Page 27 of Love, Take Two

"What's that?"

"Your travel lifestyle," she says, settling deeper into the chair. "It looks incredible from the outside, but what's it actually like? All that constant relocating, always being 'on' for social media, never really settling anywhere?"

The question hits deeper than I expected, mainly because it touches on issues I've been trying not to examine too closely.

"Honestly?" I say. "It's more complicated than the Instagram posts suggest."

"That’s what I thought."

I study her face in the candlelight, noting the genuine curiosity and complete absence of judgment. This is Vada, the person whoused to know me better than anyone, who I could tell everything to without fear of it being used against me later.

"The financial reality is pretty stressful," I admit, the words coming easier than expected. "Maintaining the lifestyle my brand requires—staying in luxury accommodations, eating at picture perfect restaurants, participating in expensive activities—it's all on cards and the hope that the next sponsored post will cover expenses."

"How stressful?" she asks gently, leaning forward with the kind of focused attention that makes me want to tell her everything.

"Maxed out credit cards, constantly calculating whether I can afford the next trip, lying awake at night wondering what happens if the algorithm changes and engagement drops," I say, surprised by how relieved I feel to voice these fears out loud. "From the outside, it looks like I'm living this incredible adventure lifestyle, but internally, I'm always one bad month away from financial disaster."

"Emory," she says softly. "That sounds exhausting."

"It is," I admit. "And the weird part is, I love the travel, I love creating content that inspires people to get out and explore, but the pressure of maintaining this perfect lifestyle image is slowly killing the joy in it."

"You should change it up,” she says. "If you could redesign your career without the financial pressure, what would you do?"

"Focus more on authentic experiences and less on luxury," I say slowly, working through the idea as I speak. "Create content about affordable travel, real cultural immersion, sustainable adventure. Partner with brands that align with actual values instead of just whoever pays the most."

"That sounds incredible," Vada says with enthusiasm. "And much more sustainable, both financially and emotionally."

"What about you?" I ask, genuinely curious about what she’s doing. "Event planning looks like it's going really well from what I can see online."

"It is going well," she says, though something in her tone suggests there's more there too. "But getting here was harder than I make it look on social media."

"What do you mean?"

She's quiet for a moment, watching the candle flames flicker while thunder continues rolling across the ocean. When she speaks again, her voice is softer, more vulnerable.

"The corporate job I left," she starts, "it didn't just end because I wanted to be entrepreneurial. I was essentially forced out by workplace politics that got really ugly."

"What happened?"

"My supervisor took credit for a major proposal I'd spent three months creating," she says, and I can hear old anger still threading through her voice. "When I tried to address it through proper channels, suddenly my work performance was being questioned, my projects were being reassigned, and I was being excluded from meetings I'd organized."

"That's terrible," I say, feeling anger on her behalf for something that happened before I even knew she was dealing with it.

"The worst part was how it made me doubt myself," she continues. "For months after I left, I wondered if maybe they were right, maybe my work wasn't as good as I thought, maybe I was being dramatic about the credit issue."

"I doubt you were just being dramatic," I say with complete certainty. "You've always been incredibly talented at organizing people and creating beautiful experiences. Anyone who worked with you in college could see that."

"Thank you," she says, and the gratitude in her voice suggests she needed to hear that more than I realized. "Building my own business has been this constant balance between proving I was right to believe in myself and terrifying vulnerability about whether I can actually make it work."

"But you are making it work," I point out. "Your social media presence has grown incredibly, you're booked solid with clients, and everyone can see how talented you are."

"Most days I believe that," she says with a soft smile. "Other days I feel like I'm one bad review away from everyone realizing I'm a fraud who's just making it up as I go along."

"Imposter syndrome is brutal," I say, understanding exactly what she means. "I feel like that about travel content sometimes—like everyone's going to realize I'm just a guy with a camera who's gotten lucky so far."

"Sounds like we're both more successful than we think we are," she sighs. "And more insecure about it than anyone would guess from our social media presence."

"Probably," I agree. "Though talking about it helps. I haven't told anyone about the financial stress before."

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