This Multiple Choice Question Only Had Me As The Answer Chapter 10

This Multiple Choice Question Only Had Me As The Answer Chapter 10

After the forum, I went back to Westwind Ridge. 

The desert wind was as harsh as ever, but I was 

used to it. 

No coffee shops. No malls. No nightlife. 

Just day after day of simulations, tests, and 

problem solving. 

And stars. Lots of stars. 

One evening, a news clip aired on the TV in the 

base mess hall. 

[A new national defense system has been 

successfully developed, marking a world–leading 

breakthrough in this field…] 

The mess hall went silent for a second. Then it 

exploded. 

People were pounding tables, clapping, whistling. 

Because that was our project. 

The camera cut to the research team. 

I was there in my lab coat, U.S. flag pin on my collar, explaining technical parameters. 

My mom called later. She said she’d watched the segment at home. 

And then she cried for an hour. 

“My daughter was on the news! Your dad was so proud he called everyone he knows.” 

“Tell him to keep it quiet. My work is classified.” 

“I know, I know. He turned off his location sharing.” 

I laughed. 

The same week, another headline dropped. 

Jordan’s company went public on NASDAQ. 

The photo showed him in a navy suit at the New 

York Stock Exchange, standing in front of the giant 

company logo. 

Young. Successful. Brilliant. 

Commenters called him the pride of Ivy Coast. The best example of his generation’s 

entrepreneurs. 

Someone dug up that he was still single and 

called him “tech’s most eligible bachelor.” 

As for Yvonne? I heard about her from an old 

classmate group chat. 

After Jordan cut ties with her sophomore year, she 

lost her anchor. 

She went through several boyfriends in college, 

each one ending the same way. She drained them dry with her neediness and emotional 

manipulation. 

After graduation, she bounced from job to job. 

None lasted more than three months. 

Apparently, she once waited outside Jordan’s 

office building downtown. 

She wore a white dress and delicate makeup, 

trying to remind him of old times. 

Jordan said only one thing to her, “I indulged you back then, not because you were pitiful, but 

because I was an idiot. Don’t come near me again. 

Seeing you just makes me hate myself even 

more.” 

When I heard that, I felt… nothing. 

Yvonne was aggravating, but mostly, she was sad. 

She’d spent her whole life looking for someone to hold an umbrella over her head. She never thought 

of learning to hold one herself. 

People like that always end up the same way. 

The wind never stops blowing at Westwind Ridge. 

Gavin and I stood in front of the radar array as the 

latest test missile launched. 

Its exhaust trail cut across the sky, a bright arc 

against the vast emptiness. 

Everyone cheered. 

Gavin turned to me and grinned. “You know what 

day it is?” 

I blinked. “What?” 

He pulled out a small cake from behind some 

equipment. He’d gotten it from who knows where. 

The frosting was already melting a little, and at 

single candle was stuck in it, slightly crooked. 

“Happy birthday,” he said. “From now on, we 

celebrate every one together.” 

I looked at that little candle, flickering in the desert 

wind, and felt my nose sting. 

I thought back to my eighteenth birthday. The 

person who wasn’t there. 

And the girl I used to be, who followed him. 

everywhere. 

Under the endless stars, I smiled and took Gavin’s 

hand. 

“Yeah. Together.” 

I took the cake and blew out the candle. 

“Did you make a wish?” he asked. 

“Yeah…” 

“What was it?” 

“World peace.” 

I leaned against Gavin’s shoulder and looked up at 

the Milky Way. 

The stars were bright. The wind was strong. The 

person beside me was warm.