Bennett is sorta like Hayes in this respect because he likes puzzles. The difference between Hayes’ end game and Bennett’s puzzle-solving is this. Bennett is playing Tetris on his phone while he waits in line and Hayes is playing chess with champions on a global stage.
Both games require an ability to see ahead and make predictions, but you can’t really strategize Tetris. It was built to entertain. Your screen is only so big and there’s the added complication of all your failures compounding at the bottom of the screen.
Bennett is OK with that. He’s playing against himself and mostly because he’s bored.
Hayes isn’t. He’s playing to win.
So… who am I in this scenario? I’m the one who doesn’t play at all.
Sad, I know. But I don’t like games. I like truth. And I have come to realize that the whole world is filled with nothing but lies and illusions, so what’s the point, really? Why bother with games of strategy when I can just watch these fuckers tire themselves out and sleep well at the end of the day?
I get it. I do. I realize this is not a great outlook.
But I have spent my whole life wanting nothing because I already had it. And sure, you could point to all my friends and associates and say, Well, they had it too and yet they have managed to be ambitious.
I am not them. I am just me. I am just… ambivalent to the whole thing. I have no purpose.
So that’s why I’m gonna be a senator, I guess.
There’s no risk. None at all. It’s not my money paying for this shit, it’s my father’s. It doesn’t even matter if I win or lose, there’s gonna be another chance, right? I mean, I’ve lost several campaigns already and no one cares, not even me. I got the backers. I got the funds. I got the name.
So I’ll just keep doing it because I got nothing better going.
It’s busywork, I decide. My whole life has been nothing but busywork.
Except that year I spent as a Dirty One.
That year… it was fucking amazing.
Sure, Kiera got shot, Emily ended up in the nuthouse, and now our whole sick, sexy story is sitting on the New York Times bestseller list, but who cares? Connor felt energized, Connor felt needed, Connor felt complete.
I’m a pretty sick dude.
Inside the helicopter we’re all wearing headsets, but there’s no sound on the TV, so the silence is awkward. Especially since I can’t really read Hayes at the moment.
I count him as a friend but that doesn’t mean I get the guy, ya know? He’s a complete enigma. His family isn’t related to the famous Fitzgerald, at least that’s what they say. Because the famous Fitzgerald family was pretty average as far as high-society thinkers go and God forbid anyone in our world be average.
Upper-middle-class working families, like Kiera’s, I suppose, are legit on their own level, but she’s right. We don’t mingle. Mostly because there is not much occasion for it. I mean, maybe Kiera’s mother made enough to pay for her Essex education outright, but sixty thousand dollars, give or take, is a lot of fucking money to most people. Even if she was well off, you don’t easily give up that kind of cash every year unless you have so much of it, it barely matters.
Hayes, Bennett, Sofia, Emily, Louise, and Camille—we’re all the same. They’re all like me deep down. Maybe they really believe in their purpose, but I doubt it.
Only Kiera is different. She might be the only intriguing thing I’ve ever encountered in my short thirty years on this earth.
Hayes clears his throat so I look up at him. “So…” he says.
I glance over at Kiera, who is curled up in the giant leather seat, seemingly asleep with her head pressed against the window and her headset in her lap.
I look back to Hayes. “So what?”
“You two have a nice night stuck in the snow?”
“It was you, wasn’t it?”
“I’m gonna need a little more clarification if you want a straight answer to that question.”
“The snow plow. It was you.”
He nods. “Figured I’d shatter the illusion and bring you two back to reality. Because we’ve got problems.”
“So wait a minute, you and Kiera…?”
“Kiera and I… what?”
“You’re friends?”
“Why wouldn’t we be friends?”
“Well, you’re Hayes, for one. You don’t have friends.”
“That’s not true. I have you. Sofia. Bennett. Camille. I wouldn’t call Louise a friend, but that’s her choice. I tried, she just wasn’t interested.”
“Hold on. You’re telling me that Kiera has been in your world this whole time?”
“Again,” he says, sighing into the mic of his headset, “I don’t know why that surprises you. We went through a lot together and we came out of it stronger. You don’t just throw that away, Connor.”
I just stare at him.