Espresso After Her Ex
3. Prologue
Prologue:
The memory of that day was a shard of glass perpetually stuck in Marigold’s heart.
She was barely eighteen, still new to the feel of magic singing beneath her skin and even newer to the frantic, beautiful chaos of loving Lucian.
He was her first everything: her first breathless kiss, the first person whose hands felt like home, and the first to shatter her world into a million sparkling, painful pieces.
It happened by the old oak tree near the creek, their usual meeting spot. His scent—earthy myrrh and vetiver—was usually a calming wave, but that day it was sharp with anger. His golden eyes, normally warm, were cold and accusing.
When she walked up, she had been so excited to meet up after school.
For the past year, their relationship had blossomed.
She felt an unshakeable certainty, a deep, quiet hum in her chest, that her future was intertwined with his.
Senior finals had occupied her day, and tried everything to keep her focus off him.
She ran up and threw her arms around his back, expecting the familiar warmth, but instead felt a biting chill. He shrugged her off with a dismissive gesture.
She recoiled, her breath catching in her throat as she met his gaze. Those golden eyes, pools that had reflected such tender affection just hours ago, now blazed with a cold, sharp disdain, like embers suddenly fanned into a hostile fire.
“You bewitched me,” he spat, the words cutting deeper than any spell. His voice, usually a deep rumble, was a choked yell. “You manufactured this. You put a spell on my heart.”
“I don’t understand,” Marigold gasped.
“You think I wouldn’t find out about what you did!” he yelled. “Quit with the bullshit and admit what you put in those drinks you gave me.”
Marigold’s hands were shaking, her teeth biting hard enough to draw blood from her lip. “Lucian, no. I never—I would never,” she pleaded, tears already blurring the image of his angry face. “Love spells don’t work like that! We just… we love each other.”
“Don’t lie to me!” he roared as he partially shifted. His ear twitched furiously. “I know what I saw. Someone showed me the proof.”
“Who?” she begged, stepping closer, desperate to understand the source of the poison. “Tell me who told you, and I’ll prove they’re wrong, because there is no proof. I’ll show you my magic grimoire, my spell cookbook, my intentions, anything you want!”
He shook his head, his jaw tight. “It doesn’t matter who. What matters is that everything—us, this past year—was a lie you spun with rose sugar, lies and dark magic. I trusted you, Goldie. And you took away my choice.”
Her heart constricted. He refused to look at the truth shining in her desperate eyes.
He refused to believe the real, raw devastation that only true, un-manufactured love could cause.
Every word she offered—that he was her first, her only, her future—bounced off the wall of fabricated evidence someone had built around his heart.
He turned and left her there, a hollow, echoing shell. Marigold stood under the tree until the sun went down, the conviction that she was losing the best part of herself settling over her like a shroud. Devastated wasn’t a strong enough word. She was unmade that day.