Strange Passion

Don't Hate On The Future

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I couldn't understand why my parents assumed I was just going to do everything they told me to do. The last straw was them telling me to marry a man I had never met before. All I saw of him were his abs. He never took any pictures of his face. Made me wonder if he was even cute. Probably wasn't. It was very common for me to find men with great bodies with ugly faces.

While I had been in Portugal, my father had finally become a real man and gotten into politics. When I returned, our family was highly respected and Bianca and Megan had finally started talking to me again. Bianca was bragging about how she was already pregnant and that I needed to start acting like I cared for her wellbeing. Good thing I was great at acting. There was no way I'd start liking her for real.

Megan wasn't even better. After coming for her wedding then leaving again, she seemed to be angry about that. Kept saying I should have been grateful she invited me. If she hadn't, her husband would have thrown a fit. For some reason he and I were like siblings. Anything she did he told me about it. We'd laugh over it, but I'd give him some serious advice. Teenage girls didn't watch other females for nothing.

When I was told I would be married off into another family for political connections, I threw a fit. I was twenty-four years old! How could they do this to me? This type of marriage hadn't been practiced in ages in America and they want to start it up again? I should have gotten kidnapped in Portugal. I would have been better off as a prostitute than an asset.

"It's for your own good," Mom reasoned.

"How is it for my own good!" I exclaimed. "This doesn't make any sense."

"Life doesn't make sense and you still live the way you do."

This wasn't even fair. I come back from my trip and suddenly they want me to marry for a political connection? What kind of sense does that make? It's like they want me to hate them. At this point, I really did. With a passion. The hate was burning so fierce in my chest that I almost popped up from my seat and strangled my mother with her 24-karat gold necklace. Just you wait, woman.

"Mãe, this isn't fair. Daniella doesn't have to marry a stranger!" I exclaimed.

"Daniella isn't my daughter, now is she?" Mom asked. "And lose the accent, you sound stupid."

"Spending nearly eight years in a foreign country does this to you, mãe. It's not something that goes away at the drop of a hat."

After seven years of being in Portugal, I had gotten used to the time change and the people. I had even passed with getting my citizenship. What made anyone think I would come back to the States without putting up a fight? I barely made myself leave the penthouse. I didn't realize that I needed a better English social life. It was fun speaking Portuguese, but sometimes I wanted to have a fully English conversation.

"Where did you say you worked again?" Brandon asked.

"Noronha Avogados. I really work from home most of the time," I said. "I miss you."

"I miss you too. Are you really okay with living alone?"

"I guess so."

"I really should have stayed with you."

Of course you should have. No one asked you to leave. It's your own fault. Wes didn't really have a choice. His mother wanted him to come back to help with his little sister. He decided to force Jeremy to go with him. Brandon did stay for a little while, but he claimed he needed to do something back home. He never returned. Duncan stayed with me for almost a year before his parents called him back. He did call me whenever he could.