Infinite Rebate System: Beautiful Women And Endless Returns

She’ll call until she stops, Xavier thought. Then she’ll sit with it. Then she’ll start piecing it together. He crossed at a light. And when she’s pieced enough of it together she’ll go to Ardmore.

That’s when the second thing lands.

He was at his desk at 11:30PM when he finally checked the messages.

Not from Sarah.

Temi. Dana. Jordan. Three separate people who had been in that amphitheatre and had his number and had opinions about what they’d seen on that screen.

He read through them without responding.

Temi’s was the longest. Three paragraphs. The particular energy of someone who was genuinely shocked and genuinely upset and had decided that expressing both in detail was the appropriate response.

Dana’s was two lines. Shorter. More measured. The kind of message that communicated more in what it didn’t say.

Jordan’s was one word.

Explain.

Xavier put the phone down and didn’t explain.

He made coffee and sat at the desk and looked at the city through the window.

Done, he thought. The Reckoning is done.

He waited for the feeling of finished to arrive.

It was taking its time.

Sarah’s first message came through at 11:58PM.

Not a call. She’d given up on calls.

@sarah.torres.official: tell me why you asshole

Then immediately after...

@sarah.torres.official: you think this is a game? You humiliated me in front of EVERYONE. Victoria was there. The PRESS was there. Do you have any idea what you just did to me?

@sarah.torres.official: I dedicated a SONG to you. I was going to bring you on stage. I told the whole crowd about you and you did THIS?

@sarah.torres.official: who does this. What kind of person does this Xavier?.

@sarah.torres.official: answer me fuvkasshole.

Xavier read through them one by one.

There she is, he thought. The real one. Not the community centre version. Not the rooftop version. Not the phone calls after the masterclass. He looked at the messages stacking up on his screen. This is the version I knew in my previous life. The one that came through the door with purpose and left without looking back.

Loud. Aggressive. Entitled even in her pain.

That’s the Sarah Torres I remember.

He set the phone face down.

Picked it up again.

Why, he thought. She wants the reason. The explanation. The thing that makes the screen make sense. He looked at the message. She doesn’t have enough of the picture yet. She has the screen. She has the public moment. She doesn’t have the previous life. She doesn’t have the train platform. She doesn’t have forty seven dollars and a cheap bottle and the particular silence of 2AM with nothing left.

She’ll never have that, he thought. That part stays mine.

He didn’t respond.

Saturday morning arrived grey and quiet.

Xavier woke at 8AM, checked his phone out of habit, and found eleven missed calls across the night. Sarah, Temi, a number he didn’t recognise that was probably someone from the Arts faculty who’d gotten his contact through someone else.

One message from Amira sent at 7:30AM.

Amira: I saw what happened. Are you okay.

He looked at that message for a moment.

Are you okay, he thought. Same question she always asks. The same way she always asks about it. Not dramatic, not loaded with expectation, just the plain question.

Xavier: yes. Tonight still on.

Amira: yes. Tonight still on.

He put the phone down and got up.

At 10AM his phone showed him something through Instagram.

Sarah’s story.

She’d posted once. A photo of the exterior of Ardmore Recording. The clean signage, the professional facade, the building that had housed six weeks of her most important creative work.

No caption.

She went to the studio, he thought. First thing Saturday morning she went to Ardmore. He looked at the photo. Either to work. Or to ask questions.

Probably both.

He put the phone away and cycled through his morning rebate spending quietly. Small transactions. Nothing aggressive.

[ REBATE SYSTEM ]

Transaction Detected: $45 spent on breakfast delivery

Base Multiplier (Tier 2): 2x

Total Return: $90

[ Net Balance: $645,106.00 → $645,196.00 ]

His phone buzzed at 11:15AM.

Not Sarah. Patricia.

"She came to Ardmore this morning," Patricia said when he answered. "The studio manager showed her the full contract at her request. She now has a complete picture of the co-ownership terms." A pause. "She asked the manager who arranged the original booking upgrade. He gave her the holding company name."

"And," Xavier said.

"She’s coming to me next," Patricia said. "She’ll be at my office this afternoon. She’ll ask me directly if the holding company is connected to you." Another pause. "What do you want me to tell her."

Xavier thought about it for exactly five seconds.

"Tell her to book an appointment," he said. "Standard client process. Nothing outside normal procedure."

"Xavier," Patricia said carefully. "She’s going to figure it out."

"I know," he said. "Let her figure it out properly. Through the right channels. At the right pace."

Patricia was quiet for a moment.

"Understood," she said. And hung up.

The second message from Sarah came at 2PM.

She’d been to Patricia’s office. Patricia had done exactly what he’d said. Standard client process, appointment booked for Monday, nothing outside normal procedure.

@sarah.torres.official: the holding company. Xavier I know it’s connected to you. I don’t have proof yet but I know.

He read it.

@sarah.torres.official: the EP. The masters. $15,000. Xavier that’s my music.

He read that one too.

@sarah.torres.official: why would you do all of this. The studio. The masterclass. Victoria. All of it. And then.. last night. Why? You dumbfuck...

Three messages in a row. The particular rhythm of someone who had been holding questions all day and had finally run out of reasons to keep holding them.

Xavier looked at them for a long moment.

She has most of the picture now, he thought. The contract. The holding company trace to Patricia. The EP masters. He looked at the messages. She doesn’t have the previous life. She doesn’t have the system. She doesn’t have forty seven dollars and a train platform. He set the phone down. But she has enough.

She’ll come to me next, he thought. Not through messages. In person.

That’s when the final conversation happens.

He put the phone away and looked at the city outside his window.

Be careful it doesn’t cost you something you actually want to keep, he thought.

He sat with that for a moment.

Then he stood up and started getting ready for the evening.

Amira, he thought. Tonight still on.

Some things were more important than watching Sarah Torres piece together a picture he’d already finished painting.

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