December 27, 1501 A lot of kids in stories have mean stepmothers. A mean stepfather isn’t any better. My name is Catalina Martinez, and my family is the worst. My mother met my father when she visited England. When she came back to Spain, she brought him with her. Their wedding was a year later, and in 1492, I came along. We were a happy family. My mother wasn’t very overprotective, or protective at all, but we got along well. My father, on the other hand, was amazing. He dedicated almost every day to me. In fact, he is the one who bought me this journal. He often skipped work only to play with me, or help me with schoolwork. Yes, I went to school. Not everyone did. I was lucky. Sometimes my father just asked me to smile. He said my eyes seemed to smile, too. Everybody makes a big deal about my eyes. I got them from my father, since he is from England. Other than that, I look like my mother. Dark brown hair and slightly tanned skin. My eyes seem to shine especially bright in contrast with my skin. Then, 4 years ago, my life radically changed. Typhus spread across Spain, filling many graves. Including my father’s. I rarely smiled after that. There are moments that the words don’t reach. There are sufferings too terrible to name. I had to learn to deal with the unimaginable. My mother became very sullen, and stopped caring about me entirely. Then, a year ago, she remarried. My new stepfather, along with his son, Diego, were awful. Diego took over my room, so I slept hunched over in a closet. He got to go to a fancy school, while I was forced to stop going to any school. Diego ”explained” that school was for smart kids, not “little maggots” like me. He is only a year older than me! And yet he still struggles with simple decimals, and lets me do his homework. His father, who was mean enough already, got drunk nearly every afternoon. Sometimes I’d find him loudly singing nonsensical songs, his cheeks resembling tomatoes and his eyes looking nowhere in particular, causing him to constantly crash into things. If I look at him for too long, or pick at my food, or do anything the slightest thing wrong, he starts beating me, like I was a stubborn horse that ran everywhere but the right direction. Honestly, if anyone is a stubborn horse in this household, that would be my stepfather. Especially if he has a bottle of rum. We aren’t even having a proper Christmas celebration because my mother said that ‘the only present we need is our family’, blah, blah, blah. It’s not fair! January 5, 1502 As I said, we did not have a Christmas celebration, but at least I could stay up until midnight on New Year's Eve. I still would rather prefer Christmas, since I can stay up late on New Year’s without anyone asking me to, but I can’t really make myself a present, since I don’t even have a lot of things. Most of my belongings were thrown out by my mother right before my stepfather and stepbrother moved in, to ‘save space’ in her own words, and ‘cram me into a closet’ using mine. February 2, 1502 Last year, back when I went to school, I learnt about Columbus trying to find India but instead finding an entirely new continent. Today, when my father booted me out of the house to buy a few eggs, I heard rumors of a voyage to the New World. After I heard from a few people, I learned that on November 12, Francisco Pizarro will set sail, heading for the New World to convert the people that live there to Christianity and to gain riches. I wish I could go with him. Exploring something sounds much better than living a single day with my ‘family’.
Just a social studies assignment that I decided to turn into a project. @Floooofy_pup has a similar one.
