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𝐅𝐈𝐅𝐓𝐘-𝐅𝐈𝐕𝐄

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The curtain lifted and fell, thin as gossamer, blue dawn running its fingers into the clean rivers of the fabric. Orange rimmed the white washed sill, orange as the terracotta tiles of the floor. It felt later than it was, by Roman's watch the time read close to four, but her sleep had been light for the past few days and now was no exception. There were worse places to wake up. She could hear the swell on the shore in the distance, but closer, the flutter of birds wings, air alive with fragrant fruit, spilling to the ground outside at the foot of an overgrown garden, soft and split by weight and age.

In Italy, it had been moments like this where she'd felt like the last person in the world. The city was a cacophony, an excess to every sense. Cora had loved it. That was a given. The silence, though,

Cora turned on her side. Roman had tossed all night, but had eventually settled away from her. When he'd fallen to exhaustion, she'd remained wide awake, Caroline's words writhing in her guts.

She raised a hand until it hovered at the back of his hair. The heat of him bit her palm. There, in the groves of the back of his head, silvery intermittent tracts of scalp, pillaged with the crust of dried blood.

In her heart, she'd known he wouldn't give up, that that little promise of danger was left wanting; there was a sense of relief when Olivia arrived on election morning, wide eyed and on the edge of breaking bad news. "I think there's a car watching the house."

She'd been taking a photo for her Instagram story of the orange creme cold brew she'd bought from a Japanese cafe down the road, which was so good, oops wait, probably shouldn't have said that, sorry!, anyway, she was walking along, minding her own, when the sedan pulled up and wound down its window, and the guy, there were two, by the way, he leaned out and said "good weather, isn't it?", and she didn't really hear him the first time, so he said it again, but this time he sounded annoyed, and she said "I guess so", then he said nothing, she said nothing, the guy in the driver's pulled out a camera, and—

"Hold on, hold on," Cora said. She reached forward and took the coffee, which had been hopping over the side of the rim, from Olivia's hand, leading her to the kitchen.

She'd known it would get ugly, and she'd at least somewhat accepted that. What she was struggling with became voiced minutes later: "What're you going to do about the appointment?"

The answer was Olivia in six inch heels, a giant pair of sunglasses and last season's Celine, making a dramatic exit into a taxi while Cora, dressed like the Unabomber, waited in the wings.

The clinic was nice enough. Cora waited in the reception room bouncing her leg and making the woman at the desk peer over her computer screen every so often. The room itself was chilled as a fridge. She changed into a crepe paper gown and lay cautiously against a padded bench. Her technician had switched off the light, leaving her to wait in the blue whirring gloom of the monitor.

She swore under her breath when the gel was applied and she did so again, moments later, dull pressure digging, until that figure had appeared amidst the contorting static.

"Do you want to know?"

Frank hadn't want to know. Maybe that was harsh. But it was as though he'd sensed it before she'd even gotten in the car. They were on the way to the cathedral, late, she'd held them up in the bathroom. Aside from the obvious, Roman being on the war path had turned her stomach. There was a microwave uneven Cold War between herself and Shiv again when it had become obvious that there was no way she would take the hint, but at the very least, she'd stopped playing messenger. 

Cora had received all sorts of colourful language, and not so veil attempts to get her into the ATN studio. And when Roman had showed up on the doorstep hours later, practically hooting in her face, she had struggled with much the same situation. "I can't let you in," she muttered, looking over his shoulder. They were down wind from his driver's Marlboro. The man could not meet her eye.

"Is this because Shivvany said you can't?" He pouted. "I'll tell you what I told her. Asked, actually. Are you even registered?"

She had sworn at the moment that she'd seen the glint of a lens. 

"But do you know what you're doing?" Frank said again.

Cora angled herself towards the window. Every few streets, they seemed to pass some sign of the carnage the previous evening. There were blocs of protestors, signs strewn. The whole city seemed to vibrate with nervous energy. No, she wanted to say, no I have no idea, but I've been alive to know that I'm being selfish. She couldn't, of course. Her throat had dried the moment she'd seen his face fall. That look had been invented for Reagan.

Frank twisted back around in his seat and sighed heavily.

Beside her, the covers shifted. Cora was on her back now, watching the ceiling slowly turn against the hint of the rising sun. Still early. Roman croaked something she couldn't understand. He tried to wince. She shushed him and placed a soft hand on the side of his face. Cora slipped out of bed and went to get a warm cloth. When she'd arrived back, he was out of bed, still in his clothes from the funeral, looking around the room as though he'd never seen it before.

"Where are we?" He muttered, scratching his cheek. She made him sit on the edge of the bed and dabbed the towel against his skin. She rechanged the bandages 

"Your mother's."

"When did we get here?"

"Late. Or early. I guess it depends."

They sat in silence for a little while. He looked towards the window. "Do you want to go for a swim?"

A set of stairs walked them directly into the water. They left their clothes a few steps up from the tide and walked into the foam. It was bitterly cold, and Cora felt herself shriek when he shoved the current towards her, flecks of salt water biting her upper arms; he had almost immediately submerged himself.

"Don't be fucking lame, get in here."

"I'm adjusting, Rome."

He disappeared beneath the surface, she felt his hand on her ankle, screaming as he yanked her under the crest of a loafing wave. Cora opened her eyes against the salty bite and cursed him with the frantic bubbles that left her mouth. Beneath the water, he let himself smile and kiss her.

"Hello, bitch."

Matsson had been waiting beside the front doors, probably tipped off by the lengthy arrival of Frank before Cora had the courage to remove herself from the curb. He clamped a hand against her shoulder and steered her from the crowd before she could hurry off, but if he'd expected her to roll over because he'd yanked her into confessional, he was dead wrong.

Mostly because he hadn't thought it through. While Cora stood wedged in the corner, Matsson's neck was bent at an awkward angle, and the magician's purple of the curtain straddled either side of his stooped torso. She laughed. Matsson's brow set in a hard line.

"I know what you're doing."

"You. Are. A. Psychopath."

"You set that up. You're hiding something."

"You had your lackey break up with me."

"Ah, you're feeding me bullshit. I don't like when you feed me bullshit."

She could see through the gaps that they were being watched by several people. He briefly craned his head over his shoulder, hitting his forehead in the process, and tried to wave their audience away. Cora smirked. "Can I go?"

He began to rifle in the inner pocket of his jacket. Cora felt a sudden jump of nerves. What could he possibly have to present her with? A photo of her at the clinic? No, something worse.

A plastic baggie with a small yellow-topped plastic container. Cora rubbed her eyes and leaned forward. Her name, date of birth, and address were printed on the sides. The bag dangled insistently towards her. She pulled back.

"And what's that for?"

"You want me to leave you alone? Piss in the cup."

She gawked at him. "What the fuck, Lukas?! I'm not on drugs."

"Exactly," he said. He produced a flask, crinkling against the bag. "It's this or the cup."

Cora tried to elbow her way past him but he sent her firmly backwards, her back hitting the wood, sending a tremor through the booth. She had been about to yell out when a hand darted through the curtain and placed itself on Matsson's upper arm.

She'd never been so relieved to see Stewy's face, peeking through the gap.

"Can I help you?" Matsson said, softening his tone as he realised who their intruder was. He did his best to relax in the cramped space.

"Well, unless you're waiting for someone, I reckon we back out of the box. I think you've sent someone's great-aunt into a coma."

To Cora's surprise, he had decided to obey. She emerged cautiously to see Stewy, grinning nonchalant, as Matsson stowed away his demands, rolling his jaw. From between them, she spotted Roman and Shiv, speaking to Caroline, in the aisle between the pews.

"Does it still hurt?"

She touched his brow and he flinched in response, his arm tightening around her waist. The waves bobbed them, calm in the burgeoning sun. He shook his head quickly.

"Nah, nah, of course not. Actually it hurts a lot. I don't know. How should I play this?" he said.

Cora rolled her eyes, as she pressed two fingers against his lips. "I think it depends. What do you want from me?"

A slap rung out along the surface of the water. A surfer had lost their balance on the way in and collided with the surface tension. Cora blushed, and sunk down to cut the water against her collarbones.

"You literally look more naked now."

"Shut up or I'll rinse your stitches."

"Oh, they're rinsing," he said. "I wanted to see if you knew how stitches work. Clearly you heard nothing that Peter said last night."

"Mm, I guess I was distracted with your mother's multiple fainting couch episodes. I don't think she blinked an eye the summer Shiv broke her arm."

"It's all in the eyes."

It was. She had seen it coming. Even if she'd been deaf to all of the stuttering, she'd seen something shatter in the glass of them when he'd stepped to the front. Cora had wanted to rush up there immediately, but when she'd tensed, Frank had put a hand against her arm, and she'd been forced to relax. Or at least, to endure.

They had been in the row behind the siblings. She'd become well acquainted with the back of his head throughout the proceedings. Before it had all started, he'd completely ignored her, staring through her as though she were one of the many ancient particles of dust stirred by the movement within the cathedral. That had hurt, and she'd wondered if it was the wrong thing to turn him away the night before.

Frank had let her go when his siblings had pulled him down. Maybe that was the right move. By that time, he'd began to search for her, heaving the request. Shiv didn't see Cora until she was immediately in front of her. "Can you just, can you deal with, can you."

Like a lost puppy, he didn't leave after that, permanently lodged in the crook of her arm, trailing damp on the shoulders of her dress. They traded words around each other. When Frank attempted to console him, and he bit back, she mouthed his apology. In the tome, she held him as she wished she had been, and bit back the reminder of Reagan as she whispered a final goodbye. At the reception afterwards, she walked hand in hand with him, thanking people for attendance, distracting from the unfocus of his eyes and the petulance on his lips.

She set him down in an armchair to go find him something to drink; he'd rejected the prospect of food. On the way to the buffet table, she'd passed a group, initiating raucous laughter. Unable to stop herself, she glanced in their direction.

Cora was not proud of her actions. Well no, she was. But if you'd asked her, she'd say that it was all the effort of suppressing the day. It was hearing her ex calling her "mommy" tauntingly. It was being laughed at by the President of the United States. She'd known, however, exactly what she was doing when she'd grabbed two glasses of red wine. Who was going to turn down an opportunity like that?

"I have to throw you out, Cora."

"No, you don't. It's your dad's funeral." She said, craning her head to try and find Roman. If she could convince him, she'd be happy to leave, but she needed to find him first.

Kendall had shifted uncomfortably. Cora had looked for a third glass of wine.

"You what?!"

"I gave it to him straight."

"Right. Really smart. God, Ken, I wonder why you're losing."

It had been dark outside, like a power outage had cut the street lights, the protestors glowing, Cora had imagined torch light, despite looking at the footage on her phone, hidden away in the bathroom, fog prematurely washing her skin of salt. Olivia had sent her the clip of what she'd missed. She was grateful that she had. Her appearance was at the end, very brief, her hair hiding her face as she pulled him up, shaking him harshly like a ragdoll.

Her stomach turned with nausea and she turned towards the toilet, right as the door flung.

"Darling, I wasn't sure if you both had spare tow—"

After that, Caroline watched her like a hawk over breakfast. Cora oscillated between pleading glances and ignoring her completely. She broke apart her croissant into tiny pieces until Roman commented on whether she was planning on making a blanket out of it, before announcing she wasn't feeling too hungry after all. Peter insisted on fixing up the sutures. She hovered around him, and Caroline hovered around them. 

Cora guessed that Caroline had figured he didn't know, but she was forced to confirm when she'd attempted to grab something from their room.

"Are you taking a prenatal?" Cora winced and Caroline shut the door, closing it with her back, crossing her arms. "I did ask Siobhan the same thing."

"Good for you," Cora muttered. "And no. After making sure that your son didn't cop a charge 

"You can't blame me for being concerned about track records when a child is concerned."

"It isn't his."

"Why do you think that would change my disposition?"

"Because." Cora said, running a hand through her hair. She took a deep breath, lowering her voice. "Because the only person who should be, and actually is, concerned, is me."

"And would it be you alone that you plan on looking after this concern of yours?"

Roman's funeral clothes were draped at the foot of the bed. Cora touched the ankle of his pants, unable to meet Caroline's eye. She walked over to her handbag, resting atop her dress. She reached inside and pulled out the picture.

Caroline cooed under her breath as Cora presented her with the grainy photo. It was barely the side of a bean, and ultimately unrecognizable from whatever would come screaming out of her in due time. She'd almost left the clinic without it. Even looking at it now, Cora didn't quite understand the mist that overcame Caroline's expression. After running her thumb against the sheen of the paper, she handed it back to Cora, who placed it in the pocket of her borrowed jeans.

"I have a lot to think about."

"And you want to do it, sweating with the locals?"

Roman lounged in a wicker chair, a hat dipping over his sunglasses. He had refused any of Peter's clothes and had somehow ended up in an outfit that resembled a child's, light pastel colours and a simple cut. Cora was somewhat hoping she couldn't tempt him to picking something up in the village. For her own sanity, she was hoping to get out of Caroline's hand-me-downs as soon as possible.

"I've never been to Barbados. I'm hungry. I don't know why I'm the one asking." She paused. "It'd be like a brunch thing."

"A brunch thing?" he snorted. "Are we going to chat about all the hot goss?"

She sat down in his lap, her legs folding over the arm of the chair. Placing an arm around his neck, she lowered his glasses down the bridge of his nose. Smiling casually, she fiddled with the collar of his shirt, detecting a hint of odd hunger in the glint of his eyes.

"Yeah, we could do that. Or you could ask me on a date."

The crunch of gravel carried over the tall iron front gates.

Roman adjusted himself beneath her. "A ... Date."

"Yes. You could take me out and we could talk and you could pay and then maybe I thank you, or you could thank me, by the side of the road

"Okay, but which one of us is driving?"

The gate creaked open.

They were moments from kissing when she heard Kendall's voice. Or rather, his disgust. Cora leapt up quickly, managing to elbow Roman in the process. He rubbed his chin and turned in his seat. Walking to the front of the house, was Kendall, with Shiv in tow. They zeroed in on their brother. Cora took a step back. Then another. It wasn't until much later that her brain caught up to her body, looking out over the shallow bay, shrouded by the night.

Caroline placed a hand on her shoulder. They watched in silence as the siblings frolicked in the dark waves. "It will never get better. And that will never get easier to comprehend." She said, and left Cora to her thoughts.

≪ °❈° ≫

New York. The boardroom. Cora was still in borrowed clothes, this time a loose linen dress in spring colours, with her funeral shoes, and her hair tied back in a long fishtail braid. The tops of her cheeks were burnt into a permanent blush, one which was added to when she was escourted into Kendall's office, briefly, by Stewy.

He had gotten her email. She barely remembered sending it, only that it must have been sometime around midnight, and she certainly didn't know what it had said. But she could guess.

As she began to unpack her situation, Stewy sat in silence, swinging back and forth in Kendall's office chair. From their vantage point, she could see people gathering in the hallway. The vote would be underway soon. Her palms, the back of her neck, were slick with sweat. The chair gave a squeak and she realised he was standing up now, pacing. 

"Wait, wait, too fast," he said, waving a hand. Cora crumpled. "No, no, I mean you're talking too fast. Slow it down. I'm hearing something about a ring, and a lawyer, but ..."

"I'm pregnant."

She felt a puff of air hit her side. The door had opened. Kendall had entered, and instantly, he was upon her.

"Wait, with Matsson's?" He began, and dumbly she nodded. "Fuck. Shit. Well, ok. This is great."

"It is?" She said.

"Yeah, you could stop this in its tracks," he said. "Go out there and tell him that unless he withdraws, you're not gonna let him see the kid." Cora looked at him like he'd gone mad, but there was no semblance of anything bar seriousness in the tone of his voice. He looked from her to Stewy. "And hey, if she does, you're cutting out of her in half the time. Win fucking win."

Stewy chuckled. "I'm not really sure this is the angle you wanna go with, Ken."

"What? This could be big."

"What could be big?"

Cora buried her head in her hands, groaning. When she pulled up, there he was, hovering over Kendall's shoulder. 

"Should I tell him, Cora? Or you gonna nip this in the bud?"

"Hey, no one's nipping anything." Roman said, pushing past his brother. "Cora? What's this about?"

He had asked her on the plane back over to the States if everything was ok, since she had spent the entirety of the flight chewing her nails down to the quick and sculling all the non-alcoholic ginger beer. She met his gaze. Could she do this? Could she tell him? She had meant to. She'd wanted to get him away, somewhere they had never been before, somewhere that hadn't been sullied by countless missed opportunities, by words left unsaid, by time.

She didn't want to tell him in Waystar of all places. It felt sacrilegious. It felt like something Reagan would have done at her absolute worst. Cora had come to the conclusion before Caroline had spoken a word to her. She'd seen the train crashing on that circuitous loop. 

The answer to whether she knew what she was getting herself into was yes. Yes she did. To be in denial of something was to know it to its core. That was what she recognised in the way he looked at her then, a hot tear carving down her cheek. She didn't need to say anything. He knew. Maybe he'd known all along, read the change, even if he hadn't understood it. But the moment he had stepped closer to her, she'd placed a hand on her stomach, almost protectively. 

"It's about the fact we don't even need to vote."

Roman placed his hand on hers. "You should leave," he said furtively.

"What?" Cora said, her voice scraping against her throat. "What do you mean?"

He didn't repeat himself. He turned to face his brother, shaking his head. "No, we're not playing it like that. We'll do the vote. Like how dad would have wanted it."

"Dad wouldn't have wanted it to have ended up here."

Roman ignored him. He placed a hand on the small of her back and began to guide her to the exit. Cora dug her heels, but he ushered her firmly until she was out in the hall. She could feel the eyes on the back of her head, conversation flattening. The linger of Greg's voice bounced the space behind her.

He leaned with his arms braced on either side of the doorway, his feet on the threshold and his torso canted forward. It could not have been longer than a few seconds, but time stretched, and for however briefly it was, they were alone. 

And she saw him plainly there. Every iteration. Every time it hadn't worked. The times they had tried and the times they hadn't. The space between them, that stretched infinitely, back and forth, that shrunk and expanded like a pair of cosmic lungs. 

Cora had thought she had known him. She had thought that he had known her. But standing on the threshold, she wondered if either of them had ever really caught sight of the other. That time and length could account for themselves, but that understanding had escaped her.

Yet she wasn't angry. And despite the tears, streaming down her face like a body of soft flowing water, she wasn't sad. She'd thought his disappearance from her life would be the end of her. Now she realised that it had been his lack, his faded presence, that had hurt her the most.

She had to do this without him. She could do this without him. All dead skin must shed. All things must end.

"Will you call me?" She said.

"You'll hear from me." He said.

"Do you promise?"

He nodded: "Yeah. I have to handle this. Just one more time. But one day."

And with that, she walked from his orbit.