Chapter 247 - 246: Poor Don’t Have Friends
Aren stared at the dollar bill in his hand. It looked more like a joke than a payment. But then Rex’s smile brightened even further—like a kid who had just traded a rock for a treasure map. Because to Rex, this wasn’t just a deal—it was a heist. For the price of a vending machine soda, he now legally owned what he believed was a goldmine. No, scratch that—a diamond mine. A potential blockbuster with a microscopic investment. The cost-to-profit ratio was absurd.
And then, as if to drive the point home and truly lock the deal in stone, Rex pulled out his phone, opened his banking app, and with a few casual taps, transferred $20,000 straight into Aren’s account.
A moment later, Aren’s phone dinged.
He frowned, pulled it from his pocket, and blinked in confusion at the balance update. His eyes widened.
Twenty thousand.
Cold hard proof that this wasn’t some elaborate prank or empty promise.
It was a number that hit him like a freaking bus, the kind that is overloaded with passengers.
Something he couldn’t save even after working tirelessly for the past two years. For someone like him—a totally average kid from a lower-class American family—twenty thousand might as well have been a million. And that wasn’t just poetic exaggeration. He hadn’t had a safety net since the day he turned eighteen, asa typical American, he was politely but firmly shoved out of his family home. No savings. No support. Not even a college fund.
His parents hadn’t been cruel, just... tired. Tired of scraping by. Tired of another mouth to feed. They barely managed to pay the electricity bill, let alone college tuition. That was why, aside from his genuine passion for film and screenwriting, he had studied harder than anyone else he knew—nose buried in books, mind grinding through lectures, soul clinging to the dream of winning a full-ride scholarship. And somehow, he’d pulled it off. He’d made it into a film program, full scholarship in hand. It had felt like the start of something.
But after graduation, reality was colder, harsher, and far less romantic than he’d imagined.