Ailana’s Journal—2026-08-06 (Patreon)

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GOOD MORNING by Ailana Geven Keller

Thursday? It seems like the week is flying by!

Yesterday was a busy day at the studio. Today, I need to get busy on the laptop.

I’m going to focus on my novel project with Meredith—Cloudfall. When we stopped working on it, we were nearly finished with Chapter One, so the plan is to draft its final scenes today.

Jason will be working at the studio today. Josh, Kel, and Geoni are heading inland and north to take nature photos for the stock photo catalog. Emily is working with Kaylee today—the other kids are all back in school.

I’ve mentioned this before, but it bears repeating—Emily and Kel start their online classes on Monday.

Then Emily’s final hearing is Tuesday. I think everyone is ready to get that over with. Josh gave us the private investigators’ final report. Emily’s mother—who is also my mother—was last seen on surveillance footage getting into a car. She appeared to get in voluntarily, but she didn’t seem happy or at ease..

She has warrants out for her arrest—both Nevada and federal. If law enforcement has any more information, it hasn’t been released, but a sworn declaration from Las Vegas police has been filed stating that she remains at large.

The charges are severe, as you’d guess. Trying to sell your sixteen-year-old daughter into sex trafficking is far from trivial. If Emily hadn't ran when she did… I can't even put the horrors into words.

So, by next Tuesday, we should have the judge’s final ruling, and no one can imagine any reason he’d reverse his earlier decision to let Emily live here with Jason and me.

I’ve mentioned before that Emily isn’t willing to accept any other decision. She’s standing by her claim that if the judge orders anything else, she’ll defy the order and live under the porch here at Whiting Street.

Josh says the lawyers are prepared to make sure that doesn’t happen. Appeals exist for a reason…

The caseworker, Caroline Rivera, says we have nothing to worry about at this point. Not a guarantee, but very encouraging…

That’s it for now… See you later…

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CHAPTER ONE FIRST DRAFT by Ailana Geven Keller

If you’ve forgotten about Cloudfall or haven’t read any of it, what follows is the end of Chapter One. I’ve posted the whole draft on Patreon if you need to review it.

When Luke and Sienna caught up with Senator Roivah, they exchanged nods with the previous guards and took their places near him. He was debating with one of the reporters who favored Governor Kenwood’s initiative to reconnect the AI matrix to the systems that ran the Stratuses.

“Senator, you have to admit the systems depend on constant AI-managed adjustments.”

Roivah shook his head. “It’s nothing trained humans with calculators can’t handle. You’ll recall that the AI matrix decided resting every seventh day meant turning off the lifts, lights, shuttles, and everything else it considered a threat to people resting.”

“That was an anomaly,” the reporter replied.

The senator shook his head. “First of all, you can’t call something that happened fifteen weeks in a row an anomaly. Secondly, you’re a reporter, so you shouldn’t be answering your own questions.”

Luke and Sienna exchanged a look. Senator Roivah was unflinching about the facts and unwavering in his belief that expert opinions should prevail over media sensationalism.

When their detail ended, they logged out of the timecard system and started back to the pod complex where they each lived. They got to the lift entrances and Luke put his arm around Sienna.

“I really do want to make things between us official. I just want you to know I mean it, and I’m not just acting on the fact that we spend all our time together.”

Sienna smiled. “Well, if you're afraid, let me know. I could ask you just as easily.”

Luke shrugged. “Seems like I’d be copping out…”

The lift to her tower arrived and the door opened. “Well, then I guess it’s single pods for us for a while yet.”

Luke nodded as she entered the lift and the door closed behind her.

WE’RE NOT TOGETHER by Nick Fashola

Before I launch into the story I want to tell, let me say that Rebecca Charm has made more progress getting Alderwick’s AI system back online. More on that later…

I had a good meeting with Will Robertson and Tom Jenkins, advisors to Brooklyn’s Pay It Forward Society team. More on that later, too…

The story I want to tell begins with my putting off a trip to the grocery store, which led me to Blackbeards’ for a late lunch—call it dinner.

I was partway to the door when a voice called out. “Excuse me…”

I stopped and looked.It was an attractive lady I’d seen there before.

If you think about it, either the dice roll of fate had beaten some long odds by putting us there at the same time more than once or—more likely—we both came often enough that I recognized her.

I waited for her to catch up.

“Hi… I’m… You…” She stopped. “I’m Camila Lopez. I’m a cop with SPI PD… So… habits are hard to break and all… I noticed while you were parking… one of your brake lights is out.”

I looked at my car. “Oh… I didn’t know.”

She shrugged and took a step toward the door, so I followed along.

She glanced over at me. “Don’t you think there should be some sensor by now? You can’t check your own brake light. At least I can’t think of a sensible way to do it.”

“That’s a good point.” I held the door open for her and followed her inside. “I guess with LEDs they last longer. Are you… giving me a ticket?”

“Oh no!” She shook her head. “I just wanted to let you know… and I didn’t want you to think I was… I thought mentioning that I’m a cop would make it less strange that I was butting in out of the blue.”

For a second, I turned that claim over in my mind, trying to decide whether it would have been strange if a non-cop had said it. I never decided because the hostess was talking to… us.

“Table for two today?”

Camila looked at me, then at the hostess. “Oh… We’re not together…”

“My bad,” the hostess said. “I thought maybe you were…”

The rest of this chapter is exclusive to Patreon.

She pointed over her shoulder. “We just had a big group come in. I’ll need to get your names. We’ve got a few tables getting ready to leave… It won’t be too long.”

I looked at Camila. “Go ahead…”

“You were here first.”

“All good,” I said.

The hostess looked at Camila. “I remember you… Camila Lopez, right?”

Camila nodded. “Yes, that’s right. You’re Angelique… you work at Paradise Beachwear, right?”

She smiled. “Seasonal… Things are slowing down, so I’ll be here more.”

The hostess looked at me, so I gave her my name. “Nick Fashola.”

She nodded. “A view of the TV if possible, right?”

More evidence that I come here too much. “Yes, if possible.”

Angelique wrote down our names. “It will be a few minutes.”

I looked at Camila. “Nice to meet you. Thanks for the heads up on the brake light.”

“Sure… nice to meet you too.”

We sat down to wait for a table, and I pulled out my phone to pass the time. I saw the manager come by and talk to the hostess. Another group of four came in and got on the list.

I watched some baseball reels for a few minutes, then the hostess said, “Officer Lopez… I have a table ready…”

Camila stood up, took a few steps, then turned back and looked at me. “Nick… you… want to share a table?”

That sort of shocked me.

Let’s say it hit 80/100 on the utter-surprise scale.

I’ll go with 60/100 on the this-could-be-cool scale.

But also maybe 20/100 on the possibly-creepy scale.

I decided to play the odds.

“Sure…” I smiled and stood up. “Sure, I’ll be happy to.”

Best choice I’ve made in days.

We started with work talk. “So, what’s it like being a police officer here?”

She told me about her job and her special assignment to get to know local store owners, staff members, and teenagers who live on SPI. Based on how the hostess responded, I figured she was doing a good job.

I told her about Alderwick’s charity programs that I run. “The top-level organization under Alderwick is Benevolence Worldwide…”

I told her about the structure of the organizations and what each one does. She said it sounded fascinating.

“So you travel to the four teams as needed to keep things going and help out as needed?” she asked.

“So far since I started,” I answered, “I’ve been on the road about half the time. I’ve actually not done the math on that…”

Then we got into hobbies and interests. We connected hard and fast over soccer. I played. I was a solid sub who could play all over the field.

She was a defender—a varsity starter from ninth grade on. She became the starting center back in tenth grade.

By the time we got to the recent World Cup, it felt like we were already friends.

“I wish I’d met you sooner,” she said as she broke a french fry in half. “It would have been fun to have someone to watch the matches with.”

I had a little mental moment at that point.

I completely agreed with her. What surprised me was that hearing her say it didn’t feel uncomfortable at all. I mentally rewound to the parking lot and thought through every interaction from the past hour. Besides being scared that I was about to get a ticket, everything had felt natural and relaxed.

We were halfway through our meals when I brought up my interest in sailboarding. “I kind of got into it sideways while growing up in New Jersey. I got the hang of it when I was in Denver for college. Reservoirs… lakes…”

“I’d like to try that someday,” she replied.

I don’t think she was just saying that to be agreeable. It looked like she really meant it.

She asked very good questions and I answered them. I told her about the time I went sailboarding on Lake Mead and shared a few stories from that trip. She seemed very interested, so I kept answering questions.

“I’ve been wanting to get out ever since I got here,” I said. “I just haven’t made time for it.”

By the time that topic had run its course, we were looking at empty plates. I thought it would be cool to get her contact info and was just about to ask when she surprised me again.

“Well, looks like we’re about out of reasons to sit and talk. Can I get your number? I’m off Saturday. I’d like to call and see if we can go out and do something. What do you think?”

I smiled as I got my phone out. “I’ll be looking forward to it.”

GOOD NIGHT by Ailana Geven Keller

I hope you had a great day. I know I did. I wrapped up the draft of Chapter One of Cloudfall and shared the new section with you earlier.

It’s still subject to revision, but it’s a solid ending. Chapter Two will open with Sienna in her pod and share some details about pod life before she gets back to work the next day.

Speaking of my own “next day,” I’ll be splitting time between the laptop and the camera. I’ll have to look at the weather, but there’s an idea afloat for a follow-up trip inland to take more stock photos.

If that comes to pass, I’ll definitely bring you along. For now, I’m going to call it a day. I don’t think anything profound is happening after this.

Emily got home from working with Kaylee and said she has something to ask me after she cleans up.

“Hey…” she said, “when I get out of the shower, I want to ask you something.”

Her tone suggested it wasn’t anything serious, but maybe it will be worth mentioning once I find out. Little things like that make all this feel real—there’s a connection between us, and it has purpose and meaning.

Maybe she wants to buy something online. Maybe she needs shampoo. Maybe she has something serious on her mind involving herself, Kel, or one of her friends.

The fact that it could be any of those things—or probably something totally different—makes this feel like regular, normal life. And I like how that feels.

May you see larger meanings in the little things, knowing that simple moments are nourished by complex relationships.

Good night.

Be your best you!

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