Fading Before the First Snow

Stella, you are not sick, right? My celebrity ex-husband stood by my hospital bed. His eyes were shot through with crimson veins.

A few hours ago, photos of my post-chemotherapy state had leaked online.

The trolls had paired the images with pure venom: The bitch got cancer, lmao.

He had called my phone like a maniac. I declined every single one. Now, he locked his gaze on my pale face, desperate to find a single trace of a lie.

I tugged at the IV tube taped to the back of my hand and laughed right in his face.

"Terminal cancer." I savored the exact millisecond his expression shattered into pieces. "I am dying."

=== Chapter 1 ===

My husband was an A-list pop idol, Jaxon.

We had been secretly married for eight years. I stayed by his side from his days as a no-name extra to a global sensation.

Whenever I asked when we would go public, he always told me to wait. Wait until the record labels and corporate sponsors stop controlling me. I bought it.

But the public announcement never came. Instead, a never-ending parade of rumored girlfriends took its place. His reactions shifted from patient reassurances to irritated gaslighting.

"It was just holding hands and some staged eye contact. We didn't do anything. The label arranged it. How am I supposed to know why she called me in the middle of the night?"

"So what if I got her a Valentine's gift? Stop being so toxic and unreasonable."

The sheer hypocrisy of it all was suffocating.

Two years ago, a male coworker offered me a hot coffee. Jaxon saw it and gave me the silent treatment for three days. I had not even accepted the drink. He refused to listen.

Now that the roles were reversed, his staged intimacy was suddenly no big deal. Did he ever spare a single thought for me? Who was the flavor of the month this time?

Right. Brittany. The center-stage debutante dubbed the once-in-a-millennium beauty.

The internet was flooded with PR campaigns for their new show, featuring endless clips of their sweet eye contact and undeniable chemistry. The comment sections were a unified wall of obsession.

[Date already!]

[They look so perfect together.]

[The ultimate visual couple, crying, I ship them so hard.]

Did it hurt? Was I jealous?

Last year, every conversation we had devolved into a screaming match. He dropped a careless "If you can't handle it, let's get a divorce," and walked out. We separated. He moved into a hotel.

But the moment I held that medical report in my hands, staring at the words Late-Stage Stomach Cancer, my first instinct was still to call Jaxon. I wanted to ask him what to do.

We had been together for twenty-two years. Since we were five years old. He was not just my lover; he was family. He was etched into my very bones.

I pressed the phone to my ear.

Instead of his voice, a woman's breathy moan filtered through the speaker. "Ah, gently."

A low, muffled chuckle followed.

My phone slipped from my grip and hit the floor. I blinked.

That laugh belonged to Jaxon.

He was actually cheating on me.

I lost my mind that day. I drove straight to his hotel and hammered on the door until my knuckles bruised.

The door swung open. He stood there, a white towel slung low on his hips. He frowned the moment he saw me. "Why are you here?"

"Who is it?" Brittany's voice drifted into the hallway. She stepped up right behind him, wrapped in a plush hotel robe, and wrapped her arms around his waist. "Jaxon, who is this?"

Jaxon stared down at me. His eyes were entirely devoid of warmth, filled only with annoyance. "My ex-wife."

"Wow, your taste used to be pretty awful."

"It was." He agreed without missing a beat, then looked down his nose at me. "Anything else?"

I slapped him across the face. My entire body shook with violent, uncontrollable sobs.

He did not flinch. He just pinched the bridge of his nose and let out a flat, exhausted sigh. "Stop making a scene. Let's divorce."

The very next day, Jaxon came back to our house. He was still wearing a tailored suit, fresh from whatever press event he had just wrapped up. He tossed a legal document onto the table right in front of me.

"Stella, let's be adults about this. Sign it, and don't make this ugly."

=== Chapter 2 ===

I had not slept a single second. I picked up the divorce papers and hurled them straight into his face.

He tilted his head. A dark, vicious glint flashed in his narrow eyes. "Stella, don't cross the line."

"Me? Cross the line? Who is the one sleeping in another woman's bed? Jaxon!"

I let out a harsh laugh. It scraped against my chest until it triggered a violent fit of coughing. A metallic, salty taste coated the back of my throat.

"What do you expect? Should I bake a casserole and throw a welcome-home party for your infidelity?"

Jaxon frowned. The annoyance in his gaze was palpable. "We operate in two totally different worlds now. You know that better than anyone."

He straightened his cuffs. "I will give you a generous financial settlement. You'll live comfortably."

I stared at him in pure disbelief.

My lungs felt like they were filled with crushed glass.

Was this really the same man? The boy who stayed by my side through childhood and youth, who stood outside the courthouse and swore to protect me for the rest of his life.

Now, he could not even look at me without disgust. How did he become a complete stranger in just two years?

Just last winter, I had a mild scratch in my throat. He treated it like a state of emergency. He banned me from drinking ice water. He kept warm tea on my nightstand. He practically dragged me to urgent care.

His eyes used to be so full of me. Now, I was choking on my own breath, and all he felt was an inconvenience.

I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand, smearing the blood directly into the dark fabric of my dress. "I am not going to let you get away with this, Jaxon."

He looked down his nose at me with quiet disdain. "My PR team has already drafted the statements, Stella. Making a scene won't end well for you."

My hand found the ceramic vase on the console table. I snatched it. I hurled it straight at his head.

It shattered against the wall right beside his ear. A flying shard sliced a thin red line across his jaw.

"Get out!"

He had never seen me this unhinged before. His lips pressed into a tight line. "If you breathe a word of this to the press, I cut all funding to the orphanage."

My throat seized. "You are threatening me with that? Jaxon, wasn't Susan good to you? Do you even have a soul left?"

His eyes went dead. "I told you I was going to climb to the very top. You know exactly what it took for me to get here."

The front door slammed shut. The walls shook.

My knees gave out. I hit the hardwood floor.

Blood spilled from my lips in violent, dark waves. My stomach twisted into a knot of agonizing, white-hot pain.

Cold sweat soaked through my clothes.

Was this it? Was I dying right now?

"Stella, let's be together. I want to spend the rest of my life looking at you." We had just graduated. Jaxon had finally landed his first speaking role. He saved up every penny to buy me a diamond ring.

It was the first snow of the year. He stood under the amber glow of a streetlamp, buried in a black puffer jacket. His curls were dusted with snow. He looked so nervous.

I knew why. He was terrified I was going to say yes to that frat-boy senior who had been asking me out. He was so cute back then.

I held out my hand. I let him slide that freezing metal band onto my ring finger. The warmth that bloomed in my chest was infinite.

A violent cough ripped me awake.

My eyes fluttered open. Sunlight spilled across the kitchen floor. I was lying in the shadows, still wearing that dark dress. The white marble tiles around me were stained with dried, rusted flakes of blood.

Withered. Pathetic. Shivering down to my marrow.

Every muscle screamed when I tried to move. So this was what dying felt like.

I dragged myself up. The vertigo hit me like a freight train.

I blindly fumbled for a piece of butterscotch candy and shoved it into my mouth to fight the bitter taste. It did not work.

A massive wave of nausea hit. My stomach was entirely empty, but I hunched over the sink, dry-heaving violently until I tasted pure bile. My mouth was flooded with a sickening, acidic bitterness.

It hurt so much.

I slid down the cabinets and sat on the cold tiles. I looked up. The house was dead quiet.

Even the knife block on the counter was empty. I had been entirely alone for a very long time.

=== Chapter 3 ===

I was the only one left suffocating in the memories.

Jaxon had already walked away, stepping effortlessly onto his so-called path of glory.

Revenge? What was the point? How much time did I even have left?

I did not know how long I sat on the cold floor. The sun dipped low, and a sliver of late afternoon light finally sliced through the window, bringing a faint trace of warmth to my frozen skin.

My fingers twitched. I dragged myself up and dialed Jaxon's number. "I will sign the divorce papers. I want fifty million, and you double the monthly donations to the orphanage."

Dead silence on the other end of the line. "Stella, don't you think you are pushing it?"

"Heh." A hollow laugh scraped against my throat. Hot tears spilled continuously over my cheeks, yet my voice was colder and steadier than it had ever been.

"You have exactly twenty-four hours. I want to see you at the County Clerk's office the day after tomorrow. Otherwise, you can forget about me ever signing those papers."

I hung up.

Jaxon showed up. He was buried under a black baseball cap, an oversized hoodie, and a surgical mask.

It did not matter. You could not hide that kind of manufactured aura. People in the lobby were still shooting him sideways glances.

He was plastered across every billboard in the city. Even the bus stops were infected with his face. It was exhausting.

I checked my bank account. The wire transfer had cleared. I signed my name on the final decree.

The clerk needed to verify his identity. He had no choice but to pull down his mask.

A sharp ripple of whispers instantly swept through the waiting room.

I had no idea this exact moment would be leaked online and detonate a massive scandal across the internet.

Stepping out of the building, we were nothing but strangers.

He did not even spare me a passing glance. He walked straight to his idling black Sprinter van and pulled the door open. Inside, a pair of flawless, pale legs shifted on the leather seat.

Brittany, probably.

The door slid shut. The van peeled away from the curb, erasing him from my life with sickening ease.

I watched the taillights disappear into the traffic. "Goodbye, Jaxon. Forever."

I looked down at the draft open on my phone screen. Nearly ten thousand words.

It held every fragmented piece of us. The first time we met when I was a five-year-old dropped off at the orphanage. The snowy night after graduation when he stood under the streetlamp and asked me to marry him.

9,821 words. That was all it took to summarize twenty-two entire years of my life. It was shorter than a college term paper.

My thumb hovered over the publish button.

A few feet away, a chubby mother was holding her little girl's hand. They were chatting about something, laughing brightly. The sound instantly reminded me of Susan.

Susan was the director of the orphanage. She had the same soft, round build and the same warm, roaring laugh. She was loud, but she loved every single one of us orphans like we were her own flesh and blood.

Because she had lost her own child when she was young.

I remembered my first weeks at the orphanage. I cried every single day until my eyelids were swollen shut.

She worried so much that she got stress blisters on her lips. She coaxed me to sleep every night, all while cooking three meals a day, washing mountains of laundry, and scrubbing floors until she could barely stand.

Years later, I asked her if it was all worth it. She just waved me off. She said she did not have time to entertain useless thoughts. Instead of letting negative emotions drag her down, she chose to hold onto the good memories.

I blinked. My thumb froze in mid-air.

If I hit send, the media, the paparazzi, and his psychotic stans would turn the world upside down hunting for me. I had less than three months to live.

Was I really going to waste my dying days tangled up in Jaxon's toxic mess? Will he ever realize the ticking clock he just ignored?

I never wanted to see his face again.

=== Chapter 4 ===

For my final days, I just wanted to be alone. I wanted to feel the world one last time and fade away quietly, severing every last toxic tie to him.

I wanted to go back to the orphanage. To see Susan and the little ones. To hear her booming voice echoing over the chaotic, joyful screams of the kids.

A faint smile touched my lips. A slow, grounding warmth washed over the agonizing wreckage Jaxon had left behind.

The ache was still there, a dull throb in my ribs, but it did not feel like the end of the world anymore.

If only life could have paused at the very beginning.

I took a deep breath and looked up. The sky was an endless, brilliant blue. It was a beautiful day to bring them some cupcakes.

I hit delete on the draft. A physical weight lifted from my shoulders. It was truly over.

"Stella is here!" Sadie spotted me the second I walked through the gates. She was five, with pinchable cheeks and an infectious giggle.

A chaotic swarm of toddlers rushed out to surround me. I laughed, handing over the bakery boxes. They scrambled to the dining tables, tearing into the boxes with wide, glowing eyes.

Susan marched out of the kitchen. She immediately slapped a heavy, warm hand between my shoulder blades.

Her voice was just as loud and commanding as ever. "Dieting again? Look at you, you are basically walking bones! You look awful!"

I looked at her. Her eyes were furious but entirely soft with worry. I noticed the silver threads weaving through her hair. Was it that gray last week?

Or had I just been too blind to notice?

My throat tightened. I wanted nothing more than to collapse into her solid arms.

I wanted to sob out every ounce of betrayal, every cruel word, and scream my lungs out about Jaxon.

I swallowed the massive lump in my throat. I hooked my arm through hers and leaned into her warmth. "It is the trend right now, Susan."

"Trend my ass," she muttered. "I am making pot roast. You are eating two full bowls of rice today."

"Deal." I sniffled, flashing her the brightest smile I could muster.

"Weirdo," Susan grumbled. But the joy in her eyes was impossible to hide.

She turned toward the kitchen, then paused. Her shoulders shifted. "How is Julian I mean, how are you and Jaxon doing?"

I froze. It took my brain a second to register his real name. Julian.

Jaxon was just a manufactured stage name his label forced on him two years ago. It suddenly hit me. The exact moment he traded his name for fame was the moment my Julian started slipping away forever.

"We are great." I lowered my gaze. I forced a convincing smile onto my lips.

Susan sighed. Her expression was a mix of frustration at my blind devotion, but she still tried to comfort me. "Those gossip sites are full of garbage. He is a grounded, good kid. He would never cheat on you."

The image of him standing in that low-slung hotel towel violently flashed behind my eyes. I saw Brittany's pale arms sliding around his waist.

I dug my fingernails into my palms until the skin nearly broke. I kept smiling and nodded. "Yeah. He treats me really well."

Susan reached out and ruffled my hair. "If it ever gets too much, just divorce him and come back to help me."

"Haha, I will," I laughed.

She shot me one last lingering, worried glance before disappearing into the kitchen to cook.

I watched her apron-clad figure retreat. I watched the toddlers making a mess with their cupcakes. My gaze drifted aimlessly across the grounds.

Past the worn-out sandbox. Past the rusty swings. My eyes finally landed on the massive oak tree near the fence.

The leaves were entirely dead, brittle and falling away in the cold wind. But I remembered it in full bloom. The heavy green canopy rustling in the summer heat.

Teenage Julian had stood right under those branches. His eyes had been so clear, so fiercely devoted when he looked at me.

"Stella, I will never let you shed a single tear. You don't have to be strong all the time. Just lean on me."

=== Chapter 5 ===

When I finally snapped back to reality, my face was completely drenched. I clamped my hands over my face. Terrified that Susan or the kids would catch sight of my shattered expression, I turned and fled.

But this was it. These were the absolute last tears I would ever waste on him. The final mourning for the pure, devoted boy he used to be.

Of course, the real reason I ran was that there was no way I could stomach two bowls of pot roast. I could not even force down half a bowl. What a shame.

I could still vividly remember the rich, savory smell of the meat. The way it would practically melt on my tongue with just one tender bite, bursting with flavor.

Funding was tight at the orphanage back then. Every kid only got five or six pieces of meat per meal.

But Julian would always silently slide his entire portion onto my plate. I had to physically force him to take a bite. He would chew it awkwardly, claim he hated the taste, and tell me to finish it all.

God, why was I thinking about him again?

I was just trying to reminisce about my childhood, but he was infected into every single memory. I squeezed my eyes shut, violently shoving the image out of my head.

I stared at the pristine grassy cemetery plots laid out in front of me. Wasn't the universe playing a cruel joke? Normal people took two or three years to get over a broken heart. Me? I got a mandatory deadline of less than three months.

"So ruthless," I murmured.

At least the cemetery was far from the city limits. The hills were green, the air was crisp, and my future neighbors seemed quiet enough.

The thought actually lifted my mood a little. I let out a dry, self-deprecating chuckle.

Jaxon used to say my brain was wired backwards, that I had the weirdest, most chaotic train of thought. But he would always say it with that ridiculously soft, indulgent look in his eyes.

There he was again. I was so pathetic.

I lowered my gaze. I stood up and brushed the stray grass clippings off my black skirt. I turned to the sales agent standing next to me.

"This one. It is perfect." I signed the contract, paid for my own funeral arrangements, and checked myself straight into the oncology ward.

Out of nowhere, Jaxon called me. "I am sorry," he said.

Absolutely insane. I did not say a single word. I hung up and permanently blocked his number.

In my final days, I was going to surgically extract him from my life. I would rip him out of my flesh and bone until absolutely nothing remained.

I had a private hospital room. The doctors and nurses were incredibly attentive. Sometimes I would chat with the nurses about random internet drama, and it was actually peaceful.

Until today. The young nurse suddenly started dodging my gaze. She kept stuttering, constantly sneaking weird, pitying looks at my face.

My stomach dropped. I unlocked my phone and opened Twitter.

The entire platform was detonating. The number one trending hashtag was written in blazing letters:

[Jaxon Divorce]

[Jaxon Secretly Married]

[Jaxon Extorted]

[Who Is Jaxon's Wife]

[Unstanning Jaxon]

[Jaxon Official Statement]

My finger hovered over the screen. I clicked into his official PR statement.

It was a perfectly crafted masterpiece of gaslighting and character assassination. The summary was simple. We met before he was famous and got married. But I grew dangerously vain, toxic, and financially reckless. He had been trying to divorce me for years.

When his career exploded, I turned into a parasite, clinging to him and draining his wealth. The statement claimed I faked clinical depression, threatened suicide, and relentlessly harassed him.

Finally, pushed to the absolute breaking point, he begged me for a way out. I demanded fifty million dollars in exchange for the signed papers.

Attached at the bottom of the statement was a heavily spliced, thirty-second audio clip.

[Me: "I want fifty million."]

[Jaxon: "Stella, don't you think you are pushing it?"]

[Me: "Heh. You have exactly twenty-four hours. Fifty million, otherwise you can forget about me ever signing those papers."]

=== Chapter 6 ===

A violent coughing fit tore through my chest. The spliced audio was so utterly absurd that my brain simply short-circuited.

Even with our endless screaming matches over the last two years, even after catching him cheating, I never thought he would do this. What exactly happened to him?

Was the fame so addictive that he had to drag my name through the mud just to keep it? When did the fiercely loyal boy I grew up with twist into this greedy, selfish stranger?

Did I ever really know him at all?

My stomach violently convulsed.

The collision of our sweetest memories and this absolute nightmare made the entire room spin, even making me feel like this whole world was fake and violently absurd.

I clutched my chest. I hacked and dry-heaved until dark, metallic droplets splattered across the pristine white hospital sheets.

I could not stop. The stains bloomed into a massive, jagged red patch.

And I was laughing.

When the pain shatters you entirely, your body just defaults to hysterical laughter.

God, it was so funny.

My stomach twisted into agonizing knots. Hot blood poured from my mouth. My skull throbbed like it was splitting open.

This was what the end of the world felt like. This was the exact sensation of every belief crumbling into ash.

I collapsed against the mattress. The world went pitch black.

When I opened my eyes again, three days had vanished. I had been transferred out of the ICU. My mind was entirely hollow.

The attending physician stood by my bed, throwing around empty medical jargon about resting and recovering.

I looked at his tense shoulders and forced a weak smile. "Just tell me how much time I have left."

He let out a heavy sigh and pulled off his glasses. "Maybe one to two months. You need to avoid extreme emotional spikes. If you rest, maybe longer. Your mindset is critical."

"It is okay. I know my own body." I offered him another small smile.

A nurse helped me into a wheelchair and rolled me back to a standard private room.

The exhaustion was suffocating. Drawing a single breath felt like lifting lead. So this was what it felt like when your organs started shutting down.

I stared out the window at the dead, brittle branches shivering in the wind. Winter was really here.

The phone on my nightstand vibrated. Another unknown number.

I had not checked my screen in a week. There were over three hundred missed calls. I did not need to guess who it was.

A few days ago, seeing that might have triggered a massive spike in my heart rate. Now, there was only a fleeting wave of annoyance, followed by absolute numbness.

I declined the call.

I just lay there in the quiet room. My limbs were hollow. Nausea churned in my throat. Even breathing required active effort.

Staring death in the face strips away every other emotion. You hurt so much that you stop wanting anything at all. Even the roots of my hair felt exhausted.

I just wanted to live.

I should have gone for spicy hotpot after leaving the orphanage. A massive bowl of boiling chili broth, thin slices of beef and lamb, crispy fried mochi.

I let my heavy eyelids slide shut.

When they fluttered open again, Jaxon was standing right beside my bed. His eyes were shot through with crimson veins. He stared at me with unhinged desperation. "Stella, you are not sick, right?"

I looked into his agonizing gaze and found it utterly hilarious. "Terminal cancer. I am dying."

"Fuck! Fuck! Why the fuck didn't you tell me? Fuck!" Jaxon lost his mind.

His manufactured, untouchable A-list persona instantly shattered into a million pieces.

He grabbed the ceramic vase. He hurled it at the wall. He swept the bedside table. Plates, cups, and the electric kettle crashed to the floor.

The television screen cracked under his fist. He was a cornered animal. He was violently tearing the room apart to bleed out his own suffocating emotions.

Was it regret? Was it guilt? Or was it love?

I watched him destroy the room with absolute deadpan silence. "Too loud."

=== Chapter 7 ===

My voice was a whisper, but it hit him like a physical blow. He froze