“Why do you think Break Up withdrew? Do you think it was because of what happened between Hudson and me?” The thought stuck in her mind like a pebble in a shoe. She didn’t want Hudson to have forfeited because of their breakup. It didn’t feel right.

“I don’t know, sugar.” June patted her arm. “But … maybe you should reach out to him?” When Annika opened her mouth to say she didn’t see the point, June rushed to add, “For closure. Get some answers. And then you can say goodbye.”

Annika closed her mouth and swallowed the lump in her throat. Say goodbye. Deep inside, Annika knew that Hudson forfeiting EPIC meant something bigger. It was, at least in part, a rejection of her; it was him saying, with finality, that they were done. He didn’t want to compete with her anymore; he didn’t want anything to do with her at all. “Okay,” she said quietly. “I think that’s a good idea.”

When June went to make herself some coffee, Annika got her phone and texted Hudson.

Hi. Heard about the pitch. Can we meet?

The response came back less than five minutes later. When?

chapter twenty-two

June left early to meet with Ziggy. Apparently, he’d texted her to say he had a few things to tell her, and asked to meet for an early dinner. June looked nervous, but Annika knew Ziggy wouldn’t tell her anything she didn’t want to hear. It was probably work stuff to do with Break Up withdrawing from the pitch.

She herself was meeting up with Hudson in a half hour at a bar down the street. She’d refreshed her deodorant, reapplied some of her makeup, and now she sat in her chair, tapping her nails on her desk. It was so quiet on their floor. Too quiet. It gave her too much time to think. She considered calling her dad again, but she’d already called him twice (once to break the news of the win; he’d yelled so loudly, the nurses had come rushing to his room) and visited once. She knew he was fine.

Gently, Annika ran a finger over the glued-together sculpture Hudson had made her, her finger snagging on some of the sharp corners that were left over from its break. After a moment, she clicked to wake up her laptop and opened the cloud service June stored her work in. She knew June’s future projection program was stored there, too.

Without thinking too closely about it, Annika fed her social media accounts to the program, which were its main source of data points unless they were manually entered, as June had done for the fictional Annie and Sam. Then, she fed it Hudson’s social media.

A message popped up on the screen: Processing, please wait … and while you wait, enjoy this scene! May the Force be with you!