SANROSA

CHAPTER 1 ❀

"You keep looking at that house and you're gonna give yourself a heart attack."

On a regular day Hazel would drift off to a different world, one where she didn't have to worry about her day-to-day responsibilities, but that wasn't possible with the odds she found herself in. Something compelled her to come to the kitchen and so often found herself staring outside the small cabinet window.

It was a breezy day. The wind had swept autumn leaves off the floor. Hazel, being an enthusiast of pleasant weather, would sneak out back and play in the piles of leaves but with her age she realised she was too old for that.

Days turned into months, months into years. The times she yearned for her old life seemed to be non-existent.

Although the neighbourhoods here were close-knitted, there were endless streams of gossip.

She was used to a community that promoted prejudice against women, but this was unlike anything she had seen before. A tourist would never notice how vastly different it was here, how backtracked they were. Everyone had a mask that was unveiled when house doors shut, when their husbands asked for lunch or when they messed up. A facade that was encouraged by their social construct.

If there is one thing everyone agreed or not, was that: "Women should be at home, Men should work."

How little people would think of that sentence. How much power it had.

But that was life down here and no one dared to object. A bustling town of various occupations, a self made society that prided itself in innovations, denied women's interventions.

Across the street was a maroon & cream bungalow, with white shutters and a wonderful garden that circled the entire property. Hazel felt something was wrong about the house with all its beautiful accents. It was surely off-putting. Anytime she mentioned her thoughts on it, Her husband argued it was probably because she wasn't content with the house they had.

Johnny had a thick southern accent and, like her father, his business was deeply rooted in agriculture. His favourite pastime was discussing women in the community and their flirtatious behaviour towards him. A self-centred man that constantly reminded her of how lucky she was to have a man like him devoted to her. One that caused her great misery. He never finished his education. He dismissed it as a time waster. Where he had got the money to move them from the city down here, Hazel didn't know and didn't want to find out.

"Do you smell that?"

"Ought to be the sewers," Johnny replied, drawing out his pipe for longer than expected. He knew his laboured lungs couldn't handle it.

Hazel rushed to his side and gave him a pat on the back, guiding him to his seat.

"Don't kill yourself."

"That was a good one," he winked. "Those nutjobs can't do anything right. How hard must it be to repair this thing?"

Johnny preferred to live a soft life, so any inconvenience had to be taken care of.

"Sweetie, the drainage is perfectly fine. I oversaw everything, and they did their best work."

"It better be. I ain't paying 750 dollars for nothing."

When Johnny recovered, he went for an evening retreat that he often spent with his buddies from work. They'll come back home reeking of what they said to be Scottish rum- even though none of them could afford it.

"Supper better be ready when I get back."

He'll say before the door slammed shut, it always was.