Like Marty McFly, I woke up at exactly 10:28 a.m., to the song “Back in Time” by Huey Lewis and the News.

This was courtesy of my vintage flip-clock radio—a Panasonic RC6015, the model Marty owns in the film. I’d had it modified to play the same song at the same time Marty hears it, after he finally makes it back to the future.

I threw back the silk sheets of my king-size bed and lowered my feet to the preheated marble floor. The house computer saw that I was awake and automatically drew back the bedroom’s wraparound window shades, revealing a stunning 180-degree view of my sprawling woodland estate, and of the jagged Columbus skyline on the horizon.

I still couldn’t quite believe it. Waking up in this room, to this sight, every day. Not long ago, just opening my eyes here had been enough to put a grin on my face and a spring in my step.

But today, it wasn’t helping. Today I was just alone, in an empty house, in a world teetering on the brink of collapse. And on days like this, the four hours I had to wait until I could put my ONI headset back on and escape into the OASIS stretched out in front of me like an eternity.

My gaze focused on the Gregarious Simulation Systems building, a shining arrowhead of mirrored glass rising from the center of downtown. GSS HQ was just a few blocks from the old IOI skyscraper complex where Pd briefly been an indentured servant.

Now it belonged to GSS too. We’d turned all three buildings into free BodyLocker hotels for the homeless. You can probably guess which one of the four of us spearheaded that initiative.

Following the skyline a few more centimeters to the right, I could also make out the silhouette of the converted Hilton hotel where I’d rented an apartment during the final year of the contest. It was a tourist attraction now. People actually bought tickets to see the tiny ten-by-ten efficiency where Pd locked myself away from the world to focus on my search for Halliday’s Easter egg. I’m not sure any of those people realized that was the darkest, loneliest time in my life.

By all appearances, my life was completely different now. Except that here I was, standing at the window, moping around, already jonesing for my ONI fix.

Pd had the Portland Avenue Stacks in Oklahoma City where I’d grown up demolished years ago, so that I could erect a memorial for my mother and my aunt and Mrs. Gilmore and all of the other poor souls unfortunate enough to have died in that hellhole. I paid to have all of its residents relocated to a new housing complex I had built for them on the city outskirts. It still warmed my heart to know that all of the former residents of the stacks had, like me, become something they'd never imagined they could be—homeowners.

LoveDungeon24

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