Part 4 — I Was Fired Because of My Second Job, but After My Answer Melissa’s Smile Slowly Disappeared

It was seven in the evening in the empty waiting hall of the old station when I looked once more at the message that had come from the unknown number.

Rain struck the roof as if someone were trying to get inside.

Nino stood beside me. She was holding a small flashlight.

“They asked you to come alone,” she told me.

“And you came anyway.”

“You came too.”

That was a sufficient answer.

At the far end of the waiting room, a door opened. An elderly man came out of it, holding an old bag. I recognized him immediately. Zaza, the former accountant of my aunt’s clinic.

“Did you send me the message?” I asked.

“Not me. But I know who the file belongs to.”

He put the bag on the bench. Raindrops glittered on its leather surface.

“The clinic did not close only because of rejected claims,” Zaza said. “Someone deliberately changed the codes and then sent those errors to the insurance companies.”

“Who?”

Zaza lowered his head.

“At that time Northstar was already trying to enter the small-clinic market. They needed an example to show that such clinics worked in chaos and that only their system could save them.”

My stomach clenched.

“Did my aunt’s clinic become the example?”

“Yes.”

Nino took papers out of the bag. On the sheets were my aunt’s signature, insurance responses, and records of transfers.

“Why did all this appear now?” I asked.

Zaza smiled bitterly.

“Because this morning Melissa called me and offered me money to destroy the old archive. I realized that the same thing was happening again.”

That same night Nino sent all the materials to the police, the regulatory service, and the investors’ board. The next morning cameras were already standing outside Northstar’s office.

Melissa called all night.

First her number appeared. Then Paul’s. Finally, the company’s chief lawyer’s.

The lawyer spoke for only three minutes.

“They are offering you a settlement,” Nino told me.

“What are they asking for?”

“Money, public silence, and part of the platform.”

“And what do you think?”

“If you want my opinion, they still think they can frighten you.”

I picked up the phone.

“Tell them no.”

The next day the meeting took place in the company’s conference room. I sat at the back, with Nino beside me. Melissa stood in front and tried to keep her face calm.

“All of this is the personal revenge of a former employee,” she said.

The chairman of the board turned on the recording.

Melissa’s own voice sounded in the room:

“If we frighten Rachel, she will sign herself.”

Melissa raised her head.

“This has been taken out of context.”

“Which part?” I asked. “The part where you were planning to take my idea, or the part where you were talking about destroying my aunt’s clinic?”

Paul lowered his eyes.

The chairman of the board slowly looked toward him.

“Is that your voice?”

Paul moved his lips, but could not find an answer.

“Yes,” I said in his place. “It is his voice.”

Melissa put her hand on the table.

“We were only trying to protect the business.”

“The business?” I asked. “Or to protect yourselves from the people you yourselves were harming?”

A few minutes after the meeting, Melissa’s authority was suspended. Paul looked at the lawyer.

“Will you defend me?”

The lawyer closed the folder.

“No, not if you keep saying that this is simply revenge. The recording, the transfers, and the copyright documents correspond with one another.”

That was the first moment when Paul heard his own words from the outside and realized that he could no longer hide behind them.

Three weeks later I returned to the company office, but a different silence awaited me there. My former workroom was empty. On the wall only one small square place remained, where my board had once hung.

In the desk drawer, however, I found the object that I had thought was in my bag on the day of the dismissal: the copper-colored card holder, with my niece’s engraved crooked star.

When I picked it up, I realized how long I had been trying to light the way for people who always considered light their property.

Because of the case involving my aunt’s clinic, the company was given a large fine. The affected clinics recovered part of the money. Melissa lost her position and an investigation against her began. Paul gave testimony because for the first time he understood that remaining silent was also a choice.

I often had to go to court, but not once did I see myself filled with a desire for victory. I only wanted my name to be there, where my work had been.

Four months later my niece and I moved to a small seaside town. The platform had a new team. I worked with clinics three days a week, and on the remaining days I taught programming lessons to children.

One morning she sat down at the table and handed me a sheet of paper. A new star was drawn on it. This time all its points were straight.

“Now it is perfect,” she told me.

“Why did you change it?”

“Because you no longer need a crooked star to find your way.”

I laughed. Then I looked outside through the window. The first snow of that year was falling, and white flakes were slowly settling on the street lamps.

One evening I received a letter from Melissa. It contained only one sentence: “We can start over if you leave all this behind.”

I stared at the screen for a long time.

Then I answered:

“I have already started over. Without you.”

I deleted the letter and put the phone on the table.

I hung the copper-colored holder by the door of the new office. The crooked star glittered in the corridor light.

This time I chose the way.