I Love You (Eu amo você) {MJ FANFICTION}

Chapter 7

They'd visited the park almost every day since.

Every day she'd suppressed the thoughts of everything she'd done in the cold nights when she'd stood out in the streets and made her income, nervously puffing at her cigarettes and praying that Michael nor his brothers decided to take a late night trip out to the red light district. Anxiously scanning every face of every man that came by, hoping the cloud of unfamiliarity would remain.

Usually at about three am, she'd see Gonçalo pull up, a young pretty girl hanging off his shoulder and some of his friends riding in the back of his car.

They always agreed to meet there and not back at her house for obvious reasons.

The last time Gonçalo had ripped a handful of cash out of her hand and been dissatisfied with the total, he'd thrown her up against the wall outside her home. Her uncle had come outside to tell Gonçalo to leave and had ended up with a bloodied eye and a deep knife scar running from his temple to the edge of his mouth. Since then her uncle had drawn the line in the sand.

But Instead of encouraging Lia stay home or he himself, offering to go out to work he'd simply told her that no men were allowed near his home ever again or she'd be out.

It was safer this way.

And so every night she'd go over to the car window and shell out her money into Gonçalo's rough palm. He'd rifle through and hand a small portion back to her, of what he believed she deserved.

But things became almost bearable when she began to walk home crossing the sand swept grounds just shy of the beach, arms crossed over her stomach with a small glimmer of hope that the next day she would see Michael grinning at her whilst showering her with mostly innocent and pure attention.

It was easy to lose track of time when in Michael's presence and recently she'd found herself bitterly counting down the days until he would get on a plane and leave her behind once again. It was as if each man she lay eyes on during the day who had a face that didn't belong to Michael felt jading to her.

She almost resented the hope he had given her and the ambitious passion that stirred inside every vessel of him, forcing the universe to lay a trail at his every whim as he spoke positive words about his dreams.

Lia had no dreams.

Not in the moving electric way that Michael did. There was something about his passion that led her to believe that he might accomplish something noteworthy one day. He seemed to have no doubt or fear. He was magnetic and Lia responded, hardly able to wait to see him the next day and hear more of his words and experience more of his views and beliefs and gentle mannerisms. She wanted to feel what he felt, in hopes it might pull her out of her own reality and into a new one where traveling to another country was a trivial matter as it seemed to be for him.

Lost in the breeze was where Lia preferred to be.

Even if it was only a distant fantasy.

*

After a day spent in trivial conversation and talking, Michael and Lia descended their usual spot in the tree at the park.

Michael had splashed water down her back as a prank. She'd pushed him into a bush as revenge and he'd laughed at the top of his lungs claiming that her treatment of him was unfair.

It was almost by pure instinct that Lia drew to a complete stop, suddenly consumed by a numbing fear.

Her breath had caught in her throat and she felt an uncomfortable jabbing in her chest when her eyes finally fell onto the face of a familiar boy who was standing a short way ahead of her.