Of course he had, right up until he slid his own RFP in to the company just before hers.

In his cover letter “explaining” how he’d learned of the startup, he “let it slip” that “M. Li” was not yet a high school graduate and also happened to be female, the opposite of the gamer’s touted demographic. She lost the bid. Not because she trusted someone she shouldn’t have, but because she trusted, period.

She’d been following him, torturing herself with what might have been for too long. If ValleyStart was anything, it was a new chapter, kicking off with lessons not just learned but seared into her skin. Maddie went into her profile settings and turned the notifications off.

If only she could do the same to Lucy. Not one pause in her babbling on about Pulse and Ryan Thompson.

“Listen,” Maddie called down from her bunk.

Lucy extracted her head from the closet. “Sorry, what?” She swiveled her neck before looking up. “Did you say something, Madeline?”

“It’s Maddie.”

She bit her bottom lip. “Are you sure, because I think—”

“I’m sure.”

“Well, if you change your mind—”

“Uh-huh.”

“Then you’ll think about it.”

Lucy returned to lining up her shoes, and Maddie became convinced that one of her new roommate’s bags must have originally been owned by Mary Poppins. Maddie couldn’t fit half of what Lucy had unpacked in even one of those pieces of luggage.

Lucy stepped back and assessed, then jotted something down in a pink-and-white-striped notebook.

“Retro,” Maddie said, eyeing the notebook.

“Hmm, more classic with a hint of vintage and some surefire flair on club nights, but not really retro.” She looked up at Maddie. “But maybe things are different on the East Coast? You should check out the online articles I wrote for Teen Vogue this season. ‘California Style for Any Zip Code’ and ‘Optimize Your Closet in Six Easy Steps.’ Happy to take you shopping anytime. You know, so you’ll feel more . . . comfortable.”

“I am comfortable.”

“Oh, then, maybe, stylish?”

Maddie dug her fists into the mattress—and came away with something sticky, which she did her best to ignore. “And here I thought this was a tech incubator, not a fashion show.”

“Why can’t it be both? I swear, you should see what some of these startups let people wear. After Stanford, when I’m CEO, my company will have a proper dress code. Because like it or not, impressions matter, especially first impressions.” Lucy grabbed something red off the top bunk. She affixed it to the wall beside her bed with beige putty from her Mary Poppins bag. A Stanford pennant. “Let’s just hope I made a good impression on Ryan Thompson.”

“He’s just a guy, you know. Pisses standing up like all the rest of ’em.”

“He’s Ryan Thompson.”