Lucky Coincidence // Stuart Twombly

VII

Lara's brain hurt after watching each and every interview in dept for the past four hours and she was ready for a break, but before that was happening, they needed to decide who was going to be participating in the program. 

The people who hadn't been able to answer the question she had come up with, namely, 'Let's say you're the size of a nickel and dropped on the bottom of a blender, what do you do?', were instantly disqualified. 

That left the team with a group of highly intelligent and ingenious college students and they needed to make a selection out of them. 

They got through the mountain of candidates pretty quick, and even though Lara couldn't vote for Stuart, he got through and she had trouble not looking too victoriously. 

"Okay, let's see who our next applicant is." Lara sat up and blinked away the fatigue from her eyes. Chetty glanced behind him where a photo of Billy McMahon and Nick Campbell popped up on the screen. "Ah, our two men from Phoenix University," He chimed. "Dana?" 

"You're kidding, right?" She scoffed. "No." 

"Eleanor?" 

The brown haired girl glanced at the screen. "They seem like really nice guys, but I don't think so," she said. 

"Lara?" Chetty asked. 

"I'll have to agree with Eleanor. They don't seem to have the qualities we're looking for," She said sadly. Lara had been quite interested in the two men, but unfortunately, they weren't what they were looking for.

"Okay, moving on," Chetty called, but Lyle stopped him.

"Can I say something?" He asked. 

"You can, you will, and we will resent you for our time, but please, don't let that stop you," Chetty sarcastically stated and Lara hid the amused smile tugging at the corners of her lips. 

"It's just... Diversity is in our DNA, right? The goal here is to find people with a different way of thinking," He explained and Lara cocked her head to the side as she took in his words. 

"There are a lot of people with a different way of thinking, but that doesn't mean that we have to hire them," Dana cut him off. 

"Very good point, Dana. Moving on," Chetty stated. 

"I'm sorry, but you read their resumes. They have more years in sales and life experience than the age of most of our interns. And not to mention, our final judgment is always based on the layover test, right? Who would you rather sit next to at a bar during a six-hour delay? The ten millionth kid who know that if you shrink, your strength to weight ratio allows you to jump way higher, duh," He mocked. "Or, the two out of the box thinkers who turn being stuck in a blender into an advantage?" 

A soft silence fell as everyone reconsidered his words. 

"I think he has a really good point. I would much rather sit next to those guys for six hours than all those kids who knew the 'correct' answer," Lara spoke up first.

"Why did you put correct between quotation marks?" Dana asked. 

"Because there is no correct answer. Yes, the one Lyle named was the most logical one, but I chose this question because it can be interpreted in so many different ways. I was really curious to see who was going to say something else than the strength to weight ratio," Lara shrugged. 

"So you're saying we should let them participate?" Eleanor asked. 

"I'm saying that maybe we should give them a chance. In the end, they'll have to prove themselves," She replied. 

"I agree," Lyle joined in. 

"Fine. Lyle, they're all yours." Chetty put an accepted stamp on their resumes before he moved on to the next one. 

***

With a deep breath, Lara entered the room where almost every intern was already present. She smiled and straightened her back before she walked up to Dana as she saw her stand by the window. "I'm going to be late to my meeting but I had to ask, who is it?" Dana asked as Lara reached her. 

Lara raised a brow. "Who is who?" 

"Your boyfriend, duh," Dana chimed and Lara let out a chuckle. She scanned the crowd quickly and eventually landed her eyes on her dark-haired boyfriend who was invested in his phone screen. Most of the interns around him were chatting and talking but not Stuart. 

"The one with the glasses." She pointed a slender finger in his direction. 

Dana nodded slowly. "He's cute." 

Lara giggled. "Yeah," She nodded. "Yeah, he is." 

Chetty came up to the pair. "Ready?" He asked. 

"I think so. I'm kinda nervous, to be honest," Lara said. 

"No need to be, these kids are all below you," Chetty stated. 

"Okay, I gotta go. Good luck, Lara," Dana said before she rushed off to her meeting. Chetty handed Lara a microphone and turned on his own. 

"Good morning, my name is Roger Chetty." He turned to Lara and she took that as her cue to speak up. 

"Good morning, everyone. My name is Lara Atkinson and along with Mister Chetty, I am the head of the Google Intern Program. Welcome to Google." At the sound of his girlfriend's voice, Stuart's gaze shot up and he abandoned his phone. "This will not be your average internship, oh no. You will do what we do and we will see how well you do it."

"You represent the finest schools. Your intelligence and achievement are well noted, but," Chetty took over. "To excel at this program you will need far more than brainpower." He paused to let those words sink in. "What you are going to need, is Googliness." A wave of laughs ran through the crowd. "There's nothing funny about that. Googliness. The intangible stuff that made a search engine into an engine of change." 

Lara stepped forward again. "Very inspirational, Chetty, thank you." A soft chuckle erupted from the interns. "Now, you will all be divided into teams and by the end of this summer, only one team..." She held up her pointer finger to put power in her words. "Will be guaranteed a full-time position. The other 95% of you will not." Lara saw people look down in thought and doubt. 

"You have been split up into several seminars to get you acquainted with our campus and culture," Chetty spoke up again. "Seminar information has been emailed to each of you." Lara saw Stuart whip out his phone and she sighed softly. "I would wish you luck, but it is not luck that you need."