’t like me selling you their product.”

“No, he doesn’t like Pear.”

“That doesn’t surprise me. How about you, sounds like you’re the one who really needs a phone.”

“I’ve never had one before, he keeps asking what I want, but I don’t really know. I know I don’t want one that.” She pointed to the one that Bram would likely order for himself, that Devon was now playing on.

“I get it, you want something that will be easy to learn and use. Maybe something smaller and cute. Do you have an idea of apps you’re going to want to use? It’s my experience the interface on the Pear suites easy tech users better than what your friend was looking at. So, don’t feel you need to just follow his tastes. It is your phone, correct.”

“Kinda?” Izabella shrugged, rolling her hand in the air. “He’s more boss than friend. I’m his new nanny for this handsome young man here, and he wants to be able to get ahold of us if he, or we, are out and about.”

“Ah, so something that communicates well, and possibly with different avenues than traditional methods might not be a bad idea. If he gets this, and the two of you get something in the same family, we could actually open all the devices to a cloud set aside for just Devon. It would allow you both to have your own private sections on your phone, but complete access to Devon’s and some shared file groups.” The woman was now grabbing different phones from the same table and offering them to her to look at.

Bram came back, leaning against the table as she looked at a smaller phone, she smiled up at him. “I think I like this one.” She handed the phone to him and though he clicked it on and perused it a bit, he handed it back. “She said if you get that one, and we check to make sure Devon’s works with them both, we can add them together and share files. Or something like that, right?” Izabella looked over at the woman who was smiling, and dove right into the explanation for Bram again.

“Yes, that’s what I want.”

“I want that phone too, dad.”

“Alright, now, sell us on two tablets with the same features, and a laptop for her.”