Chapter 7
Bernadette looked at Nolan like she could not believe what she was hearing, her eyes going red.
“After ten years together, are we really ending it like it never happened?”
“You don’t have to leave,” Nolan said.
“I promise you she won’t show up again. We’ll go back to how we were.”
Bernadette’s eyes widened–she could not believe these words were actually coming out of his mouth.
“I can’t do that.”
Her voice was shaky. She turned, went into the bedroom, and came back with their documents. “We’re going to the courthouse tomorrow morning.”
Nolan’s face turned cold when he saw the documents. “Sometimes I really wonder if you even have a heart.”
“A heart?”
He had already torn it to pieces long ago–there was nothing left.
Bernadette gave a sad little laugh, did not bother arguing, and just walked
out.
***
The divorce papers were done so fast that it felt unreal.
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It took them seven years from dating to marriage, and only seconds to end
- it.
Nolan did not say a word the whole time. When Bernadette got in the car, he just said coldly, “Don’t regret it.”
She did not look back. She just stepped on the gas and drove off.
In the rearview mirror, Nolan got smaller and smaller until he was gone.
For ten years, he had taken up almost her whole life–and now it was really over.
She looked away, and the tears finally fell.
She pulled over to calm herself and was about to call her grandparents, but Nesta’s name popped up first.
“Bernadette, check the internet. Something’s happened!”
Bernadette froze. She opened Twitter quickly and the top trending topic slapped her in the face. “The Svola Studio’s Plagiarism”
In just ten minutes, thousands of people were cursing them out.
“They are such a big studio but they are stealing designs?‘
“So the Crowley Group ditched them because they copied others!”
Something like that happening in the construction industry would not get this much public attention–unless someone was pushing it behind the
scenes.
Nesta sounded a bit panicked on the phone, “Now a few partners are saying our reputation is ruined and they might pull out.”
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Bernadette rubbed her forehead and said, “Just calm them down for now.‘
Then she clicked on the trending topic and froze.
The so–called “comparison image” was actually the draft she had sent the Crowley Group herself.
She had drawn that by hand. Only she and Nolan had the original.
A chill ran down her spine and she immediately called Nolan.
“We were husband and wife, do you really have to push things this far?” Bernadette gritted her teeth, forcing herself to stay calm.
She had expected that Nolan would not back down easily, but she had not thought that he would stoop this low.
Nolan stayed silent for a while. “Come home. I can help you shut this
down.”
Bernadette felt her heart go cold. There was nothing left to say between
them.
She hung up, took a deep breath, and started typing her own post.
First, she circled the basic framework in both “comparison” pictures, then explained each point to prove there was no plagiarism.
Next, she posted photos of her awards.
She had the Pritzker Architecture Prize, the Aga Khan Award for Architecture, and even the top prize in domestic architecture–the Frazer Award.
She had won them all, plus a mountain of other prizes.
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In the end, she wrote two clear statements.
“Every part of the so–called ‘plagiarized‘ image is based on public
structural prototypes, so it’s not plagiarism. And I don’t need to plagiarize.
“The design not being chosen was due to the Crowley Group’s internal issues, not because of the Svola Studio.”
Then she paid the platform to pin her clarification statement to the top of the trending list.
Anyone in the industry would know whether she was lying. As for netizens just there for drama, she did not care anymore.
Her only goal was to let the right people see the truth.
She thought that would be the end of it, but when she woke up the next morning, her phone was flooded with over 30 nasty texts from Jessica, each text nastier than the last.
“Are you insane, buying yourself to the top of the trending list?
“Answer mell
you playing dead now?
“Oh, so you won’t let me live in peace? Then don’t even dream of having peace yourself!”
***
Bernadette frowned, opened Twitter, and saw the plagiarism post had been taken down.
However, the new number one trending search was “The Crowley Deputy General Manager’s Affair With the Representative from Arcobaleno
Studio“.
