An Address I Wanted to Keep

By 2024 the venture was no longer four names and a borrowed evening. We had engineers, designers, support staff and paying customers in several countries. The small Tuvalu market had never been asked to contain all that growth; our operation was based in New Zealand and served a wider private market. Annual revenue reached seven million New Zealand dollars, with one million four hundred thousand in profit after operating costs and company taxes. Subscription tools, original licensed designs and launch work earned the money. A domain could help a customer remember where to arrive. It could not make the customer stay if the room was empty.

An investment group offered to buy part of my holding at a twenty-million-dollar equity value for the whole company. I sold thirty percentage points for six million dollars and retained forty. Mila kept her thirty; the buyer held thirty. The six million was paid to me for my shares. After one million five hundred thousand for personal taxes, fees and reserves, one million two hundred thousand for a Wellington home and three hundred thousand of family help, I kept three million in separate cash and investments. My remaining holding was valuable on paper, with future value still uncertain. For the first time I could be patient without wondering which bill would punish me for it.

Mila checked the ownership table, then called to ask whether I intended to become one of those rich men who offered advice whenever someone was trying to work. I said I hoped to become a rich man who could be told to move his chair without becoming offended. She said the prospects were promising. The buyer received an agreed role, not permission to take her creative authority by rearranging the meeting. We hired a capable operational manager. I continued with product decisions but stopped being the person who had to answer every evening message. The first time I took a full week off, the company survived with insulting ease.

Lina kept her nursing career. When I showed her the house I wanted, she asked whether it contained a life we would both choose or simply a larger room for my computer. We walked through it twice, discussed the distance to her work and disagreed about a wall I believed needed to be removed. Lina said money had apparently made me think every wall was a suggestion. I said I was willing to negotiate with this one. We bought the house only after we could imagine ordinary days there. My personal purchase did not make her responsible for the company or obliged to give up the work she loved. We made our own arrangements about a shared home, expenses and the choices that belonged to each of us.

At our first dinner in the new place, she wore a soft green dress and let me struggle with the tablecloth before helping. She leaned across me to straighten a candle, brushed my shoulder and caught my glance with a smile. I asked whether she had planned the distraction. Lina said she had planned dinner; what happened to my concentration was my own disappointing management. I drew her close. She rested her hands at my collar and kissed me slowly enough that the expensive room became less interesting than the woman inside it. We ate late, laughed at the food and left the phones somewhere neither of us wanted to go looking for them.

We visited family with time to remain after the first round of photographs. I helped with practical expenses people actually wanted help with, from the personal family budget already set aside. An uncle asked if all those clever names had made me better at fixing a door that refused to close. I said I had become rich enough to admit when someone else knew how. He handed me a screwdriver and told me admission was an excellent first step. Lina watched us argue amiably with the hinge, then said she liked this part of being rich: the man at the table had stopped acting as if every unhurried conversation was making him late.

The other women kept surprising me in ordinary ways. Ana opened a new class on her own terms, Pua sent a photograph of an arrangement she was proud of, and Mere released music I listened to without waiting for a use for it. Joy invited us to an event and laughed at my greatly improved first step. Tia photographed a family day after deciding enough time had passed for us to be friends. Fia and Lei remained clear about the difference between work and affection. Nia reached a goal she had trained for, Rita finished her programme and May built lessons people returned to because they helped. Their stories did not end when mine chose a partner. That was one of the better things I had finally learned to enjoy.

Mila brought her partner to a company celebration in 2026. He was kind, funny and annoyingly good at the game I had expected to win. She watched him defeat me and said I could take comfort in having correctly predicted a decade of internet habits. I said it seemed an inadequate advantage in the current contest. Lina sat beside me, rested her hand on my leg and told Mila not to worry; I was accustomed to being rescued by women who understood what was happening. The room laughed, including me. Rex sent a routine renewal request the next morning. Our support team answered it without asking whether anyone needed a moment to appreciate the poetry.

In November I reached the end of the years I remembered. I had no private calendar for what came next. There was a strong company in which I kept forty percent, three million dollars of personal cash and investments after the specified transaction spending, and a home where a woman I loved could tell me to stop working without needing to compete with the future. The operating business still needed care. Investments could change. I no longer required every tomorrow to be guaranteed before I could enjoy an evening. Lina asked where I wanted to go that night. I looked at the address on our own front door and told her I was already there.