The office was small, a rented suite in a glass tower that looked out over the endless sprawl of Los Angeles. Sunlight pooled on the pale carpet, and potted plants stood in the corners like patient witnesses. Jesus sat in a simple chair, not much different from the one across from him.
He called himself Jesse here. It was easier. People expected Jesse to be a man with kind eyes and soft words, not someone who had walked dusty roads in sandals centuries before.
The client today was a young woman named Ember. Her hair was perfect, bright as a sunrise, her lips lined in a color that caught the light with every word. She was an influencer, though she said she was also an artist. Her phone was never far from her hand. It glowed on the small table, waiting to record the next moment worth sharing.
Ember spoke with practiced ease, words that had been rehearsed for the camera. She said she felt empty. That every time she posted, she wondered if she was just feeding a hunger that would never end. She said, “I have two million followers. But I don’t know if anyone really sees me.”
Jesse listened. He always did. He had learned long ago that silence was often the gentlest cure. He let her words drift like incense in the small room, watched the way her eyes darted to the window, to the phone, to anywhere but him.
Finally, he asked, “What would you share if no one else could see it?”
She looked startled. “I don’t know. I’ve never thought about that.”
He nodded, his expression gentle. “Maybe that’s a place to begin.”
Outside, traffic moved like a river of metal and light. The city was a hum of ambition and soft despair. Billboards promised beauty, wealth, salvation in a bottle or a brand. Jesus had seen temples like these before, though they looked different now, lit by LEDs instead of candles.
Ember glanced down at her phone. “Do you think it’s wrong? To want to be seen?”
He shook his head. “No. Wanting to be seen is a human ache. But being seen is not the same as being known.”
She blinked, her fingers curling around the phone. “But how do I know the difference?”
“Maybe it’s in what you’re willing to share without applause.”
The hour ended, as hours always did. Ember stood and smoothed her dress, her eyes softer than when she had arrived. She said, “Thank you, Jesse. I don’t know why, but I feel lighter.”
He smiled, a small, warm thing. “Sometimes the soul just needs someone to hold its questions.”
After she left, he sat in the quiet. The room smelled faintly of roses from the candle she had lit on her way in, hoping for calm. He thought of the stories he once told, of seeds and soil, of lost sheep and coins found in dark corners. The stories had not changed, even if the audience had.
He wondered if this world, so hungry for love and validation, could ever learn that the soul is not a brand, that grace cannot be measured by likes.
He looked out the window. The city glowed beneath the setting sun, a neon testament to the ache of wanting more. He breathed in the silence of the office, feeling the weight of every bright facade and the quiet lives that hid behind them.
He knew he would stay here a while longer, listening to the stories that no one else could hear. Because in every confession, there was a crack of light. And in every crack of light, there was a door waiting to be opened.
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