Chapter 142

Sophia glanced at her phone and saw a call from her college mentor, Zachary.

Raising an eyebrow in confusion, she picked up the call.

It turned out that Zachary was hitting her up for a meal.

He was in town for a scholarly conference and knew she was still around, so he wanted to catch up over some grub.

Sophia was kinda taken aback.

Zachary had been her uni mentor.

Back in her freshman year, she’d snagged an award at the Architectural Design Competition and caught Zachary’s eye. He’d taken her under his wing ever since.

During those years, it was Zachary leading her through projects, from group gigs without any credit to solo designs where her name could shine. His mentorship paved the way for where she was today.

So, for her old college mentor, Sophia had nothing but respect, gratitude, and admiration.

When she nailed her grad school acceptance here, she’d buzzed Zachary with the good news first thing.

Life, work, and studies had gotten in the way, and while they hadn’t worked together in a while, they stayed in touch. But since she hadn’t managed to go back home, she hadn’t had the chance to visit him in person.

Now with Zachary swinging by for a conference, Sophia was both surprised and stoked.

She was down for the dinner date.

Zachary had set it up for the evening at a joint near the campus.

Zachary was already

was over sixty,

and clout, he still got the odd invite to lecture. Post-retirement, he’d shifted

years, with a head mostly silver, but he still had this refined

greeted with a smile upon seeing

standing to greet her.

menu, he turned to Sophia. “Have you

head, “Just graduated, pretty chill

after

her dad asked,

some stuff here then head

gig at Star-Dempsey Architects?” Zachary threw

froze, giving Zachary a puzzled

mentioned it

sorta her senior by the same mentor, both Zachary’s

advised with a hint of concern, “In our design biz, sure, talent and smarts matter, but so does finding your patron. Our job’s about pleasing aesthetics, but beauty’s in the eye of the beholder. Before you make a name for yourself, your masterpiece might be treasure in A’s eyes but trash to B. With your bold style,

to secure their livelihood than take risks, unless you’re the big cheese with a vision. But in today’s climate, those folks are few

quietly. “I

the job hunt’s ups and

compromises in the

thoughts to paper. Aligning

wavelength, a project could suffer endless tweaks until

was just

all over the place, you were back in endless

Sophia hadn’t felt much of this pressure.

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