Chapter 10: Freedom

[Lillian: Alex, what will you do now?]

What can I do?

All I can do is take a private jet to a seaside vacation, stay in a luxury hotel to watch the sunrise, eat and drink well, and go home to be my own boss.

I spent three years building Vivid from scratch.

Give me another three years, and I’ll surpass it.

But knowing that some people still care about me—these three years at Vivid weren’t wasted after all.

That’s the only thing worth celebrating today.

I typed out a short reply to Lillian, told her to take care of herself, and closed Slack. The salty wind and the distant cry of gulls reminded me: I was free. Scared, yes—but free. Maybe that was worth something, too.