He pulled out the plastic container filled with the golden-brown pancakes he had packed that morning.
He opened the lid, releasing the faint sweet smell, allowing it to fill the room. Levi chewed slowly, letting the faint sweetness of the pancake settle on his tongue. Across the dusty room, Laila was still pacing, her voice hushed as she pleaded with Maya about his "mental health".
Levi bit his fork. Mental health? He had spent his previous life sleeping with weapons glued to his thighs and under his pillow. A million people mashing their keyboards on social media wasn't a crisis. It was free marketing.
'Right. Free marketing.'
He unlocked his phone. #ArrogantRookie trending at number one, and #LeviBigDebut fighting it at number two. Then he opened a group chat he had created last night. It already had 2.5 million followers.
[May: Hey. I didn't know you would come today. I had wanted to message you last night regarding what we were doing with the budget.]
