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Agatha woke before her alarm, as she always did, with that faint, familiar ache behind her eyes. The sky outside her window was a shade of gray that couldn’t decide whether to brighten or give up, and the hum of the city was already working its way through the glass. She lay still for a minute, listening - the faint buzz of her refrigerator, the tap of a branch against the pane, the heartbeat she didn’t trust.
She sat up, counted it out anyway. Still there. Still hers.
The kitchen smelled faintly of burnt coffee and last night’s rain. She moved through it in slippers, unhurried but restless, her fingers trailing along the counter like she was reading Braille. The newspaper on the table had three headlines circled in pen, and the mug beside it still held the ghost of yesterday’s tea.
“Tell me you’ve taken it,” Jennifer Kale said, not as a question but a diagnosis. She appeared in the doorway, coat half-buttoned, hair caught in the wind. She was always moving, as if life had put her on a treadmill she’d long since made peace with.
Agatha looked up from her bag, guilty. “Define ‘it.’”
“Don’t play with me,” Jennifer warned, tossing her scarf on a chair. “The little white pill. Heart-shaped irony.”
Agatha gave a noncommittal hum, reached for the kettle instead.
“That’s a no,” Jennifer sighed, exasperated but fond. “You know, when I said I wanted to be part of your morning routine, I was thinking coffee dates. Not medical supervision.”
“Consider it community service,” Agatha murmured, pouring the water. “You’re performing a public good.”
“Mm-hmm. Until you drop dead mid-keynote and I have to explain to a roomful of academics that I told you so.”
Agatha’s smile was soft, self-deprecating. “If I do, at least it’ll be memorable.”
Jennifer leaned against the counter, crossing her arms. “What’s this one even about again?”
“Legacy,” Agatha said, stirring sugar into her tea. “What we leave behind. What gets erased. How memory is curated.”
Jennifer whistled low. “Cheerful as always.”
“I aim for accuracy, not cheer.”
“Mm. And how’s the heart?”
“Still present,” Agatha replied, with that small, dry tilt of her mouth. “Loud when I’m quiet, quiet when I’m busy. Like an untrained student.”
Jennifer didn’t laugh at that one. She just reached out and squeezed Agatha’s shoulder once - a quick, practical gesture, the kind of touch that said I know, without making a production of it.
“You’re sure you’re up for this?”
Agatha met her eyes. “It’s only twenty minutes of speaking and forty-five of pretending to enjoy hors d’oeuvres. I can survive mortality a little longer.”
Jennifer rolled her eyes but smiled. “Try to make it through the day, yeah?”
“I always do.”
When Jennifer left, the apartment felt too still. Agatha stood at the window with her tea, watching the reflection of her own face blur in the glass as the light changed. She thought, for a moment, that there was someone standing just behind her - a trick of the mirror, a half-formed silhouette she didn’t quite recognize.
She blinked, and it was gone.
She checked her pulse again, just to be sure.
Then she laughed under her breath, shook her head, and went to get ready.
The conference was held at a hotel that had spent decades pretending to be new. Its glass façade caught the morning sun like a vanity mirror, all glare and promise. Inside, everything smelled faintly of citrus and carpet cleaner, and the hum of conversation filled the atrium like white noise.
Agatha signed in, smiling at the volunteer who handed her a badge with her name spelled correctly for once. Dr. Agatha Harkness - Guest Speaker. It looked strange to her, the title and the name together. Too official, too certain.
She moved through the crowd with that quiet efficiency of someone who knew how to be both present and invisible. People greeted her, some she remembered, others she pretended to. She answered questions, shook hands, laughed when expected. She was very good at pretending to be healthy.
The keynote wasn’t until afternoon. For now, she was a ghost with an agenda: coffee, quiet, and maybe a place to review her notes. She found a table near the windows where sunlight spilled across the marble floor like spilled honey, and set down her bag.
That’s when she saw her.
Across the room, framed by a wall of glass and the slow motion of the lobby crowd, stood a woman in green. The kind of green that didn’t belong to fabric so much as forest- dark, deep, living. She wasn’t talking to anyone. She wasn’t even checking her phone. She was just there, still and watchful, as if the whole room moved for her benefit.
Agatha didn’t realize she’d stopped mid-sentence until the colleague beside her asked a question twice. She made some polite sound of acknowledgment, eyes flicking back toward the woman- and found her looking straight at her.
It wasn’t a smile exactly. More a question, unspoken and direct.
Agatha looked away first. She wasn’t sure why her pulse had picked up.
She gathered her notes, told herself she was overthinking. She had always been like this- curious about beautiful strangers, drawn to things that felt slightly dangerous. Probably just another visiting speaker, maybe one of the philanthropists sponsoring the event. The name on the banner came back to her from the registration desk: Vidal Foundation for Legacy Studies.
Vidal. Rio Vidal.
It sounded made up. Like a character in a novel someone would warn you about.
By noon, Agatha had spoken to a dozen people but couldn’t remember any of their faces. Every time she glanced up, she caught that same glint of green across the room- sometimes closer, sometimes gone. It should have been unnerving, but instead it felt… reassuring, somehow.
The main hall began to fill, rows of seats turning toward the stage. The moderator tapped the microphone, voice echoing through the space.
“Please welcome our guest speaker- Dr. Agatha Harkness.”
Applause. Flashbulbs. A throat cleared in the second row.
And in the fourth- there she was again. Rio Vidal, sitting perfectly still, hands folded, expression unreadable.
Agatha began.
She spoke of mortality and memory, the architecture of legacy. How people built monuments to survive their own forgetting. How every act of preservation was, in its own way, a refusal to die. She spoke with her usual precision, her dry humor intact, but part of her mind was somewhere else- wondering why this woman’s gaze felt like a tether.
When the Q&A began, the first question came from Rio.
“If death paused for one mind,” she asked, her voice low and even, “would the world collapse or catch its breath?”
A ripple of interest passed through the audience, half thinking it was metaphor, half unsettled.
Agatha met her eyes. “Depends on whether that mind likes attention.”
Laughter broke the tension, polite and scattered. Rio didn’t laugh. She only tilted her head slightly, like she was committing the answer to memory.
For the rest of the session, Agatha felt watched- not with menace, but with a kind of attentiveness that made her words sharper, her pulse heavier. By the time it ended, she was flushed with adrenaline and something she couldn’t quite name.
She stepped down from the stage, the applause still echoing, and found Rio waiting near the back doors, as if she’d known exactly where she’d go.
“Hey.”
Jennifer appeared at her elbow, quick and efficient as ever, already holding a bottle of water. “You okay? You look- flushed.”
Agatha smiled, trying for light. “Occupational hazard. Mortality’s a thrilling topic.”
Jen squinted at her, unconvinced. “Mm. You sure it’s not that new beta-blocker? You’re practically glowing.”
“Maybe I’m just popular,” Agatha said, taking the bottle.
“Don’t flatter yourself, professor. Half the audience was asleep.”
Agatha laughed- real laughter this time, quick and sharp. It steadied her heartbeat, but not the sense of being watched. There it was again: that prickle at the back of her neck, the awareness of someone’s eyes.
Jen followed her line of sight toward the doors. “Friend of yours?”
Across the hall, amid the slow drift of guests, Rio Vidal stood waiting. The crowd curved around her without touching her, like she was a fixed point the world was built around.
“I- don’t think so,” Agatha murmured. “She’s with the Vidal Foundation. Probably a sponsor.”
“Well,” Jen said, slinging her bag over her shoulder, “your sponsor’s been staring at you since the third question. Maybe she’s about to offer you tenure.”
Agatha rolled her eyes, but her stomach fluttered anyway. “Go on, before you start matchmaking.”
“Too late for that,” Jen teased, stepping back. “Meet me at the bar in twenty, okay? And take your pill.”
“Bossy,” Agatha muttered.
“Alive,” Jen corrected, and vanished into the crowd.
Agatha turned- and Rio was already closer, cutting through the dispersing audience with that unhurried grace that made space bend for her.
She stopped a few feet away, the applause still echoing faintly behind them.
Agatha stopped. “Enjoy the lecture?”
I’ve heard better eulogies,” Rio smiled faintly.
“That was supposed to be optimistic.”
“It was honest,” Rio said. “That’s rarer.”
Agatha’s laugh came too easily. “Well. Glad to be a novelty.”
Rio glanced toward the bar area. “Would you let me buy you a drink? You look like someone who needs to forget how to be impressive for a while.”
Agatha hesitated, caught between instinct and impulse. “I have another panel in an hour.”
Rio’s gaze didn’t waver. “Then you have fifty-nine minutes to waste.”
And Agatha, who never wasted anything, found herself saying, “Lead the way.”
The hotel bar looked the same as every other one she’d been in: too much brass, too much beige, and lighting designed to make everyone look like they’d slept well.
Agatha hadn’t.
She sat near the end, blazer folded neatly beside her, the condensation from her drink soaking into a napkin. Her pulse still hadn’t settled from the keynote; she could feel it in her neck.
“Is this seat taken?”
That voice- low, calm, threaded with something she couldn’t name.
Agatha looked up. The green suit again, cutting through the neutral room like it had been waiting for color.
“It’s all yours,” she said, gesturing to the empty stool. “Though full disclosure, I’m terrible company when I’m tired.”
Rio sat anyway. “I don’t mind quiet.”
“That’s lucky for you, then.”
The bartender came over. Agatha waved him off; Rio ordered water, no ice. The man nodded and drifted away.
“You’re the sponsor,” Agatha said, pretending to look busy with her straw. “The Vidal Foundation. I saw your name on the program.”
Rio nodded. “That’s me.”
“What exactly does your foundation do? The website was vague.”
Rio’s mouth curved slightly. “We fund transitions.”
Agatha tilted her head. “That sounds like PR for something sinister.”
“Probably is.”
The joke was dry enough to make Agatha laugh, surprising herself. “You have a sense of humor. I wasn’t sure.”
“Did I look serious?”
“You looked like you were studying everyone. Like you knew something we didn’t.”
“Maybe I was just trying to figure you out.”
That stopped her. “Me?”
“You don’t look like a person who enjoys talking about legacy and mortality in front of a crowd. You look like a person who’d rather be left alone with a book.”
Agatha raised her glass in acknowledgment. “You’re not wrong. But they keep inviting me, so maybe I fake it well.”
“You do.”
She met her eyes. “You were watching me the whole time.”
Rio didn’t deny it. “You’re hard to ignore.”
Agatha felt that small jump of warmth in her chest again. “Careful. You’ll ruin my reputation.”
“Do you want one?”
“Not particularly.”
Rio’s water arrived. She didn’t drink it. She traced the rim of the glass with one finger instead, eyes still on Agatha.
“Can I ask you something?” she said.
“Depends how invasive it is.”
“Are you happy?”
Agatha blinked. “Wow. Straight to the good stuff.”
“You don’t have to answer.”
“I don’t think anyone’s happy all the time. But- yeah. I have good friends, a job I like most days. I’ve made peace with the rest.”
“Peace sounds nice.”
“You don’t have it?”
Rio shook her head. “Not really. My work doesn’t allow it.”
“What do you do?”
“I told you.”
“Transitions?”
“Something like that.”
Agatha smiled over the rim of her glass. “You’re the most evasive woman I’ve met all year.”
“And you keep asking questions,” Rio said, amused.
“I’m curious.”
“I’ve noticed.”
Agatha leaned back. “Then tell me something real. Favorite movie.”
Rio seemed to think. “The Conversation.”
“Of course it is.”
“You?”
“The Philadelphia Story. Cary Grant and Katherine Hepburn. Smart people making bad choices.”
Rio’s smile was genuine now, soft enough to disarm. “I think I’d like that one.”
“You would.”
Silence stretched again, easy this time. The bartender changed the music- something slower, older.
Agatha glanced at Rio’s untouched glass. “You really don’t drink?”
“I don’t need to.”
“Everyone needs to sometimes.”
Rio’s gaze held hers. “Not me.”
Something about that certainty made Agatha’s skin prickle. She didn’t know why she said it, but the words came out anyway. “You feel familiar. I don’t know why.”
Rio’s expression didn’t change. “Maybe we’ve crossed paths.”
“I think I’d remember.”
“I think you’d be surprised.”
Agatha studied her- calm, beautiful, unnervingly still. “You’re very sure of yourself.”
“It’s easier than being sure of anyone else.”
Agatha smiled faintly. “That sounds like experience talking.”
“Old habits,” Rio said.
Agatha leaned in without meaning to. “How old?”
Rio’s voice dropped. “Older than I look.”
Something in the air shifted. Not cold exactly- just paused. The low music thinned out, as if the speakers forgot the next note. Agatha felt her chest tighten, a flutter that wasn’t quite panic but close.
She looked down. Rio’s hand was resting lightly over hers, thumb just grazing her pulse.
“Her voice dropped. ‘What are you doing?’”
“Nothing,” Rio said softly. “Just...stopping for a moment.”
Agatha’s pulse thudded under Rio’s touch. “Should I be worried?”
Rio studied her face. “Not tonight.”
Agatha wanted to ask what that meant, but the sound around them crashed back into place- music, laughter, glasses clinking. The air moved again.
Rio’s hand slipped away. The warmth vanished with it.
Agatha looked down at her own fingers, like they might still remember. “You do that often?”
Rio stood, smoothing her jacket. “Only when I shouldn’t.”
“You’re leaving?”
Rio’s smile was faint, but real. “I don’t like goodbyes.”
Agatha blinked, and for a heartbeat she thought she saw the space around Rio blur, like a heat wave. Then the moment was gone, and she was just another woman walking toward the elevator.
Agatha sat there for a while, hand wrapped around her glass, pulse loud in her ears. She didn’t understand what had just happened. Only that the world felt louder without her in it.
She watched Rio walk toward the elevator, the crowd parting neatly around her. She didn’t decide to follow. Her body did.
The doors were just starting to close when Rio reached out, pressed the button, and waited without turning around.
“You’re persistent,” Rio said when Agatha stepped inside.
“I’m curious,” Agatha replied, slightly breathless.
“That can be dangerous.”
“So I’ve heard.”
The doors slid shut with a soft click. The mirrored walls threw their reflections back at them, too close, too bright. Agatha found herself adjusting her hair, regretting the coffee stain on her sleeve, and wondering why she suddenly cared.
They stood side by side as the elevator hummed upward. Rio’s calm was almost unreal- hands folded, eyes steady on the glowing numbers.
Agatha broke the silence first. “Can I ask you something weird?”
Rio’s mouth curved. “You seem like you will either way.”
Agatha hesitated, then: “Do you think people ever really know when it’s their time? Not the obvious way. Just- some small part of them that feels it coming.”
Rio turned her head, interest sparking in her eyes. “That’s not weird. Just rare.”
“You sound like you’ve thought about it.”
“Maybe I have.”
“So?”
“So what?”
“Do they?”
Rio smiled, low and amused. “You tell me, Doctor Harkness. You’re the one who studies legacy.”
Agatha laughed quietly. “That’s a deflection.”
“It’s an answer,” Rio said. “Just not the one you want.”
Agatha leaned back against the wall, studying her reflection beside Rio’s. “You’re good at avoiding things.”
“I’m better at ending them.”
“Is that your job?”
Rio turned fully toward her now. “Something like that.”
For the first time, the air between them shifted again- not cold, just charged. The elevator slowed, a faint lurch as if time hiccuped.
Rio stepped closer. Agatha didn’t move.
“Do you believe in déjà vu?” Rio asked.
“Sometimes,” Agatha said. “Mostly when it’s inconvenient.”
“Then this will sound familiar.”
Rio reached up, her touch light but sure, and tucked a loose strand of hair behind Agatha’s ear. Her fingers lingered just long enough to make it feel like memory.
For a moment, the mirrored walls flickered- not reflections anymore, but flashes: a cottage with smoke curling from its chimney, a field under gray sky, a boy laughing somewhere off-screen, a green cloak caught in the wind.
Agatha blinked, and it was gone.
“What was that?” she whispered.
Rio smiled faintly. “Another life. You were very stubborn in that one, too.”
Agatha tried to find words, but her phone buzzed in her pocket- urgent, repetitive. Jen.
Rio’s gaze dropped to the vibration at Agatha’s hip. “Listen to your friend,” she said softly. “Take your medicine.”
Agatha opened her mouth to ask how she knew, but Rio caught her hand instead, lifted it to her lips, and pressed a kiss to the inside of her wrist- right over the pulse still hammering.
“Stay curious,” Rio said.
The elevator dinged. The doors opened onto an empty hallway washed in gold light.
When Agatha looked up again, Rio was gone.
Her phone buzzed once more. She answered, voice shaking.
“Jen?”
“You sound out of breath. Did you run?”
Agatha looked at her reflection in the mirrored wall. Her pulse was still strong beneath the spot where Rio had kissed it.
“Something like that,” she said.