Riven sat alone on a bench two blocks from the hotel, the cold seeping through his sleeves. The night was quiet now. No applause. No flashing lights. Just the distant sound of traffic and the heaviness in his chest.
He stared at his hands. The same hands that had helped build everything Celeste now stood on.
His phone buzzed again; it was his sister. He let it ring out.
His breath came in uneven puffs, each one stirring memories he couldn't keep buried anymore.
Two years ago, she had shown up at his apartment door in tears.
"They rejected me again," she'd said, holding a crumpled pitch deck. "I don't know what I'm doing wrong."
He had pulled her inside, made her tea, and read through every slide while she sat across from him on the floor. The pitch was raw, scattered, full of heart but no structure.
"You're trying to sell a dream," he told her. "But dreams need foundations."
That night, he stayed up reworking her deck, tightening the numbers, rewriting the story. He even created a mockup of the app's interface on his laptop.
By morning, she had something real to present.
"Why are you doing all this?" she asked.
"Because I believe in you," he said.
They had met at university. She was bold, brilliant, always three steps ahead in ideas, but never quite able to land them. He was quieter, methodical. Where she ran against walls, he found the door.
He helped her through finance classes, rewrote her research papers, and even covered her share of rent for six months when she couldn't keep her part-time job.
It had never felt like a sacrifice.
They were partners. Or so he thought.
He introduced her to Daniel Kwan, an early-stage angel investor Riven had met while freelancing as a backend developer. Kwan wasn't impressed by Celeste's pitch, but Riven stepped in.
"She's not polished," he admitted. "But she's relentless. And if you give her a shot, she'll outwork every founder in your portfolio."
Kwan agreed to a modest seed round just enough to start development.
That night, Celeste cried in his arms.
"You made this happen," she whispered. "If I ever make it, it's because of you."
They built late into the night, eating cheap takeout and arguing over features. Riven coded while Celeste drafted customer personas and branding concepts. He fixed bugs. She practiced her pitches. He skipped job offers to stay and help her get to launch.
They had nothing.
But they had momentum.
They had belief.
Now, the glow of that past was gone, snuffed out like the cigarette he'd crushed earlier.
Riven finally stood, the ache in his legs matching the one in his chest.
He walked home in silence, hands in his pockets, eyes on the ground.
When he entered his apartment, the whiteboard still hung above his desk, filled with sketches from the early prototype.
Most of the handwriting was his.
He sat down, staring at it for a long time.
She used to say, "One day, we'll change the world."
Turns out, she meant her world.
And he was never going to be part of it.