Marriage Proposal

[Axel: twenty-five years old; Chemist]

"Yeah, alright. I'll try but I won't promise."

"Don't tell me that same old line, Axel! You return this year's Christmas and that's final!"

"I said I won't promise, mom! It's not like I don't have work to do here. Alright, I'm hanging up! I'm busy!"

"What are you even busy about it's weekend..."

Groaning, I end the call and toss my phone to my side. Damn it! Christmas should be the time for jolly. But for me, it's a dreadful celebration. It's because I'm forced to return home in the mansion. After discovering Annalouie having sex with a woman in his room, I left the mansion the following day.

I easily escaped my mom's interrogation by telling her about work. Well, it wasn't a lie anyway. I did have a work so I start living in my condo and have been away for years ever since then. But I think I must be away long enough that I become suspicious to them. I sigh and lean back to the couch.

Dingdong!

Frowning, I get up from the couch and walk to the front door, peering into the hole to check who's my uninvited guest at this hour. Seeing that it's Jessie, I quickly open the door and welcome her.

"Jessie? What brings you here? Come in!" I widen the door and let her in. "Sit down. Do you want beer?"

"That would be nice." She drops herself on the couch, buries her face in her hands and sighs.

"Whoa! That's something that needs heavier than beer. Vodka?"

"Whatever that can make me hammered will do."

I chuckle and retrieve a bottle from my mini rack, take a couple of glasses before returning to my living room. I put everything on the coffee table, get back to my kitchen and take two big bags of potato chips and toss them together with our drink.

"Alright, let's start. What's making your life sh*tty right now, huh?" I ask, opening the bottle and pouring each of our glass.

"I'm about to be deported." Jessie informs as bland as sh*t, her eyes resigned to her fate.

"No, shit!"

"Yeah. My visa's about to expire."

“Wait, can't you get back to your country, renew the visa and return here?"

"I wish it would be as simple as that. But the moment I leave my post, the seniors said they'll hire a new one." Jessie leans over, reaches for her glass and gulps it down before stuffing her face with chips. "I'm gonna lose my perfect job and its generous pay. Leave my perfect apartment, and my Mr. Perfect neighbor without even telling him I love him! Then I'm gonna return to our shitty home and live forever as a wife to my fisherman husband and get impregnated every year! I won't be able to enter a luxurious spa anymore, forget what it feels like to have a hot oil and bubbling Jacuzzi. And most especially, I won't have a delicious friend with Axel as his name. I would be very miserable for the rest of my life!”

I wince and take a swig of my own drink. If I were a woman, the life Jessie enumerated would sound really sh*tty. Well, to rephrase it, if I were not a Webber, my life might've been sh*tty already. Because I've known luxury since young so even after getting a job in a big company, my life didn't really change. Just got busy.

"Can't you think of a way?"

"I did." Jessie refills her glass, drinks it up and refills it again. "But Mr. Perfect rejected me. Ouch! That really hurt a million times."

"What do you mean rejected? What does your infatuation have to do with your current problem?"

"I propositioned him marriage. Of course, it's just on papers. Through marriage and staying married for five years, I'll become a residence. That'll solve my problems. But of course, Mr. Perfect already has a fiancé and he rejected me right that instant. How come I didn't know he already has a fiancé? That really sucked!”

"Five years?" I carefully ask, taking a swig of my drink.

“Five years." Jessie nods and fills her mouth with chips.

"Marry me then."

Jessie coughs, sprays the crushed chips from her mouth into the table and some of it even enters my glass. I give her the vodka but it only chokes her more. I quickly run to my kitchen, get two bottles of water and give her one with the lid already opened.

"The hell, Jessie! You're so dirty!" I pick up my glass, make a face at it before throwing the content to the sink and return to the couch in the living room. "If I didn't have an ego as high as the Everest, I would be insulted by your reaction."

"That's right. You got the ego of the Everest, how can you easily propose marriage to me? I know how high your standard is!"

I chuckle and pour my glass with a shot, swirl the content before throwing it down my throat. "Well, I'm not thinking about marriage yet, and you're my friend. So I want to help. What's the big deal? But..." I turn my body towards her, resting an arm over the back of the couch. "No sex, alright?"

Jessie's eyes widen. "Oh, god! The manwh*re actually asked me not to have sex with him!"

I laugh, picking up a handful of chips and stuff my mouth with it. "I'm serious with my offer. Think about it."

"No way!" Jessie clutches my collar, acting as if she's about to cry but I know it's just her drama. "I won't waste time thinking anymore! I do!" She puckers her lips as if wanting for a kiss but I only shove her face away.

“And I'm serious about no sex."

"What's gotten into you?" Jessie frowns, straightening up. "I really don't want to pry because I know how private you are with your personal matters but, you know, I kind of got worried about you when you started changing."

"Changing?" I frown, chuckling to lighten up the suddenly serious tone.

"Yeah. Like it happened around two years ago. After we returned here from our intern. You stopped hanging out during pay day. You also stopped commenting about girls t*ts and how sexy their thighs are. In short, you stopped being a maniac and a manwh*re. Did something happen to you at home?"

"Yeah." I stuff myself a handful of chips and wash it down with another shot of my drink. "Sh*t happened."

"Did you get your d*ck castrated?"

I laugh and flick her forehead. "What the hell are you even spouting about?"

"Well, because if you no longer have a d*ck, there's no reason for you to flirt anymore. Maybe that's why you stopped your pu$sy hobbies." Jessie shrugs, looking at me at the corner of her eye. “Do you want to talk about it?"

"I'm in love with a man, Jessie."

Jessie freezes up, stares at me with wide, disbelieving eyes. She looks like a moron. As if realizing it herself, she quickly blinks and takes a swig of vodka before munching on the chips like a squirrel. She frowns and looks at me again like how she examines an unknown microbe.

"The hell happened to you? Sh*t got your tongue?"

"I don't know. You were into pu$sies before. I mean..."

"I know. I was damn straight as sh*t before that fucking son of the b*tch happened!"

"What happened?"

"He ra*ed me." I pause, giving way to Jessie's dramatic gasp. "But I ended up liking it."

"Whoa!"

"Yeah, whoa!" I chuckle, taunting myself more. "Blew my f*cking mind off. Sh*t felt so good, ruined me from the rest of the pu$sies. I just want his ten-incher."

"Ten incher?"

"Yeah. Hard to believe, right? Even I was shocked myself. To think I was so proud of my seven."

"Wait a minute. Before I get curious about your seven and let you show it to me. Let me ask first, are you really in love with this guy or just the sex?" The chips make crackling noise as Jessie chomps on them.

"I thought about it, too. So, I tried other dudes. You know, experiment about it so I had one give me head but I felt dirty afterwards. I asked another for sex but I ended throwing up on him. I got a punch to my face and a bill to the hotel. It's not just the sex that I liked. It's the person himself and the feelings he stirs inside me. To tell you honestly, I even hated this man ever since I met him that's why when I realized that I fell in love with him, I hated myself as well.”

"It's just as the romantic says, the line between love and hate are just as thin as a strand of hair. Or whatever sh*t that was. And you've crossed it.”

"Yeah. But I actually kept crossing that f*cking road back and forth, you know." I take a swig and bite down on the chips. "One moment I love him. The other time I want to kill him. And it keeps happening all the time."

“Yeah, I can relate to that. Jealousy's such a b*tch.”

I pause and so does my glass as it freezes halfway to my mouth. F*ck! I was jealous? Heat rises up from my gut to my chest and spreads around my face. I bet my hair has even stand on end in embarrassment as well.

I recall the times I felt so angry about him and I gasp. All along, it was jealousy? To think I was jealous of the women around him way earlier than the time I acknowledged my love for him!

"You just realized it?" Jessie asks, sounding amused.

"Yeah." I pick up the vodka and take a long pull of it straight from the bottle. "Damn it! Does this mean I've been in love with him all this time?"

"What about him? Why did he ra*e you in the first place?"

"Well..." I shrug, get to my feet to get the brandy from my rack and return to the couch. "I was really mean towards him when were young. I bully him all the time and I didn't know that hed held it against me. When he first did it, he told me he's paying me back to all I did with interest."

"So why this kind of torture? He could've beaten you up. Could he be interested in you as well?"

I chuckle without humor. "No way. He hates my guts. And he's a womanizer. He f*cks just about anyone that wears skirts. Damn him! He even f*cked the women I've been with."

"As an outsider, my opinion is that he's harboring something towards you as well. The feeling could be mutual, Axel. Did you try talking about it with him?"

"Hell, no! The only time we interact is when we get nasty between the sheets."

"So, the ra*e becomes consensual in the end."

"I would be hypocrite if I fight back when my body is moving with his pounding c*ck.”

Jessie laughs, shakes her head before taking a swig of brandy. "But will you be alright? To get married with me?"

I shrug and nibble on the chips. "Five years is no big deal as long as I can help you. I'd hate to lose a dear friend such as you.”

"Aww! I'm going to cry."

"Shut up!" I chuckle, shoving chips into her mouth. “Besides, I finally have the reason to return home this Christmas. What if you come home with me as well?"

"I plan on visiting Sitka during holidays, although it's not fixed, yet. I'll give you a call once I've settled my schedule."

"Sure." I pour each of our glasses again, pick up mine and raise it up to Jessie. "Cheers for our upcoming marriage!"

"Cheers, husband to be!"

Clink!

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