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This year, Max, Dahlia and Anthony no longer invite me out to brunches and holidays. They circle me warily, like cats unsure if their prey is wounded enough to be harmless. I don’t think they sense the danger of what they’ve done—they talk and laugh about it openly enough. But they can sense that something’s changed.

That’s fine. I let them paw at my peripheries and toss little jabs my way. In the meantime, I watch their ugly underbellies just like I do in my seminars, my books, my externships.

I see the way Dahlia and Anthony seem almost happy when Max isn’t around, less restless. The way none of them ever mention their families, their parents, their siblings.

The way Anthony, for all his casual arrogance, is attending every networking event, every recruitment dinner, throwing himself at law partners and professors with a fervid desperation in his dark eyes.

I make my hypothesis: heneedsthis.

Ultimately, the law isn’t just a system; it’s a framework for power.

And power, I learn, isn’t just money and influence. It’s knowing how to find chinks and cracks, where to apply pressure, where the whole thing will shatter if you push just hard enough.

I don’t enjoy networkingevents any more than I did in my first year. I don’t enjoy small talk; flattery repulses me no matter whether I’m the recipient or the purveyor; Law seems to attract the exact sort of man I could never find interesting in a thousand years: polished, manipulative,dull.

But I don’t need to enjoy networking events to be good at them. Not liking small talk is an advantage: I don’t feel the urge to speak and so I can listen more, notice the useful little things most people let fall in the cracks of conversations. I don’t like flattery, and the people I need to flatter are numb to itanyway.

Networking, I realised that night at the New York gala, is a chess game. I don’t need to enjoy the chessboard or the chess pieces, I just need to play, and play well.

Tonight, the chessboard is a towering edifice of glass and steel overlooking the Boston skyline. Once you’ve been to one of these events, you’ve been to them all. I walk past floral arrangements of ivory roses and calla lilies without noticing them, to the gleaming marble bar where I order the only drink I’ll have tonight: a dry martini with a lemon twist.

I drink it slowly, one elbow propped on the bar, scanning my chessboard. The Harvard contingent is obvious: a mix of my classmates, students from both the DART programme and the main cohort, mingling with partners from firms they’re desperate to impress.

Max isn’t here tonight. He likes to pretend he doesn’t need events like these, but how true can that be? Dahliaishere, letting Marcel Roth, her summer internship boss, buy her drinks and display her on his arm like a shiny trinket. As usual, she’s playing dangerous games.

I take my martini and plunge into the crowd, slipping easily into conversation with a federal judge, a silver-haired man in an impeccable tux, drawing him in by discussing a case I worked on over the summer at KMG. He leans in to listen closely as I outline a particularly complex contractual loophole, and I spot it: the little glint of interest.

I tip my head and slow my voice down, smooth and self-assured, about to cement my advantage—

When Anthony appears at my side.

“Sutton,” he says, sliding into the conversation like a knife prying open a shell. “Talking contracts, are we?” He turns to the judge, offering a knowing smile. “You should hear her thoughtsonKeller v. Ashwood—some of the most, uh, unconventional reasoning you’ll hear.”

I don’t react. Instead, I take a small, slow sip of my martini, meeting his gaze over the rim of my glass. I don’t say anything, because that’s when people make mistakes: when they speak to fill an awkward silence rather than because they actually have something to say.

The judge shifts slightly, his gaze moving between us, trying to figure out the dynamic at play. Anthony has succeeded in his aim: he’s redirected the current of the conversation away from me and onto himself.

But now, he’s on the back foot, forced to retain this stolen attention, to prove that this interruption was worth it. He licks his lips and takes a too-quick sip from his champagne.

“I’ve been spending the summer preparing an article on promissory estoppel,” he says. A good sales pitch, but still a sales pitch. “I’m planning to have it published in the Harvard Law Review.”

“It’s a competitive process,” the judge says, but he’s relaxed a bit, and now his attention is firmly on Anthony. “As I’m sure you know.”

“Incredibly competitive,” Anthony says with barely disguised satisfaction. “Especially since the editors only have room for one student from the Direct Admissions programme.” He glances at me, just for a second. “But I’ve been preparing all summer, and Mr Park believes the article shows enough promise that he’ll be personally recommending me for publication.”

A great play; the judge’s eyebrows lift.

“Samuel Park?” The judge nods appreciatively. “You’re in very good hands, then.” He shakes Anthony’s hand. “I’ll look forward to reading it.”

The judge gives me a polite smile and lingers for a moment, only walking away after I’ve acknowledged him with a nod. I watch him walk away, swirling my drink in my hand, expression perfectly blank.

Inside, I’m beaming with a cold, coruscating sense of victory.

Anthony just made his first real mistake, right here in front of me. Dizzy with his own triumph, he’s made a disastrous strategic slip-up and revealed his hand far earlier than he should ever have.

And now I knowexactlyhow I’m going to crush him.

“The Harvard Law Review?” I ask sweetly. “That’s very impressive, Ray-ray.”