Infinite Cashback: My Wealth Rebate System

Sarah’s attention eventually drifted toward the television, her head tilting slightly as she studied it with the skepticism of someone appraising a used car. "Isn’t that, like, two generations old?"

Jason glanced over, his face slightly unbothered. "It works fine."

She lifted a hand and gave it a small dismissive flick, the kind reserved for antiques and outdated relatives. "I didn’t say it doesn’t work. I’m just saying it should be in a museum with a little plaque"

"The plaque would say, ’Still functional, unlike your attitude.’"

Sarah laughed, bringing a hand up to cover her mouth like she could stuff the sound back in before it got any louder but it didn’t work.

Jason watched her for a moment, something about the gesture catching him off guard. She’d laughed at him before, but this was looser, less like a reaction and more like she’d forgotten to perform one.

Sarah suddenly stood. "Take me to your kitchen."

Jason looked at her. "My kitchen?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

She was already walking towards him. Jason didn’t move, planting himself with quiet confidence.

Sarah stopped in front of him and looked up. "Don’t ask so many questions."

"You’re in my apartment."

"Exactly. So you should know where your kitchen is" she said delivered with the flawless logic of someone who’d clearly decided the argument was already over.

That wasn’t what he meant, but he got the distinct sense that pointing this out would only cost him more ground.

Sarah reached for his arm and gave it a small tug, a gesture with all the physical authority of a kitten pushing against a parked car, and roughly the same effect.

Sarah looked up at him, and there was a brief pause where Jason could have pointed out that her dragging him anywhere was physically impossible. Instead, he simply followed.

Sarah led the way toward the kitchen with the confidence of someone who’d somehow been promoted from guest to temporary resident without a single vote in her favor. Jason trailed behind, and the surprising part was that he didn’t actually hate it.

He watched her back as she walked ahead of him, moving through his apartment like she’d already memorized where the furniture was.

"Alright." He looked at her. "What’s the emergency?"

The kitchen wasn’t the most organized place in the world, but to him it registered as normal not because it met any reasonable definition of the word, but because he’d lived with it long enough that his brain had quietly reclassified it from problem to background scenery.

He didn’t cook. He barely knew how. The kitchen had accordingly evolved from a place where food was prepared into a storage unit that happened to contain appliances.

She stopped, her eyes moving slowly across the room, then back to him. "This..."

Jason waited.

Sarah pointed toward the kitchen. "This is the emergency!"

He looked around, frowning. What?

She turned to face him fully, one hand gesturing at the counters, the sink, and the general archaeological layer of neglect he’d apparently stopped registering months ago. "How long has it been like this?"

Jason looked at the kitchen again, then at her. "Like what?"

The moment the words left his mouth, he knew. The way you know a step is missing right after your foot’s already in the air.

Sarah’s expression changed. Not dramatically but just enough. Her eyes narrowed a fraction and Jason felt the atmosphere shift by a solid three degrees.

Ah. Wrong answer

Wrong answer. He’d walked directly into that one, and there was no version of "like what" that was going to walk him back out.

Sarah pointed at the kitchen again. "Jason."

"Yes, ma’am. "

"We’re cleaning this."

He looked at her, then at the kitchen, then back at her. "Right now?"

Sarah’s eyebrows rose. "Yes. Right now."

He stared at her. She’d apparently walked in expecting to wait for her roommate and somehow left with managerial authority over a kitchen that wasn’t even hers.

Jason looked at the mess again with the sudden, sinking suspicion that his evening had just been rerouted without his consent.

Sarah rolled up her sleeves. "Come on. Let’s get started."

Jason sighed and opened his mouth, already loading up what he considered a perfectly reasonable defense but he never got the chance to present his case.

Sarah was already walking toward the sink. "You’re washing those."

Jason stopped. "Those?"

Sarah glanced over her shoulder, and he followed her gaze, one hand lifted, pointing toward the sink, specifically at the dishes.

He had no idea when the pile had reached that size, only that somewhere along the way he’d crossed the invisible line between "I’ll wash these later" and "these dishes now have enough members to hold elections."

He sighed. "Fine."

He rolled up his sleeves, first one arm and then the other, folding the fabric neatly above his forearms, taking his time with it, partly because he was actually preparing to wash the dishes, and partly because surrendering too quickly felt like handing Sarah a trophy she hadn’t technically earned yet.

Then he walked over to the sink. "Has anyone ever told you that you’re extremely bossy?"

Sarah didn’t hesitate. "Yes. A lot of people, actually" delivered with the quiet pride of someone reporting a personal record.

Jason glanced at her. "Oh." He nodded. "So it’s not just me, then. That’s nice."

"See? It’s practically a personality trait at this point." Sarah said, her shoulders lifted with a smile.

"You’re proud of that?"

"Why wouldn’t I be?"

"Because I wasn’t complimenting you."

"You can take it as one anyway. I think it’s better that way." Jason added

Jason stared at her for a second, then looked toward the sink.

This was going to be a long afternoon and somehow, he already knew, with the grim certainty of a man reading his own future, that she was going to enjoy every second of it.

He picked up the first plate with the reluctant care of a man handling evidence in a case he had no interest in solving, fingers curling around the edge and lifting it from beneath the others with a faint scrape of ceramic against ceramic.

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