After high school graduation, my four childhood best friends dragged me into a game of Truth or Dare. When it was my turn, the long-lost "real daughter" of the wealthy family they all doted on dared everyone to reveal their top college choice. One by one, they showed their screens: Texas A&M. Carter slid his college application portal to me, tapping my perfect 4.0 GPA and 1580 SAT score with a smirk. "I dare you to give up Stanford and come with us. Whoever backs out is a dog." That night, right in front of them, I signed the binding early decision agreement. Amidst everyone's cheering, Carter accepted my confession and agreed to be my boyfriend. It wasn't until the official acceptance letters arrived in the mail that I went over to their place, only to accidentally find the living room TV still screen-mirroring a group chat. The chat was named: "The Stay-in-State Bodyguard Squad." [Did she sign it?] [Yeah, signed. Four fake application portals to get her to voluntarily ship herself off to Texas. Solid trade.] [Mia is a genius. One stupid game and we finally got rid of the annoying shadow.] [Carter made the biggest sacrifice. He still has to pretend to date her until classes start.] I stood frozen in front of the screen just as the front door clicked open. The four boys and Mia, holding bottles of champagne to celebrate their acceptance into Stanford, froze in the doorway. 1 Carter was the first to regain his composure. "Since you saw it, I won't lie to you." "Mia doesn't have any real family, and she can't handle being far from home in a place like Texas. You’ve always been tough; you'll do fine on your own." Mia’s eyes welled up with tears, and she grabbed his sleeve. I didn't cry. I just pointed at the chat logs on the screen. "Who made the fake college application portals?" Carter admitted it without hesitation. "I photoshopped them." "Who came up with the Truth or Dare game?" Mia’s eyes darted away. Noah immediately stepped in front of her. "We all came up with the idea together. Don't single out Mia to bully her." I nodded, then looked back at Carter. "So agreeing to be my boyfriend last night... was that part of the plan too?" Carter’s Adam’s apple bobbed. "You wouldn't do long-distance." "If I didn't say yes, you wouldn't have signed." He said it as if it were an absolute fact, without a shred of guilt. Mia’s eyes turned redder, and she suddenly reached for Liam’s phone. "This is all my fault. I'll change my college decision right now." "I'll go to Texas with Chloe, and you guys can stay in California." All four boys instantly surrounded her. Ethan snatched the phone out of her hand. "Your Stanford acceptance letter is already here! You're not changing anything!" "But what about Chloe?" Mia’s shoulders shook as she cried. "She's going so far away all by herself. She's going to be so sad." Carter pulled out a tissue and gently wiped away her tears. "She's been fiercely independent since she was a kid. She'll thrive anywhere." "Your health isn't great, and you've never left California. Don't risk your future just because you feel guilty." I stood a few feet away, watching them coddle her. So this was the truth. It wasn't that Texas wasn't a good fit for Mia. It was that they couldn't bear to see her struggle, but they were perfectly fine sacrificing me. Liam pushed his glasses up his nose, his tone as analytical and cold as always. "Chloe, while the methods weren't the most honorable, looking at the outcome, everyone got the best possible result." "You're going to the aerospace engineering program that perfectly suits you, and we get to stay in-state to look after Mia." "Nobody's future was ruined." I gave a small, bitter smile. "So I should be thanking you guys?" Noah caught the sarcasm in my voice, his face darkening. "You wanted to go to Texas A&M anyway! Otherwise, why didn't you just explicitly decline the recruiter when they called you all those times?" "We just helped you make up your mind." It was true that I wanted to go. The research focus of their program had been my dream since I was a little kid. But because I couldn't bear to leave them, I had turned down the recruiter’s invitation twice. I had even considered giving up my favorite major just to stay in California with them. But there was no point in saying any of that now. I picked up the acceptance letter sitting on the table. Carter instinctively stepped into my path. "Where are you going?" "Home." "What about... us?" I looked at him. "What 'us'?" His face stiffened. "Chloe, don't say things you don't mean out of anger." "Agreeing to date you so you'd sign the paperwork wasn't entirely fake. I'll still be your boyfriend until school starts, and I'll come visit you when I have time." "I gave you exactly what you wanted, didn't I?" So in his eyes, gracing me with a two-month fake relationship was an act of profound charity. Mia spoke up softly, trying to comfort me. "Chloe, Carter really does care about you." "After you fell asleep on the couch last night, he even put a blanket over you." I almost laughed out loud. Tricking me into signing a legally binding early decision agreement, and then putting a blanket over me. When you do the math, I really came out ahead, didn't I? "Then I hope you guys stay together forever." I picked up my jade pendant from the table and dropped it right in front of Mia. "Didn't you say you wished you could have had our childhood memories?" "You can have this, too." Mia was too scared to take it. Carter’s brow furrowed deeper. "What is wrong with you today?" "Didn't you always say the five of us would never be apart?" "That was then." I turned around and walked out. My phone buzzed in my pocket. A message from the research program director. [The extraction vehicle will arrive in California in forty-eight hours.] [Chloe, please confirm if you are ready to join the classified team early.] I tapped 'Confirm'. The project required strict security clearance. Once I entered the facility, my phone number and personal devices would be confiscated and locked away. For a very long time, absolutely no one would be able to find me. I locked my screen and set the group chat containing the five of us—my companions for the last eighteen years—to 'Do Not Disturb'. They thought I would react exactly the same way I always did: get mad, cry a little, and then obediently come crawling back. But this time, I truly, permanently, didn't want them anymore. 2 Before leaving, I wanted to return their things. When Noah was twelve, he shoved his very first basketball championship medal into my hands, saying he was afraid he'd lose it, and told me to keep it safe for him. I took the medal and went to the community gym to find him. He was crouching on the floor, assembling a dorm room clothing rack for Mia. Surrounding them were piles of mattress toppers, desk lamps, and storage bins. "Put this hook a little lower," Mia said, measuring the height with her hand. "I can't reach it." Noah immediately took it apart and started reinstalling it. Seeing me, he asked casually, "What are you doing here?" I handed him the medal. "Returning this." Noah paused for a second. "Can't you just keep it? Why are you suddenly giving it back?" "I figured I wouldn't have another chance." He completely missed the finality in my voice, casually tossing the medal into a cardboard box full of random junk. "Perfect timing. Mia's dorm is missing a wall hook. You're strong, come help me lift this." I didn't move. Mia quickly interjected: "It's fine, Chloe is moving out of state soon. I'm sure she's super busy packing." Noah glanced at me dismissively. "She's been able to pack a bag in ten minutes since she was a kid. What could she possibly be busy with?" I turned and walked away. He didn't even chase after me to ask when exactly my flight was. Liam was in the library. I returned the stack of math Olympiad notebooks he had stored at my house. He took them, but his eyes immediately locked onto the camera hanging around my neck. It was the DSLR I had bought when I was fifteen after saving my allowance for an entire year. Almost our entire high school lives were saved on that SD card. "Leave the camera, too," Liam said. "Mia wants to make a montage video to play at the freshman orientation party." "This is my camera." "I'm just borrowing it. I'm not stealing it." He waved Mia over. Mia walked up, staring at the camera with eager, pleading eyes. "Chloe, I just want to pull a few pictures of everyone from when we were kids." "But our childhood doesn't have you in it." Her face went pale. Liam looked at me with deep disapproval. "Is it really necessary to be that harsh?" "She just feels bad that she didn't meet us sooner." "So she gets to steal my past to fill her void?" As if he had lost all patience, Liam reached out and grabbed the camera bag hanging off the back of my chair. "I'm just borrowing it for a few days. Stop being so dramatic." I reached out to grab it back, but he dodged me. "Once the video is done, I'll have Carter give it back to you." I stared at him for two full seconds, then let my hand drop. "Fine." There was nothing on that camera I couldn't live without. Anything truly worth keeping, I had already backed up to a hard drive long ago. Ethan blocked my path at the entrance to our neighborhood. "Perfect timing." He tossed an external hard drive directly into my chest. "This has all the home videos from over the years. You're the best at editing—help Mia put together an 18th birthday documentary." "She doesn't have eighteen years of footage with us." "That's exactly why we're using ours," Ethan said, completely oblivious to how insane he sounded. "Just cut out the parts where you're fully in frame, and splice in some solo pictures of Mia. It'll be fine." I looked down at the hard drive in my hands. It held videos of us learning how to ride bikes, our first camping trip, and every single birthday party the four of them had spent with me. And now, they wanted me to literally edit myself out. To let Mia replace me, so she could have the illusion of a perfect, complete childhood. "Sure." I accepted the hard drive. Ethan actually looked surprised. "You agreed that fast?" "Didn't you say I'd be over my tantrum in a couple of days?" He rubbed his nose awkwardly. "As long as you've thought it through." From start to finish, not a single one of them asked me what day I was leaving for Texas. That night, Carter took me out on a "date." We went to our usual hotpot place, but he spent the entire dinner looking down at his phone, rapidly typing. Mia texted saying her dorm mattress was too hard. He immediately contacted a luxury bedding store to have a custom mattress topper delivered. Mia texted saying she was worried about not getting along with her roommates. He sent several minute-long voice memos comforting her. The beef tripe on my plate was boiling until it was tough as leather, and he didn't even notice. "Carter." "Hmm?" "Do you remember what I'm supposed to be doing tomorrow?" He finally looked up. "Packing your luggage?" "Close enough." He let out a sigh of relief and pushed a bowl of dessert jelly toward me. "Stop pouting." "Once you get to Texas, just settle in. I promised I'd come visit you, and I won't break that promise." When we parted ways, he leaned down and kissed my forehead. "Be a good girl and wait for the semester to start." "We'll all come out to visit you in a few months." I didn't call him out on his lie. When I got home, I plugged the external hard drive into my computer and permanently deleted every single file containing our shared memories. Why should my eighteen years of life be used to decorate Mia's existence? I safely ejected the hard drive and dropped it into a padded shipping envelope. It was my final parting gift to them. A clean, pristine past, entirely free of me. 3 At 7:00 AM the next morning, I went back to the high school to pick up the last of my sealed academic transcripts. As soon as I walked into the main hall, I heard people laughing behind my back. "Oh, look, the brilliant 4.0 valedictorian has arrived." "I heard she tried to follow Carter to Stanford, but all four guys ended up picking Stanford, and she got shipped off to Texas A&M." "Shipped off? Please. She threw herself at them, got rejected, and is running away with her tail between her legs." A group of girls blocked the bottom of the staircase. Standing right in front was one of Mia’s newly acquired friends. She looked me up and down, then suddenly reached out and grabbed the camera hanging around my neck. "Is this the precious camera you wouldn't even let Mia borrow?" I clamped my hand down on her wrist. "Let go." "Why are you being so aggressive?" she yelled, intentionally raising her voice to draw a crowd. "Mia was right. Just because you grew up with four rich guys, you actually thought you were a princess." The girls behind her immediately chimed in. "Too bad for her, they all chose Mia." "Someone literally threw herself at Carter, begged him to date her, and got dumped after one day. Pathetic." A crowd quickly formed, whispering and pointing. I lifted my eyes and looked down the hallway. Carter and the others were standing right there. Noah was holding a stack of Mia’s orientation folders, Liam was helping her review her housing documents, and Ethan was carrying her iced coffee. Carter saw me, too. But he just frowned and didn't move an inch toward me. In the past, if someone even breathed a rumor about me relying on the four of them for status, Carter would corner the guy in the broadcasting room and force him to issue a school-wide apology over the PA system. Now, I was being surrounded and physically harassed over my own camera, and he acted like I was invisible. Mia jogged over, looking distressed. "Guys, please don't do this. Chloe is just in a bad mood." The girl gripping my camera scoffed. "Mia, you're way too nice." "She's just jealous that you have people who care about you. She wouldn't even give you a few childhood videos, and you're still defending her?" Mia's eyes instantly welled up with tears. Carter finally walked over, but only to pull Mia protectively behind him. "Chloe, if you have an issue, take it up with us. Don't take your attitude out on Mia." Before I could even open my mouth, the girl behind me violently yanked the camera strap. The camera hit the concrete floor with a sickening crunch. At the exact same time, another girl "accidentally" knocked over a janitor's mop bucket, splashing filthy, soapy water all over my legs and shoes. Loud laughter erupted in the hallway. "Oops! So sorry, my hand slipped!" I wiped a splash of dirty water off my cheek and bent down to pick up the broken camera. Carter looked at me, his tone dripping with annoyance. "If your clothes are wet, go home and change. Stop making a scene at school." So them publicly humiliating me was just a "slip of the hand." But if I demanded basic accountability, I was "making a scene." I didn't spare them another glance. I grabbed my transcript envelope and walked out of the building. Half an hour later, I had just finished changing into clean clothes when someone pounded aggressively on my front door. The four boys had brought Mia and barged right into my house. "Where is the jade pendant?" Noah demanded, cutting straight to the chase. "Mia was just wearing it, and a second later, it was gone." I leaned against the doorframe. "And?" Ethan scowled coldly. "You were the only one who got close to her at school. Who else would have taken it?" Without waiting for an answer, he marched straight into my bedroom and yanked open a drawer. The others followed, tearing through my closet and desk. For eighteen years, they had never knocked before entering my room. I used to think it was a sign of intimacy. Now I understood—they just assumed that everything I owned was theirs to dispose of. Noah ripped open a closet door and froze when he saw it was completely empty, save for a few stray hangers. "Why are you packing luggage?" My chest tightened slightly. Liam glanced at the suitcase and answered for me: "She's trying to scare us." Ethan scoffed. "Chloe, how old are you? You're still pulling the 'running away from home' stunt?" They laughed, completely relaxed. Not a single one of them entertained the thought that I was actually leaving. Carter found the early decision agreement folder sitting on my desk. He just glanced at the cover and shoved it carelessly under a table leg to stabilize it. "Normal colleges don't start until September. It's not like you can vanish into thin air today." Just then, Mia pulled a jade pendant out of the narrow gap behind my desk. "I found it!" She had dropped it herself. Mia looked at me, her cheeks flushed with embarrassment. "Chloe, I'm so sorry. I misunderstood you." Carter just gently ruffled her hair. "It's fine, you found it. Stop crying." Not a single one of them felt the need to apologize to me. Mia quickly noticed the open video editing software on my laptop screen. It was loaded with files—us burying a time capsule at age ten, our trip to Santa Monica at fifteen, and every single birthday we had celebrated together. "So the unedited files were here the whole time!" Her eyes sparkled with excitement. "Can I use these for my 18th birthday montage?" "No." I stepped forward and closed the laptop. The light in Mia’s eyes instantly died. Noah stepped in front of me, blocking my path. "What is your problem? Didn't you agree to help her edit the video?" "I changed my mind." Tears immediately began spilling down Mia's cheeks. "Do you guys think I'll just never be good enough to be your real friend?" Carter's face darkened, and he aggressively grabbed my computer mouse. "If she wants the videos and you don't want to be in them, we'll just delete you from the footage." "Carter, don't touch that." He ignored me entirely, highlighting every single file that had my name tagged on it. I reached out to stop him, but Ethan grabbed my arm in a vice grip. "It's just a few videos. It's not going to kill you." A second later, Carter hit the 'Delete' key. The progress bar zipped to the end. Me learning to ride a bike for the first time. Me winning my first science fair. And the video from my sweet sixteen, where Carter looked into the camera and swore he would marry me one day. All of it, manually sent to the recycling bin by his own hand. "There. Problem solved," he said coldly, letting go of the mouse. "From now on, you won't be in any of our memorial videos anyway." He only said it to hurt my feelings. He had no idea that his words were about to become a permanent reality. My phone buzzed. A text from the research director. [The vehicle will arrive in two hours.] I shut my laptop and zipped my suitcase closed. Eighteen years of my life, perfectly fitting into a single, 28-inch piece of luggage. 4 At dawn, a black, government-plated SUV pulled up outside my neighborhood gates. My parents were still overseas leading an engineering project, so they had to say goodbye via FaceTime. My mom’s eyes were bloodshot. "Are you absolutely sure you don't need us to fly back?" "The facility doesn't allow family escorts anyway." My dad was fighting back tears off-camera. "Take good care of yourself out there." "If anyone bullies you, tell your superiors. Don't just swallow it." My nose stung. At least someone couldn't bear to see me leave. As for Carter and the others... Last night, they were at Mia's house, decorating for the "Stay-in-State Squad" celebration party. The group chat had been pinging non-stop all night. Noah sent a photo of a wall completely covered in balloons. [Chloe, you have the best eye for design. Get over here and fix this mess.] Liam replied underneath: [She's still throwing a tantrum. Just ignore her.] Ethan posted a picture of a massive cake with five names written on it. [Let her eat dust in Texas for two days, she'll behave. We'll just FaceTime her during the party so she can watch.] I didn't reply to any of them. The extraction officer loaded my suitcase into the trunk. "Chloe, once you get in this car, the classified protocols initiate." "Your personal phone and social media accounts will be temporarily frozen. Is there anyone else you need to contact?" "No." I got into the backseat. My phone suddenly pinged with a group chat notification. Mia had changed the group name from "The Five Musketeers" to "The Stay-in-State Squad." Immediately after, she sent a screenshot. My nickname in the group used to be "Little Boss." She had just changed it to "Texas Penpal." Mia sent a giggling emoji. [I just changed it as a joke! Chloe won't be mad, right?] Noah replied instantly: [If she gets mad, tell her she can crawl back from Texas to change it herself.] Ethan sent a string of laughing emojis. Liam didn't say anything, but he 'liked' Noah's message. Carter sent the final reply: [It fits perfectly.] Staring at the screen, I realized I didn't feel much sadness at all. They had no idea. In ten minutes, I wouldn't even be their "Texas Penpal" anymore. I exited the group chat and deleted all four of their contacts from my phone. When I got to Carter's name, I hesitated for two seconds. His final message just happened to come through. [Stop being dramatic.] [Come over tonight to celebrate with Mia. And bring the hard drive with the videos.] The same commanding, arrogant tone as always. He was still absolutely certain I was at his beck and call. I didn't reply. I just hit 'Delete Contact'. The extraction officer handed me a tamper-proof evidence bag. "Power your phone down and place it inside." "For the duration of the project, you are forbidden from contacting the outside world, and the outside world will not be able to track your whereabouts." I held down the power button. The moment the screen faded to black, my ties to the last eighteen years of my life were permanently severed. The black SUV slowly drove out of my neighborhood. Outside the tinted window, the old oak tree we used to climb as kids flashed past in a blur. When the car reached the highway toll booth, I felt something hard in my jacket pocket. The jade pendant I had worn since I was a baby. Yesterday, I told Mia she could keep it. But she complained that my initials were carved into the back. After taking a picture of it for Instagram, she had shoved it back into my backpack. Eighteen years of companionship, and in the end, I didn't even get a proper goodbye. The toll gate slowly raised. The extraction officer reminded me: "Once we cross the county line, there's no turning back." I rolled down the window. The crisp morning air flooded the cabin, whipping my hair around my face. I opened my palm and looked at the jade pendant one last time. Then, I let it go. The jade hit the concrete barrier by the toll booth with a sharp, crisp crack. The black SUV didn't slow down. It carried me out of California, speeding toward a classified facility thousands of miles away. And I never looked back.
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