Dyalessia Games: Melody & Sarah (Dyalessia Games Book 3) Read online

  Table of Contents

  Legal

  Also By

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Epilogue

  Social Media

  Legal

  Dyalessia Games: Melody & Sarah is a work of fiction.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2018 Scott Kujawa. All Rights Reserved.

  Version 1.0

  Also by Scott Kujawa

  Dyalessia Games

  Alexandria & Christie

  Bess & Mira

  Melody & Sarah

  Dyalessia Friends

  Elly & Kitty

  Bastet's Daughters

  Beginnings

  Growth

  Endings

  Rainy Days

  Overcast

  Bastet's Daughters Shorts

  Samantha Redding

  Boxed Sets

  Dyalessia Games Trilogy

  Bastet's Daughters Trilogy

  Dedication

  To Grandfather.

  Chapter One

  Sarah didn't know how many times she saw the older blond sister of Dyalessia Games pass by the front of Night Readers, the bookstore and cafe she opened about the same time Dyalessia Games moved into the building across the street.

  When she learned about the company moving into the building across the street when Sarah cleared out space in the back of the bookstore, allowing her to squeeze in enough space to set up a half-dozen desktop computers as a way to draw more people in the store which was a mix of different stores.

  She thought the computer stations might be useful to bring in anyone from across the street or any of the video game players who might want to have a place where they can come inside and stare at the building where Dyalessia Games housed all the employees the video game company would have when the video game company started by the two sisters and their friend became as popular as Sarah expected the company to become.

  It was a good thing Sarah added the cafe to the strange blend of a bookstore, computer hub, and cafe because the drinks and quick food she offered helped her stay open and in business once the word of mouth of how she offered a large selection of different sizes and blends of coffee, different blends of tea, a nice mixture of soft drinks, and later came the stocking of the energy drinks when it became clear many of the family of video game designers at Dyalessia Games wanted her to stock those, she added those type of drinks to what she sold.

  The quick and easy meals were as popular as the drinks she sold. Bagels, muffins, sandwiches, and other sweets or pastries which could be eaten on the go or without spending a long time waiting for them to prepare meant more word of mouth about her store spread among those who entered or left the building across the street.

  It was odd though. Not once did Melody ever set foot in Night Readers though Sarah kept the store hours open late, not opening the bookstore, cafe, computer hub, and gathering place until at least noon which meant she didn't close her business until an hour or two after the last employee at Dyalessia Games left for the day, which meant Sarah kept the store open to about eight to ten at night. Though the designers left work, they came to the shop after they've left work, relax in the shop as a way to unwind from working all day on the world of Dyalessia or the other projects any of they were working on for the video game company.

  Night Readers was more to her than her business, it was a place where she could meet people, or host book clubs, which happened once a week with different men and women who asked if they could use Night Readers as a place where they could gather to discuss the current book they've selected to read during the time between each of their gatherings.

  Each book club differed from the other which amused Sarah since there were about six different gatherings of people and each gathering were a range of ages from young adults, to college age students working on their degrees at any of the local colleges around Rochester, to adults who wanted to get out for the night and away from their children or husband or wife, depending on who was part of those groups, to those who were older and close to retiring or have retired and wanted ways to be social with others of their age or anyone younger.

  With the way Sarah stayed in business because of Dyalessia Games and having her store across the street from the video game company helped her keep the dream of owning her own bookstore from closing, Sarah appreciated having the video game company across the street from Night Readers because the more Dyalessia Games grew, the more Night Readers brought in more money and allowed Sarah to expand her business if expanding the store into the place it has become didn't happen overnight and it took years to turn Night Readers into the store it grew into.

  When she first started the bookstore, Sarah never dreamed her bookstore wound grow into the business it became due to the way many of the employees at Dyalessia Games spread the word about the bookstore across the street from the building where they worked.

  Night Readers didn't start off into the large blend of different things the store turned into. When Sarah first opened the bookstore, she rented the space from the landlord and the store was a store which sold nothing except books. At the time she first opened Night Readers, the inside of the store appeared to be a stereotypical bookstore.

  Cases of books were placed around the store and books were shelved onto the cases, any which way the books could be shelved to make use of the available space on the book cases. Stacks of books were all over the store, making towers of books but one thing Sarah made sure of was the towers of stacked books were books of all the same size. Paperbacks made towers of paperbacks. Soft covers made towers of soft covers. Hardbacks made towers of hardbacks.

  At the time she first opened Night Readers, the lighting inside was what most people imagined in all the bookstores they read about or seen in movies. Lighting which cast shadows throughout the store and was bright enough to make it hard to find their way through the aisles between the book cases or the other open places where people could walk while they browsed for any book which caught their interest.

  There had been times the first year when Sarah was one of the people who bumped into the book cases, or the stacks of books she created as more books filled the store or were brought to her by those who noticed Night Readers and wanted to unload the books from their homes or from the other places where they stored their books.

  During the second year was when she hired someone to update the store, taking away the lights which had been in the building since the middle of the 1900s. With the modern lights installed, they brightened the store and removed the danger of walking among the book cases and the other dangers in the store which was still a small space.

  The counter where she had her cash register and where she made a space for rarer books, she wanted to keep a watch on and out of the hands of anyone who wanted to be grabby was off to the right of the entrance and the counter space was one place she never changed or moved as she expanded into the other space in the back of the store when she made enough funds to grow Night Readers into the space which sat empty until Sarah talked the landlord into letting her have the space which wasn't doing him any good with the space being unused though the space was packed with years worth of junk which had been stored in it.

  Most of the time Sarah sat on a three-legged stool she placed behind the counter made of a walnut as dark as the paneling on the walls, which Sarah kept during all the changes to the Night Readers she made over the years. The wood of the dark counter and the dark panels on the walls were part of the store from when the inside was first decorated and from the moment she saw the walnut counter and walnut paneling on the walls, she fell in love with them and decided she wouldn't change those features of Night Readers.

  Chapter Two

  Sitting at her desk in her office at Dyalessia Games, Melody wasn't being active and busy with the work she knew she should work on. The financial aspects of the company wouldn't finish the reports by themselves but for once, Melody wasn't in the mood to handle the books, or do the math she needed to do to keep the books updated with the income the video game company brought in over the weekend while she was out of the office, or do any of the calls and more which she had taken upon herself to handle so the game designers, artists, and the rest of the employees at Dyalessia Games could do what they were hired to do.

  The thought of something Alex said to Melody last year kept repeating through Melody's head like it was stuck on repeat and Melody couldn't shake the thought she knew she had work to take care of. All she kept hearing was Alex saying, "We're all complex, and there's no black an
d white for what we feel towards other people." and Alex saying, "You need to take a vacation. You're wound way too tight."

  Was her sister right? Did Melody need a vacation and was Alex right about the words her sister said to Melody when her older sister confessed to Alex about the way Melody felt about the woman who changed everything Melody thought she knew about herself when it came to someone Melody was attracted to?

  While she sat at her desk and stared at the monitor and at the game of solitaire she opened a while ago without paying attention to the game, Melody moved the cards in the game while part of her thoughts were running over and over on the two thoughts repeating at the front of her mind. She used the computer card game to keep some of her mind distracted, allowing her to focus her thoughts on the two different thoughts she couldn't shake although she knew it was Monday, and she should work her way through the things she needed to handle for the video game company.

  With it being the new year, it was more important for her to get a handle on the book keeping, but she spent most of the morning so far putting off what she should do and instead she sat at her desk and stared at the computer screen and at the card game which she's been playing for over two hours now and ever since she arrived at Dyalessia Games.

  When the new window popped up in the middle of her screen, the sudden way the window pulled her from her distraction caused Melody to flinch in surprise because she didn't expect the window to appear nor did she expect the sound of the ringing phone sound to accompany the window as the Skype call came in, which was what popped up on her monitor and caused her to flinch.

  Seeing the person who tried to connect with her, Melody clicked to connect the call, letting her sister's image pop up on the window though Alex could have walked across the space between their offices and stepped into Melody's office since Alex's office was only a few feet away.

  "Melody Louvre Johnson," came Alex's first words before Melody could say anything to her sister, making it clear to Melody her sister was being serious since Alex used Melody's full name the same way their parents used the full names of their daughters when one sister did something their parents didn't appreciate. "I don't know what you're doing but whatever you're doing has the horde out in the bullpen gossiping like a gathering of chickens clucking at one another."

  Alex smiled at her sister through the video conferencing program, trying to show Melody the younger sister wasn't trying to upset her sister with what Alex said to her about the employees and how everyone knew how Melody continued to act out of sorts and different from the way Melody went about doing the things she knew she needed to complete.

  "Tell me, what is the matter? And don't tell me there isn't something going on with you because if I have one more come knock on my door and want to talk, I will come over to your office and yell at you until I get you to tell me what is going on with you."

  Giving her sister the look Melody learned to give to her sister during the years they grew up together and during the years they worked together, Melody hoped the annoyed expression would get Alex to drop the subject and leave her sister alone.

  When she heard her sister repeat Melody's full name a second time, she knew Alex would not let this go and her sister would needle her until Alex got Melody to open about her feelings and talk to her sister about why Melody was acting the way she was acting.

  "Alex don't you dare -" Melody said as she saw the way Alex stepped away from the camera on her computer, making it clear Alex wasn't going back on her threat, and she would be inside of Melody's office in seconds.

  Chapter Three

  With a book open before her, Sarah looked down at the copy of the lesbian romance she read as a way to pass the time during the time things slowed down in Night Readers. Being open during the evening the way Sarah kept Night Readers open during the afternoon and into the evening meant there were times when nothing happened in the bookstore beyond the talk of the gamers who came inside to use the computers at the back of the bookstore. Or the table-top gamers who came inside to have a place where they could play out their campaigns for a few hours instead of meeting up at someone's house, or apartment, or somewhere else.

  Pulling her long black hair back from where it fell forward, having escaped the loose gathering she kept it in while sitting on the padded stool she could be found sitting on most of the time, Sarah kept an ear on the conversations going on in the back room, making sure none of them gamers became to vocal or annoyed the others in the back area of Night Readers.

  While she read more of the chapters in the romance novel she has been reading for the last few nights while interacting with anyone who stepped into her store to browse the book shelves at the front of the store, or to ask her questions about the books they found on those shelves, or the books they wanted to be ordered from the various distributors Sarah could contact when she offered to order books for the costumer who sought any books Sarah didn't have on any of the shelves in her bookstore.

  Hearing the chimes of the coins hitting one another come from the front door when it opened, Sarah smiled each time she heard the round coins hung on the red cords strike one another. Those coins were supposed to bring wealth to the place or person who hung them, and the red color of the cords threaded through the center of the round coins was the red thread of fate.

  Sarah might not be Chinese but it didn't mean she couldn't make use of the symbols to bring wealth, luck, fate, or more into her bookstore.

  Having the features of her Asian ancestors, Sarah honored the genetics of her ancestors. Giving honor to her heritage came easy to her because she appeared to be her bloodline with the black hair most Asians have, the tilted eyes were as dark as her hair, and the way she was shorter compared to the average height of a woman in the States, being only five feet. Her height was another reason she sat on the stool every chance she could, using it to see over the counter of Night Readers.

  Hearing the happy, "Hi, Sarah," come from her best friend caused Sarah's smile to grow wider as she looked up from the romance book she was absorbed in since her attention wasn't needed by anyone in the bookstore.

  "Zoey, hi yourself." Seeing her friend step into Night Readers, Sarah's mood perked up, and she was happy to spend time with her friend. From what Sarah remembered earlier in the day when the two talked with each other, Sarah wasn't sure why Zoey was spending time at Night Readers since Sarah was sure Zoey mentioned earlier in the day she was busy tonight since Zoey had a third date with the man she has been having dinner dates with and who Zoey was getting to know each time the two went out together for one of those dates.

  "Wait... what are you doing here? It's early in the evening still and I know you said you had a date tonight." Seeing the way Zoey smiled back at the way Sarah frowned at her and gave her friend a long searching gaze, it was clear Sarah wanted to know what was wrong and why Zoey was spending time with her in Night Readers instead of with her date.

  Laughing at her friend, Zoey curled up in one chair in the front of the store and took her time pouring a cup of tea for herself, making Sarah wait for the answers to her questions Sarah shot at her friend. When Zoey was content with the cup of tea she fixed for herself, she took a sip from the fragrant tea and smiled from the taste of the blend of tea she enjoyed every time she came to Night Readers.

  After she wrapped her hands around the sides of the cup, she answered Sarah's questions once it was clear Sarah was losing the patience she held inside while she waited for Zoey to prepare her tea and get comfortable in the chair she claimed as her own, for now.

  "Calm down, Sarah. Everything between Brian and me is going great. We were finishing the main part of dinner when Brain got an emergency call. Sometime went wrong at Dyalessia, and he had to head into the building across the street to take care of whatever happened. Since he had to go into work, I came across the street and visit my best friend at Night Readers until Brian finished what he was called in to handle."