The price is reasonable. The reviews mention moose and silence and the kind of cold that makes you forget about everything except survival.
I book it before I can talk myself out of it.
Then I turn off my phone, close my eyes, and let myself fall apart without an audience for the first time in three years.
By morning, the video has eleven million views. My DMs are radioactive. Devon has left a ton of voicemails, each one more frantic than the last.
And I'm on a plane to Anchorage with no plan and the bone-deep certainty that if I don't disappear, the internet will eat me alive.
Ashwood Falls, Alaska.
Where there's barely any WiFi. Where nobody knows my name.
Where maybe I can figure out who Piper Meadows is when she's not performing for the world.
Chapter 1
Piper
The GPS lies with the confidence of someone who's never actually been to Alaska. "You have arrived at your destination!" it chirps, like we've just pulled up to a boutique hotel instead of what appears to be two cabins locked in an architectural disagreement about what "straight" means.
I kill the engine and stare through the windshield at my new temporary home. The January cold seeps through the glass, making the rental car creak in protest. The cabin on the left stands pristine and level, all clean lines and practical angles—the kind of structure that screams "I understand basic physics." Mine—the right one, of course—tilts slightly, like it got into the whiskey stash and decided to lean against its neighbor for support. Between them, the "Twin Pine Cabins" sign swings in the bitter wind, metal grinding against metal with all the enthusiasm of a funeral dirge.
Outside, the thermometer on the porch reads minus eighteen. Minus. Eighteen. I'm from Seattle originally, where forty degrees counts as "Arctic conditions" and the city shuts down if three snowflakes fall. Even after living in Anchorage the last few years, I'm pretty sure humans aren't supposed to survive in temperatures where your breath crystallizes mid-exhale. Outhere, three hours from civilization, it feels like the air itself wants me dead.
"Perfect," I tell the steering wheel. "Just perfect."
My phone buzzes with notifications I've been ignoring since leaving the city. Twelve missed calls from Mom. Forty-two texts from various friends who saw The Video. Three hundred and forty-seven Instagram DMs that I'm absolutely not ready to face. The only message I open is from my booking confirmation:Experience authentic Alaskan living in our rustic wilderness retreat!
Rustic. Right. That's real estate speak for "you'll be lucky if the toilet flushes and the roof stays attached."
But I'm here for authentic content, and nothing says authentic like hauling seventeen color-coordinated suitcases through snow that's apparently been accumulating since the Paleolithic era. I check my appearance in the rearview mirror—my "Frozen Femme Fatale" nail polish still pristine, my carefully tousled waves still camera-ready despite traffic infused five-hour drive from hell. My new Alaska Adventure outfit cost more than most people's monthly rent: designer snow boots with decorative buckles that definitely aren't rated for actual Arctic conditions or snow, a parka that screams "I shop at Nordstrom, not REI," and mittens that match my nails because God forbid I clash while freezing to death.
The first step out of the car teaches me that decorative boots have the traction of buttered skates on an ice rink. One foot shoots forward, I grab the car door, and manage to stay upright through sheer determination and core strength built from three years of yoga influencer challenges.
"Okay, Piper. You've got this. It's just snow. Frozen water. You've dealt with worse." Like finding your boyfriend in bed with your supposed best friend. Like having your breakdown go viral with two million views. Like?—
No. Not thinking about that. I'm here for a fresh start, and fresh starts begin with hauling the Ring Light of Doom from the trunk.
The ring light weighs approximately as much as a small caribou—which I only know from hastily googled "Alaska wildlife facts" while sitting in traffic. It's my most expensive piece of equipment, the one that makes me look ethereal instead of exhausted, angelic instead of anxious. Without it, my content looks like everyone else's. With it, I'm Piper Meadows, lifestyle influencer with 487,000 followers who think my life is aspirational instead of falling apart.
Dragging it through knee-deep snow while pulling my first suitcase—the rose gold one with my skincare essentials—proves that whoever designed these boots has never actually encountered winter. Each step sinks deeper, snow creeping over the decorative tops and straight into my supposedly waterproof socks. My parka, which looked so cute in the boutique, offers about as much insulation as tissue paper. The expensive kind that fancy stores use to wrap purchases, but still.
"This is fine," I pant, hauling my life across the frozen tundra one expensive bag at a time. "This is character building. This is content. 'City Girl Survives First Hour in Alaska.' People will eat this up."
By suitcase number three—the turquoise one with my ring light's backup batteries and charging station—I'm reconsidering every life choice that led me here. The mittens, while coordinated and adorable, make gripping anything impossible. Snow finds gaps in my clothing I didn't know existed. I've developed a sort of penguin-waddle technique that probably looks ridiculous but keeps me mostly vertical.
That's when I hear it. A sound like someone chewing celery amplified through a Marshall stack, mixed with aggressive snuffling.
I turn, still clutching my suitcase, and freeze.
Not freeze like "oh wow, what a surprise." Freeze like every muscle in my body has suddenly forgotten its job description. Freeze like someone hit pause on my entire existence.
Because standing in my driveway—my driveway—munching on my rental car's side mirror like it's an appetizer at an all-you-can-eat buffet, is a moose.
An actual moose.
Not a large deer. Not a weirdly shaped cow. A moose. With antlers that could double as satellite dishes and a body that makes my rental car look like a Hot Wheels toy. Its massive head turns toward me, jaw still working on what used to be my passenger-side mirror, and we make eye contact.
