In her desperation to escape dating “one of my former bullies,” Jing-Jing had lied about already having a perfect boyfriend. Her parents had agreed to give the supposed love of her life a chance—one chance—so enter Rent for Your ’Rents. Enter me. My mission (should I choose to take it, which, yes, I obviously did) was to win over the Wangs and make them feel secure enough in Jing-Jing’s and my loving relationship to turn down the heir of No One Systems. Which meant that on this job, Andrew Huang had to be rich and successful, with a bright enough future to rival Hongbo’s. Given how the Wangs had reacted to my parents’ jobs plus my UChicago education and potential doctor future, we were right on course.

I was helping her. Providing a much-needed service. Without Rent for Your ’Rents, what would she have done? She’d mentioned in her application that talking to her parents wasn’t working, that they were convinced they knew better for her future than she did (man, did I know what that was like), so in some ways this position was honorable and not sleazy or a joke, right?

I wriggled around, trying to find that comfortable spot—you know the one, where you sink down so far it feels like you’re melting. But I couldn’t find it. My couch-bed was beautiful (burgundy leather, button-tufted, rolled arm), but it wasn’t made for melting. Or any sort of comfort, really. Too cold to the touch, and not broken in enough to conform to my body at all. It matched the rest of this house in its clean, minimalist, not-quite-lived-in style. Sterile, like a dentist’s office. The house was spacious for Palo Alto and the ridiculous pricing, but in another city it would have been on the smaller side for a family with two working dentists, I was guessing. Perhaps that explained the modernist approach to the interior design—an attempt to make it grander than the size and layout inherently were.

All in all, it wasn’t the best or worst couch I’d slept on for a job. The jackpot was getting a king-size bed to myself, which had happened twice, and the range for other jobs had included bunking with a younger sibling, an air mattress on the floor, and even a sleeping bag in the dog’s room (Denny was very friendly and cuddled me as I slept).