Infinite Cashback System

Chapter 262: 262 | The American Dream Is a Loaded Question

Jordan pushed the door open.

The hinges made a soft click that sounded unreasonably loud in the quiet study room. Eliza looked up from her notebook, and that smile stayed fixed on her face like she’d practiced it in the mirror this morning. Maybe she had. The old Jordan would have tripped over his own feet walking to the table. Would have apologized for existing. Would have already started calculating how much money he needed to spend to keep that smile directed at him.

The new Jordan walked to the chair across from her and sat down.

"You’re early." Eliza’s voice came out softer than he remembered. Breathier. Like she was speaking through a filter designed to make everything sound like an invitation.

"So are you."

"I wanted to make sure the room was set up." She gestured at the table, which contained her laptop, her notebook, the stack of printed research papers, and absolutely nothing that required advance setup. "Professor Delgado’s rubric is really specific about the argument structure."

"Uh huh."

Jordan pulled his backpack off his shoulder and set it on the floor beside his chair. He didn’t look at Eliza’s neckline. He didn’t look at the way her cream top created shadows where shadows had no business being in a library study room at two in the afternoon. He looked at her face, at her eyes, at the carefully constructed expression she was wearing like armor.

She noticed him not looking.

Something flickered across her features. Confusion, maybe. Or frustration. The old Jordan would have been staring so hard his eyeballs dried out. The old Jordan would have been sweating through his shirt and stammering about how nice she looked. The old Jordan would have been mentally calculating whether complimenting her outfit would cost him fifty dollars or five hundred.

"I brought you something." Eliza reached into her bag and pulled out a bottle of blue Powerade. She set it on the table between them and pushed it toward his side. "I couldn’t remember if you liked blue or red, so I just grabbed blue. I think you mentioned it once. During one of our dinners."

Jordan looked at the Powerade bottle.

Huh.

Weird.

He’d never mentioned Powerade to Eliza. Not once. Not during any of their twelve dinners. Not during any of their awkward coffee shop hangouts where she texted someone else under the table while he paid for everything. Jordan drank Red Bull exclusively. The old Jordan’s apartment had been littered with enough Red Bull cans to build a small aluminum fortress. His recycling bin had looked like a energy drink graveyard.

Eliza had never noticed. She’d been inside his apartment exactly twice, both times for less than ten minutes, and both times she’d spent those minutes on her phone while he scrambled to clean up evidence of his pathetic existence.

She didn’t know what he drank. She’d never paid enough attention to know.

This Powerade was a prop. A conversation starter. A way to say I was thinking about you without actually knowing anything about him worth thinking about.

"Thanks." Jordan picked up the bottle because refusing it would make this weird. Well. Weirder. He set it beside his backpack without opening it. "So. The debate."

Eliza’s smile dimmed by approximately three watts. She’d expected him to make a bigger deal about the gift. To get flustered. To thank her profusely and maybe offer to buy her something in return. That was the pattern they’d established over two months. She gave him crumbs of attention. He paid for the privilege with meals, gifts, and the shredded remains of his self-respect.

"Right. The debate." She pulled her laptop closer and angled the screen so they could both see it. "Professor Delgado assigned us the myth side."

"I know."

"Which means we have to argue that the American Dream is just a fairy tale. That it doesn’t really exist anymore." Eliza wrinkled her nose. "Honestly, I think that’s kind of depressing."

"Why?"

"Because I believe in it." She leaned forward slightly, which pushed her chest against the edge of the table and created a view that Jordan continued to not look at through sheer force of will. "The American Dream, I mean. The idea that anyone can make it if they work hard enough. That’s what this country is built on, right? That’s what makes America special."

Jordan considered several responses.

The diplomatic response would be to nod and agree and move on to outlining their argument structure. The professional response would be to note that their personal beliefs didn’t matter because they’d been assigned a position and they needed to defend it regardless. The old Jordan response would be to immediately abandon his own opinions and adopt whatever position made Eliza happy.

Instead, Jordan said: "You think the American Dream is real."

"Of course it is." Eliza’s eyes brightened with something that looked almost like genuine enthusiasm. "My grandmother came to this country with nothing. Literally nothing. She worked three jobs, saved every penny, and eventually opened her own business. She put my mom through college. My mom put me through private school. Now I’m here, at Pacific Crest, on track to graduate and build my own career. That’s the American Dream in action."

"Your grandmother’s story is great. It’s also from sixty years ago."

"So?"

"So the economic conditions that allowed your grandmother to succeed don’t exist anymore." Jordan opened his backpack and pulled out his laptop. He’d actually done the reading for this class, which would have shocked the old Jordan into cardiac arrest. "Housing costs have increased faster than wages for four decades. Healthcare is tied to employment, which traps people in jobs they hate. Student loan debt is approaching two trillion dollars nationally. The median net worth of millennials is lower than any previous generation at the same age."

Eliza blinked at him.

"What?"

"Since when do you know things?"

Jordan felt his jaw tighten. He forced it to relax. "Since always."

"No, I mean." Eliza shook her head, her honey-blonde hair swaying with the motion. "You never talked about this stuff before. When we were together. You never had opinions about anything except where to eat dinner and which Marvel movie was best."

Because you never asked, Jordan thought. Because you never cared enough to have an actual conversation with me. Because I was so desperate for your attention that I suppressed every part of my personality that might have been interesting in favor of agreeing with everything you said.

What he said out loud was: "People change."

Eliza studied him with an expression he couldn’t quite read. Her eyes moved across his face, down his neck, along his shoulders visible beneath the unzipped hoodie. The black tank top underneath showed off the results of three weeks of boxing and the Tune Up trait’s aggressive physiological optimization. Jordan knew he looked different. He’d seen the double-takes in the hallway. He’d felt the eyes following him across campus.

But Eliza’s expression wasn’t just about his body. There was something else there. Something that looked almost like recognition. Like she was seeing him for the first time.

"You really don’t believe in the American Dream." Her voice had dropped the breathy quality. This sounded more like the real Eliza. Whoever that was.

"I believe some people succeed. I don’t believe success is equally available to everyone who works hard."