The phone buzzes on the counter—Claire Han. I snatch it up.
“Turn it off,” she says immediately. “Don’t react. Don’t post. We’ll handle the narrative.”
“I’m not letting him?—”
“Leo,” she cuts in, her voice sharp. “You go off right now, you lose. Let him talk himself into a hole.”
I don’t answer. I hang up instead.
Sage’s reflection flickers in the dark TV screen—still, silent, her mug untouched. The broadcast rolls on until the credits fade, leaving us in a room full of static and swallowed words.
Finally, she sets the cup down, the sound small but final. “He’s not just coming after you,” she says softly. “He’s coming after what I built.”
I meet her eyes. “Then we stop playing defense.”
We don’t turn the lights back on. The TV screen goes black, and in the reflection, I can still see the faint outline of us—two people standing in the aftermath, too wired to sit, too tired to speak.
Sage runs a hand through her hair, pacing the length of the room. “You think he planned that? The timing?”
“Of course he did,” I say. “He waited until the league hit me, until you got pulled from the restaurant. He wanted to kick us while we’re already down.”
Her laugh is sharp, humorless. “So what, we just let him?”
The question hangs between us, heavier than it should be. I can feel her frustration, the energy rolling off her like heat. She’s never been one to stay quiet, and watching her fight the urge now—it makes something twist inside me.
I move closer, steady, deliberate. “No,” I say. “We don’t let him. But we don’t play his game, either.”
She stops pacing, turns to face me. “Then what’s ours?”
“Control the story before he does.” The words come out harder than I mean them to. “We tell the truth before someone else spins it.”
Sage’s brows furrow. “You think the truth even matters to people who’ve already decided we’re the villains?”
“It matters to us,” I say quietly. “And that’s the only way this stops hurting.”
Her eyes meet mine, and I can see the fight in her shift—less fury, more resolve. “So how do we start?”
I exhale slowly. “We start with you.”
Her mouth parts, surprise flickering across her face. “Me?”
“You’ve been letting them tell your story for weeks,” I say. “It’s time you tell it yourself.”
She looks away, chewing her bottom lip. “You think anyone would listen?”
I step forward until there’s barely space between us. “They’ll listen to you. They just need to see the real version—the one he can’t twist.”
For a moment, the only sound is our breathing, low and even. Then Sage nods, slow but sure. “Okay,” she says. “Then let’s take it back.”
And just like that, the heaviness in the room shifts. It’s not gone—just changing shape. Turning into something we can use.
An hour passes before either of us speaks again, the storm outside fading into a steady drizzle while our breathing evens out. It’s enough time for anger to cool into focus, for chaos to start looking like direction.
The plan starts small. Scribbled notes on napkins, ideas fired back and forth between us until they start to form something that looks like purpose. Sage paces while she talks, her hands moving fast, voice rising with each spark of momentum.
“I can do a video,” she says, eyes bright. “Not some influencer apology thing—just me, in the kitchen. Honest. Real. Show people what I actually do, what my business is about.”
I nod, jotting things down. “We can frame it around authenticity—hard work, craft, community. Take back the narrative from the Puck Whisperer crap.”
