I sit back. My hands are shaking slightly. I press my palms flat against the table, let the cool surface ground me.
I pick up my phone. Text Tom.
I just did something scary.
The reply comes fast.
Good scary or bad scary?
Good scary. Tell you about it later?
Can't wait.
I set the phone down. Look at the confirmation email sitting in my inbox.
I don't open the odds spreadsheet I built last month. I don't calculate submission-to-finalist ratios or try to figure out how many applicants they'll receive this cycle.
My phone buzzes one more time.
Proud of you. Whatever you did.
I trace my thumb over his name at the top of the screen.
I think he could be,I'd told the girls this morning.
I read his text again, feeling that same helpless, quiet smile from the coffee shop pull at my mouth all over again.
See you tomorrow.
I shut the laptop, cutting off the glow of the confirmation email, and let the room go dark.Let the jury decide what they want.
The most important thing I'm building right now isn't in that application.
Chapter forty-five
Tom
My name is sitting on the CC line of an Architectural League of New York confirmation email.
I let go of my mouse. The commercial proofs I've been editing for the last two hours blur out of focus on my left monitor.
The subject line reads: Submission Confirmation — Morgan, Samantha.
The CC list includes Richard, the developer, and me.
"Dear Ms. Morgan, Thank you for your submission to The Architectural League Prize presented by The Architectural League of New York. Your project, 'Harbor District Mixed-Use Development: Light as Spatial Choreography,' has been received and will be reviewed by our jury in the coming weeks. We appreciate the collaborative nature of your submission and have copied contributing collaborators on this confirmation."
Click through her project description, design statement, process documentation. The images are clean, sequenced with precision. Her writing is sharp, technical without being cold.
Then I reach the acknowledgments section.
"Photography by Tom Bennett, whose visual story brought this project's spatial experience to life and made visible what words could not capture."
She put my name on it.
I read it again. Then I scroll back up, click the attached PDF, and open the image gallery she included.
The sightline views. The pedestrian flow studies. The blue-hour waterfront shots where the steel framework catches the last fifteen minutes of golden light before dusk.
