Not principal investigator. Not lead researcher on a $1.5 million federal grant. Just… professor.
A lecturer position at a state university three states away, teaching undergraduate botany to students who probably thought fungi were just the fuzzy things in their dorm room fridges.
I’d lost everything.
Really.
The conservatory—my dream, my passion project, the culmination of a decade of work—was sealed by federal order. My professional reputation had taken a hit too. Not officially; the investigation had cleared me of wrongdoing. But whispers followed me anyway.
That’s the researcher whose family destroyed the federal grant project.
She didn’t secure her facility properly.
Family drama contaminated millions in research.
It didn’t matter that I’d been the victim. In academia, scandal is scandal.
I’d been soft.
That was my crime.
I’d known my family was selfish, manipulative, appearance-obsessed. I’d known they resented my success, that they saw my work as weird and my achievements as somehow embarrassing compared to Tiffany’s Instagram-perfect life.
But I’d never suspected they’d do this. I’d never imagined they’d break into a research facility, remove biohazard warnings, and host a wedding reception in a BSL-II lab just to avoid paying venue rental fees.
That failure of imagination had cost me everything.
My phone buzzed again. This time it was a news alert.
Viral wedding disaster results in record lawsuit settlement.
I didn’t click on it. I’d lived it. I didn’t need to read about it.
My family had lost everything because of greed. Because they’d valued appearances over integrity, convenience over responsibility, social status over basic human decency. They’d looked at my life’s work and seen nothing but a free venue and an inconvenient obstacle to their perfect wedding fantasy.
I’d lost the grant. I’d lost the conservatory. I’d lost years of research and a career trajectory that had once seemed so promising.
But they’d lost more.
They’d lost their home, their savings, their reputations, and their futures. They’d be paying off debt until they died. Tiffany’s marriage had lasted shorter than most people’s honeymoons. My father would never retire now. He’d be working until his body gave out, every paycheck garnished to pay restitution to the government and compensation to the guests he’d poisoned with ignorance and arrogance.
My mother’s perfect family image—the one she’d curated so carefully for decades—had been incinerated in the flames of a wedding reception gone catastrophically wrong.
The highway stretched out before me, heading west toward my new life. The sun was setting, painting the sky in shades of orange and purple that would have been beautiful if I’d had the energy to appreciate them.
I’d packed everything I owned into this car and a small moving truck that was already on its way to my new apartment. I had no furniture; it had all been in the conservatory, destroyed by the hazmat team. I had my clothes, my books, my diplomas, and my laptop.
Everything else was gone.
Starting over meant starting with nothing. But nothing was better than being tied to people who would destroy everything you built just to save themselves a venue rental fee.
I merged onto the interstate and accelerated, leaving behind the town where I’d grown up, the family who’d betrayed me, and the dream project that had consumed a decade of my life.
Somewhere ahead was Prairie State University, a fresh start, and the possibility—however small—that I might rebuild something worth keeping.
I’d lost the grant, but my family had lost everything because of greed.
That was the fair price of natural justice.
And somehow, driving away from the wreckage of the life I’d built, I felt lighter than I had in years.
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