CHAPTER ELEVEN
AXEL
“You want Chinese tonight or Korean?” Damian asked dully from the kitchen as he rustled through take-out menus.
“We got enough money for takeout again?” Trace asked sharply from the bathroom, where he was shaving in front of the tiny mirror.
“We fucking better,” I chimed in as I opened the refrigerator, assessing the absolutely abysmal state of anything edible. “Because it’s not looking so hot in here.”
“This is where we should try an activity called ‘going to the store,’” Trace said, tapping his razor against the side of the sink. He had a big interview tomorrow with a potential employer since he was graduating this semester, instead of next semester like Damian and me. Somehow after almost a decade of practice, he still sucked at shaving. He needed some time to let the nicks heal before meeting with these people. “I know it sounds like a drag, but I promise you we can make our own food on occasion. Mom might not have wanted us in the kitchen often, but we all know how to boil some damn noodles and make a solid Bolognese sauce.”
“So…does that mean get groceries delivered?” I asked Damian.
“Jesus. You guys suck at managing money,” Trace muttered.
“That’s why you’ll be CFO of our business,” I shot back. “We know you’re the best, Mr. Money God. Now should we waste time ordering groceries and cooking, or just have them bring the Chicken Teriyaki straight to our mouths like we want?”
Trace sighed dramatically.
“Chicken teriyaki,” Damian confirmed. The food debate was resolved, but the money worries tugged at me. We’d been skating the line with destitution for a few weeks. What had been a declined debit card the night I proposed to Cora was actually an overdrawn bank account and now, a late tuition payment. Luckily, one of our favorite Chinese places accepted cryptocurrency, which meant we could eat for at least a couple more months on our crypto holdings alone.
“I’ll make sausage and potatoes next week,” I called over my shoulder to Trace. “Just like Mom’s. Promise.”
He grumbled something I didn’t hear as he rinsed off his razor. Tiny bits of toilet paper dotted his chin and left cheek as he came out into the kitchen.
“Another shave well done,” I teased him. “You’re ready for the work force, buddy, you walking cube steak.”
“Fuck off,” he said. “You guys know as well as I do that I need this job so we can all stay afloat and launch our business like it deserves. If I were you, I’d be offering to shave this beautiful mug myself just to woo the recruiter.”
I clapped him on the back. “That sounds like one of your weirdo fantasies again.”
”Is this the part where we’re supposed to thank you for graduating early and taking care of your broke brothers?” Damian deadpanned. “Because if it is, you’ll have to inform the class of your expectations.”
“I think we should just go ahead and give him the accolades anyway,” I told Damian. “That way he’ll be more willing to support us once he makes his first billion and we’re still trying to graduate.”
Trace blinked. “I’m honored you think I could make a billion dollars that fast.”
“Or maybe I was saying that it’ll take Damian and me a few more years to finish this shit up.”
We all shared warm smiles. The playful ribbing was one of our tried-and-true methods for dealing with money anxiety. We’d learned during our teenage years, once Damian and I had really gotten settled at the Fairchild house. It had taken us about a year to feel safe enough to let the Fairchilds into our hearts and three more before we completed the formal adoption process and traded the last name Haynes for Fairchild.
The home we found with Deb and Gary Fairchild was warm but cash strapped. Trace was their only biological kid, and the addition of two foster brothers made for a bustling but broke household. Even if my younger sisters hadn’t been split up from us before the Fairchilds, they certainly wouldn’t have been able to join us, and their loss still haunted me.
I’d spent years traumatized by and rehashing the turn of events that split us up from our two sisters. When we found out that Kaylee had passed away our freshman year of college, it only made everything sting worse. She’d become a victim of human trafficking. The same system that failed her had uplifted us. We still couldn’t find Jordan. We’d been able to find out that she and Kaylee had been separated at some point after their initial joint placement. It hurt too bad to consider where—or how—she might have ended up. Especially when Damian and I were thriving. Where was the fucking balance in that?
Yet despite those first tumultuous years in the foster care system, Damian and I found some stability. We saw that a decent future was possible. We scooped horse shit for a meager allowance while Mama Deb and Papa Gary lightened the money stress load with a rotating repertoire of jokes and lightheartedness. We were one emergency away from the food pantry, but it never felt that serious.
It wasn’t until we got out on our own that we realized how fucking poor we really were.
I swiped at my phone, ready to order some damn chicken teriyaki but also half-looking for a sign of life from Cora. Since she’d left, something had been off. Even three weeks later, she still wouldn’t tell me what, but I felt it, and I searched for some way to equalize the pressure. The only way I knew how was to get my ass out to LA and visit her, but after buying the engagement ring and stocking the apartment with toilet paper, we were tapped.
AXEL: Hey babe. Haven’t heard from you since this morning. How are classes? I wish I could squeeze you right now.
She’d been taking longer to write back, which she blamed on her classes. And the longer she took to write back, the more I needed to hear from her, which made me feel like a codependent twatwaffle. I watched the message thread for a moment and then turned the screen off.
“What’s wrong?” Damian asked quietly at my side. He’d started thumbing through the takeout menu from the Chinese restaurant that accepted Bitcoin.
“Nothing.”
“Oh, okay. Then why do you look like you’re trying to shit out a screwdriver?”
I blinked, looking over at him in surprise. “Have you ever shit out a screwdriver?”
Trace looked up at us from across the kitchen island that doubled as our dining room table. “What did Cora do to you with a screwdriver?”
I X’d my hands through the air. “Let’s back it up. There were no screwdrivers involved, unless Damian had a farm accident back in the day he forgot to tell us about.”
“Okay, so what’s wrong?” Damian tried again.
“Nothing,” I repeated.
“Then let me rephrase.” He paused, licking his lips in thought. “How’s Cora?”
My gut twisted. Fuck my brothers for knowing me so well. “She’s fine, I guess.”
“You guess,” Trace echoed. “That sounds weird, coming from you. I thought you guys were telepathically connected.”
“The telepathy only works when she uses her phone, which she’s doing less of these days.” I worked my jaw back and forth. I hated how my brothers could tease the truth out of me so fucking fast. “I dunno. Something’s been different since she left, and I can’t figure out what it is.”
“You sure it isn’t pre-wedding jitters?” Damian asked.
“I’m sure. I’ve never been more certain of anything in my life, actually. But I swear to God Cora is just…distant.”
“But she said yes,” Trace reminded me. “She wants to marry you.”
“I know,” I said, though I didn’t know. I felt like this entire house of cards could crumble at any time. Not just with Cora, but with what we were trying to do out here. With the business. With all of it. “Maybe she realized how broke I am and wised up.”
“I’m pretty sure she’s always known how broke you are,” Damian teased.
“Yeah, but dating a broke guy is different from marrying one.”
“She’s not like that,” Trace reassured me. “I know she isn’t. You know she isn’t. You guys have been together for three years. She’s probably just stressed from school.”
“Yeah, you’re right,” I muttered, running my fingers through the front of my hair. I wanted to believe him so badly, but I just didn’t. “I honestly expected some kind of blowback by now from her dad. I guess she hasn’t told him yet.”
“He’ll find out come the wedding day,” Damian laughed.
“Can’t wait for the suit fitting,” Trace said, shoving my shoulder. “Where we gonna have the bachelor party?”
I smirked. “Depends on if you’re bankrolling this shit or not.”
“Of course. Anything for my younger brother,” Trace said, touching his palm to his heart.
“Does that apply to me too?” Damian asked.
“You have to actually want to get married first,” Trace shot back. “And, you know, date someone.”
Damian frowned, looking at the takeout menu in his hands. His glasses slipped down his nose, and he pushed them back up with his index finger. “I’ve dated plenty.”
“You’ve fucked around plenty, which is not the same as dating,” Trace said.
While my brothers continued splitting hairs about fucking vs. dating, I swiped my phone open again. I returned to my thread with Cora, realizing the last time she’d written to me that day had been at nine a.m., and it was six o’clock now. My stomach plummeted to the floor all over again.
I called her immediately. This wasn’t right.
The phone rang and rang while my brothers continued bickering about the virtues of fuck buddies. Arguing in our family was just another way to show love. The call clicked over to voicemail. I hung up and shot off another text to Cora.
AXEL: Babe, is everything okay? You’ve been distant and it’s making me worried.
I got my brothers back on track then and we ordered our Chinese food, forking over miniscule amounts of crypto in exchange for the hot and greasy delivery. Just as the food arrived forty minutes later, I got a call from an unknown number in Los Angeles.
“Hello?” I answered, half of me expecting it to be a telemarketer, the other half expecting it to be a bill collector.
“Axel, thank god you picked up.” It was Cora. Relief flooded me, fast and hot. I nearly toppled from the sensation.
“Babe, where have you been? What’s wrong? What number is this?”
“I’m using my friend’s phone. I’m sorry I haven’t texted. My phone’s been acting weird.”
I snapped my fingers. It was just the phone. Everything was fine. At least, I wanted to believe that. “You had me worried you were dead.”
She laughed, but it sounded sad, like I’d told a joke and wasn’t aware of it. “No, everything is fine.”
Silence blossomed between us. I had so many questions for her I didn’t know where to start.
“How was your day?” I finally asked.
“It was fine. Long. Stressful.” From the background, I heard someone say “Eli, what’s up!” The hairs of my forearms stood at attention.
“And what are you up to now?”
“At a meeting with some classmates,” she said. There were some cheers in the background.
It was so noisy, wherever she was, that I could hardly even think of what I wanted to talk to her about. It wasn’t the place for us to connect or catch up like we needed to. “Can you call me when you get home?”
“If my phone works,” she said.
“Do you need me to send you a new one?”
“I’m getting it figured out.”
I worked my jaw back and forth as I mulled over her words. Something was wrong. Just a little off, like chatting with someone who was posing as Cora.
“Hey, I better get going,” she said. “I love you, Axel. Talk soon.”
The line was dead before I could even return the words. I frowned as I pocketed the phone and reached for my takeout container. Chicken teriyaki awaited me, and my grumbling stomach was ready.
“So, she called you,” Trace said as he slurped some beef lo mein past his lips. “That’s good.”
“Yeah. Except she didn’t use her phone and she was with Eli.”
“Eli?” Damian asked, hunched over his orange chicken.
“The rich douchebag her parents want her to marry.” I stabbed at my food, the aromas not exciting me like they normally did. I shoved a forkful of chicken into my mouth. After chewing thoughtfully, I added, “I think I need to go out there.”
“To LA?” Damian asked.
“No, to Shanghai.” I kicked his leg in the armchair next to me. “Yes, LA.”
“They sell plane tickets with crypto yet?” Trace cracked.
“No.” I stabbed my chopsticks into my food again and then caught Trace’s eye. “Was thinking maybe you could sell off a share or two for me.”
Trace let out an exaggerated groan. “You’ve gotta be kidding me.”
“Dude, something is wrong with Cora. We just need to see each other, you know? It’s probably her dad making shit weird somehow. I mean, isn’t it always? He’s probably tracking her. I dunno—I just need to see her.”
“I know you miss your girlfriend—” Trace started.
“Fiancée,” I corrected sharply.
“Right, your fiancée. But that doesn’t justify selling off shares so you can afford a plane ticket.” Trace dipped his head, sending me an admonishing look from over his takeout container. He managed the family fortune, as I liked to call it. Really, it was an expertly diversified portfolio of stocks, bonds, and more that Trace managed and grew for us so we could reap the dividends each quarter. It was one of the main reasons we could stay afloat in Manhattan—his ingenuity. “We have to be smart. We’re on limited resources until I get this job or we snag a few early clients for our business.”
“But something is wrong. I know it is.” I took another bite of food, unnerved by how bland I found it. That alone was a sign that something needed to be done. “I can’t explain it.”
“I think you’ve got the jitters,” Damian offered.
“Fuck your jitters,” I told him. “Cora and I, we’re connected, okay?” I stabbed angrily at a piece of chicken and then realized I actually wasn’t hungry anymore. I set the container down and leaned back on the couch, interlocking my fingers across my forehead. “She’s been acting weird since she left. And I’ve gotta figure out why.”
The thing about grad school was that it sucked. The days were long, and the money struggles were real. That didn’t even take into account my internship, which paid just enough to skirt labor laws. But even with how much was going on in my day-to-day, I could still count the accumulating absences of Cora.
They piled up in the lengthy response times, seconds stacked on minutes stacked on entire days. They sliced at me with each unanswered call. The short, abnormally stilted calls with Cora, like the night of the crypto chicken teriyaki, started happening more and more. I even sent flowers to her house once, got the delivery confirmation, and she didn’t mention them for two entire days. Sometimes, she’d message me from inside a social media app for the first time in a day. Who the fuck did stuff like that after three years together and an engagement?
Not my Cora. The more time that trudged by, the worse I felt about it. She always dodged the distance comment. No matter how many times I mentioned the distance growing like a chasm between us, she’d deflect, divert, or hang up.
I felt like I was engaged to a shadow, the wisps of which disappeared anytime I happened to catch a glimpse.
And as far as I was concerned, it wasn’t going to continue like this. The semester was almost over, which meant Cora should be coming home for the holidays soon. But I hadn’t heard a peep out of her about it. A week before Christmas, I decided enough was enough. I’d get her to open up. To stop stressing about classes—if that’s what this really was—or take a chill pill or whatever she needed to do.
AXEL: Call me ASAP. Very important.
I sent the message through the last random social media app she’d used to message me and waited. I waited all fucking day, in fact. I spent the entire day bouncing between the business and economics library and my exams scattered around campus. This was the second-to-last exam period I’d ever have in my life—wasn’t that incredible—but I could barely enjoy how close I was to getting my MBA because all I could think about was Cora.
I finally got a call from a random ass LA number around eight p.m. It had to be her. Because this was normal now.
“Cora?” I asked as I picked up.
“Axel. Hey. What’s up?”
I peered around the walls of my library study cubby. I couldn’t have this conversation here. They’d shush me out of the damn building. I bolted for the stairwell, keeping my voice low. “Just finishing up some studying for my last exam. How are you?”
Her pause said more than her words. “I’m okay.”
“Are you?” I pushed out into the stairwell, a gust of cool, paper-tinged air whooshing around me.
“Of course. Why wouldn’t I be?”
I expelled a breath I’d been holding. “Because you’re acting super fucking weird these days.”
When she remained quiet, I realized it was because she didn’t even have a way to defend herself. So she recognized it too.
“What’s going on with you, babe?” I asked softly. My fingers twitched from wanting to see her. Hold her. Soothe her. “You’ve got me worried.”
“I don’t know.” Her voice sounded a million miles away. “I don’t know, Axel.”
“Well, can we fix this?” I leaned against the wall, staring through the thick, square window in the stairwell door, back into the library proper. Inside there, everything was orderly. Organized. The opposite of the majority of my childhood. It represented the pinnacle of everything I’d fought for alongside my brothers. But here in the stairwell, my entire world threatened to unravel. Whatever Cora said during this phone call had the power to demolish everything.
She’d always had that power, because I’d willingly ceded it to her. She was the only woman in the world who would ever get it.
Cora was quiet for a while, which grated on me.
“Cora,” I snapped. “What is going on? You need to talk to me.”
“I am.”
“Oh, is this what you call talking?” I scoffed, fisting the front of my hair. “You used to open up to me, no problem. Do you even still want to marry me?”
She gasped. “Axel! How could you just—” She sighed heatedly. “That’s a leap and you know it.”
“It’s an honest question. Do you want to?”
“You know the answer.”
Her evasiveness was infuriating. My blood pumped faster, hotter, angrier. “Why can’t you give me a yes or a no?”
“Axel,” she started, but nothing else followed.
“Here, let me show you how it sounds. Cora, I am deeply invested in our relationship. I would kill another human being to keep you in my life. Your happiness is literally more important than my own. The only thing I want to do more than launch this business with my brothers is become your husband and have kids with you.”
Silence flooded the line, but it wasn’t long before I caught the muffled hiccup of a sob.
“Cora, what the fuck is going on with you?” I shouted, my voice echoing in the stairwell. The double doors swung open then, two students eyeballing me as they headed downward.
“Things have been weird around here, Axel,” she said, her voice thick with emotion.
“It’s your dad.”
“It’s more than that,” she whispered.
“I can’t help you if you don’t talk to me. Babe, we need a beach session.”
“Now?”
“Yes. Emergency beach meeting.” The beach meetings always put us right. Searching for the beach glass that resembled each other’s eye color calmed in a way nothing else could. I knew that if we had a shot at fixing this, it would happen on the beach. The Hamptons were a trek and a half from where I stood right now, but I’d go, even if it took me until midnight.
“I can’t.”
“What? Then let’s do it tomorrow.”
“No, I…I can’t.” Her voice was thick with tears.
The rejection was so stunning I grappled for air for a moment. “Okay. Then when are you coming home? It’s almost Christmas. Let’s just go together when you’re back.”
“I’m not coming home this year. My parents have already flown out to LA for Christmas. I—” Her voice faltered but she didn’t pick up her train of thought. I mulled over her words. If her parents were out there, then they were probably putting a lot of pressure on her.
“Did they find out about the engagement?”
“Yes.”
“Jesus, Cora, why didn’t you tell me?” I slapped my palm against the smooth wall, creating a loud bang! “That’s news, you know? That’s some fucking news you should share with me.”
“I haven’t had a chance,” she said, her voice watery again. “I-I-I’ve been so busy.”
“Busy? I—” My voice faltered as a tidal wave of emotion swept through me. “Clearly. You’re so busy you can’t even talk to your fiancé. How are we gonna make a marriage work if you can’t even talk to me while we’re engaged?”
“Axel, you’re just…doing it again,” she hissed.
“Doing what?”
“You’re being overbearing.”
“You think that me wanting to talk to my fiancée is overbearing?”
“I think you do a lot of things in a really overbearing way,” she snapped.
“Wow. This is just—wow. I don’t even have the words.”
Tense silence settled between us.
“It’s like pulling teeth to get you on the phone anymore,” I blurted. “I’m shocked we aren’t messaging on Instagram right now, since that’s apparently where you love to conduct our relationship now.”
“Axel—”
“I never thought I’d see the day when you’d have to resort to social media to talk to me. I could solve this right now and send you a phone, but no. That’s not good enough. Why don’t you tell me what’s really going on, Cora?”
Her voice was thick with tears. “I think we should take a break.”
I stared at the wall in front of me for so long I forgot where I was. But the double doors opening for other students reminded me.
“Excuse me?”
“I-I…You heard me.”
“I just asked you to marry me, and you’ve got cold feet already?”
“Yes.”
“After three years together?”
“Axel—”
“Why didn’t you just send me a message on Instagram?”
She sighed shakily, quiet sobs escaping her.
“This is bullshit. I’m flying out there so we can have this conversation in person.” I fisted the front of my hair, my heart rate near fatal levels. I wanted to cry and break my phone and punch the cement wall into pieces all at the same time. None of this made sense. Not a fucking bit of it.
“You can’t,” she said. “My dad is here.”
“I don’t fucking care. What does he matter?”
“Don’t come,” she warned in a low voice. “It won’t end well.”
“Oh, and you asking for a break from two thousand miles away is the happy ending you dreamed of? Cora, what the fuck is wrong? Seriously—are you ill? Do you have a brain tumor?”
A soft laugh made it past the tears, but it was sadder than I’d ever heard.
“You yourself told me that your father did not matter when it came to making our future work,” I spat into the phone. A couple students slowed as they walked by me, and I glared at them before whipping around to stare at a different part of the wall. “Why does he matter now? The only reason I can think of for you breaking up with me is that he put you up to it.”
“He didn’t,” she said after a pause. “This is my decision. I think this is what is best.” More sobs rolled out of her. “I’m allowed to have second thoughts.”
“Second thoughts.”
“Yes. I’ve been thinking about what I want and I just…”
“You what?”
She sniffed. “You’re too much. I can’t even function when I’m around you. Seeing you and then not being with you and then—the future—I just—” She was blubbering then, like she’d been reading notes and dropped them halfway through.
“I don’t believe this for a second.” She sounded like a robot. Like a half-dead impersonation of the woman I loved. “You’re acting crazy, but we can talk this out. If nothing else, you need a welfare check.”
“I’m fine,” she insisted with a tear-clogged voice.
“Yeah. You sound real fine.”
She whimpered. “I have to go.”
The line went dead, and I stared at my phone for a few moments, asking myself if I was really awake. Maybe this was part of an active nightmare. Something I’d slipped into due to exams.
But when I accessed my call history, the ten-minute conversation was on the top line.
This shit was real. And my world was officially falling the fuck apart.
I gathered my shit and raced out of the library.
Trace wouldn’t be happy with me, but I needed to cash out my stocks.
I wouldn’t take no for an answer. Not when I needed to get to LA yesterday.