Queen of tragedy

   The devastation brought by the wave could be seen easily from the castle, which had been built in a peninsula that shoot straight into the ocean with a very high elevation. The waves that attacked the city did not really affect the castle or the people inside it, although they did feel the arrive of the killing water and saw how it engulfed the whole fishing town that was located very close to the castle. Every little boat and those small and weak houses were rapidly destroyed by the wave. The people didn’t even have time to pray or to scream. The wave was just too fast and too destructive, it didn’t leave a thing standing. The people in the castle, including Princes Ariana, were all horrified. She sent some soldiers after it happened but, as they were about to go out, another wave, even taller than the last one, hit the beach.

 No one could have survived that. And the thing now was that, because of the second wave, the access to the castle had been flooded. Until the waters receded, they were all trapped there, without any communication with the rest of the world. Ariana’s father, the King, had left the day before to attend a very traditional ceremony in an inland town and her mother the Queen had also left to visit her brother who was a duke in some region south of the castle. Ariana was alone and needed desperately to talk to someone, as she was very perturbed by the images of water hitting the fishing town with such vile and strength. She remained in the chapel for a whole day, praying and asking God for the souls that had been lost. She asked “why”.

 But, of course, she never got an answer. After that time, the princess tried to help the people that were inside the castle and organize everything for every single person to have a ration of food. She had no idea how much time that could last but she would at least try to help them as only she could do it. At the end of the day, the castle was hers, her domain, and everyone inside it had to hear her until the King or the Queen came back. The day after the waves hot the coast, the castle started to receive various letters sent by aerial means (pigeons, mostly). Many were soldiers informing of the situation on their towns and others were people, asking for help as the situation was very dire. It was a surprise to see letters from far inland and the Ariana’s heart stopped for a moment.

 She asked her helpers to look for letter from a specific location. There was only one letter and it was from a farmer. He said the wave had flooded his field and now his crops had been destroyed, so he had no means to sustain his family or to trade with others. He also mentioned, although briefly, that the nearby town had been flooded too and festivities had been cancelled. Ariana breathed out. Her father was probably okay but she needed to be sure. She asked her servants to answer the letter she had just read and do what they could to locate his father and help that poor man with his crops. She owed him, or at least she felt so.

 Ariana did the same thing to know if her mother was okay but there were no letters from that region in the big pile that had arrived during the day. More pigeons entered the castle during the day, but almost all came from very nearby, were apparently the stench of death was already hard to ignore. People said that there were no victims, as the people who sent the pigeons were merchants that traveled from town to town and saw what happened all around them. Apparently the fishing town couldn’t be saved and the most awful part of it all was that everyone could easily see the ruins of the town from the castle. It was so close but at the same time it had such a different faith than the people hidden in the castle.

 They received a letter from the King the day after that. He informed the people that he had been injured by the flooding, that had taking everyone by surprise. He was in bed with a very swollen ankle, product of a fall as he escaped the water towards higher ground. The doctor said that it was easy to cure but that he had to stay there for some day, at least a week, to make his leg better. Ariana read the letter in front of everyone and even shared with the people the nice adjectives he had for her. He said that the castle was in hands of the princess and that everyone had to respond to her orders and listen to her lead, as she was the only person with authority to be there with them.

 These words from her father made Ariana feel very happy and also very important. She had never done much in the castle or even in her life, only being a nice girl that sits correctly whenever an important visitor comes and that leaves for her room to do nothing at all there, except if you consider combing your hair or looking at your dresses some sort of job. The truth was that Ariana was thrilled to finally have some responsibility and taste, however short it may last, the sweetness and pleasure to share her kindness with her people and with everyone that wrote the letters that kept coming into the castle. On the fifth day, the waters finally receded and soldiers were sent to every single nearby that to assess the situation.

 The small fishing port had not been the only one to be destroyed completely. A very large portion of the coast had been devastated by that same wave, ten meter tall or more, so many towns had suffered the same faith. Even some soldiers that decided to check on the state of the castle came with urgency to see the princess and asked her to put some men to work. Apparently, the bases of the castle had been shaken very seriously and repairs had to be made in order for it not to fall into the ocean. A small army of men was hired to do those works and the proper army was tasked with burning every corpse they saw and help survivors, if any. There were not to many.

 The first week was difficult for Ariana, specially when a merchant that sold fur came into town and old everyone how the wave had destroyed the region south of the castle. He swore the smell was too overwhelming and bodies piled up on both sides of the roads. Ariana felt awful and sent some soldiers right then but it was useless. The man was right; there was nothing but destruction, especially because in the south there were no hills or mountain. It was a big plain and now it was something like a swamp, with flies flying all over it and over the bodies of hundred of people. One of those was the Queen, who had died with her brother as they were outside the duke’s house when tragedy came. Being inside, wouldn’t have changed a thing, though.

 The princess tried not to cry when she received a pigeon telling her of her mother’s death. She only asked for the soldiers to bring her body and that of the duke, if they found him. Some days later the dead body of the Queen arrived into town and a rapidly organized funeral was arranged. Ariana would have loved to have her father there to comfort her but was now having a very dangerous fever and his doctor recommended for him to stay were he was, as any trip might be too dangerous for him. So she had to bury her mother alone, in the family mausoleum. Many people attended the funeral and she wasn’t surprised, as her mother had always being loved by her people.

 Ariana, in the inside, was devastated. Now she didn’t want any responsibility or to grow up, she didn’t want to be the woman who ruled over the kingdom. And even if she was the last royal, she would have to marry to be able to exercise her role as Queen. It hurt her to be thinking of such things, as if her father was dead too but he wasn’t, he was just injured and she wanted to be with him but then no one would stay behind to help the people that needed the family. Some of her father’s helpers wanted her to leave to have a free reign over everything but she refused to go and even jailed some of those who pretended for her to leave the city and stay away from the corruption.

 Only two weeks after the waves hit the coast, the King came back to town. But Ariana suffered once more because he wasn’t doing as well as the doctor had said. Unsurprisingly, the doctor had left the party that accompanied her father. She ordered soldiers to execute him if they ever saw him. But the most important thing for her was to see her father, which whom she talked privately and summoned a religious authority and a lawmaker. After some days, the King was too weak to keep talking and he eventually died from his wounds and mistreatment. His funeral was attended by all and he was buried in the crypt next to his wife.

 Everyone was more surprised, however, with the fact that a new law had been enacted the day before the king’s death. It liberated his daughter of marriage and gave her the power to rule the kingdom as Queen. People didn’t know whether to celebrate or not. But eventually, they would know the answer to that question.

In their minds

   Joanna let her tray fall flat to the ground; make a very loud sound and spilling everything everywhere. Everyone around her stopped right where they were and looked at her, as if she had exploded herself. She had fallen to her knees and was grabbing her head, saying something very fast over and over and over. Some people tried to get close and help her but they would suddenly get a horrible headache. One teacher started bleeding through the nose and young girl fainted. But after a couple of minutes, Joanna fainted and she was taken to a hospital. Everyone in the school talked about it for days and concluded, very fast, that she was just insane. It wasn’t unheard of that students could become crazy and that’s what everyone thought had happened to Joanna.

 But in the hospital, the doctors did not find any anomalies on her brain or anywhere else. Her body was in perfect shape except for the fact that this was the third time she was admitted for a similar event. However, this time seemed to be special as, a full day after the incident, she was still sleeping and the doctors could not do anything to wake her up. Her mother, father and brother came in and tried to help the doctors but it was useless. Joanna would remain sleeping and also mumbling whatever word or words she had thought about just as the incident happened. Her mother stay in the hospital with her a whole week until finally Joanna woke up, as if nothing had happened. She was scared. She had no idea what had happened and the fact that a week had passed her by didn’t help to calm her down.

 The doctors checked her up one last time but couldn’t find anything abnormal. They asked Joanna’s mother to get her to a psychiatrist in order to help them with her problems at school. He had said it as if Joanna had done something awful to one of the students or something but the truth was that every time something happened, Joanna suffered the only real injuries. The nosebleeds and fainting were nothing compared to what she described as a massive headache, where she could hear many voices inside her head. But these voices were not random ones but the voices of her classmates, her teachers, her family… Something was very wrong with her and it was Joanna who first said so in therapy.

 She went to the psychiatrist two times per week and her parents decided to home school her, at least for the remainder of the school year. It was obvious she wasn’t ready to be with other kids and seeing them everyday after what they had seen her go through was clearly not the best idea in the world. And the truth was she didn’t miss anything about school. After the first incident, when she had started screaming in gym class, every single one of her so-called friends stopped talking to her. They only looked at Joanna as if she was a freak and made noises and mocked her. So she was happy to get rid of that.

 Her parents did not know this. Only the psychiatrist knew and she had told Joanna that it was very normal to see fear as a reaction when people didn’t know what was happening. In their sessions, they always talked about the voices in her head and that, once she had realized they were the voices of her classmates, she could choose to hear one of them over the others. And that made her even more nervous. When she let the tray go in the middle of the cafeteria, she had happened to break in the thoughts of a boy she had always found mysterious and handsome. And inside of him, he heard the most awful things, thoughts of suicide and of killing others. He felt guilty and alone. For her, it had been very painful to hear him in her head, so she let the tray go and screamed.

 The psychiatrist thought that Joanna was internalizing a lot of anxiety and had created this “power” in order to get attention. She thought Joanna had channeled a huge amount of feelings into one single event and now she thought she heard people’s thoughts. In the following sessions, the doctor tried to get Joanna to understand that what she heard was just herself. She had created this great power but now she had to let her go in order to get better. Joanna did as the therapist said and followed her every advice. She began doing yoga to relax the mind and started talking to her mother and father in order to have a better connection to them, as a real family should be.

 The truth was they had always been a little bit too private. Her parents were the kind of people that think that their children should be shielded against everything, even the fact that the parents are humans and have feelings and failures too. It was hard for them to tear down that wall they had built around their two kids but day by day, they made progress and Joanna started to get better. She was smiling again and soon she had finished her school chores and exams. She did it sooner that her classmates in the actual school, so her parents and the therapist agreed that the best thing would be for her to get some responsibility.

As summer was beginning, her mother found her a job as a lifeguard in a public pool not very far from home. Joanna was not thrilled about the idea but decided that she could use the money and maybe it could be the beginning of her working life. The first day, it all went perfectly. She helped many children to their parents and even saved one girl that had fallen by accident. Many people praised her and thanked her. She saw many people that she knew from school but decided not to say a word to them. That was the past for her and she did not want to go back to it. That evening, she told everything about her day to her mother and she was happy that her daughter was so much better now.

 But then, it happened again. Joanna was in her post, looking at the kid’s pool when a gorgeous young man came in. He was very handsome and his swimming gear was perfect on him. Joanna smiled to him and he smiled back and then she could hear his thoughts. Only that this time, it wasn’t painful. She didn’t collapse or scream. She had learned to relax so the voice just came in and she heard him think that she had beautiful her. She went a bit red on the cheeks and decided to try it out with other people. She saw a mother with her child and heard her think about the father of his son and how worried she was he may not come back from his next business trip. Apparently, she though he was cheating on her.

 It was the best thing that had ever happened to her because she realized that her gift was not something awful and hurtful but a great way to know what people were thinking in order to make their day happier. She brought balloons for kids that were sad and tried to cheer up many people by doing fun activities like exercising in the water. She was glad to be of help and for people to finally like her as she really was. At night, she would write it all in a journal and even thought of telling herm other but she stopped short because she realized it would be too much of a crazy story for her to believe it. If she said anything maybe her mom would think she needed more help or something more permanent to help her and Joanna did not want to go to any more doctors.

 She did, however, go to her therapist one more time. It was her last appointment and she wanted very thing to go great but she had the feeling she had to tell someone about her powers and how now they were just good and under control. But the therapist was an adult and adults did not take these things as good things, always afraid of everything. She went through the whole session without any reference to her powers until the phone rang and she couldn’t resist knowing what it was about. She realized the therapist was talking to the boy she had heard in school, the one with suicidal thoughts. Joanna had described him to her. He was called Evan. And he was her next appointment.

 Without any hesitation, she asked her therapist if Evan was going to be ok. At first, the woman seemed surprised but then she calmed down. Joanna asked her if she believed in her powers now. She read her man and asked her why she was thinking Joanna was unbalanced. The doctor smiled and told Joanna that Evan had serious problems, because he had already tried to kill himself only a few days ago. Joanna went the rest of the session trying to pretend everything was fine but the truth was she remembered how Evan had felt in school and needed to see him herself. After the session, he was there and, crazy as it sounds, she talked in his mind, asking him to join her in the hall.

 She had no idea if that could work but moments later she heard Evan apologize to his mother and the doctor, saying he really needed to pee. He stepped outside and joined Joanna. They looked at each other. Evan was a little bit scared and shaken and Joanna was too but also hopeful of what her powers could do. Then, she just hugged him tight and he responded the same way. They did not say a word, only Joanna left another message in his mind: "call me soon". She left and he went inside. And they both felt better about themselves because they had realized they were never alone.

The cauldron

   Terrified with what he had seen in the cauldron, the knight ran down the stairs of the tower. He was running so fast he missed a step and his heavy armor made him fall hard on to the ground. He broke his neck and there ended the legend of the brave knight from the valley. What just happened was exactly the same thing he had seen in the thick and ever bubbling water of the cauldron, which only needed fire in order to reveal its secrets to the person in front of it. However, as the knight had realized, the cauldron did not receive orders or commands of any type so he showed whatever he wanted from the life of the person peeking in his waters, and as an element of black magic, the cauldron often showed people their deaths, which often happened before they could leave the tower.

 There was no castle to speak off. The dark witch who had created the cauldron had left it in that tower because there a person would have to go through several trials in order to finally get to the cauldron. There was a wasteland with living dead underneath it, a sea of quicksand, hungry wolves, rivers of fire and many other horrible creatures in the dark. It was no place for anyone who just wanted to take a look. The people that went there had decided, consciously, to ask the cauldron for its wisdom. They still believed the object was magical and good because the legend said so and no one had ever returned fro musing it. So many valiant folk went and died, their bodies adding up to the army of the dead of the wasteland or dying in some other horrible way.

 One day, a woman appeared in the far side of the wasteland. She was very beautiful and was completely alone. What was very strange was the fact that none of the creatures tried to eat her or even growl at her. Every single one of them kept a distance and she just walked slowly over the ashes, the crushed bones and the skulls of so many men and women who had come this far just to die and never had their questions answered. She got to the tower and, patiently, she walked up, looking through the small windows on the side of the tower. There was no one. She finally got to the cauldron and there she transformed into a very old lady, with a very mean face.

 It was the witch, the one that had created the cauldron. After many years of exile, she had decided to come here and wait. Out of nowhere, she materialized a kitchen, a bed and a loom. The room was also expanded in the inside but had been an imperceptible change from the outside. The old woman boiled up some water and made herself some tea and as she did, she just gazed at the cauldron. She couldn’t change it anymore, she couldn’t do anything for the souls that had been taken by it but she could offer the next man or woman the chance of seeing something more that his or her death. She wanted the cauldron, for the first time, to be able to grant wishes. She would do it only once and that’s would be it.

 The truth is she waited for several years, maybe even hundreds of years. As a witch, time didn’t affect her in the same way that it affected every other living thing. She would just cook and drink tea and work on beautiful pieces she made with her loom. That was until she felt someone entering the wasteland and she decided to take a look from the window. Using her magic, she was able to see it was a woman, a noble woman to be exact. Somehow, she had decided to cross the obstacle wearing a gown, with her heels on her hands. Her hair and makeup were all run down and her expression was desperate. It was clear she wanted something out of the cauldron and that she would be an interesting choice for the wish.

 She was almost caught by the dead, but she just took off her dress and threw her shows into a river of fire to be able to pass. She was very skilled as she kicked every creature in the right place, and jumped when she needed to. The witch thought that maybe that woman was too skilled, too bright to be here asking a cauldron for advice or a wish. Besides, the noble people did believe in fairy tales but would rarely go out to the world and try to see if their beliefs were actually truth. So the witch decided to wait and not to intervene in the good luck the woman was having crossing the obstacles. She would be with her in no time and it was important that she realized what kind of person the witch was. So she made everything disappear except the cauldron that was impervious to magic and just stood in the middle of the room, waiting.

 When the woman finally arrived, she fell to the floor tired, and did not even glanced at the witch. It seemed like hours passed with them just like that. The witch wanted to say something but the woman seemed to ignore her presence or at least not even care about her. It was when the noble woman stood up and walked to the cauldron, that the old woman stopped her with her cane and asked her what was she looking in this place. The woman finally looked at her and the witch screamed. That woman was no ordinary human, she was another witch, one much more powerful and twisted than she was.

 The noble witch announced herself to be Morgana, the eternal sorceress that had heard of the cauldron and had decided to destroy it. The older witch asked her why would she do that. She explained that the cauldron caused death, despair , fear and false hope, so why not let it be there to teach a lesson to all the humans that had always hurt the witches and their brothers and sisters. Morgana stood still not saying a word. She had, however, transformed from the almost noble woman to a beautiful tall woman with purple eyes and hairs as black as the night. She thought about what the older woman said and finally, she just smiled.

 With one word, one in an ancient language that no one ever spoke anymore, Morgana engulfed the old woman in deep red fire, burning her to death like many men had done to other witched before. But when she ended the fire, the witch was unharmed physically but mentally broken. She lay on the ground sobbing, not saying a single word. That was Morgana’s way of punishing a witch for letting her feeling rule over her. Even though as her words had been very convincing, her heart told the red fire the truth and that’s why she would never again be the same with or even woman that she had been before. She was now powerless and useless and would die soon but from natural causes. That was the price to pay.

 Morgana then peered into the cauldron and look at its surface for a long time. Nothing was revealed, the blackish water did not reveal any images or made any special sounds. It was as if the cauldron didn’t work on her but she knew better than that. It was because her magic protected her from the spell that had been put into it. So she tried to think of another way to use the cauldron to her advantage. Maybe in battle? Or put it in a less safe place? All those traps and trials on the way to the tower were really useless. If the point of the cauldron was to cause harm and even kill, why not put it in an open space and just let humans die for their stupidity? Maybe that was it… Morgana decided to take the cauldron back with her but then she realized something she had not expected: the cauldron wouldn’t move.

 She tried doing it in many ways, with her arms, her magic and her mind but nothing worked. The cauldron seemed to be glued to the ground somehow and just wouldn’t move. The old woman, still lying on the ground, started laughing like crazy. Morgana lifted her with magic and demanded she told her what to do to move the cauldron or she would kill her, this time for real. The witch looked at Morgana in the eyes and just spit at her. This enraged the legendary sorceress, who threw the witch against the hard stone wall and tried again to move the cauldron. She grabbed by the sides and pulled but she would only see the black waters inside and nothing else.

 Then, Morgana’s mouth began to dry and her eyesight suddenly disappeared. She screamed and fell to the ground, begin for the witch to do something to help her. The witch slowly stood up and transformed into the beautiful woman that had arrived before. She told Morgana that her magic was far darker and ancient that hers and that she should never underestimate the power of someone who has not only caused suffering but who has also felt it her skin, flesh and bones. Morgana found her feet and begged the witch for forgiveness and asked her to be her apprentice. She said they could be unstoppable if they united their powers, something the older witch was momentarily interested by.

 But with one stroke of her cane, she made Morgana’s body break into a million pieces that fell in the ground before being absorbed by the cauldron. The witch then disappeared and left the cauldron alone once again. But now, if anyone gets close enough, Morgana’s screams can still be heard, deep in the black waters of the mysterious cauldron.

The best

   He had always being that person. You know, the kind of man that’s always on top of everything and whom everyone thinks about. Many want to be like him and others want to be with him. But few have ever get close enough to really know him as he has being intelligent enough to keep it all separated, in order to keep up the illusion.

 Yes, an illusion. Because Martin, the perfect man, had always had to act and had always had to do things to stay where he was. Martin wasn’t only an employee, he owned the company and ran it for the last five years, after his father had decide, rather surprisingly, to leave control of his beloved company to his son. This had been a matter of discussion amongst the high class of the city and the commerce guilds but eventually all doubts disappeared when they realized he was much more than what he looked like.

 He had gone to school in Europe and had a keen sense of fashion. He knew every single member of the richest families on both sides of the Atlantic and he had more than one affair with many of them, men or women. Many would have looked over him because of him being a bisexual man but another surprise; people found this a very interesting trait, complemented by his great skills handling money and people. Because his most alluring trait was the fact he could make anyone do anything he wanted. Sometimes, he didn’t even have to ask.

 Some people thought it was all about his physical appearance.  He was tall, tanned but not too much, well dressed, manly but soft features and ideal in every sense. Many magazines had asked him to do photo-shoots and he had accepted gladly to all the offerings. He would even do them for free if it helped the company promote some new article that they wanted to push on people or simply to get everyone to know who he was.

 People love to buy things to get to be like someone. Because people are obsessed to be closer to their idea of perfection, which is actually the idea of the media. And Martin was exactly that. Once he was in every magazine, more than one man was getting their hair cut in the way he had it and stores selling the clothes he liked had their sales rise for a whole month. Of course, his company owned many of those stores so it was all a very round business.

 His father eventually died and his mother went away to leave in France. This left him with free rein, more than ever, over his company and his image. From time to time, he would let paparazzi’s come close enough to get a few shots of him, maybe alone or maybe with a young beautiful model or someone people would hate him to be with. Because his goal was to make people want to be that model, be that person who had the unspeakable honor of going around town with him.

 So what people didn’t know very well about him was that he was very manipulative of everything he did. Most people would never calculate every single movement in their lives as he did but it was not as if he had an option. From a very young age, he had realized it was best to be the one with power and not the one being ruled. And if his family’s fortune was of any help, he wanted to be that guy everyone admires for every reason possible.

 It was him who started, not only doing benefits and helping those in need, but he actually went to the orphanages, hospitals and retirement homes to help in any way he could. Martin knew that he needed people to admire him because it benefited both him and them: if they were in love with him, the earning of his companies will rise but also the amount of money he was able to invest in any charity he would like. So it was great for everyone.

 Once his family left, he was more and more controlling of the company but no one ever said anything because it became one of the best companies in the world in less than three years. Before, it had been an old and respectable company but now it was on top of everything. Besides, working there was seeing as the best that could happen to anyone. The pay was great and employees enjoyed many benefits, all which had been established by Martin. He thought that if they were happy, they would work harder and the company would do even better.

 In time, he started absorbing minor business and it became one of the top companies in the country. It was so powerful, that their endorsement in any way was almost a warranty of success. Martin, however, had never cared for politics thinking those men and women always had underlying intentions. He thought of himself of a more honest person than them and decided to be clear, stating that his company would never serve anyone’s political efforts. He would rather shut it all down before bow to a politician.

This was rather hypocrite from him because Martin had never really being honest about him. He had created a character, a sort of persona, who acted his life. But the real Martin, the one that had existed back when he was only a kid, had been trapped inside his brain and was never allowed to be outside, to be in control. He sometimes had minor breakdowns, suffering from flashes of depression. Martin’s acting had earned him a severe headache problem but people knew and were not surprised: with everything he had on his plate, he was allowed to have a headache from time to time.

 When he reached the age of thirty five, people thought he was finally going to get a wife but that didn’t happen. He was still being photographed with many beautiful men and women but he knew them all too well to have anything more compromising with any of them. The models were always dull and the pretty faces always hid stupid minds. And Martin, handsome as he was, was not as stupid fool at all. He would have wanted to meet someone like him, someone that had fought his way to the top and wasn’t afraid to do or say anything. Because that was another thing he loved about his position: he could have any thought about any subject in current life and people would always support him or, at very least, not even care.

 And, to explain it further, he was a self made man. In spite of his money, he had decided to become much more than he was supposed to be. All his life he had heard it from the media, from his parents, from the society he had been born into. He had heard of perfection and of the rulers and the ones that are ruled. So he decided, at a very young age, to be the one on top. To beat every single other guy or girl in that race and be the one to beat them all. That's who he had always wanted to be. He started learning about everything and finally, he came back from Europe as a new man that would change the world.

 Of course, there were people that did not trust him be he never worried about any of them. As far as he was concerned, they were only jealous of the amount of power he had because, after all, that is what people really look for. When improving ourselves physically, we are only seeking to have power over other, to be better than the rest. Because being better than other means that there is a sense of superiority and that always entails powers. And Martin thought that those that were too mediocre to improve were the ones expending their days criticizing his life and way of doing business.

  Martin acquired a big condominium in the middle of the city, on top of one of the tallest residential buildings of town. From there, he could see his office tower and the lives of many people below. He felt even more powerful than ever but it was then, only then, when he realized there was no one beside him to share everything with. No family, no real friends, no lover. There was no one with whom he could share his visions of the future or his passions. It was only a huge space, filled with riches but with no soul at all.

 When feeling like that, he would disguise himself and walk around the people on the street and he realized what he lacked was love. Not only romantic love but also every single kind there is in the world. Some people that were far from being like him laughed in the street and appeared to have the best time possible. They loved themselves far more than he would ever love himself, because he had no idea who he was anymore. He had renounced to his true self long ago and now that boy was lost forever.

 After a few outings, he decided to cut off all thought of that forever, focusing on the future of his company and how to enjoy life with all the power and money he had. Because, after all, he had made a decision all those years ago: he had decided to be perfect in every sense, to go to the gym and get a perfect body, to handle money correctly to have the most refined luxury items and clothes and teaching himself to be the business man his father had never been.

 He was going to be the best. And, according to him, he already was.