Chapter 1 #2
“Which she will be a lot sooner if she doesn’t start getting a handle on her sleep schedule.
” Aria catches up with us, and together we enter the small kitchen where Ramon, in defiance of Sophia’s threat, is pouring himself another coffee.
I queue up behind him and let my gaze wander across the room, which is based on the lighthouse in Novel Haven: warm colors, nautical decor, and a bookshelf sponsored by Notting Hill Bookshop, which takes up the ground floor of our office building.
It exudes all the calm and coziness that we want people out there to experience in our game.
And the game itself shows a lot of my inner world that never had an outlet before.
This office, like Novel Haven, has become a sort of home for me.
A refuge in a world that excludes me more than it accepts me.
And that’s the exact reason why I don’t care about the bags under my eyes or my weird sleep schedule.
Because if I can offer even one person the kind of refuge that once helped me, it will all have been worth it.
“Cheers.” Ramon raises his mug, winking at me, and steps aside so I can access the coffeepot with my Princess Mononoke mug. “Your coffee consumption is getting worse than mine.”
“As long as I’m not hanging over the coffeepot at six p.m. like you, I’m sorted,” I reply. I catch a glimpse of Ramon sticking out his tongue at me before he dips back out of the kitchen.
“A roller disco opened up in Marylebone,” Nataly starts again, loud enough to drown out the hiss of the coffeepot.
She wipes a few crumbs off the counter, hops up on it, and dangles her feet, which are, as usual, clad in elegant shoes.
Today’s are a pale-yellow pair, a perfect color match for her vintage dress.
“Disco?” Aria shakes her head. “I’m out.”
“Lads, come on! We can’t be living the retiree lifestyle just because we’re done with university.”
“I never went partying during university,” Aria interjects.
“Please, for me.” Nat flutters her lashes at us, and I can just see Aria’s resolve crumbling.
As usual. I bite my lip so I don’t laugh out loud.
Nataly is our studio’s marketing lead, and not only does she manage to convince us to get out on the regular, but recently, she even managed to get Kamal to do a TikTok dance.
I wish I had even twenty percent of her persuasive power.
Nat is our resident social butterfly. Aria’s more introverted, but even Aria manages to do live streams, despite her shyness.
I’m different—I usually stay away from all of that.
And for good reason too. I can be myself inside our four walls, here in the office, and in Novel Haven, of course.
But out there? In the real world, nobody wants my true self. I’ve had to learn that the hard way.
“All right, fine.” Aria gives in with a sigh, and Nat hops down off the counter to fling her arms around her neck.
“You’re the best!”
“But that means you have to tidy up that pile of clothes in the bathroom,” Aria counters, and Nat nods furiously.
“Consider it done.”
Aria and I exchange a skeptical glance, because although Nat is obsessed with her looks, she’s complete and utter chaos otherwise.
“Well then,” I say after adding a splash of oat milk to my coffee.
“Now that I’ve checked the demo version for bugs and glitches for the seventy-flipping-fourth time, I can finally get on with my work.
” I give the two of them a wave and trudge back to my desk next to Ramon, who is already fully immersed in Novel Haven again.
I watch him in secret for a while as he tidies up the lighthouse bookshop and offers the newly found books for sale.
Everything’s working seamlessly, and I sink into my desk chair with a sigh of contentment.
The next few minutes disappear in a vortex of numbers and code as the cute pixel graphics that Aria created make their way from the screen on my left into the game.
Since Aria can’t have a pet in real life, she’s convinced us to add a bigger selection of animals to the game.
Now players can adopt not only a dog, a cat, and a guinea pig but also a turtle, a bird, and . . .
“What on earth?” I murmur as my eyes fall on a folder of capybara graphics.
Novel Haven isn’t set in a real country, but the surroundings and the climate are supposed to look like South America.
Grinning, I open the messenger app and type a message to my flatmate.
Her profile picture is in the style of our game: A pixel-art graphic shows Aria as an adorable little character with wavy, dark-brown hair, bangs, and a book in her hand.
Lara: Capybaras? Seriously?
Aria: Sooo. Cute.
Lara: I swear, if we get any negative reviews for animal cruelty . . .
Aria: Yeah, because a single lonely cat living in a bookshop is so much better. Or a free-roaming guinea pig.
Lara: Touché.
Aria: Add the capybara or buy me a dog IRL!
I’m about to type a reply when another chat message pops up. From Sophia. Seeing as she’s the only other full-time programmer on our team aside from myself, that’s no rarity. But her being short, and no emojis at all? That is.
Sophia: Can you come to my office, please?
That’s all there is to the message, and Sophia has stopped typing. No smiley face, no hearts, nothing. Very unmillennial and, more importantly, very un-Sophia. An uneasy feeling starts creeping up on me.
Please, please, don’t let it be a bug in the demo. I checked it a hundred times already. Ramon, Kamal, and I pulled so many all-nighters.
Sighing, I grab my coffee cup and walk over to Sophia’s office.
As our boss, she has the great privilege of owning a door she can close, while the rest of us share a single large room.
I knock, and the lump in my stomach grows heavier when I hear her flat “Come in.” She sounds like she’s had the life sucked out of her.
I do a double take on entering, because that’s exactly what she looks like too.
Her fair skin looks even paler than usual, and she’s nervously drumming her fingers on her desk.
“Everything all right? Do you need me to buckle down on something? It’s no problem at all; I can absolutely get it done by tomorrow!”
“No, it’s not that, I . . .” She clears her throat, and her voice is so rough that it’s starting to sound like mine. Only the roughness in my voice is permanent. “I can’t go to the prelims tomorrow.”