A Graduation Gift

She knew she had to move out. She couldn't live in this apartment any longer. Rufus acted as if it was his apartment and she was something that belonged to him. Now Cassandra realized she must have been nothing but a well-thought-out plan for him.

But she didn't want her heart to sink deeper.

A few days passed in a blur. When Rufus came to her apartment again, he opened the door to nothingness. The apartment was empty.

There was no trace of Cassandra, not the tea cups, not the potted plants, not the chinaware in the kitchen...Everything was gone. Well, everything but one thing.

Rufus saw it, passing by the bedroom and suddenly came to a halt. He walked back a few steps and then into the bedroom. A unicorn lay on the night stand.

He looked at it with pursed lips for a while, then picked it up gently. Its happy smile suddenly seemed sad. The glow in its eyes seemed like brimming tears.

He remembered Cassandra telling him how she would always hold the unicorn doll in her arms when she was a young girl, how she used to pour her heart out to it. The only reason she treasured it so much was that it was the first ever gift Rufus had ever given her.

And now, she was gone, taking everything with her but the unicorn. Rufus knew it wasn't carelessness. He knew it was deliberate.

She must have known that Rufus would come by again and hence decided to leave it here, as a token of an end, a goodbye. They were done. She didn't have anything to do with the unicorn, or with him.

Rufus seized the doll. Inside, he felt cold and hollow, almost as if wind could pass right through him.

'Cassandra, you can't wait to get rid of me, right?' he said to himself.

But the trouble wasn't over, like Cassandra would have thought. From the very next day, she began to receive roses in her office. There was no name tag on them. They were fresh and beautiful; their bright colors cought her eyes throughout the day. She tried to reject them every time, but they kept coming.

started to gossip about it. It wasn't so much a controversy, rather a sense of envy they

that, they were also quite bored. Qin Group hadn't gotten any projects of late. Everyone simply dragged through the

list of the Top 10 young entrepreneurs of G City, she was now replaced by someone else. But she was resilient, taking in silently whatever life threw at

seduced easily. After her divorce with Lionel, she fell in love with his brother, Rufus. On top of that, she was put into the detention house being a suspect of an intentional homicide. Who would want to collaborate with a woman of such bad reputation?

the right track a while ago and now they seemed to be boycotted from the market. Cassandra felt extremely pressured.

since there were so many employees, even to pay their salaries was becoming difficult. If she couldn't

She tried contacting the old clients but everyone rejected her. Most days, she would come back to the office in

hooks in a small warehouse in a corner of their office. She set up a small stove and managed to find a broken shelf to keep the rest

the company floating,

salaries. By the end of the month, some already

was that Cassandra had no argument to make them stay. She couldn't stop them from working at a better place. Moreover, at this point, she was more concerned about the expenses and hence didn't persuade them to reconsider, given that she might not even be able to pay them

aspirations. She couldn't

kept coming. The situation was such that there were more bouquets in the office now,

day, Cassandra's assistant handed out her resignation letter. She felt extremely sorry for Cassandra but had lost faith in Qin Group. She didn't think she had any choice but

at the letter and let out a bitter smile. The gradual degradation of the company this time, was the same as it was during Vernon's time. Cassandra felt powerless with no ambitions

Group alive when she felt so suffocated herself?

didn't need to make any appointments now. Cassandra was not busy and she did not have

an old client, asking for new projects, but she was rejected, again. Everyone now gave her perfunctory replies. She

to be in some trouble. Am I