CHAPTER 5 - JOSH
1719 Words
There I was, gaping into a face that could have come from those recollections directly. As if time had folded in on itself and opened a portal right in the middle of my office. My grip tensed around the mouse, knuckles dulling. I should’ve said commodity. Anything. But words felt foreign in that moment, like trying to flash back how to walk after being aquatic too long.
I was a man used to commanding apartments, deconstructing arguments, obliterating substantiations with surgical perfection, and yet, I couldn’t indeed say hello. She listed her head slightly, curious, perhaps, or just conforming to the light. And I saw it — just a flicker. A wimpiness around the eyes. A pull at the corner of her mouth. commodity Agatha used to do when she was allowing but did n’t want anyone to know she was.
“ Mr. Alexander? ” she said eventually, her voice indeed measured. Not Agatha’s voice. But close. Too close.
“ Yes, ” I managed, throat dry. She extended her hand.
“ Clara Rumsfeld. ” Clara. Not Agatha. Right. Of course. This was an interview. I had a schedule. A list. Eliana had just said her name, hadn’t she? But my brain, it had had stopped, stopped entirely, not minding about the environment. It was too busy trying to catch up to attune the conflict between who she was and who she looked like.
Walking towards her way establishment, her features, Agatha like. Darm the the gods I allowed.
A joke of some sort to them?
Stretching out her hands, her handshake was firm. Controlled. Casting a bit further than a regard at her, i noted the minimum jewellery, the structured blazer, and the minimalist leather portfolio put away under her arm. She had the polished sharpness of someone who prepared for everything. The kind of medication Agatha used to fake and I used to respect.
“ Have a seat, ” I said, waving toward the president across from mine. My voice sounded far down, like it was coming from nearly behind me. She sat. Crossed one leg over the other. Calm as a lake in the afterlife. I reached for her résumé indeed, though I’d formerly read it that morning. Top of her class. Harvard. Clerked for a civil judge in Boston. externship at an action exchange that handled high- stakes pharmaceutical cases. Strong references. Of course, she was perfect.
I cleared my throat. “ So, your resume states it all, does it not, that you clerked for Judge Lathrop? ”
“ Yes, I did, ” she jounced.
“ Twelve months. Eastern District, ”
“ What was the most gruelling stir you had to draft? ” I asked her, hoping for a difference or sort by her. Trying to separate she from her. She didn’t hesitate, neither did she notice.
“ We had a Daubert challenge in a product liability case, mass tort. The defence tried to count the complainant’s expert on occasion. I was asked to help draft the response. ” She responded
“ And? ”
“ We kept the expert. slightly. The judge wrote in her opinion that the wisdom was ‘ just above the admissibility line.’ But it gave us room to negotiate a favourable agreement. ” I jounced.
Professional. Articulate. Smart. Effective.
But none of that signified right now. Because my mind, treacherous as ever, kept studying her mouth when she spoke. That mouth. It was n’t just analogous it moved the same. The meter, the perfection. The slight pause before she made a point. I knew those measures. Knew them like old music. I forced myself to shift gears.
“ Why Xanderia? ” Her answer was solid, commodity about the establishment’s character in complex action, our trial record, our mentorship programs. I was not harkening. Not really. I was watching her hands now. Small, deliberate movements. The way she rested them on her knee. Agatha used to do the same thing when she was pretending to be relaxed. She was n’t ever relaxed. Not really. Clara kept speaking, ignorant , or perhaps not, that my world was beginning to come piecemeal at the seams. I wanted to look down.
To concentrate on the sense of the moment. But the resemblance was so grim it felt like I was hallucinating. And for many moments, just a many, I let myself wonder, What if? What if Agatha had changed her name? What if this was her, ever? What if she had come back, reconstructed, repackaged, slipped through the cracks of time just to sit across from me and say nothing? Of course, it was n’t rational. But grief does n’t follow sense. It waits. It sleeps. And when it wakes, it does n’t knock. It kicks the door in and points at the scar you allowed had healed.
I do not remember the rest of the interview. Not really. I asked questions. She answered them. I indeed made notes, out of habit. But my mind kept circling the same insolvable conclusion this woman, Clara, was not Agatha, but ever, she was visited by her. As the interview wrapped, Clara stood and offered another calm, polite smile. No coyness. No recognition. Just business.
“ Thank you for your time, Mr. Alexander. ”
“ Josh, ” I corrected before I could stop myself. She broke. Just for a beat. also jounced.
“ Thank you, Josh. ” And also she turned and walked down. Her heels echoed again, soft but certain, until the door clicked shut behind her.
I sat there, gaping at the empty sit acroos me, still gripped by commodity I could n’t explain. Absentmindedly, I buzzed Eliana to request her of the coming seeker.
“ Coming seeker ready?" Eliana buzzed through the intercom.
“ No seeker, Sir, she was the last. ” I did not answer right down. Because commodity inside me had formerly shifted. commodity long- buried had cracked open. And I knew, no matter what came next, this wasn’t over. Not by a long shot.
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-CLARA'S POV-
I could still feel his stare long after I’d left the room.
There was something about the way he looked at me, as if he were peeling back time, not just skin. Not like most men look. Not with lust, or power, or intimidation. It was something else entirely. Recognition? Shock? Pain?
He didn’t blink much. Didn’t smile. Didn’t ask for small talk. Just stared like he was reading me with the intensity of a man who had once lost something and wasn’t sure if he’d just found it again—or if he was losing his mind.
And for a fleeting second, I almost felt guilty.
But I pushed it away.
I kept walking down the hall, ignoring the nervous assistant who offered me a glass of water like I might faint from the pressure of interviewing at Xanderia. I didn’t need water. I didn’t need comfort. I needed control.
Once I reached the elevator, I pressed the button and waited in silence. The metallic doors reflected just enough for me to catch a glimpse of myself. Calm. Composed. Professional.
Nothing like the girl I used to be, and nothing close to understanding the new me. It was just vengeance orientated.
Nothing like the daughter of a woman who had left her little daughter to seek a better life,better her somewhere, or probably a better man.
The doors slid open. I stepped inside.
As the elevator began its descent, I finally allowed myself a breath. Not a deep one, just enough to move air through my lungs and wash away the tension that numbed my entire bring.
My phone buzzed.
A text from Rhea.
> So??? Did you see him?
I didn’t respond right away.
I stared at the screen, thumb hovering, unsure what to reply.
> Yes.
A second later, the three dots appeared. Then:
> OMG. WHAT WAS IT LIKE?? Did he recognize you?? Did he say anything?
> He didn’t recognize me. But he stared like he was trying to.
> Creepy or… intense?
> Both, I think.
> Girl, what did I tell you? You’re basically Agatha with contour and confidence. If you’d dyed your hair black, he probably would’ve fainted.
I smiled, barely. Rhea always had a way of making darkness sound like fashion.It was true, though. The resemblance wasn’t accidental. It wasn’t even natural, if I’m honest. It had taken a very intentional set of steps—subtle tweaks, minor lifts, specific cuts, certain brands of lipstick, and hours of pouring over old photographs and private videos on an encrypted drive no one knew I had.
Not even Rhea.
Especially not Rhea.
Rhea had connections everywhere. That’s just who she was. The kind of girl who made friends in cabs, elevators, and jury duty.
We were roommates at Harvard. She was loud, messy, and fearless. I was the opposite.
One night during our 2L year, we were drinking cheap red wine in our apartment when I asked her, “Have you ever heard of a lawyer named Josh Alexander?”
She blinked. “You’re kidding, right?”
“No.”
She laughed. “That man is the stuff of litigation legend. He built Xanderia from the ground up. His firm basically is the ground. Why?”
I hesitated. “I just… came across an article. Curious.”
She didn’t buy it, but she let it go. That was how much of a family she was to me.
Few years, she came home waving a flyer. “Externship opportunity. Xanderia. They’re interviewing, and we will graduate next semester. You want in?”
I said yes before I even finished reading the damn thing.
Now, standing outside the elevator, I wasn’t sure if that had been brilliance or delusion.
Maybe both.
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As I walked out of the building and stepped onto the sidewalk, I could feel the weight of his eyes still clinging to me like a second skin.
Josh Alexander.
The man who had, in some fractured way, made me.
He didn’t know who I was. Not yet. But I knew him. I had spent years knowing him from behind glass.
And today, for the first time, I had stepped into his world.
The shadow had walked into the light.
And he hadn’t even flinched.
Or so she thought.
- Writer
