He cracked open a Red Bull. “The VCs want us to hire more engineers, maybe a designer. But we might be able to bring on a contractor to help you for a few months.” He took a swig and switched into his friend voice, the looser cadence I remembered from our early days together, right out of college, before he’d written a line of code for DateDate. “A new roastery just opened on 7th and Folsom. A kiosk out of a garage, nothing flashy, but the coffee is superb.”

We’d met in a café in Palo Alto, where the owner, an old man from Trieste, introduced us as espresso purists. “No nonsense with the two of you,” he’d said, waving a hand at the flavored syrups that lined his bar, a compromise he made to compete with the Starbucks down the street. When I learned that the Founder dropped out of Stanford as a junior, I immediately respected him. He had edge. It was one thing to find success as a Stanford grad, and another thing entirely to find success as a dropout. Plus, I was excited that I finally had someone to talk coffee with, even if I was ashamed of my bougie interest.