Short Love Story
"The Dawn of Breaking Things"
Chapter 1: The Edge of Dawn
The Atlantic hissed against the
shore, its froth clinging to Emily’s ankles like a lover begging her to stay.
She dug her toes into the sand, still damp from the retreating tide, and
watched the horizon bleed from indigo to gold. Dawn had always been their
time—hers and John’s. They’d shared silent sunrises on this beach for three
years, shoulders brushing like conspirators, his hand occasionally finding hers
in the half-light. But today, the sunrise felt like a betrayal.
“You’re the alchemist, Em,” her
CEO had said just yesterday, clapping her shoulder as she presented the
campaign. “Turning trash into treasure.”
She’d smiled, her cheeks aching
with the lie.
At 34, Emily Carter was the
youngest Chief Marketing Officer in Vanguard’s history. She’d clawed her way up
from a cubicle in the Denver branch, her rise fueled by 80-hour weeks and a
knack for selling stories instead of products. “People don’t buy
sneakers,” she’d once lectured her team. “They buy the version
of themselves they see in the ad.”
But lately, the line between
fiction and fraud had thinned.
A gust of wind snatched a page
from the folder. She lunged for it, sand gritting against her palms, and caught
the sheet mid-air. **GreenLuxe Target Demographic: Women 25–40, household
income 150k+,sustainability−consciousbutstatus−driven∗∗.Emilysnorted.Translation:womenlikeher,whowore150k+,sustainability−consciousbutstatus−driven∗∗.Emilysnorted.Translation:womenlikeher,whowore200 yoga pants to cry in their Teslas.
“You’re up early.”
She turned. Raj Patel, her
neighbor and occasional running buddy, stood at the boardwalk’s edge, his Great
Dane panting at his side. His scrubs were rumpled, eyes shadowed from a night
shift at the ER.
“Couldn’t sleep,” she said,
tucking the page back.
He nodded toward the folder.
“Workaholic.”
“Pot, meet kettle.”
Raj laughed, but his gaze
lingered. “You okay? You’ve been… quieter.”
Emily hesitated. Three months
ago, she’d have unspooled her doubts over a bottle of Malbec. But then John
moved in, and her friendships faded like old Polaroids. “He’s your
priority now,” her mother had warned. “Men like John don’t
wait.”
“Just tired,” she said.
The lie hung between them until
Raj’s pager buzzed. “Gotta run. Cardiac arrest in Bay 3.” He paused. “Come by
tonight. Lena’s making biryani.”
She watched him jog away, the
dog trotting beside him, and wondered when she’d last eaten a meal that didn’t
come in a takeout box.
The loft smelled of espresso and
ambition. John’s Italian leather briefcase sat by the door, a monogrammed
anchor in their shared life. He stood at the floor-to-ceiling windows, phone
pressed to his ear, his reflection a sharp silhouette against the city skyline.
“—need those projections by
noon, Mark. No, yesterday.”
Emily set down her keys. John’s
startup—AquaVault—was weeks from a breakthrough. A solar-powered desalination
plant that could turn seawater into freshwater for pennies. “It’s not
just a company,” he’d told investors. “It’s a lifeline.”
But his lifeline had a cost.
“Hey,” she said when he hung up.
He turned, his smile not quite
reaching his eyes. “You left before six.”
“Couldn’t sleep.”
“You’re working too hard.”
The irony pinched. She’d
canceled their last three date nights for GreenLuxe deadlines.
“Says the man who microwaved
ramen at 2 a.m.,” she shot back, nodding at the crumpled cup on his desk.
John winced. “Touché.”
For a moment, they were just Em
and John again—the duo who’d danced barefoot in this loft the night they bought
it, drunk on champagne and the future. But then his phone buzzed. He glanced at
it, and the shutters came down.
“I’ve got a call with Dubai,” he
said, already reaching for his AirPods.
Emily caught his wrist. “Wait.”
He stilled.
“We need to talk about the IVF
consult. You canceled. Again.”
A muscle twitched in his jaw.
“Em, the timing—”
“You promised. After the
AquaVault funding—”
“This plant could change millions of
lives.”
“What about our life?”
The words hung, brittle. John
cupped her face, his thumb brushing the apple of her cheek. “You’re the
strongest person I know. You can handle a few more months.”
She wanted to believe him. But
as he walked away, his phone already at his ear, Emily felt the crack in her
chest widen.
By noon, she was back at
Vanguard, staring at a spreadsheet. GreenLuxe Q4 Profit Forecast: $42M.
Her assistant, Zoey, slid a latte onto her desk. “You’ve got that look.”
“What look?”
“The ‘I’m about to burn down a
Walmart’ look.”
Emily snorted. Zoey, 23 and
unapologetically Gen Z, had a gift for cutting through corporate BS.
“It’s the campaign,” Emily
admitted. “We’re claiming these shoes are ‘100% eco-conscious,’ but the
packaging alone—”
“Uses enough plastic to choke a
sea turtle. Yeah, I know.” Zoey dropped into the chair across from her. “So
quit.”
“What?”
“You heard me. Walk into
Halpern’s office and say, ‘I’m not selling this crap anymore.’”
Emily stared at her. “I have a
mortgage. A life.”
“Do you?”
The question lingered long after
Zoey left.
That night, Emily dreamt of the
beach. John was there, but his hands were full of seawater that slipped through
his fingers no matter how tight he gripped. “I can fix this,” he
insisted, frantic. “Just give me more time.”
She woke to an empty bed and the
smell of rain.
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