Chapter 11
Jayjay's POV
Day 4.
I hadn't slept.
Maybe three hours. Two, if you don't count the twenty-minute panic nap I took face-down on my notes.
There were graphs to format. Reports to edit. Interview transcripts to polish. And Keifer?
Keifer was sketching.
Again.
We were supposed to work after dinner — go over the final pitch deck. Instead, I walked into our room and found him lying on the floor, pencil in hand, sketchbook open, eyes half-lidded like he didn't have deadlines breathing down his neck.
"You have got to be kidding me."
He looked up, blinking. "What?"
"You're drawing again."
"Yeah, I think it's helping me think."
"We're presenting to actual CEOs in two days and you're doodling your feelings?"
He sat up. "It's not— okay, first of all, rude. Second, I'm not the one obsessing over formatting fonts at 2AM."
I slammed my laptop shut. "Because someone has to make sure we don't fail."
"We're not going to fail—"
"You might not care," I snapped, voice shaking now, "because you never have to try, but I do. I have to. Or what's the point?"
Keifer froze.
I didn't mean to say all of that. Not like that.
But now it was out there — the exhaustion, the desperation, the ache of never being enough. And the sting behind my eyes wouldn't stop building.
I turned away fast.
"Jay…"
"Just help me," I said, quieter now. "Please."
He stood there for a second, hands limp at his sides, like he didn't know what to do with himself.
Then he nodded. "Okay. What do you need me to work on?"
We didn't speak much after that.
He typed in silence. Actually helped.
Didn't complain. Didn't draw.
But I caught him glancing at me once or twice — the kind of look someone gives when they realize maybe you're not as invincible as you act.
Later that night, while I pretended to be asleep in bed, I overheard the girls outside our room.
Bianca was talking.
"I'm worried about her," she whispered. "She doesn't rest. She acts like if she stops for five seconds, everything will fall apart."
"I know," Lumi added. "She's burning out and won't let anyone in."
"We need to do something," Freya murmured. "She's not okay."
Something in my chest tightened.
I squeezed my eyes shut.
Of course they were talking about me. Of course they were right.
And of course… I couldn't let myself break.
The next morning, Keifer was quiet.
Didn't joke. Didn't tease.
We walked side by side to the conference hall. Not friends. Not enemies.
Just two people caught in the eye of a storm, pretending like we were still on opposite sides.
Back at the hotel, as Section E regrouped in the lobby, I spotted Felix typing furiously into his phone.
"Fake elevator malfunction?" he whispered to Edrix.
Ci-n: "Already bribed the front desk."
Freya: "We're locking them in tonight."
Mica: "If Jayfer isn't real by Day 7, we make it real."
I sighed.
This trip was going to kill me faster than the reports.