Excerpt from The Son of Good Fortune by Lysley Tenorio, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

"Bahala na, mahal, it's okay. Please don't worry."

"How much. Tell me."

"I can't accept." She swivels her chair away from the screen. "I'm too ashamed."

"Just tell me. Please."

She takes a deep breath, nods. "Twenty-two thousand pesos."

"Pesos? How much is that? "

"Four hundred dollars." She turns back toward the camera. "USD."

Henry says nothing, just listens.

"Half the money for the doctor, the other half for the medicine," she says. "In the Philippines, if you have no insurance, medical care is very expensive, it's almost impossible, talaga. It's not like in the States." She dabs her eyes with her pinky and, with her other hand safely out of camera view, reaches for the switchblade next to her computer. She flicks it open and twirls it between her fingers, a thing she does when anxious or uncertain, when the inevitable is on the edge of finally happening.

On-screen, Henry is motionless, his face a blank. "Mahal," she says, "are you there? "

Finally, he moves. "I'm here," he says, "sorry. The screen froze for a sec. Where were we? What were you saying? "

"Money. For the medicine."

"And how much was it? Five hundred? "

"Five, yes," she says, nodding. "Five hundred. USD."

He looks toward the ceiling and blinks, like he's adding up figures in his head. "Let's make it six hundred, okay? "

"Six? " She shakes her head, says no, no, no, starts to weep. "It's too much, mahal, too much—"

"Sshhh," he says, a finger to his lips. "There's no price on love, di ba?"

She laughs. "Di ba! Yes, that's right." She wipes her eyes with a Kleenex, says it's almost one p.m. in the Philippines, time for her to go. She gives quick instructions when and how he can wire money to an online account, tells him she'll let him know when the payment goes through. "This will help me so much, so much. Thank you, mahal, thank you," she says. "And soon, one day, I promise, we will meet."

Henry nods. "Yes, mahal. And when we do, we'll sit in the countryside, put on some Shania, and then"—he leans into his camera, filling her screen again—" we're gonna fuck like bunnies." He winks and kisses the air, and the blade spins faster in Maxima's hand.

They say good-bye and Henry signs off, disappears from the screen. But Maxima is still there, and for a moment she watches herself, tilts her head slightly, like her face is one she recognizes but doesn't quite know.

She turns off the webcam.

She lifts her shirt, carefully peels away the wound, a trick of rubber and glue, then jots down quick notes in a small spiral notebook. She picks up the switchblade and opens her closet, where on the inside of the door she's tacked up a human target, the kind found at a shooting range. She steps back, stands against the opposite wall.

She raises the blade, aims, and throws. She misses the heart, but not by much.

From The Son of Good Fortune by Lysley Tenorio. Copyright 2020 Lysley Tenorio. Excerpted by permission of Ecco, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.