Chapter 4

A few weeks later, flyers appeared all over town for the "New England Young Designers" competition.

It was a regional contest, fairly new, but with a significant cash prize and, more importantly, exposure. The winner would get a feature in a Boston newspaper and their designs showcased at a regional craft fair.

I read the details with a flicker of interest. In my past life, costume design had been my passion, the core of our theater supply business. I had decades of experience, a wealth of ideas.

Then I heard Mark was entering.

He wasn't a designer. Not really. He handled the business side of our company, the accounts, the orders. He appreciated my work, sure, but he never had the creative spark himself.

Tiffany, apparently, had been talking non-stop about a dream vacation to Europe.

A trip like that cost money, money Mark, with his student loans and efforts to impress her, probably didn't have.

The prize money from the competition would be a big help.

He started spending hours locked in his parents' garage, a secretive air about him.

One evening, I was at the community library, looking through some old theater journals for inspiration. I overheard snippets of conversation from a nearby table.

It was two women who knew Mark's family.

"...says he's working on something spectacular for that design contest."

"Really? Mark? I didn't know he was artistic."

"Well, he told his mother it's a theatrical costume, something incredibly unique. He said he' s had the idea for years."

A cold dread seeped into me.

A theatrical costume. Unique. An idea he'd had for years.

Late in our first life, just before the accident, I' d been working on a special project. A passion piece. It was a historically inspired, intricately detailed gown for a hypothetical production of a Shakespearean play, but with a modern, almost fantastical twist. I' d poured months into the concept sketches, the fabric research.

Mark had seen the designs. He' d praised them, called them my masterpiece.

He knew every detail, every nuance.

He wouldn' t. He couldn' t.

But the Mark I knew, the one who respected my work, my talent, seemed to be gone.

This new Mark, desperate to impress Tiffany, desperate for money and status, what was he capable of?

The thought that he would take my work, my vision, and pass it off as his own made me feel sick.

It was more than just plagiarism. It was a theft of a part of my soul, a part of our shared past that he was now trying to weaponize for his own gain.

I left the library, the words of the gossiping women echoing in my ears.

I had to enter the competition. Not just for the prize, or the exposure.

I had to show him. I had to show everyone.

That my talent, my vision, was mine. And it was far beyond anything he could steal or replicate.