The day he was fired, Manhattan left him no door open

The next morning, the interview turned out to be with an exhausted operations manager who skimmed his resume for five minutes and asked, “Do you have buy-side experience?” “No. But I can read cash flow and balance sheets.” “We don’t hire people who can read reports. We hire people who can make money for the boss.” “Then why interview me?” The manager blinked, then laughed. “Because the ATS recommended you. You can go.” That evening, Darren waited under the subway awning for the rain to slow and opened the Everpoint Labs prospectus supplement he had kept in his bag. Everpoint was a hot enterprise-AI company, the kind of name every finance outlet loved to repeat.