Setting down my new, blank journal, I sipped my coffee, savoring it. Alone on my balcony outside the turret room, I watched the cobalt water glistening against the distant snowcapped mountains. The air was crisp that morning—my last morning as an Influencer—hinting of the pine trees that dotted the shore. The view was void of augmentation; the natural landscape didn’t need it.

Will I miss this? Adjusting my fluffy robe, I breathed in the coffee’s nutty aroma. I don’t know how to make coffee… I don’t know how to make anything. I guess I’ll learn…

Sparkles pricked the corner of my eye, the sun reflecting off my shimmery vintage Balenciaga dress hanging in the window. And I might miss the dresses…

Laughter bounced up to me off the water. Down below, my friends were headed to the beach, huge sunglasses and floppy hats obscuring their faces from the relentless sun. They’d apparently survived a night with a vampire, but they were moving slowly.

…But I won’t miss them. At least not all of them. Adam kept me awake most of the night, everything he’d said running repeat in my mind. Once I was certain everyone was asleep, I’d crept around until I found the house’s Network center. The Myrna-bot was still auto-posting for me. My parents weren’t taking any chances with this weekend, and I was still cut off from my own feed.

Pulling up the Network on the house account, I scrolled through my feed, going back months—realizing I didn’t miss the Network at all—until I found the post where I accused Adam of forcing me to sleep with him in exchange for him pretending to like me, for wielding his Influence. The Myrna-bot had pulled images from my Life Stream to dub a confessional video where I went on and on about how terrible he was and the courage it took for me to finally speak out.

It was my parents’ attempt to save my numbers—paint me as a victim to get people on my side and give Deena what she wanted by making Adam hate me—but all it did was make me hate my parents even more. At least it proved Adam and Deena weren’t gaming me all along. I still didn’t understand why they were hooking up, but it reopened the possibility that what Adam and I had was real.

On the beach below, Jax and Bryce put on running shoes and took off in the direction of town while the girls slathered themselves with thick sunscreen and lay in withered piles on the blanketed sand. They all had their own version of sweating out last night’s sins.

Wreck and repair… Before I wreck it all.

“So, where did he sleep?” Lil’s voice drifted up.