My Future Self Called

The instant I clicked the mouse, every ounce of strength drained out of me, and I sank back into my chair.

A confirmation window popped up on the screen.

[Congratulations. Your full scholarship offer from the University of Elinseburgh has been confirmed.]

I stared at that line for a full three minutes.

My phone screen lit up. It was a message from Harley MacGowan.

Harley: [Babe, did you pay the rent this month?]

Harley: [My account's dry. Send me three thousand for now, just to cover it.]

A clingy little sticker followed, the kind he always sent when he wanted something.

The old me would have opened the transfer screen the second I saw that message, no questions asked. Half of everything I earned tutoring on the side went to his rent, the other half to his clothes and dinners.

I'd thought we were building something together, that he was just stressed about his grad school exams and needed me to hold things up.

But my future self had told me the truth. He'd already secured his own placement three months ago. He didn't need the money at all.

What he needed was someone to bleed dry.

I marked the message as read and didn't answer. Then I opened my investment app and set up an automatic deposit for the twenty-one thousand dollars left in my account.

Once the Eklund Growth Fund went public next March, I was going all in.

My phone buzzed. A voice message from Harley, forty seconds long. I tapped it open. His voice came through lazy and self-assured, the way it always was when he thought the world owed him something.

"Why aren't you answering? Holed up in the library again?

"Don't work yourself too hard, okay? I booked us a table tonight, somewhere nice. You can front the bill for now."

I killed the message and let out a short, humorless laugh. Wonderful. Even taking me out to dinner meant I paid.

I typed back one word.

[Busy.]

Ten seconds later, he called.

"What's gotten into you, Anita?" Harley said, laughing, still wearing that same practiced gentleness. "I know you've been stressed lately, but forget about studying abroad, all right? We already agreed. You're staying to study for your grad exams, and next year we do this together."

"Mm. Got it."

I cut him off, my voice flat, without a single ripple in it.

He paused, clearly not expecting me to be so curt, then said, hesitant, "So the money..."

"Later."

I hung up. Not because I wasn't going to send it. Because I was never sending it. Ever.

Less than twenty minutes later, a message from Katy Kirman popped up.

Katy: [Anita, my thesis model won't run. Can you take a look?]

Katy: [Just a small piece of code, it'll be quick! Please, please!]

A string of crying-face stickers and folded-hands emojis followed.

I stared at the screen, remembering what my future self had said.

'Katy needs you to finish her senior thesis for her.'

Not help her look over one piece of code. The entire thesis, from proposal to defense, I was the one doing it. And the time she'd freed up doing that, she'd spent sleeping with my boyfriend.

I took a deep breath and typed.

Me: [I've been swamped lately. You should ask your advisor.]

There was silence on the other end for a long time. Finally, she sent a single "Okay," with no emoji attached.

I knew she was upset. But I knew even better that it wasn't because I'd refused to help. It was because she was scared her thesis wouldn't get finished, that she wouldn't graduate on time, that she wouldn't get to run off into her happy future with Harley.

I set my phone face-down on the desk and opened the course guide for the University of Elinseburgh.

The AI lab. I could apply before my first semester even ended.

It would be acquired by Coogle two years later.

My life, starting this very second, belonged to no one but me.