INCEPTIO (Roma Nova) Read Free Page A

behind my ears, brushed the front of my skirt to ease the creases out, grabbed my notebook and scuttled after her. What could the boss want from me? I was nobody. With no college degree, I had watched with second-hand pleasure, but a twinge of envy, as others overtook me. But it hadn’t seemed so important; I had lived for the park. Maybe I needed to change that now.
     
    I stumbled out of the boss’s office an hour later, head whirling. After nearly two years, they’d pulled me out of the herd and given me my chance. I was to make the pitch presentation to new, and important, foreign clients. Back at my desk, I stared at my notes, terrified at the responsibility, but thrilled to be chosen.
    I slogged away researching, drafting and reworking my material over the following four days. I practised in front of the mirror to get it word-perfect. I worked on it over the weekend; I had nothing else to do.
    Now the day of the meeting had arrived. I glanced again at my watch, checked my face again, happy that my hair was still in the elegant chignon I had persuaded it into this morning. I knew my new blue linen suit was right – the vendor in Nicholson’s had said so.
    Unable to bear waiting any longer, I got up from my desk. Amanda squeezed my hand and said, ‘Go, girl.’
    I had made the long walk into the conference room but my hands wouldn’t stop trying to rearrange the neat stack of paper in front of me. I gulped some water to relieve my parched throat. Hayden, the boss, glanced over at me, one eyebrow raised. He was English. Proper English, not one of the 1860s left-behinds. His old-fashioned sports jacket and pants made him look like a crusty old guy from a black and white movie, but he gave me a human-enough smile.
    The new clients came from Roma Nova, in Europe, where my mother had been born. I couldn’t remember much from the Saturday Latin class my dad had insisted on, so I was curious about what they’d be like. Checking off ‘Latin (elementary)’ in the language ability section on my application had seemed so irrelevant two years ago. Now it was my springboard.
    A buzz on the intercom, and the door of the glass-walled conference room opened. Hayden and I rose to meet them. A short, brown-haired man walked past Hayden and held his thin hand out to me. Hayden nodded at me, nursing a half-smile, and made the introductions. This was our inventor.
    ‘ Salve , Sextilius Gavro,’ which was about as much Latin as I could muster at that precise moment.
    ‘My interpreter, Conradus Tellus,’ he said in a sing-song tone.
    His colleague was more than striking – blond hair long enough to slick back behind his ears. And tall. Several inches taller than me, even. Above a smiling mouth and a straight nose marred by a scar, his eyes were tilted slightly upwards, red-brown near the iris, green at the edges. He fixed his gaze on me like he was measuring me up, assessing me. I refused to break, but felt warmth creeping up my neck into my face as he widened his smile. A little flustered, I eventually looked down at his outstretched hand but hesitated. I gave myself a mental shake, threw myself into businesswoman mode and took it.
     
    Over the next two hours, the interpreter’s gaze tracked me as I moved to the screen on the back wall and around the table, giving out mock-ups and sales projections. He asked me to pause now and again so he could interpret, but each time he finished, he flashed me a half-smile. Sextilius Gavro scribbled notes ceaselessly, his fingers twitching with nervous energy. He kept looking up from his papers and fixing me with a stare. Although I described market segmentation, platforms and the importance of usability in full detail, they still asked so many questions. I was a prisoner under interrogation.
    I only realised hours had passed when my stomach bubbled; it was running on empty. I stopped talking. I had nothing else to say.
    After they’d left, I sank back into my seat and shut my eyes for a