“Look...” I fall into a chair. “It probably won’t go anywhere. But I wanna see if I can do it,” I say. “Working on something so exciting I don’t even know if I can pull it off is why I used to make things, and I don’t know, I guess I feel alive again thinking about it.”

Robbie pulls up a chair. “Let’s do it.”

A few hours later, Robbie is knee-deep in the books, and I am typing up some preliminary notes on his laptop when his phone rings.

“One second.” He stands up. “I gotta take this.” He steps into his bedroom, shutting the door behind him.

I just nod and don’t look up. I am plugged in, typing rapidly as I hit flow state, new ideas coming to me every second. My hands fly over the keyboard and—

Wait, what just happened?

The page I was working on disappears and an error message replaces it.

No, no, no, no, no.

Luckily, I know how to recover documents like the back of my hand, thanks to my parents’ confusion that because I know Java, I must also be well versed in tech support.

I make my way to the deleted documents on Robbie’s computer, and sure enough, there is the one I was working on. But something else catches my eye.

To Sara, it is titled. It was created in November. Which is weird, because he gave me a candle for Christmas, and my birthday isn’t until June.

My cursor hovers above the file I am supposed to click on. I pause and look around. His bedroom door is still closed.

I know I shouldn’t. But it’s my own name. I think I have a right to...

I slide the cursor down and click on To Sara.

The program takes up the whole window. The screen goes dark and then a question appears. Like a trivia game.

What is the best Beatles song?

Below the question is a small answer box. It’s funny, because that seems way too subjective of a question for a Trivia game. Hell, fifty Beatles fans might give you fifty different answers. Well, I mean, let’s be real, a good third of them are gonna pick “Let It Be,” and for good reason, but still. You can’t design a Trivia password with a subjective question unless you want only one person to get into it.

My fingers hover over the keys. I mean it did say my name, might as well try.

I type “Hey Jude” and click Enter.

The screen flashes green, and another question pops up. I am too excited about my correct answer to consider how weird this is.

When color coding binders, what color should the Urgent Tasks section be?

I type, Blue because it is calming and red sets off stress hormones in your brain. The last thing you need when facing a deadline is more stress.