The Silver Lining

ONE

AN old converted loft apartment at the extreme nook of The Mill Hill Broadway was filled with nitid sun rays of a pleasant early-morning, a mild lavender fragrance and the girly guffaw. An elderly British woman, who preferred a reference as Grandma Hall, couldn't contain her happiness and kept expressing her gratitude to The Lord. In her arms rested her beloved granddaughter-Lisa, who had snuggled up in motherly embrace.
Grandma Hall was Lisa's mother, father and everything a family would mean to a person. Moreover, she was a proud educated woman with a lot of bad experiences in her Basket. With sour marriage, deceased daughter and no other heir to her throne, she had raised Lisa in her converted loft, for twenty long years, with all the love, care and guard. On routine days, Grandma Hall would roam around The Mill Hill Broadway tutoring the neighborhood kids and Lisa would stay in her bed, studying hard to beat the law exam finale, which lately seemed like a never-ending endeavour. Not that Lisa was complaining because of a book nerd that she was, she was more than eager to start her career, now that even financial aspects had turned challenging.

'So the Day is finally here!', Lisa thought. Today, Lisa had received an important letter, calling her for the final round interview for an opening of a Junior Associate at 'Spade & Wright'. In Lisa's opinion, she shouldn't have received the letter because she didn't think she deserved another round. However, she figured why she was called as she read the contents of the letter. The letter stated that the law firm had invited only those who lived in the nearest vicinity, despite their performances in previous interview rounds.
Considering that the interview was in the afternoon on the very same day, she had to get started for the day.

Lisa broke the chains of hugs, finally, and walked straight into the shower. All she could think of was the chance she had got to do something better for her not-yet-materialised career... A chance to finally be able to help those who can't afford to be legally heard. She remembered her grandmother telling her the stories about how giving her parents were. She wanted to be exactly like them but she admired her grandma's sap... 'warmth in heart and a lethal vigour in muscles to beat the crap out of bad people', She smiled at the thought and nodded as that thought frilled her lips and she wanted to become all of it.

While tangled in her own thoughts, she hurriedly dressed up in her all-time-go-to navy blue blazer to match her trousers and white shirt. She dialed the number given on the Letter to inform that she would be attending the interview round and surprisingly ended up with an early schedule. She gulped down OJ with the butter-layered bread and stepped out of the apartment. For this special day, she had received enough allowance to hire a cab and she did exactly that.

When she reached at the square on 313 Roundway, she paid the bill and decided to walk a little to clear her thoughts before walking through the entrance of the glassy building of 'Spade & Wright'. She was about to cross the road when a car dashed past her and hit the post box located next to the building of 'Spade & Wright', all the while scattering her portfolio down on to the pavement. In dilemma of whether to gather her documents first or to calm her angry nerves, she rushed towards the car to check on the driver but instead she heard a man yelling at her like a crazy clown from IT. Though his car seemed to be totaled, it seemed to Lisa as if the man had hit his head, not his car. He observed her from her tip to toe and blessed her with a lot of respectable terms, which Lisa mindlessly ignored.

"Are you okay?" Lisa asked with a concerned glance.

"Are you blind?" reverted the man, mostly sarcastically.

He glanced at a page of Lisa's Portfolio, which had stuck underneath his right shoe and spit the words while pointing out at the glassy building. "You're here for the interview, eh? 'Spade & Wright' won't even let you stand if the word reaches to its Board about how disrespectfully you behaved with Mr. Spade. Yet here you are, all ready to pounce and charge, eh?" All the while, he kept pointing at himself while referring to Mr. Spade and this made Lisa laugh.