For the record, Danny never wanted to be called “The Boy With The Computer Brain,” or any of the other names he got tagged with. That was his father’s idea, to use him as a “spokeskid” for Sharp Industries’ products when he was ten. To this day, if you enter “that annoying kid from the 90s computer ads,” an old picture of him will pop up on Google.

The coder turns back to Danny. “When I heard we were buying you out, I went down a serious Wikihole looking at all the old stories about you! You went for the altitude record in a homemade jetpack! You actually did that!”

Danny remembers spending most of the summer when he was eleven in traction, his leg and collarbone broken in multiple places. “Yeah. I did that.”

The other guy nods slowly and squints, as if trying to see something at a great distance. “Oh, riiiiight.” He smiles at Danny too, working up some interest. “My first computer in grade school was a Sharp-C80. Man, what a piece of crap that was.”

It’s like he farted in an elevator. The first coder looks embarrassed. “Dude,” he says.

The other kid tries to soften the blow, which only makes it worse. “I mean, no offense. You were really something back in the days of dial-up.”

There’s a pause and the conversation dies while all three of them stare at each other. But what’s Danny going to say? The kid is right. It was a long time ago.

When it can’t get any more awkward, the coder says, “Well. I guess we’ll see you around.”

“No,” Danny says. “You won’t.”

They stare at him for another moment, then turn and walk away. Danny can hear the first guy mutter to his friend, “Dude. Not cool. Not cool at all.”

Danny watches them head across the Facebook campus. The sun sparkles off the water in the bay. A flock of birds takes off from the roof garden. Other smart people pass him on the footpaths, staring at their devices, drinking coffee or smoothies, on their way to work on the Next Big Thing.

He’s glad he’s not going to work here, he decides. His future could never have looked like this. This looks like an expensive community college.

He would have had jetpacks.

Back at his office, Danny has to pack up his things. He’s been procrastinating. The staff of SharpTech is long gone, and the landlord has already leased the space to a different start-up. He walks past the abandoned standing desks, the dismantled espresso machine, the rows of unplugged computers waiting for the liquidator to come pick them up. There’s a construction crew scheduled to put in a new climbing wall on Monday.