crazy proposal: to pretend to be a loving girlfriend just to help him. I would never let things get out of control because I know that Levi is incapable of truly liking a woman, and he never wanted to get married and have children, which is exactly my dream... But, when the fantasy becomes reality and I see a positive pregnancy test, I realize that nothing will be the same, and that my life is going to change upside down... PROLOGUE In Pontal do Sul on highway 412. The smell of the sea invades my nostrils, and I open the car window just to feel it. I'm in ecstasy, experiencing the energy of the ocean approaching. It's been a long time since I saw nature like this, so close. I feel like screaming, letting out exclamations of pure relief. After five years without vacations or time off, believing fervently that a job that sucked all my strength would bring me any return and success (but that destroyed my sanity and left me sick – and fired, after two seven-day sick leave), now I was trying to create hope for the future. That's it. I have hope. The sea completes that. I want – really – to take this weekend off, take a deep breath, and start planning my search for a new job. After all, it's not like I have nothing. I have a fiancé who loves me – Marcos doesn't say, but... he loves me, of course... he asked me to marry him... why would he ask me to marry him if he didn't love me? – a small apartment that I got from an absent father, a popular car that's always in the mechanic's shop, but that brought me to this isolated beach in Paraná, and... and nothing else. But I have something. I just need to breathe and plan. I observe the deserted landscape. The day is cloudy, and there is not a single person on the street, but I can hear the sound of the sea in the distance. I follow Avenida da Praia, Waze telling me to go straight. Once again, it is strange that there is no one on the street. Not a single living soul. The wind is cold, and I feel sad thinking that I will not be able to wash my body and soul in the sacred, salty waters. I needed a dip in the sea so badly. I reach the end of the avenue, and a sandy road greets me. I park the vehicle on the last stretch of asphalt and get out of the car. "I am happy," I try to assure myself. I would be happier if Marcos were here with me. But he thought it was silly that I wanted to come to the beach after being fired. "What difference will that make?" he asked. "Haven't you realized yet that you don't have the body to go to the beach?" That hurt me deeply, but I tried to ignore it because I knew he was stressed about my firing. For a while, Marcos would have to take care of our main household bills. Even though he no longer had to pay rent since he came to live with me, I always paid for most of our expenses. In fact, Marcos used to just buy us snacks on the weekends and pay for our trips to clubs or movies – things that, most of the time, I didn't even want to do, but I didn't have the courage to tell him. Now, with me out of a job, he would have no choice but to take on most of the expenses. I hoped to find a new job soon, but... Marcos said that no one gives a sick woman a hard time. He wasn't wrong. That's why I needed to get better soon. That's why I needed the sea. No depression or anxiety can survive the sea. I start walking along the beach. I move around a little and take off my sneakers, letting my feet touch the soft sand. "I'm happy," I repeat to myself. I read somewhere that words have power, and we only attract good things if we say good things. So, I'm confident that everything will work out, and I don't allow any discouraging words to escape my lips. I admit that I've been a little shaken since I got sick. It all started the first year I joined a multinational company based in Curitiba. I worked in the administrative sector, but I also did logistics and accounting. Basically, I was hired for one position, but I had three. And I couldn't make a mistake in any of them. Sometimes I couldn't do it, and I would hear my boss yelling at me about how incompetent I was. I didn't doubt what he said. My father
Chapter 1 high-class woman
mother got pregnant with their miracle baby, and my sister became their great love. At that moment, they regretted adopting me, removed me from my room – so my sister could have a better room of her own – and hid me in the maid's room. I barely saw them in the following years. They traveled on their days off with their biological daughter, and worked hard when they were in the city. When I turned eighteen, my father gave me an apartment and asked me to leave home. It was very painful, but I never blamed them. Never. Especially because Ana, my sister, was beautiful and intelligent.
And I was the opposite. Marcos also always said that I was not very intelligent or very pretty. So, when my boss started yelling at me, I believed he was right. In the first year, I only worked in the administrative area, and I held firm. In the second year, I began to understand better how everything worked, and I received many compliments and more responsibilities, with promises of promotions. In the third year, I began to get tired and began to be constantly humiliated at work. In the fourth year, I could no longer sleep at night without medication. It was during this period that I started having night terrors, and I had to take antidepressants to be able to get out of bed in the morning and lie down at night. In the fifth year, after a breakdown and a crying fit at work, I went back to the doctor who had been treating me for two years, and he took me off work once. Everything got worse because my boss wouldn't accept that I was sick, he said I was faking it, that no one needs seven days off like that, and when I came back, he demanded that I quit so that I wouldn't have to pay my benefits. I had another crisis, and I had to be taken off work again. That's when, when I came back, I ended up on the street. But I wasn't fired nicely, calmly. I was fired with shouting and insults, and I left the office bursting into tears. I called Marcos for help, but he said he didn't have time for my nonsense. I got to the sea. The waves crashed against the cliff, and I looked out at the ocean in front of me. A part of me wants to walk over to him, and just go... sink into him, disappear without a trace. I try to push the thoughts away. "I'm happy," I repeat. Tears stream down my face. I don't know what I'm doing with my life. ◆◆◆ An hour later, I feel recovered enough to get back into the vehicle. I had rented a room in a lovely inn near the beach. I planned to get there in a few minutes, take a shower and take a nap. Despite having driven a little over two hours to this small coastal town, I was exhausted. It feels like tons are on my shoulders. I get in the car, and start it. Nothing. I try again. This time there's a sound like a splutter, and then a small "boom" that startles me, especially since I can see a thin white smoke coming from the engine. "Don't... don't do this to me," I beg the Palio. It's doing it. And not for the first time. I've blown almost my entire labor agreement rebuilding the engine. I open the door, getting out of the car. I go to the hood, wondering whether or not I should open it and see what's going on. Something rings in my head, a memory from some news report, that you never open the hood of a car that might be on fire. Still, I'm foolish, and nervousness makes me pull the latch. Luckily, there's nothing burning, just smoke coming out. "No... no..." I mumble. I don't even have the money to take the car to Curitiba. The tow truck must cost a fortune. A hysterical laugh bursts from my throat, when I realize all the shit that's going on. What am I going to do? "Are you okay?" A smooth, velvety male voice echoes behind me. I turn my body quickly, and come face to face with a tall, handsome man in a white shirt and plaid shorts. It's strange that he's wearing shorts, when it's clearly cold. My eyebrows rise, as I notice his muscular, golden legs. - Hello? - he insists. - How are you? - he asks again, walking towards me. I'm alone in this deserted place, but I'm not afraid because something about him seems familiar. - My car... - I point. He comes closer. He's close to me, so close that I can smell his perfume. It's strong, very characteristic of a man like him, probably rich from the presence he gives off. - I'm not a mechanic, but I think his engine broke down. Wow, he's so handsome, up close. Something inside me knows I've seen him before, and I try to concentrate. He turns his face from the engine to me and smiles. - Television - he says. - What? - I ask, trying to concentrate. - You're wondering where you've seen me before. It was on the news. - Are you a reporter? - Yeah... I am... - he doesn't seem very proud of it. - I know a guy who works at a tow truck. If you want, I can ask him a favor. - I can't pay him - I admitted, this time noticing how his eyes are such a dark blue that I almost believed they were black. - I'm fucked... The word escaped my lips. Honestly, I didn't want to say it. Not only because it was disrespectful to the famous person, but because it took my focus away from the good words that attracted good things. Oh, my life was shit... I guess I'm not attracting anything good anyway. To my surprise, he laughed. - Okay. He owes me a favor. There was a tow truck mafia in Curitiba, and I reported it. - Seriously? Can you help me get the car there? - Sure. I wanted to hug this man, but all I did was extend my hand, introducing myself. - I'm Bia. - Levi - he accepted the greeting. - Levi Bellucci. I don't know why, but something clicked in me. My positive words brought me something good. A friend. I had so few. It was unparalleled luck. 1 Two years later. - You really didn't think I would tolerate this, did you? I stare at Marcos. He stands before me, his eyes wide and – to the same extent – distant, as if he were just a ghost, not the man who once asked me to spend the rest of my life by his side. "What do you mean?" I murmured, because even though he had already told me the reason three times, I still had difficulty understanding. "When I got engaged to you, I was a high-class woman. I had a lucrative job, a promising career, my own apartment, my own car, youth, beauty... but now... Look at you... You're selling brigadeiros on the street." He lets out a bitter laugh, as if the fact that I was working in that job was extremely embarrassing. "But... I remember the suggestion coming from Levi. My friend who I met at the beach saw my struggle to get a new job with so many traumatic disorders resulting from the last one. Levi then advised me to work for myself, and gave me a series of alternatives. Among them, selling sweets on the streets. I was exactly good at cooking, and I liked the idea. Incredibly, I invested only one hundred reais on the first day, and I came home with more than four hundred. I had never earned so much in a single day of work, and
Chapter 1 high-class woman
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Chapter 2 woman's mental problems
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Chapter 3 approach her and offer help
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Chapter 4 with sunglasses
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Chapter 5 Let the games begin
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Chapter 6 She smiles
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Chapter 7 And he finished
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Chapter 8 I used to kiss women
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Chapter 9 I stopped
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Chapter 10 trying to catch anything outside
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Chapter 11 consolidate my position
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Chapter 12 Don't go
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Chapter 13 wasn't all bad
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Chapter 14 to see her without her noticing
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Chapter 15 Levi looks at him
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