Before Mercer
1788 Words
The memory came back because of a cardboard box.
Elena saw one sitting beside the bank elevator while Nate handled the paperwork with Mara. Nothing special. Brown cardboard, packing tape, one corner crushed.
Then the polished marble disappeared.
The bank became a cramped apartment.
The box became a desk.
And Nathaniel Mercer was twenty five again.
“Don't touch that.”
Elena stopped halfway across the living room.
“What?”
“My computer.”
She looked at the laptop balanced on top of two cardboard boxes.
“I wasn't touching it.”
“You were looking at it.”
“Your financial model is visible from space.”
Nate quickly closed the screen.
Elena laughed.
“You're hiding numbers from a financial analyst?”
“I'm protecting my dignity.”
“That ship sailed when you used a moving box as furniture.”
“I am a graduate student.”
“You have a couch.”
“The couch was free.”
“From the curb.”
“It was lightly used.”
“It smelled like somebody's dog.”
Nate pointed toward the kitchen. “And yet you keep coming over.”
“Because you keep buying tacos.”
“I knew this relationship was built on something meaningful.”
Elena smiled.
They had been officially dating for four months.
Four months of late dinners, terrible movies, studying beside each other, and waking up more mornings together than apart.
It should have felt too fast.
Instead, Nate fit into her life like he'd been waiting for the space.
Elena dropped her bag onto the couch.
“Show me.”
“No.”
“Nate.”
“No.”
“You have been working on this mystery project every night for three weeks.”
“Four.”
“That is worse.”
He stared at her.
She stared back.
He sighed.
“You're exhausting.”
“You like me.”
“Unfortunately.”
He opened the laptop.
Elena moved beside him.
The spreadsheet covered projected revenue, staffing costs, software development, customer acquisition, and enough assumptions to make her eye twitch.
She read silently.
Nate watched her face.
“Well?”
“This is terrible.”
His expression fell.
Elena kept reading.
“Your customer growth is too aggressive. Your operating expenses are too low. You forgot payroll taxes, your insurance estimate is fantasy, and this margin makes me personally angry.”
He stared.
“You said terrible like you hated the idea.”
“I hate the model.”
“What about the idea?”
Elena looked at him.
For the first time, the joking disappeared from his face.
“This is what you've been talking about since college?”
Nate nodded.
He wanted to build software that helped small and midsize businesses handle projects, invoicing, scheduling, payroll, and vendor management from one system.
At the time, there were companies doing pieces of it.
Nate believed there was room for one platform to connect everything.
“You really want to do this.”
“I really do.”
“When?”
“Now.”
Elena laughed.
He didn't.
Her smile faded.
“You're serious.”
“I've saved enough to cover six months.”
“You have six hundred dollars in your checking account.”
“I have investments.”
“Three thousand dollars is not a venture fund.”
“I have a developer willing to work for equity.”
“You have a classmate who thinks sleep is optional.”
“He's good.”
“He once came to your apartment wearing two different shoes.”
“He was coding.”
“That doesn't explain anything.”
Nate laughed.
Then he closed the laptop.
“I know it sounds ridiculous.”
“It sounds risky.”
“Same thing when you're broke.”
Elena sat beside him.
“What happens if it fails?”
“I finish my degree and get a normal job.”
“And if it works?”
His smile returned.
“Then I never have to get a normal job.”
She bumped her shoulder against his.
“You're impossible.”
“You knew that.”
A knock sounded at the door.
Nate groaned.
“If that's Jaden, don't let him near the refrigerator.”
Elena laughed as she opened the door.
A younger Jaden stood there holding two grocery bags.
“I brought food.”
Elena blinked.
Nate appeared behind her.
“Who are you and what have you done with my brother?”
Jaden shoved a bag into his chest.
“Mom said you look thin.”
“Mom hasn't seen me in three weeks.”
“She saw a picture.”
“What picture?”
“The one Elena posted.”
Nate turned toward her.
“You sent my mother a picture?”
“She likes me better than you.”
“That is true,” Jaden said.
Elena grinned.
Jaden had been twenty two then, still finishing college and changing his major every other semester.
Where Nate was focused, Jaden was restless.
Where Nate entered a room expecting people to follow, Jaden watched long enough to know which person already controlled it.
Elena liked him immediately.
Mostly because he annoyed Nate.
Jaden unpacked groceries while Nate complained.
Then he noticed the laptop.
“What is that?”
“Nothing,” Nate said.
“A company,” Elena said at the same time.
Nate looked betrayed.
Jaden sat.
“You're starting a company?”
“Maybe.”
“What kind?”
Nate explained.
Unlike Elena, Jaden didn't challenge the numbers.
He listened.
When Nate finished, Jaden said, “You need a better name.”
Nate frowned. “I don't have a name.”
“Exactly.”
Elena laughed.
Jaden leaned back.
“What about Mercer Systems?”
“Sounds like plumbing.”
“Mercer Solutions.”
“Sounds like debt collection.”
“Mercer Technologies.”
The room became quiet.
Nate glanced at Elena.
She shrugged.
“Not terrible.”
Jaden smiled. “You're welcome.”
Years later, Elena would see that name on skyscrapers, conference stages, financial news, and documents worth millions of dollars.
But the first time anyone said Mercer Technologies aloud, they were sitting in a tiny apartment eating grocery store pasta while Nate's laptop rested on a cardboard box.
Elena didn't know why that made the memory hurt.
Maybe because everything had been simple then.
Not easy.
Simple.
The company was just a dream.
Jaden was just Nate's irritating younger brother.
And Elena loved Nathaniel Mercer without wondering whether loving him would eventually cost her more than she could afford.
Later that night, Jaden left and Nate opened the spreadsheet again.
Elena sat beside him with a calculator.
“Move over.”
“What are you doing?”
“Saving your company.”
“My company isn't even real.”
“Exactly. Easier to save.”
She began changing assumptions.
Nate watched.
“Your growth rate needs to come down.”
“That ruins the valuation.”
“You don't have a valuation.”
“I have confidence.”
“Investors prefer math.”
“Debatable.”
For the next three hours, they rebuilt the model.
Elena corrected his cost structure. Nate argued with every conservative assumption. She created scenarios for best case, expected case, and disaster.
“What is disaster?” Nate asked.
“You run out of money in month four and move into my apartment.”
He smiled slowly.
“That sounds less like disaster.”
“Focus.”
At two in the morning, Nate stared at the finished spreadsheet.
“You're good at this.”
Elena looked offended.
“You sound surprised.”
“No. I knew you were good.”
“Then why say it like that?”
“Because this is different.”
“How?”
“You see the whole thing.”
She looked at the screen.
Numbers had always been easy for her.
But this felt different too.
She wasn't just analyzing someone else's company.
She was imagining one that didn't exist yet.
Nate turned toward her.
“Come with me tomorrow.”
“Where?”
“I have a meeting with a potential investor.”
Elena laughed. “Absolutely not.”
“Why?”
“Because I have a job.”
“After work.”
“I have work after work.”
“Dinner after?”
“That is emotional bribery.”
“Tacos.”
She stared at him.
“Fine.”
He grinned.
It should have ended there.
Instead, three months later, Elena found herself spending every evening helping Nate prepare pitches, build budgets, and answer questions investors asked that he hated.
One Friday, after another meeting, Nate caught her hand as they walked through the parking garage.
“You know what my problem is?”
“There isn't enough time.”
“That too.”
“What then?”
“I don't want to build this without you.”
Elena stopped.
Nate looked terrified.
Not of rejection.
Of how much he meant it.
“You have a developer,” she said.
“I don't mean coding.”
“You have Jaden.”
“I don't mean operations.”
“What do you mean?”
Nate stepped closer.
“I mean all of it.”
Her heart began pounding.
“You have a career,” he continued. “A good one. I'm not asking you to throw that away.”
“It sounds like you are.”
“I'm asking you to think about what we could build together.”
Elena looked at him.
She had student loans.
Rent.
A retirement account she'd proudly started at twenty three.
Health insurance.
A boss who had already mentioned promotion.
Nate had a laptop, a dream, and approximately four dollars.
It was the least responsible offer anyone had ever made her.
And some part of Elena wanted to say yes before he even finished speaking.
Nate squeezed her hand.
“You don't have to answer.”
“Good.”
“Tonight.”
She glared.
He smiled.
“I'll give you until Sunday.”
“You're unbelievable.”
“You knew that too.”
The memory faded with his smile.
Elena opened her eyes inside the bank vault waiting area.
Nate stood several feet away, older now, watching her carefully.
“You remembered something.”
She nodded.
“What?”
Elena looked at the man who had once asked her to risk everything on him.
“You asked me to build Mercer with you.”
His face softened.
“Yes.”
“What did I say?”
Nate smiled sadly.
“You told me no.”
Elena blinked.
Then he added, “For exactly forty eight hours.”
- Writer
- chap_listContents
- likeADD