Chapter 115: Quiz time

Amira looked at him.

"Question two," she said. But something had shifted slightly in her expression. The particular recalibration of someone who had prepared for a different outcome and was adjusting.

She went through eight questions. He was lucky it was the aspect he crammed.

Xavier answered all eight.

Not perfectly. Two of them he gave partial answers that she supplemented with what he’d missed. But well enough that by the fifth question she’d stopped looking at him like she was waiting for him to fall short and started looking at him like she was genuinely engaged with the answers.

When she finished she closed the tablet.

"You read it," she said.

"I told you I would," he said.

"You told me a lot of things Monday evening," she said. "Not all of them happened."

"The reading happened," he said.

She looked at him for a moment. The expression that had replaced mixed feelings entirely. Warm, certain, the particular look of someone who had long since stopped being surprised by him and had simply accepted what he was.

"You look different," she said.

There it is, Xavier thought. Kelvin says it every time. Now Amira.

"Different how," he said.

She studied him properly. The particular read she gave him when she was actually looking rather than just seeing.

"Something physical," she said. "Did you start working out."

"Started Yesterday," he said.

She nodded once. Filed it. Moved on the way she moved on from information she’d received and processed.

"Come on," she said. Turning toward the building. "We have a lecture."

They sat in their usual seats. The lecture started. Xavier cycled a donation quietly under the desk.

[ REBATE SYSTEM ]

Transaction Detected: $300,000 spent on donation — Women’s Empowerment Fund

Base Multiplier (Tier 2): 2x

Total Return: $600,000

[ Net Balance: $12,697,994.00 → $12,997,994.00 ]

His phone vibrated at 10:23AM. He checked it under the desk.

[ REBATE SYSTEM ]

Asset Rebound Triggered

Courier Company Acquisition

3x Investment Return: $1,260,000

[ Net Balance: $12,997,994.00 → $14,257,994.00 ]

$14,257,994, he thought.

He looked at that number for a long moment.

Past fourteen million, he thought. During a Wednesday morning lecture on food systems policy.

The lecturer was talking about something. Xavier heard it the way you heard rain from inside a warm building. Present, registered, not fully processed.

Fourteen million, he thought again.

He closed the notification and put the phone away.

Amira glanced at him sideways.

"Phone away," she said quietly. Not looking up from her notes.

"It’s away," he said.

"It was under the desk," she said.

"It’s away now," he said.

She almost smiled and kept writing.

Kelvin found them at lunch.

He looked at Xavier when he sat down with the particular squinting expression he deployed when he was identifying something just outside his field of vision.

"You look different," he said.

"Obviously, you say this every time" Xavier replied.

"Because it keeps being true," Kelvin said. He studied Xavier more directly. "Something physical. Did you join a gym."

"Amira told you, you can’t just see a day worth of gym," Xavier said.

Kelvin pointed at him. "I knew it and between it was my observation. I said to myself this morning, Xavier looks like someone who joined a gym yesterday." He looked at Amira. "Did you tell me shii?."

"You said Xavier looks like someone who spent money on something," Amira said without looking up. "Which is true every day."

"Same thing," Kelvin said. He looked back at Xavier. "Which gym."

"It’s located at commercial district," Xavier said.

"Of course," Kelvin said. "Not the campus gym. The commercial district gym." He picked up his fork. "One day Xavier. One day you’re going to do something ordinary and I’m going to be so surprised I’ll need to sit down."

"Sit down now," Xavier said. "You’re already at the table."

Kelvin pointed at him again. Ate his food.

Xavier cycled one more transaction under the table.

[ REBATE SYSTEM ]

Transaction Detected: $9 spent on campus cafeteria

Base Multiplier (Tier 2): 2x

Total Return: $18

[ Net Balance: $14,257,985.00 → $14,258,003.00 ]

After lunch Amira found a reason to walk with him toward the car park. Not arranged. Just the natural drift of two people whose routes happened to align.

She was quiet for most of it. The comfortable quiet she brought to spaces that didn’t need filling.

At the car park entrance she stopped.

Looked at him.

"Xavier," she said.

"Amira."

"The exam is Friday," she said. "You’re not sitting it yourself are you. You look super suspicious."

He looked at her.

She knows, he thought. Or she suspects. She’s been watching me not stress about exams for four months and she’s put the picture together.

"Someone reliable is handling it," he said carefully.

She held his gaze for a long moment.

"Okay," she said. Just that. The word of someone who had received information they didn’t fully approve of and had decided that saying so wasn’t going to change anything.

"Amira..."

"I said okay Xavier," she said. "Just pass. Whatever arrangement you have in place just make sure it passes."

He looked at her.

She’s not going to push it, he thought. She’s filed it under things she doesn’t have control over and moved on. He held her gaze. That’s the Amira version of letting something go. Not like she has a say.

"It’ll pass," he said.

She nodded once. Looked at the Panamera in the car park.

She looked at him one more time with the expression that had no fully adequate name.

"See you later," she said.

"See you later sweetheart," he said.

She almost smiled.

Turned and walked away.

Xavier watched her go.

She knows about the exam, he thought. Filed it. Moved on. Said just make sure it passes. He unlocked the Panamera. That’s Amira.

That’s entirely Amira.

He got in and drove home cycling some transactions on the way.

[ REBATE SYSTEM ]

Daily Cycle Complete

Donations processed: Digital Access Initiative, Child Nutrition Foundation, Rural Water Access Trust, Global Youth Foundation

Total Spent: $700,000

Total Returned: $1,400,000

[ Net Balance: $13,558,003.00 → $14,258,003.00 ]

[ $200,000 buffer retained ]

$14,258,003, he noted. Past fourteen million. Amira’s test passed. Courier rebound landed. This buffer is for real important.