What Goes Around...

Part Four

Chapter Four

An hour later there was a knock at the door, and when Freya called out for whoever it was to come in, the door opened slightly, and it was Oscar who peeped around the frame.

                "You ok?"

She was sat on the sofa, a book open on her knee, the pizza box empty on the table in front of her.  "Fine."

He nodded then stepped into the room, his eyes instantly drawn to the mirror which was now clean of the signs of her earlier mental debate.

                "He told you?"

Oscar crossed the room to sit beside her, "think he was a bit upset."

She nodded, "suppose I seem the epitome of ungrateful."

Her brother shrugged, "maybe. He's a good guy."

Nodding she reached for her glass and drank the water in it, "I get that. But he's still odd. What's his story anyway? All moody and moping around."

He laughed out loud, "funnily enough that is EXACTLY what he said about you."

Freya pondered that for a moment. "I went out looking for work today. Wandered everywhere, no one wants or needs a twenty seven year old over qualified academic with no practical skills at all." She lifted her glass in his direction in a 'cheers' gesture then before clearing the drink added, "who'd have thought it, hey?"

Oscar lowered himself into the chair opposite, "what?"

Shrugging she stood and walked to the sink, refilling her glass, "that fourteen years of higher education would leave me unemployable. I'd laugh if it wasn't so worrying."

                "What happened? In MIT? I mean one moment you were on top of the world, and now this."

Freya stared at him for a moment studying him, "would you believe me if I said I can't tell you?"

                "I'd believe that you don't want to tell me. That's you."               

Leaning back against the work surface she lifted an eyebrow, "really?"

He nodded, "I know as little about you now as I knew when you were fourteen and embroiled in school. You've never needed anyone...that's why I'm so surprised that you're here...and worried."

That made her pause, they hadn't been close, but they were so different, she'd never thought about him over the years, or rather her lack of relationship with him. But he was right; they knew so little about each other.  

Taking a deep breath, she leaned back in her chair. "After getting my PhD I was working on a secret project. I was helping develop an eco fuel, developing a new clean and cheap alternative to gasoline."

                "Wow. Life changing stuff."

She nodded, "as you can imagine there are a lot of people out there who don't want this to work. Someone was compromising the results. I found out a few days before I called you that someone on the project was accepting backhanders, manipulating results for money. Jeopardising the project.

His jaw hung open, "wow. Are you implicated?"

She shook her head, "I discovered it. The results kept changing, things didn't work as we expected. So I confronted the dean of the faculty. So I went to the Dean of the Faculty with my findings. He was stunned, didn't believe me at first, but I couldn't go to anyone in the team. I don't know who did it. Whoever it is has broken every rule that they could have, and ruined the last four years work."