He Gave Her a Title, I Took His Empire

A once-in-a-decade blizzard dumped snow over Kenshire as Lucian Brooks and I stepped through the doors of the County Clerk's Office lobby. The blizzard must have kept most people away. Only a handful of couples sat scattered across the mostly empty seats, and a sharp, strange feeling crept over me all of a sudden. We did not belong here with them. Lucian spotted the snowflakes dusting my hair and lifted a hand to brush them away gently. I guess the soft gesture looked too much like a happy couple's affection, because a staff member walked over and waved us toward the forms, telling us we could fill out the paperwork first and then get a number to get our marriage license. I caught the flash of awkwardness on Lucian's face, so I turned to the staff, smiled, and said, "Sorry about that. We are here to get a divorce." The staff's smile froze solid on her face. She quickly recovered and led us over to the divorce counter instead. The clerk behind the counter pulled her curious gaze away from the two of us and asked what our reason for divorce was. Lucian, standing right beside me, did not say a single word for a long stretch. I smiled at the clerk again. I said, "Incompatible personalities. Irreconcilable breakdown of the relationship." Lucian's hand, resting on his thigh, twitched slightly. He cared so much about keeping up appearances. I was just giving him what he wanted. I did not want anyone else to know my so-called failed marriage fell apart because he had taken a mistress and poured every last piece of his heart into her. He was a man just barely in his thirties, desperate to set his heart on fire one more time for love. He had told me that only after he met Nova Rivers did he finally understand what real passion and real love felt like. I had laughed right in his serious face that day. I laughed so hard by the end I had to grip the edge of the table just to stay standing, my sides aching. We had been married for eight years, together for twelve. We had been inseparable since I was eighteen. On our wedding day, he cried as he said he could not even imagine a future without me in it. Before that, he had gotten down on one knee in front of me, holding a bouquet of roses, and whispered that I was the only woman he would ever love. But now, here he sat across from me, saying he had met his one true love right as he was about to hit middle age. He said, "Xenia Blake, you are turning thirty soon. You are not as young as Nova." Staring at Lucian right then, I felt exactly the same way I did last month when I dropped my old television off at the secondhand market, looking at all the secondhand items lined up for sale. He cheated. I did not want pre-owned junk, so agreeing to divorce was as easy as pie. The clerk held our two marriage certificates in her hands, her gaze still locked on Lucian. She kept trying to talk us into giving it more thought, to think things through carefully. It was only then that silent, stone-faced Lucian deigned to drop a single sentence: "I am in a hurry. Let us get this done quickly." It did not take long before we walked out with our divorce filing receipt in hand. We stepped outside the office. The raging blizzard had softened into light flurries, and a staff member bundled in a thick puffer jacket was already shoveling snow off the entrance steps. Lucian turned to look at me, then asked, "Xenia. Where are you headed? Can I give you a ride?" I glanced at the snow-blanketed street, then at my ride-hailing app. There were one hundred and ten people ahead of me in line. I canceled the request without a second thought and stuffed my phone back into my pocket. I reached for the passenger side door, and then it hit me: we were not husband and wife anymore. In the end, I bit the bullet and climbed into the backseat, all while Lucian watched me with that unreadable, complicated look in his eyes. His black sedan merged smoothly into the sluggish, snow-day traffic. Even from the backseat, I could tell Lucian was in a good mood. I asked him to turn the heat up. It had been so freezing cold lately that my sinuses were acting up again. He wordlessly passed me half a pack of tissues and said, "Xenia, I will talk to your parents about the divorce." It was really quite something. Lucian still could not stop himself from taking charge of my problems, even then, as we were getting divorced. Old habits died hard, I guessed. Even when we were kids, he had always insisted on carrying every one of my problems on his own shoulders. When no one else would play with me, he would take me everywhere with him. His friends would tease that I was just his little tag-along, but he would always step right in front of me and declare proudly, "Xenia is under my protection!" Years ticked by, and before I knew it, Lucian had grown into the wildly popular heartthrob of our campus. Back then, I just thought of him as my best bro. But he had used tutoring me in math as an excuse to drag me out to study every single day, all because he was dead set on going to the same university as me. It turned out that we both got accepted to the same university. From that day on, Lucian basically became my personal suitor repellent. No matter how pretty or well-known I was, as long as he was around, not a single guy dared to approach me the entire four years of college. On our graduation day, he took me down to the riverbank and set off the most gorgeous fireworks show I had ever seen, just for me. He squeezed my hand tight, his palm slick with nervous sweat, and asked, "Xenia, will you marry me? I swear, I will treat you well for the rest of my life." Back then, I said yes without a single moment of hesitation. But now, faced with his fake, performative concern, I turned him down flat, saying, "No need, Mr. Brooks. I can handle my own business. You do not have to worry about me."