The paradox. (:

Somewhere in the glass towers of ambition, where men wore their LinkedIn headlines like armor and decisions were made over shitty coffee, Miles stood at the heart of his quivering realm.

Miles’ empire was the corporate equivalent of a designer gift box—sleek, glossy, tied up in the perfect little bow, looking all expensive and high-end until you actually picked it up and realized it weighed about as much as a pack of breath mints. And just like a fancy box with nothing inside, it had a tragic little secret—it made noises when left alone for too long. The kind of noises that reminded you of a stomach so empty it starts negotiating with itself—low, awkward grumbles of desperation, the occasional gurgle of uncertainty, and, at times, a full-on wheeze of existential panic.

It strutted around looking like a billion bucks, but the moment you knocked on it? Hollow. The moment pressure was applied? Creaking under the weight of its own pretense. The moment you actually needed it to hold something substantial? Collapse. Because at the end of the day, a good-looking empty box is still just that—empty—and no amount of branding, PR, or overpriced ergonomic chairs could fill the void where actual substance was supposed to be.

You can want an apartment that looks like California sunshine, but if it’s still an outdated shack with bamboo sticks ready to fall on your head at any second? Unhygienic. Dangerous. And, frankly, delusional.

And then there was Her.

She didn’t just predict trends—she shaped them, bent them to her will, and sent them off into the world with a knowing smirk. The kind of person who didn’t need a title to be in charge because her ideas did all the talking. And yet, here he was, standing inside a space that only existed because of her, pretending he had conjured it from thin air.

But here’s the thing about stealing a vision: you can mimic the lines, copy the colors, even parrot the philosophy—but the soul? That stays with the original artist. And Miles, no matter how much he tried, was about to learn that some ghosts simply refuse to leave.

Then, as the self-proclaimed visionary, Miles did what all great leaders do—pretend he thought of it first. The only problem? You can slap your name on a Picasso, but you can’t un-Picasso the Picasso.

The heist, if you could even call it that, was led by two or three men who had the combined strategic acumen of a potato. First, there was Rash—storage guy, volume enthusiast, and the human equivalent of a car horn in traffic. He thought yelling made people productive, which only worked if your workforce was made up of parrots. Then came Hurly, the creative "guru," a man so out of sync with reality that if originality slapped him in the face, he’d demand an apology. He was the kind of guy who used "innovative" to describe a literal chair.

These two didn’t even like each other. Rash thought Hurly was pretentious, and Hurly thought Rash was barely house-trained. But their mutual desperation to look important in Miles’ eyes meant they were stuck playing a game of corporate tug-of-war—except instead of a rope, it was Miles’ limited patience.

But what truly united them? Their shared, delusional belief that they had access to Miles. Oh, the way they spoke of him—"Miles likes this" or "Miles likes that," or "Miles used to live here," or, my personal favorite, "Miles has two noses instead of one." Who asked? Why did anyone need to know that? Was this a startup or a fan club? At some point, it felt like if you left Rash and Hurly alone long enough, they’d start discussing Miles' preferred toothpaste brand and his childhood pet’s astrological sign.

She had flagged the issue from day one.

Even before Rash and Hurly awkwardly danced around negotiations, she had already run the mental math. She understood how Miles’ company operated, had studied the public financials, observed their decision-making patterns, and could smell a tight budget from a Mile away. (Pun intended.)

"They can’t afford us," she had said. "And they’ll never admit it."

But instead of walking away with their heads held high, they stole the idea anyway. Of course, they did a terrible job of it—like taking a Michelin-star recipe and recreating it with expired ingredients and a broken stove. But in their minds? A win was a win.

The irony? She wasn’t even angry. She was amused.

Because here’s the thing about building something with true vision—even if someone steals it, they’ll never truly own it. And that, ladies and gentlemen, was the deliciously cruel joke in all of this.

Miles would never escape her.

No matter how many pointless meetings he attended, no matter how many public speeches he gave about “pioneering a new wave of bullshit,” he was living inside her vision. A fragment of her mere dream.

Those nooks? Her. The entirety of the functional space that encouraged both collaboration and deep focus? Her. The futuristic dance that performed on rustic wholesomeness? Her. The perfectly optimized quiet areas where you could actually hear yourself think? Her. Her. Her.

Miles, for all his power and pseudo-genius vibe, was now a tenant in the house that she built.

And the worst part? He knew it.

Late at night, when the chaos died down and the space was eerily quiet, Miles would feel her presence. Not in a literal ghostly way—God knows she wasn’t haunting this place; she had far better things to do.

But in the little details.

In the way the bookshelves were placed at just the right angle, so you didn’t have to crane your neck to read the spines. In the way the seating was arranged so effortlessly that you could move between solitude and collaboration without even thinking about it.

Every damn thing pretending to work so seamlessly, so intuitively, that it almost mocked him.

And that’s when the thought would creep in. The one he would never say out loud. The one that gnawed at the edges of his carefully curated I’m-it persona.

"Would she have done it better?"

Obviously. Duh.

Miles had everything. The title. The money. The PR-crafted reputation of a visionary.

And yet, she had the one thing he couldn’t steal—actual brilliance.

She left no fingerprints, no official credit, no grand speech claiming her place in this story. And yet, she was everywhere.

Every meeting held in that office? Happening inside her vision.
Every employee soaking up the revolutionary space? Breathing in her unspoken influence.
Every journalist praising the new approach? Celebrating her work without even knowing it.

Miles could run, pretend, deny, rebrand, gaslight, but he couldn’t escape her. Because no matter how much he wanted to rewrite history, he was living inside her blueprint.

Perhaps in some alternate universe, Miles did the right thing. Maybe he acknowledged her, collaborated instead of stealing, admitted that the best minds don’t work alone.

But in this reality? That would mean admitting weakness. Showing vulnerability.

Which, in all honesty, Miles and his empty-box empire lacked the depth for.

If emotional intelligence had a scale, this would be in the negatives.

They diluted it, cut corners, compromised in places where she would have elevated.
But here’s the problem with stealing a vision:

You can steal the structure.
You can even copy the details.
But you cannot recreate the essence.

So, he did what powerful little boys do best—basked in borrowed relevance and convinced himself it didn’t matter.

And yet…

As he stood in this house, looking out at the city, the quiet pressed in.

Somewhere out there, she was building something else, untouched by all of this.

And Miles, for all his influence, was left to wonder.

Wonder if this could have been something real.
Wonder if, despite everything, she had won.
Wonder how long it would take before he could finally stop thinking about her.

(Spoiler: he never could. He never would.)

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Until next time

S