Volume 3: My days in a college fraternity Chapter 130 Contact Meeting
Tommy straightened his suit, sat down at the table, and looked across at Mickey Kapur, Robert Morley, and Jim Mantz, who was leaning slightly to the side and looking at him with his chin in his hand.
Seeing that Tommy didn't say anything, the court audience gently pressed the reminder bell, indicating that both parties could start talking about anything. This was just a formal private contact, not a court session. Both parties could chat about any topic like strangers meeting, but topics unrelated to the case would not be recorded and submitted after confirmation.
Neither side was in a hurry to speak. Mickey pushed his glasses. He had disliked Tommy Hawke since he saw his picture before. Now when this guy sat opposite him, he became more and more certain that they would never be friends.
For some people, you only need to look at them once to know the difference between them and you. It is obvious that the blond boy opposite is the kind of person who likes to show off, attract girls, and has many friends in high school and college.
As we all know, those who are opposed to such people are the nerds like us who are ridiculed, humiliated and bullied by these campus celebrities.
The lawyers on both sides did not rush to ask questions. Delia flipped through her notebook slowly, while Robert observed the reactions of Delia and Tommy.
There was a small walnut photo frame on the table, but there was no photo in it. Tommy looked at the frame for more than ten seconds and broke the brief silence: "This frame looks a bit old. I'm curious about what kind of photo was inlaid in it before."
Everyone else was a little confused as to why Tommy asked this question, but Jim took his hand away from his chin and spoke slowly, "Scenery, this is a business meeting room, no private photos will appear here. If I'm not mistaken, it should be an award-winning replica of Boston scenery, the same as your company's OSS."
"Mr. Jim Manz, let me remind you that the words you used just now were very offensive to me..." Delia didn't even raise her head. She flipped through her notebook and reminded Jim Manz that some words should not be used indiscriminately before the court gave a verdict.
Before Delia finished speaking, Robert also spoke up: "You can mark Mr. Jim Manz's words, Ms. Delia Case, but you have no right to stop him from saying anything here."
"Thank you, I guess so." Tommy didn't care about the routine cockfighting between the two lawyers at all. He looked at Jim Manz and thanked him with a smile: "In fact, the owner of this business center should consider buying the commercial copyright of that photo. If there are counterfeits in such a place, it will make customers feel..."
Jim Manz still seemed to be staring at Tommy: "Like a high-class beauty carrying a shoddy fake designer bag, like there's a company called Actor next to Stanford University?"
"Mr. Jim Manz, let me remind you that your wording is already..." Delia, like Robert, successfully played the role of getting paid to do things, saying things that she knew were useless but still had to say.
Tommy waved his hand, signaling Delia not to remind him. "Yes, that's right, sir. That's the feeling. But I have a better analogy. It's like the software company Artworks that developed the world's first spreadsheet and the company next to it, Lotus. Artworks is a steaming pile of shit, Lotus is the first fly that came after smelling the stench, and Actor may be the seventy-eighth, ninety-second, or thirty-eight thousand and fifty-ninth fly that followed. By the way, you know, I saw a joke about flies not long ago. Flies that like to chase stinky smells can even quarrel with each other: Hey! This pile of shit belongs to me, understand? You can't get close, or I'll have my lawyer send you a letter."
"Mr. Tommy Hawke, you are using flies to ..."
"Mr. Tommy Hawke just said two things. One was to describe some problems in the development of the software industry from a biological perspective, and the other was just a joke. There is no connection between the two." Delia raised her head and looked at Robert Morley:
"If it's not clear, I can provide a transcript with clear punctuation after the meeting. If anyone else makes any assumptions or malicious speculations based on anything other than what he said, we will hold him accountable for his legal responsibilities."
Tommy looked at Mickey Kapur and made the gesture of flapping bee wings with his hands: "I am a country boy. The things I see most are feces and flies. Oh, I have an idea. We can use a more elegant metaphor. Soft Art Company is the flower dripping with honey. Mr. Mickey Kapur is the first bee to collect honey. Tommy Hawke is just another little bee following Mr. Mickey Kapur, diligently carrying the honey back to his own hive, working hard to get rich."
When Mickey Kapoor heard the guy across from him directly comparing Lotus to the first plagiarist, he wanted to refute him, but in the end his inner reason told him that this bastard was deliberately provoking him so that he would say something that would easily be used against him when he explained in a hurry.
"Mr. Tommy Hawke..." Robert also fulfilled his duties as a lawyer and immediately reminded Tommy Hawke that his words were suspected of verbal insults to Lotus.
Jim Manz also waved his hand and said, "Robert, this is not a court session. Let's just chat casually. Anyway, the two companies will exchange each other's testimonies and evidence after the meeting. Let me chat with Mr. Tommy Hawke like a friend."
After he finished speaking, he looked at Tommy, carefully considered his words, slowed down his speech, and spoke sincerely: "Mr. Tommy Hawke, we are not sitting here to discuss biology with you. We have seen that your company has done a lot of things that are beneficial to society, such as helping women find jobs, providing computer training services to people with low education, etc. We came here with sincerity. Mr. Mickey Kapur, Jonathan who was not present, and I are all pleased with what your company has done. Do you mind talking about this?"
Mickey Kapur, Robert Morley and other Lotus lawyers present were all surprised, obviously Jim's words were beyond their expectations.
Tommy caught Delia's pause in flipping the notebook out of the corner of his eye, then smiled and looked at Jim: "Mind, because you always express your satisfaction, but never donate to us or support us. This is the main reason why we have not met until now. If you really want to know everything, it's very simple. I will ask the secretary of those organizations to provide you with a donation account. Cash or check is fine, and there is no limit on the amount. At that time, I am willing to talk to you about charity, but not now, because you are not the sponsor."
Jim rubbed his lips with his palms. This guy named Tommy Hawke was really just like himself, a complete bastard. He asked such sincere questions, but got such disgusting answers in return.
"Mr. Mickey Kapoor, I saw the news recently. You were on the newspaper. It said that many women reminded you outside the Lotus company. I guess they were reminding you to do the right thing and not do the wrong thing." Tommy kept staring at Mickey Kapoor. Even when answering Jim, he would pay attention to the other's expression. As soon as Jim was stunned, he would continue to stare at Mickey and attack him.
Mickey Kapoor crossed his fingers and said calmly: "History tells us that those who really do wrong will be punished."
"It sounds like the history courses at MIT are different from those at Stanford, because the history books I read told me that the Native Americans did nothing wrong, and those who did something wrong became the most powerful country in the world after killing all the Indians." Tommy Hawke looked at Mickey Caple:
"Didn't I just persuade Mr. Mickey Kapoor to donate to support charity? Now I think it's unnecessary. You might as well donate some money to MIT and ask them to update their history books to avoid misleading students."
"So Actor thinks it's the right thing to do?" Jim Manz tried to shift Tommy's attention to himself, because he didn't know how long Mickey could endure such nerdy humiliation.
Tommy looked at Jim innocently, "Actor did not scalp Soft Art. As for who the murderer is, I think everyone here knows it clearly ."
"Tommy...can I call you Tommy? I think you have a strong resistance to us. Maybe you thought that at the contact meeting, the lawyers would line up to ask all kinds of tricky questions, but we are not prepared to do so. We want to talk calmly and get to know each other. Maybe the previous problems were just because of the lack of communication between us."
"Soviet Union." Tommy stared at Mickey and uttered a word.
Jim was stunned for a moment: "What?"
"Soviet Union, do you think the misunderstanding between the United States and the Soviet Union is due to lack of communication? Mr. Jim Mantz? You have been to the Soviet Union and you have a say in this." Tommy suddenly turned his eyes, stared at Jim Mantz, and asked with a smile.
Jim was a little speechless. This question was not easy to answer. What he just said about talking to the other party calmly was all bullshit. From the moment they sat down until now, both sides had been attacking each other as much as possible with every question, and leaving written records, which they would use as weapons when they spoke again in court to attack each other in front of the judge and jury.
He had a lot of words to explain the conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union, and he could also give a brief description of it, but if he was not mistaken, this would definitely become a weapon used by the other party to attack the judge and jury in court. They would probably compare Actor to open America and Lotus to the Soviet Union, which was opposed to freedom, to win sympathy. He could not give the other party this opportunity.
"I think the misunderstanding between the two American companies is due to lack of communication. As for Tommy, if you want to know the details of the question you just asked, National Review has a 150,000-word report that can tell you the answer." Jim thought for a moment and spoke.
"Mr. Mickey Kapur, Actor Corporation once took the initiative to communicate with you. I'm curious why you didn't respond. Do you remember? During our testing period, a Lotus 1-2-3 user at Stanford University excitedly sent you a version of OSS for us after he helped with the testing." Tommy asked, still staring at Mickey Kapur.
Mickey Kapur frowned slightly, but nodded honestly: "Lotus did receive the software, but I thought it was just a personal action of one user, so I don't think it was a reaction from Actor."
"Of course, back to communication, if you are really sincere, I think Actor should have received a phone call instead of a lawyer's letter." Tommy looked at Mickey and suddenly spoke faster: "We are sitting here to communicate, which is what you want to see, Mr. Mickey Kapur, right? Just like the way you solved unpleasant things with some classmates in high school, you like to communicate, but in front of the dean or the principal. You want to see those guys who stripped you to your underwear to go to class, and those guys who helped you write Hello Girl on your organ with a marker when you had your first date with a girl, bow down to you because of fear of the principal..."
Tommy had already finished a long speech before Robert spoke to stop him.
"I remind you..."
"Don't remind me, Mr. Lawyer." Tommy looked at Robert Morley: "You can just record it and make sure that if I lie or make up something, you can sue me for defamation."
Then, Tommy stared at Mickey Kapur and continued with a smile, "This is the communication you wanted, right, Mr. Mickey Kapur? After the meeting, when we exchange some testimonies, you will find that your high school classmates have completely different memories of those events than you do. My lawyer has thoughtfully sorted them out for you."
Mickey Kapoor's face showed strong anger, but he managed to control himself and not lose his composure.
Jim breathed a sigh of relief and looked at Tommy, trying to draw the fire to himself: "Tommy, the definition of communication and sincerity is..."
"I know what I am telling you. I think that is the best definition of sincerity in communication." Tommy turned to Jim Manz with a sparkling look in his eyes.
"By the way, Mr. Jim Manz, did you know that a woman we helped at Actor actually said that you didn't pay her and her companions when you had sex in California? Unfortunately, during the investigation, our lawyers found that you seemed to have sold some lunar land to farmers in Montana when you were in college. Don't worry, I know that those things have nothing to do with this case. Besides, after the SSD fraternity learned about this, they are contacting those poor people to help provide compensation."
Noticing Jim Manz's expression change slightly, Tommy smiled, looked back at Mickey Kapur, and opened his arms slightly:
“These are the three things that Actor always adheres to: sincerity, communication, and doing the right thing.”
