Category: Notes and such

Maura Benson: Background

Role in Story: Protagonist

Occupation: Wants to start a new business. Has been a social media success, worked with a Klout-like company. Is looking to build a new company.

Physical Description: Early 40s, blonde like somebody who was born blonde, very blonde as a kid grown up into highlights and dirty natural blonde now. She’s 5’10” with a face that still shows the cherubic child, the one that looked like a classic doll-like child at 3. She was born in Mexico, where her childhood self would occasionally stop people on the street. tempered by life, though. She was gorgeous at 20, but never thought of herself like that, so she didn’t use make-up, wasn’t big on dating.

Personality: The only one who didn’t understand how amazing Maura is, is Maura herself. She’s likely to linger in the background. She’ll let others lead the conversation. She’s brilliant. She was phi beta kappa at Stanford. She’s a natural mediator, comes from a large family, was often called on to help

Habits/Mannerisms: Maura waits for others to move, plays a background role, tends to sandbag a conversation by waiting in the background until the rime to move, and then she comes on strong and powerful if it’s about her areas of competence, or her child. She often lets others be right when it doesn’t matter.

Background: Raised in Palo Alto, youngest of five, very smart, phi beta kappa at Stanford. Her father John started a software company in Palo Alto. She saw the struggles, thought she’d never be an entrepreneur, but of course events led her there. She was an early helicopter child, very loyal to her parents. Maura’s fiery mother is Mexican, Angelina, a fireball, gorgeous when they met at Notre Dame.

Maura married Donald out of Stanford. He’d been a founder of a networking company, Netpower. He bowled her over, not just with limos and such, but with kindness, with intellect, he seemed the ideal suitor. The honeymoon was disappointing, as she dealt with his character, darkness, the real Donald. His love of Netpower, he wanted her to do the parenting, he’d never been affectionate, and their son was born with a disability called developmental dyspraxia. Maura felt steadily more alone as she developed her own life, he ended up as a revenge character.

Internal Conflicts: She deeply regrets marrying Donald because she felt dumb, deceived; but she loves her son. She struggles

External Conflicts: The main plot.   Notes:

TimeLine

When        What

   
2002 Maura Graduates from Stanford. Works at WordPower blogging platform. Donald moves to Silicon Valley with his partner.
2004: Maura meets Donald. Dating experience.
  Maura marries Donald, just three months later.  Starts freelance writing small business articles. Her mother hated her dropping her job.
  SoShall goes public. Donald takes jets on test drives, installs servers, builds his fortress.
2005: SoShall tanked. Donald goes deep dive. Maura continues to freelance. Fascinated by blogging in general. Donald doesn’t want her working. Donald can preserve his vision of ideal family. Donald makes a living consulting. Chinese are his best clients.
2007: Donald gets MeetYUP funded. Virtual teamworks for enterprises. Wants Maura to work for him there, but only part time, and controlled. She meets Nate, his VP development. Has friction over Nate’s sloppy approach, overpromising.
2007: Jack is born. It’s really John Peter, but Donald insists on Jack, and not John Joseph, like Maura’s father. Maura’s desire to continue working is a source of tension between her and Donald. She drops out, happily.
2010: MeetYUP isn’t growing. Maura discovers Donald is good at fundraising but doesn’t actually do the work. Nate and Donald have a falling out, Donald is furious at Maura for talking to Nate. Nate is doing all the work. Nate complains to Maura often. Maura is frustrated with Donald’s objections to child care, Jack seems neglected. Maura talks to her dad.
  Taxes come down hard on Donald.
2011: February: Donald is angry about everything, retreats … taxes become a big deal … he ignores Jack.
  May. The Divorce. Jack is 4. Donald issues threats.
2012: Maura takes fulltime job with WordPower. Struggling with single parenting and Donald’s lack of cooperation. She meets Matt and Janet at WordPower.
2014: Maura comes up with Syfon. Late at night. She finds Celia. Early on she’s approached by Nate Yalonis to join. He heard she was looking. She doesn’t trust him. He bad-mouths Donald and MeetYUP. She talks to WordPower. Gets permission.
2014 She learns from the nanny and yacht captain and freaks out. Contempt of court and makeup time.
2015: Maura makes progress. Meeting with bosses at WordPower.
2016: April: a high point. The presentation for SWAG. Everything looking good.
  May: The opening scene takes place in 2016. The low point. Nate, now financed by Donald, files suit against Syfon for using software owned by MeetYUP, developed by MeetYUP under his supervision.   then by claiming software ownership as he jumps.
  June: Matt lands client #1. Donald sues for custody of Jack.
  October: the trial. Highs and lows.
  November: Matt lands client #2
2017: Maura hires. Business is growing.
  Coffee with Dan, Matt, and Maura. Apply for SWAG 2017. Nope.
  Celia and Carlos in Zihua, March.
  Matt and Janet figure it out
2017 Celia’s interview. Matt and Janet get their money back, in spades.

 

The synopsis

The Deal is Dead

It’s May of 2016. It seemed like Maura and Syfon were ready to go, about to get a half million dollars from SWAG angel investors, when suddenly something has gone terribly wrong.

Maura’s first pitch had gone well. Her first pitch to SWAG had gone spectacularly well. During the following weeks, she’d been working well with the due diligence committee. Syfon had a credible team, some early traction, an interesting market, good prospects. Maura felt like a star. She’d given herself the luxury of enjoying the ride, at least briefly.

But in the last meeting, last night, the good vibe changed to eery suspicious silence. Maura fielded a series loaded questions, coming seemingly out of nowhere, at a point in due diligence when normally things were getting easier. There was doubt whether her software was really hers, or actually developed while she was employed by her ex husband. And there was a question about her personal legal problems, a reference, apparently, to a custody battle the previous year.

Clearly something is up, but what? New competition? Some fatal flaw? Or – much more likely, in Maura’s mind – sabotage. Somebody with an axe to grind. It might be Natalie Yalonis, former partner, with whom she had a falling out over questions of right and wrong, business ethics. Or it might be Donald Ford, her ex husband, still and always seeking revenge. 

That first morning, the day after, as she shares the disastrous turn of events with Matt, her mentor, Maura suspects Caroline or Donald but can’t be sure. She tells Matt the story of Donald. Nobody would believe it.

Matt calls in some favors and gets the deep background. Angel groups keep these things confidential, for obvious reasons, but Matt knows most of the players. He finds out that Don Wilson, a SWAG member investor, lumber millionaire, has campaigned with the due diligence team. He claimed he was on to something the others didn’t know, about the software, and her. It was a smear campaign, innuendos. He had been silent, in the background, at the meeting. So where did he get that? And why? It doesn’t make sense. Neither Maura nor Matt have any history with Wilson, but this feels personal. 

Wilson won’t talk to either of them. He doesn’t return calls.

The next day, Matt and Maura talk to their lawyer about the software ownership allegations. There is nothing there. It’s completely defensible.

At lunch after the meeting with the lawyer, Matt and Maura, still reeling, calculate next steps with the assumption that Syfon won’t get the money. First problem is what they do about Celia? She was going to be moving to the US and coming on full time, but can they do that without the SWAG? They discuss Matt’s efforts to land a sugar daddy first client.

Meanwhile, Celia and Carlos are struggling with the move. They both want it, but Carlos has a good job in Mexico City and no job in the US. Anti-immigrant sentiment worries him. His family is concerned about him moving or not based on his wife’s job. He’s a Stanford MBA. 

And Janet’s worried that Matt is going to get caught in the crossfire. They argue. She knows Maura and has always liked her, but worries that Matt is making this one of his causes, and is going too far. Maybe he shouldn’t have given up his agency too early. Maybe this is about him, struggling, as he’s reached his sixties? 

Then Maura gets Donald’s petition for more time with their son. The petition, a formal filing like a lawsuit, alleges that a boy needs his father. But does that make sense, given the serious custody evaluation of three years earlier? Or is it Donald lashing out? Was it prompted by the specter of Maura getting funded and outshining him?

Then the other shoe drops. And then Skip tips Matt to Natalie’s new company. Sounds like Syfon. Natalie’s the main founder, and Don Wilson and Donald Ford are backers. 

Maura contemplates Syfon and her legal situation. More lawyer costs coming. And the SWAG deal is done. Money will be running short again.

The long uphill trail

Syfon was born from need. Problems and solutions. As the world

Maura and Donald

A great beginning

The first big fall

 

The second big fall

The custody evaluation

 

Matt and Janet

Another great beginning

You just blink

The dark wood

Celia and Carlos

Anticipation

The gift of the magi

The family dinner at Zihua

Unanswered prayers