Chuck Palahniuk Adjustment Day Novels & Stories

The day I found out I was pregnant with twins, Vincent Castellano celebrated like a man who had been handed heaven. Fireworks over Brooklyn. Vows whispered against my stomach. Promises that his empire, his loyalty, and his life were mine. That same day, I found out the hospital built in my name had been sheltering his affair. While I was throwing up and fighting to keep our babies safe, he was holding another woman in the next room. So I made my choice. I would keep the twins. But Vincent Castellano would lose all three of us.

My husband, Julian Sutton, is busy with work on the day of my prenatal checkup. His childhood sweetheart, Vera Levine, with whom he's been amorous for years, offers to drive me. On the way there, she suddenly swerves and rams into the back of a truck. The car is flattened. Julian is a doctor in the emergency room, but I don't call him. Instead, I dial 911 and wait for assistance. Why? I called him in my past life, and he took me to the hospital. Our child was saved, but Vera died due to significant blood loss. Julian claimed not to blame me and even arranged for me to stay in a private hospital ward. But on the day I was discharged, he dragged me to Vera's grave and stabbed me. I lost the child and was on the verge of death as I stared into his bloodshot eyes. They were filled with unbridled hatred as he snarled, "Vera wouldn't have died if you hadn't grabbed the wheel! Don't think I'll believe you just because you're acting innocent! An eye for an eye—I want you to die for her, but only after experiencing the pain she felt in a hundredfold!" He twisted the blade and stabbed me repeatedly. My blood splattered on Vera's gravestone, dying it red. When I open my eyes again, I find that I've been taken back to the scene of the accident.

My dad collapsed from a sudden heart attack and died. The shock hit my mom like a freight train, and she blacked out cold. By the time I raced home from college, his body had already been reduced to ashes in the crematorium. Grief barely had a chance to sink in before the debt collectors pounded on our door. That was when the ugly truth emerged. My dad had secretly racked up billions in loans, saddling my mom and me. A year later, the relentless harassment from those goons drove my mom to despair. She ended her life, and I was forced to drop out of school, scavenging dumpsters just to scrape by. But fate had a cruel twist in store. I spotted my "dead" dad, alive and thriving, hosting an extravagant birthday bash for his secret son. I stormed in, desperate for answers, only to be hurled out by security. My head cracked against the pavement, and everything went black. When my eyes fluttered open again, I was inexplicably back on that fateful day of my dad's heart attack.

I've died on my wedding day. When I'm in the middle of getting cruelly tortured by the thugs, my parents, older brother, and my fiance are all comforting my younger adopted sister, Arianna Capuano, who's bawling her eyes out. Before I die, I've called them for help. But Diego Atzori, my fiance who's the next Don of the Atzori family, sounds extremely angry at me when he picks up the call. "Carlotta Capuano, Arianna's life is more important than our marriage! Stop putting on an act just to attract attention!" The call goes dead. My life is also entering its countdown. I can only lie in my own puddle of blood, my body broken and mutilated, until I stop breathing entirely. No one can find me at home. They think I'm just throwing a tantrum because the wedding has gotten canceled. Perhaps I've chosen to run away from the altar just so I can attract their attention. What they don't know is the fact that I've never left home. In fact, I've died in the basement of my own house. I died right beneath their feet.

cold finger brushed my chin. It was barely there, but it sent a quick, immediate thrill through me, as though my body was unsure whether to retreat or lean in. He raised my head slowly and purposefully. At first I fought; my muscles clenched with terror, but his hold was unbelievably strong, and his touch was commanding but delicate. I had no choice but to follow. Then our eyes connected. My breath caught in the back of my throat. Elara’s lineage was cursed. A werewolf by blood, a witch by fate, and something far more dangerous by destiny. She had spent her life looking forward to the mate ceremony but she gets the shock of her life as he rejects her and she is attacked. Everything that she has ever know about herself is not what it seems. Rejected by her mate, she is hunted by the supernatural council. But the night has other plans. When she falls into the hands of Abbadon, the Vampire King, she expects death. Instead, he saves her, binding their fates in ways neither of them understand. With war looming and the council determined to erase her existence, Elara has no choice but to embrace the darkness within. The witches who should have stood by her have turned against her. The werewolves see her as an abomination. And the council’s most feared enforcers are closing in. When her home is burned to the ground and her family slaughtered, she swears vengeance. No longer just a fugitive, she becomes the storm that will bring the supernatural world to its knees. Will she survive or will she forever be an abomination to be hunted until her death?

On our wedding anniversary night, my husband, Lucian Moore, comes home with a seven-year-old orphan named Chloe Martin. He even hands her the necklace he bought me for our anniversary and lets her play with it like a toy. Because of her, my son, Ryan Moore, shouts at me for the first time. "You're a bad woman! I don't want you to be my mommy!" I watch the three of them sitting together, warm and cozy, and I say nothing. Instead, I buy a ticket to leave the country. At first, they think I'm just acting out and will come home in a few days. But when they return from Feanland after celebrating Chloe's birthday, they find out I've joined a ten-year classified research project and will not come back again. At that moment, they fall apart.

“August, I don’t work for you anymore,” she said, voice steady. “I’m not obligated to listen to you.” A pause. Then, “Oh, but you will.” He stepped forward. She stepped back. Again. Until her back hit the wall. Her breath caught, but she didn’t look away. August placed both hands on either side of her. Blocking her in completely. No space left. No escape. “You’re not my employee,” he said quietly. A beat. “But for the next 90 days…” “…I own you.” Weeks before his wedding, August Thorne discovers something impossible, he is already legally married. To Genesis Michaelson, his former personal assistant who vanished three months ago without a trace. There is no memory of the ceremony. Only fragments of a night in Las Vegas that don’t fully add up. When the court refuses to annul the marriage due to time passed, they are left with one option: divorce. But even that comes with a condition. A 90-day consideration period in which they must live together as husband and wife. What begins as a drunken mistake turns into a forced arrangement between two people who can barely stand each other, yet cannot stay away. Tension rises. Clashes become constant, while external forces close in, determined to keep them apart and destroy Genesis in the process. But someone is lying about what happened that night in Vegas. And the truth runs deeper than either of them realizes, closer to home, and far more destructive than the marriage itself Will they survive this game of lies and deceit and fall in love or... ?

Rule number one: Do not kiss strange men in clubs. Rule number two: Never kiss the owner of the club. Rule number three: If he’s a secret billionaire with a dark past and a disturbing obsession with your heartbeat? Run. My name is Scarlett Whitmore. And I broke all three. I was born with a heart condition called Mitral Valve Prolapse. My mother hates me for ruining her life. My brother cannot stand me. And my boyfriend, Drake Bittencourt, the man I thought was the love of my life, proposed to my twin sister in front of 19,000 hockey fans. And she accepted him without hesitation. When my sister walks into the club I work at, flaunting Drake’s ring without remorse, I make a rash decision: I grab the first man that catches my fancy and kiss him like my life depends on it. He turns out to be Harlan Rousseau. Team captain of the formidable Vancouver Icefangs. Hockey god. And according to the tabloids, dead broke and drowning in debt. But the tabloids are wrong. Not only is Harlan Rousseau NOT broke, he’s the secret heir to a ninety- billion-dollar oil empire. He offers me a deal: wear his ring. play the devoted wife. And sleep in his bed for a year. In exchange, he’ll pay off my medical debt and save my best friend from homelessness. The most important of all: he offers a chance to get my revenge. I should’ve said no. But I was desperate. And desperate women make deals with the devil. The longer I stay, the more I realize Harlan Rousseau is not just hiding wealth. He’s hiding a monster. And I’m starting to think I don’t want to run from it…

After getting laid off, I come across a post when I'm looking for a new job. "What sort of job is the most lucrative these days?" There's a comment with the most likes in the comment section. "Find yourself a sugar daddy, duh! My sugar daddy is already the CEO of a company even though he's only in his 30s! He gives me 100 thousand dollars every month. Not only is he handsome and caring, but he's also amazing in bed! Hoo boy, we can keep going around seven times every night!" Someone asks the commentor, "How did you find such an amazing daddy?" "Last May, he was at a bar drinking his sorrows away after an argument with his girlfriend. I consoled him for a bit. That's how we ended up being together. "He kept complaining that his girlfriend was like dead fish in bed, so he was already sick of her a long time ago. You know what men are like, always going for excitement in life." My fingers curled around my phone slightly. Last May, I did get into a huge argument with my boyfriend, Brian Dicht. He never came home that night. The next morning, he returned while reeking of alcohol. I continue scrolling down the comment section, only to see the commentor posting a photo. "See? I was acting all cute and whiny to him just now by telling him that I cut my finger when I was preparing a meal for myself. He agreed to drop by my place to keep me company tonight." In the photo, there's a diamond ring adorning the ring finger that has a plaster wrapped around it. That ring looks exactly the same as the set of engagement rings Brian and I have. At the same time, my phone starts ringing. Soon, Brian's voice drifts from the other end of the line. "Bella, something came up in the company at the last minute. I'm not coming home tonight."

I've won a lottery hosted by the local bank that gives me an opportunity to experience a day as a rich person. Because of that, I'm given a temporary black card that has a credit limit of a billion dollars. Excited, I rush home to tell my wife, Lara Crawford, about it and plan on taking her to a fancy meal. Unexpectedly, Lara drugs me just so she can steal the black card. Then, she starts a livestream that's titled "Goodbye, Loser. Hello, Billionaire Life." with her male best friend, Adrian Schmitt. Lara can be seen buying a shopping mall with the black card on the livestream. Then, she mocks me for being an impoverished man who only deserves to eat the cheapest food available. What she doesn't know is that the purchase history of the black card is being live-streamed on the bank's channel at the same time. The title of that livestream is "A Test of Human Nature—When a Gold Digger Finds a Billion Dollars." Now, there are ten minutes left before the experience is over.