How Are You True?

Chapter 20: Multiple Set-Ups

April 17th, 2032
Thursday, 11:24am - Los Angeles, California

Madison and María were arguing too much, too loud that Nate had to cut off his conversation with his mom too early. Seated on the brown smooth couch in the living room with a quilt draped around his half naked body like a cape, Nate tossed his phone aside and rubbed his tired eyes, digging out the crust from the inside corners. He yawned and exhaled dramatically, hoping they can hear his annoyance from the kitchen and cut the fighting. It's been like this since 8am and then resumed after Madison came back from the farmer's market at 10. Over what exactly?

"What do you mean take a break? Why the hell would we take a break, Mads? That doesn't make any sense," María argued, stopping what she was doing while Madison chopped up vegetables and fruit for a salad.

"Why not? Why does taking a break to figure things out regarding our relationship not make sense but staying together while cleary stuck and wanting different things does?" Madison countered in a more mellow tone—far different from her girlfriend's.

"You're saying you want to break up. That's what a break is, it's a break up. And I don't wanna break up with you!" María yelled, desperate for Madison to leave the salad bowl alone and focus solely on her. "It's silly to end something we both want and love all because of a disagreement on marriage."

"Is it?" Madison dropped the knife, startling María. "Because I'm thirty years old. I'm getting older. I don't want to date anymore, I wanna settle down. I want marriage, I want to adopt, I want to have a family that'll last forever. I don't want what you want, what you want bothers me."

"So? So what??"

"I need to figure out if you're worth not having those things or not!" Madison finally broke and shouted.

"If I'm WORTH IT or not??" María repeated, making sure she didn't hear that wrong. She scoffed then laughed ironically. "Wow. Do you even love me, Madison?"

"Of course I love you. Obviously!"

"Then how come that isn't enough? You're choosing a title over our future together."

"No I'm not and it's not just a title. I wanna settle down, María, not settle for less," Madison clarified with a sneer.

"I wonder if you realise what that sounded like just now. Damn, babe, tell me how you really feel when you look at me," María walked away from the kitchen just to walk back in, holding up a finger to signal she had more to say. "You know what? Just break up with me. Because taking a break to me means you're just scouting for another partner who is looking for a wife and kids while still having me to hold onto just in case you don't find anyone. That's not fair. I don't deserve to be put on the side like that."

"And I don't deserve not getting my happy ending. All I'm asking for is time to think—"

"Break up with me!! Do it, don't be a coward!" María went full force and shoved Madison, her voice cracking. "Tell me you don't want anything to do with me and that keeping me around means you're settling for less! Go ahead, Madison!"

Madison shook her head and shoved past María who couldn't bear to let her go. She couldn't bear it either but this was too much for her at the moment, the TV star had to remove herself. Fighting was not on her to-do list today. Her talk show opportunity got ripped from her, leaving her absolutely gutted, and that was the main thing on her mind above everything else. Madison was prioritising trying to heal from that while accepting a radio show instead with a brave face; if she had to deal with a break up on top of that, she'd break easily and quit everything. Madison was never the type of person who could carry all sorts of levels of pain and do just fine. Not getting what she wanted more than once was also something Madison couldn't do well with.