For context, please read Nothing Personal.
It all ends with something like pinot noir and baked brie in the evening, and it all begins when Cloud asks her if she's okay.
Eve hasn't been okay since she was twenty-one and in love. Eve hasn't seen okay in her future since her son told her he wanted to be a lawyer.
(How ironic, she thinks, that he should take after his grandfather in that manner. Would Helputt Seiker be happy to know of his secret grandson?)
"Yes," she lies, through years of hidden grief and feathered half-truths and exactly one year's prescription of birth control. "I am alright, thank you."
Eve is an awful liar. Eve also knows that Cloud knows she's an awful liar.
She swallows down the pills of lies and guilt with her pinot noir, draining the glass and reaching for the bottle. Cloud stops her before she can take the stopper off, and she looks at him with all the ice she can muster.
"Do you want a divorce?" he asks softly, in that caring tone that he often uses when he really wants an answer out of her. Fatherly, kind, more like her actual father than anyone else she's ever met. Eight years her senior. Treasures her like a fragile glass sculpture, and dotes upon her son even though both she and he know he's not the father and that she has never loved him, even for a second.
Cloud is smart. He developed Empyrean's ZERO transportation system almost singlehandedly. He made headlines at the age of twenty for it. He's got a PhD and nearly twenty years of experience in the engineering field. No one can deny how accomplished he is.
But accomplished as he may be, Cloud isn't what Eve needs, and he certainly isn't what she wants.
No matter how much of an intellectual equal he may be, Cloud Mason is not a man that Eve wants to live out the rest of her days with.
"Yes," she says quietly. And then, "I'll deal with the media storm if you give me full custody of Nexus."
Cloud smiles. "Of course."
She knows she doesn't need to fight him. The boy was never his to begin with.
Chung has only just made himself his first espresso of the day when the doors to his office burst open and Echo trips on his carpet and falls face-first into his desk.
"Mr. Seiker," she gasps, grasping at his new Nasod Motors XYZ laptop, "the news."
She's prone to theatrics, but this is really something new. Chung raises an eyebrow and sips his coffee as she screams incoherently again and runs off in the direction of Lucy's office.
Calmly, Chung props his feet up on the empty garbage can hidden under his desk and slips his phone from his pocket. Echo's outburst had to be from the front page news, right?
He opens his news app. Reads the first headline on the front page.
Immediately hurls his phone at the wall and sinks in on himself, fighting back tears.
The message is clear. He doesn't have to wait anymore.
[BREAKING] Evangeline Nasod and Cloud Mason announce divorce
By Camilla Maxwell
ALTERA - The CEO of Nasod Motors and the creator of Empyrean's ZERO Transport have announced that they intend to divorce.
In a thread on Evangeline Nasod's official Twitter account, the couple expressed their intention to legally separate by the end of the month, followed by final divorce proceedings by the end of the year. Nasod cited "amicable but hindering circumstances" as reasons for their sudden separation. Mason later confirmed this on his own account, adding that while they were open in the relationship, the "manner in which [they] came together wasn't in [their] best interests", and has since led to their break despite seemingly no public expectation of the event.
Response to Nasod's original thread has caused the hashtags #EvangelineNasod, #CloudMason and #nasodmotors to trend in Elrios, Empyrean and Maple. Concerns in regards to their five year old son Nexus caused the hashtag #Nexus to trend briefly; however, Nasod stated later in a separate thread that she would be taking full custody of the boy and legally changing his last name after the divorce proceedings, leading some to speculate that the divorce may be taking place to protect the boy for whatever reason. The announcement has also resparked theories on Twitter in regards to Nexus's parentage, as many have pointed out that he more closely resembles the CEO of Seiker Inc., Prince Seiker. No official statement has been put forth to confirm or deny these claims.
More information to come as more light is shed on the situation.
08:23
"Nexus," Eve says, "we aren't leaving this house."
His chin is trembling. Eve has to remind herself, again and again, that her son is still so young, only five years old with stars in his eyes and every intention to become as great as his mother. "Nothing is changing except Cloud isn't going to live with us anymore," she says. "You don't have to be afraid."
He is still so young and thinks the world of her. Eve doesn't have the right to break that trust, not when he's seen her scream at Cloud about her sins and cry because she can't explain why she committed them. "Mama," he says, eyes wide, "is Cloud going away forever?"
"No, baby," she says. "Not forever. We can still visit him. But he won't be living with you and I anymore."
Not that Cloud really needs to. He complains regularly about having to leave his huge estate and lab in Empyrean. Elrios was never the right place for him, just as Empyrean was never a home to Eve. As soon as their separation gets finalized, he'll be moving back to Empyrean.
But Nexus doesn't need to know that yet.
"Can I give him something before he goes?" Nexus asks, and Eve's heart jumps out of her throat and dives into the void of her chest. "I want to make him a card."
"Of course, baby."
(Bearing him was the easy part. Raising him is so, so much harder.)
Eve's diet is mostly cheese and wine these days. After Cloud moves out, the penthouse gets a whole lot emptier and the fridge becomes home to a palette of fine cheeses that empties at an alarming rate.
"That's not healthy," her father chides as he looks in the fridge for cream to add to his coffee. "Eve, when's the last time you ate vegetables?"
"Last night," she argues. "I had some broccoli when I was making pasta for Nexus. He can vouch for me."
Adrian sighs. Astarte is playing with her grandson in the next room, no doubt using the time to plan out her merciless verbal beatdown of her daughter. "I'd really hoped you'd be happy with your marriage to Cloud."
Eve shakes her head. She hopes her father doesn't notice that the contents of her travel mug aren't actually coffee. "Father, I was never happy with the prospect of marrying him," she says, for what has to be the millionth time. "I appreciate that you kept my technological interests in mind when you introduced the two of us, but."
She pauses. It's not like she can just tell her father that she's been madly in love with her old flame from university since having to leave him to fulfill her tech-empire-destiny. "But?" her father prompts, curiosity lining his voice.
"But," she says, "some things just never worked out."
Her father studies her as she takes another long sip from her travel mug. "You've changed," he says, pausing next to her chair by the kitchen island to brush a loose strand of hair from her face. She only barely refrains from flinching as she remembers Chung doing the same. "And it isn't because of your son, or because you got married, or because you took over the company."
Eve huffs a smile against the mouth of her mug. "I've experienced a lot since I was a young girl," she says. "It was only natural that I changed to match those experiences."
"I'll hold you to it," he replies. "Oh, Eve?"
"Yes, Father?"
"Do hold off on the wine. You're making a horrible example for your son."
A/N: IB exams are kicking my ass so I thought I might as well just release something I've been holding onto for a while
so uh this is just going to be a collection of miscellaneous oneshots and ideas I've never gotten the chance to explore because I run big stories and not much else apparently. yes there will be more of this particular au. updates will be sporadic.
the aus from which each oneshot belongs, along with any prior reading you might want to do to understand them, will be listed at the beginning of the chapter. I'll also do requests for any of my existing aus, but please don't be too specific with the requests - sometimes, the story might have already gone a different way.
also if you couldn't tell I'm a sucker for pinot noir and brie. especially brie.
~Marg