Fifteen years into her legal career, the protagonist reflects on the dual paths she has walked: the unrelenting demands of a high-stakes criminal lawyer and the passionate, tumultuous journey of her personal life. Both worlds have shaped who she is, yet one feels more controllable — the courtroom, where she can bend facts and emotions to win justice. The other, her marriage, feels like a legal contract that has grown more fragile with each passing year.
As she sits in her office, overlooking the futuristic skyline of 2040, she flips through the pages of her diary — her secret outlet for desires, frustrations, and reflections. Her pen traces the ink of moments when her legal victories felt hollow next to the failures in her personal life. In this diary, one name keeps appearing: Toshu — short for Tathagata Basu, her husband, and once the center of her world.
Toshu was never supposed to be more than an accidental love affair. He had walked into her life during a routine corporate legal function. She, already a rising star in criminal law, had found herself in a conversation that should have been forgettable, but wasn’t. Something about his calm, assured demeanor — completely unfazed by the pressures of corporate law — struck her. They bonded over their shared passion for the law, although his expertise in contracts was a world apart from her immersion in criminal defense. His cool professionalism contrasted with her fiery courtroom persona, yet they shared an intellectual intensity that quickly evolved into a passionate, whirlwind romance.
In those early days, Toshu — whom she had begun to call affectionately — was everything she desired: successful, charming, and disarmingly attentive. His career as a corporate lawyer was nothing short of immaculate. His rise in the legal world seemed effortless, as if everything he touched turned to gold. While she fought tooth and nail in courtrooms defending criminals, Toshu brokered billion-dollar deals with the same precision and finesse. His unblemished career, unmarred by scandal or controversy, stood as a testament to his dedication. He was admired, respected, and feared by his adversaries — a lawyer who always played by the rules, always won, and rarely showed the cracks of human emotion that she was all too familiar with in her clients.
But their romance had always been like a flame burning too brightly, too quickly. Their dating life was short — an intense, all-consuming love affair that left no room for anything but their mutual admiration and desire. Nights were spent debating legal theories and indulging in the kind of passion that seemed to defy logic. She fell in love with his mind as much as his body. His intelligence was intoxicating, his self-assuredness thrilling. Their chemistry, both emotional and physical, was undeniable.
Yet as her legal career soared, so did the distance between them. She found herself taking on more complex cases, defending clients accused of horrific crimes, while Toshu’s corporate legal career continued its smooth, upward trajectory. The intensity of their initial romance began to fade, slowly but unmistakably. His focus remained on his work — his clients and contracts — while hers shifted toward the dark, complex realm of criminal psychology, justice, and the human mind.
Their marriage, which had once been a perfect blend of shared ambitions and intense passion, began to feel more like a business arrangement. The more she delved into the minds of criminals, the more she felt Toshu slipping away, no longer understanding the weight of her work or the emotional toll it took on her. Their once-volatile passion cooled into routine, their love now punctuated by professional achievements rather than personal connection.
Still, Toshu remained a constant in her life, his presence soothing but distant, his love unwavering but lacking the intensity of their earlier years. He was, after all, a corporate lawyer who viewed relationships through the lens of contracts and negotiations, not the messy, emotional entanglements that she dealt with in her criminal cases. She began to wonder if he would ever understand the darkness that inhabited her — her fantasies, her desires, the part of her that she couldn’t express in their ordered, structured life.
As she closes her diary for the night, she knows that her marriage is at a breaking point. She has already begun to draft a divorce decree, knowing that their love, like a contract, may need to be severed. Yet a part of her holds on — just as her career has, against all odds, withstood the pressures of the legal world, perhaps there is a way for their love to survive the tests of time, distance, and ambition.
But for now, she is left with her diary, her thoughts, and the unresolved question of whether love, like law, can be saved by a new strategy — or whether it’s already too late.
Read the Story line here — https://fiatlexica.medium.com/my-secret-diary-as-a-criminal-lawyer-2c2ce0f3b384
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