Intro
This story is purely for mental exploration and not for real life. We often have fantasies that should never take place in the real world. This story is such a case. Read and enjoy, but do not attempt to make this real.
Description
A woman's life takes an unexpected path when trying to save her true love.
The Revelation
Sarah was having the greatest day of her life. After only 12 months, she was promoted to floor supervisor at the bank. At 19, she was the youngest person to ever be given this position. Months of 12 hour days and showing that she could keep a cool head during emergencies had proven her value to the management, and when the position opened up, she was the first person to be offered the job. She could envision herself moving all the way to the top one day.
Arriving home, she gives the good news to her boyfriend. He is excited for her, and he tells her "We need to celebrate tonight!" Sarah and Tim had been together for nearly 5 years. They met in high school, and had been together ever since. They planned to marry once they had saved enough for a down payment on a house. She puts on her finest dress, and they head out for their celebratory dinner.
At dinner, Sarah discusses her career ambitions at the bank. "I will be CEO one day," she says.
Tim, being the supporting man that he is, tells her "Of course you will! And you will be the best!" The conversation shifts toward their future together. Sarah discusses her dream home, and what they will name their children.
This is when Sarah notices a drastic change in Tim's demeanor. She thinks nothing of it, but Tim's face is becoming more and more distraught. Finally, Sarah asks him directly "What is wrong?"
Tim holds stern for a few moments with "Nothing. Nothing is wrong." Then suddenly tears stream down his face.
Sarah thinks to herself, "Oh my God! Is he breaking up with me?!"
Tim sits in silence for a few moments, just looking down at the table. Finally, he breaks his silence and tells her "I have been living a lie, and I can't take it anymore."
"What do you mean??" Sarah replies.
He tells her "6 weeks ago I lost my job, and I have been living off of my savings. I have been looking frantically for a position in my field, but nothing is turning up!"
Sarah assures him "I wish you would have told me, but this is not the end of the world. We can get through this together."
"That's not all," he tells her, her heart sinking, "I felt so guilty about spending my savings, that I became desperate looking for ways to turn what I had into profit. I got introduced to a guy who does sports betting, and I began betting on games. At the beginning I was doing great. I had doubled the amount of money that I had put in! Then I got overly confident and placed a large wager on a team that I thought was a sure win. Everything was going as expected, then in the last half of the game, the other team turned things around."
Sarah sat in shock. She was speechless. It took her nearly 3 minutes to say a single word. Finally, she said "OK. How much do you owe?? 2,000?? 3,000?? We can pay them. We can find that money somehow."
Tim looks down at the table again. "That won't be enough", he says.
"How much money do you owe them?!?! Tell me right now!!" she says, almost screaming.
"$50,000 dollars", he says with a broken spirit.
"$50,000?!?!?!?" she shrieks. "But how is that possible?!?!?!" she says in disbelief. "There is no way possible that we can pay that!!" she says. "This is no place to discuss this," she adds, "We need to go home NOW!!"
There is silence in the car the entire way home. Not a word is spoken. Upon arriving home, Sarah immediately pours herself a large glass of wine and finishes it without stopping. "Sit down", she yells at Tim. "OK. Call this guy and tell him that we need to work out a long-term payment plan", Sarah proposes.
"We can't," Tim says, "I already tried that. He gave me until the end of the month."
"The end of month?!?!" she screams, "That's it. I'm calling the police, we are going to bring this guy down."
"No!! We can't do that!! You don't understand. This guy is dangerous. He has connections. Even if we hide, his people could seek out our family members," Tim exclaims.
"How could you even get involved with someone like this?!?!" Sarah says in disbelief.
"I was desperate," Tim says, "I thought you would leave me when you found out that I had lost my job and my portion of what we are saving for our house. You are everything to me, and my life would be nothing without you!"
Sarah sits in silence, boiling mad, and scared. Her hands are shaking. "What is his name?" she asks Tim.
"What are you going to do??" he replies.
"Give me his name!!" she yells.
"Marco Xavier," he tells her. "Promise me you are not going to the police!!" he begs her.
"Don't you worry about what I am going to do!!", she yells back. Sarah, marches to her bedroom, and slams the door shut. Tim knows what this means: do not come in here. He pours himself a glass of wine, covers himself on the couch, and passes out. He awakens in the morning to find that Sarah has already left for work.
The Encounter
Sarah was distracted all day at the bank. The overwhelming sense of fear and dread. "Who is this Marco Xavier guy?!" she kept thinking. "What is he going to do to us if we don't pay?!" she thought. "I can't take this anymore. I have to try to find this guy and talk to him personally. If I tell him our situation, maybe I can convince him to give us more time than just the end of the month," she thought to herself.
Finally, she decided to Google him. And it turns out that there was only one person found with that name in the city. But, nothing gave clearly identifying information. No address. No profile pictures. Just a name and a city. "Could he have an account with this bank??" she wondered.
Employees are not supposed to lookup customer information unless they are working with that customer, but this was not an ordinary circumstance. She decided this was a case for breaking the rules for sure. So, she logged into the company's system, and to her complete surprise, there he was. "What were the odds of that!?" she thought, "This is too coincidental. The universe wants me to resolve this!" She felt trepidatious, but also a glimmer of hope. She quickly jotted down the address on a piece of paper, told her manager that she needed to leave early, headed to her car, and put the address into her GPS.
Sarah pulled up to the house, and parked on the street. The neighborhood was quite wealthy. All of the houses were surrounded by walls with security gates. She approached the gate of the address, and just behind it was an armed security guard. She told the security guard that she needed to see Marco Xavier.
"Do you have an appointment?" he asked.
"No. I need to speak with him about an urgent matter," she told him.
"What's your name?" he asked. "Sarah Hutchinson," she replied.
"Wait here while I get clearance for you to enter," he said. The guard walked over to a security booth, and picked up a phone. She could see him talking to someone while looking at her intensely. He returned after a few moments, and told her "You are clear for entry." He opened the gate and told her that someone would be waiting for her at the front door of the house.
As she approached the front door, she could not help but to notice the expensive sports cars parked around the house. She had never even seen cars as fancy as these. She was not quite sure what to make of this environment. She knew of this neighborhood, but had not known anyone who lived here, nor had she ever been inside a house like this.
When she arrived at the front door, there was a woman waiting there in a maids uniform. "Follow me," she said to Sarah. The maid led Sarah into a room decorated with mirrors and plush sofas. "Wait here for Mr. Xavier," the maid told her.
Sarah waited for what seemed like an eternity. The longer she waited, the more nervous she became. "What will I say to this guy?!?!",she thought. Then finally, she hears someone approaching the room, and stands as a sign of respect to the host.
A man enters the room."Mr. Xavier?!", she asks, surprised.
"Yeah, that's me", he says as he takes a seat. He was not at all what she expected. Marco was a tall dark-skinned black man, dressed like a hip-hop star. He had a large gold watch, sneakers, and tight sleeveless t-shirt.