Two hours into us coding, he looks up from his phone. “So how are we presenting this thing?”

Sara doesn’t even look up from her computer. “We need to know what it is before we try to sell it.”

“No, we don’t.” He sits up.

“Uh, yes, we do,” she says.

“I thought you might say that.” Braden grabs his backpack and saunters over to the counter. He unzips his bag and starts rooting through it.

“Oh, he came prepared,” I say, without thinking. I’m sure he thinks I’m being sarcastic, but I’m genuinely shocked.

Sara looks up. “What?”

“Do either of you know what this is?” Braden puts a small piece of paper on the fridge with a magnet. It’s some sort of company logo, but he has replaced the name of the company with stylized text of the word logo.

“Uh, no,” I say.

Sara shakes her head.

“This one?” He pins up another piece of paper, with another logo on it.

We both shake our heads.

“That’s what I thought.” He reaches into his bag again, this time pinning up the classic apple with one bite out of it.

We both laugh.

“Well, of course I know that one,” Sara says.

“I mean, dude.” I gesture to the two open MacBooks sitting in front of us.

“That’s what I’m talking about. Most people don’t know what computer is the fastest or has the most storage or capability. Both of you are CS majors and neither of you even knew what company these were without the name—you surely couldn’t tell me if they make better computers.” He pauses, I’m assuming for effect. “Because what most people know isn’t the gritty details in the code and wiring of the thing they’re buying. They know which company had the 1984-themed commercial about beating The Man, or which one told them to Think Different in 1997. It’s a computer that’s advertised with sexy close-ups and displayed in stores with glowing counters like it’s a damn modern art gallery. It’s Justin Long, while these ones you don’t recognize are the old dude whose name you don’t remember.” He punches the Apple logo with his finger. “They know a simple logo for a simple concept—Mac is sleek, it’s smart, it’s free and it’s young. People remember that and they open their wallets for that. That’s what’s important.”

“Nice speech.” Sara crosses her arms over her chest. “But we aren’t presenting to the ‘average person,’ unfortunately for you, Braden. We are presenting to an expert in tech, and he will know whether it’s the fastest, or whether, you know, it works at all, which is the risk we are facing right now. So, if you’ll excuse us, Robbie and I need to go back to coding.”