For a month, I stayed inside. I never went out. I didn't do anything. I just lost the will to try and associate with anyone. The apparent friends I had disappeared. Moore vanished. It was just me and my thoughts, just me and the paper and laptop I had. The phone still worked, so I had that too. I was bored, sometimes depressed. Angry, sure. One night I got so drunk I decided to call Lea. The first call didn't even get answered. She didn't pick up and I wondered if maybe that was some sort of falseness, too. I'm in my bed drinking, thinking about how I gave up a dream for money.

The phone finally goes off. I pick it up. "Alex?"

"Lea, hey, how are you?" I ask.

"Good, good," she says, some obvious rain in the background, "glad you called. How are things?"

"I'm... okay."

She's probably smiling on the other end. "Okay is not bad, so that's good."

"Yeah."

"I haven't even heard from Alex the Entrepreneur Mastermind in what, a couple months? Thought you just fucked me and left," she said.

"No," I say, "no, just... been dealing with some stuff. What are you doing, anyway, Lea?"

"Oh, just got fired," she laughs.

I sigh. "That's not good."

"I'm not going to really worry about it," she drinks something I can't see.

I'm in bed, confused about why someone isn't upset about their bad luck and misfortunes. "Aren't you upset? Worried?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because I can find something else. Chances are always coming, you just need to take them. Like you did, right?" she says.

"You know," I say, "you're right."

"Can I come up and visit you? I can pay for the plane ticket."

I grin. "No, I can cover it. When?"

"Well... uhm..."

"You don't have anywhere to stay, do you?"

"No," she lets out a long sigh.

I think I could probably use a good company. "I'll take care of it."

"Really?!"

"Yeah."

She's giddy on the other end, bursting with joy. "Oh god, thank you so much. What airport?"

"We'll figure it out," I say, "there are probably a ton."

"I'll get my stuff. When?"

"Fuck," I look over, "tomorrow. Morning. I'll wire everything you need, then you can go. I'll just pick you up. I need to sober myself."

"You're drinking?" she asks, concerned.

"Yeah. Drown the sadness. It swims."

"I'm coming up there and smacking you for that. Don't drink when you're sad by yourself," she pauses, "I mean you're alone right?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Well... just curious. Look, whatever is bothering you, other things can be worse."

"I fucked up Cryptid," I say, "it's gone. The company killed it."

She scoffs. "Assholes. But, so?"

I don't know how to handle that. "What do you mean, 'so'?"

"You can do it again. But better, right?"

Maybe. "I don't know that," I say.

"Yes you can," she is scolding me, "you know you can, don't doubt yourself."

"Oh come on, you just liked me because I was famous."

"No," she said, "no, I'd been following you for a while. I just ran into you and thought, well, why not?"

I laugh. "If you could do me again but better, would you?"

"Yes. I'll do you as much as I need to until it's never anything under perfect."

I laugh. "Better and better."

Then it hits me. I can do it again and better. I got into this business because I loved starting things, mothering them into their full form. I love making things, not money. I mean I love that too, but its just a secondary thing. "You know," I take another drink, "you're right. By the way, where are you?"

"The Bahamas still."

"Go to the nearest airport. I'm paying for the ticket right now."

I can hear the joy in her voice. "Really?"

I open my laptop and start transferring some money. "Give me your bank details."

She's right, though. Chances come and go. I made a vow after I picked her up from the airport. I wasn't going to sell my company again. All I wanted since I was little was to grow something and nurture that thing until I died. She and I worked together and started a new company. I guess she had a knack for design. It failed, then we tried another and it failed too, but we kept going.

Eventually, we got one to work. Oleander, a name she picked. It was a small computer in a small thumb drive that stored data about the statistics of your employee's working history. You'd see if they were fucking off or actually working. It also kept records on the computer or server things, like the amount of RAM being used and temperature. What made it special was that when you plugged it in, it cross-referenced it with previous data in the bank and compared it for efficiency. This was linked to a server we had that stored it for comparison, which turned out to help companies a lot.

A few times we had people offer to buy us out which neither of us agreed to.

I wrote the software and soldered the hardware, she did the design for the website and logos. Together we made a good pair. It took a few times but I had my dream back. This time, I wasn't going to mess it up. I wasn't going to sell it to the highest bidder. I didn't really want to do that anyway.

It's not about the money for me and if I ever thought it was, I was wrong. Oleander would prove that. Besides, we were making so much money off Oleander we didn't need to sell to anyone. I wouldn't anyway, even for a ridiculous price. I wanted to be an entrepreneur, a startup master.

I get a call one day from someone. "Hi, this is Jeremy from Interlab. We'd like to talk to you about Oleander, if we could."

"What for?" I ask.

"Well, we were interested in purchasing it."

I shake my head. "Oleander is not for sale."

"Well, we have a really nice offer that would say something otherwise," he says.

No. Nope. Never. "No."

He sighs. "Look, just hear me out."

Sometimes hanging up a phone feels better than it should. Each time I tell them no, it just gets better and better.

I smile, lean back in my crappy couch with Lea, kiss her and hang up the cell phone.

Oleander isn't for sale.