MARRIAGE CONTRACT WITH THE MONSTER

CHAPTER TWO:THE MONSTER'S RULES

Life inside Dante’s house was not life at all.

It was a shadow of living.

I woke up every morning. I counted the walls. They felt like bars to me. The walls were like something that was holding me back. I counted the walls every day.

I looked up at the building and I counted the floors and to me the floors were, like steps that could lead to freedom. I knew I would never take those steps to get to that freedom, the freedom that the floors represented.

The morning I woke up the room was really big. It had a high ceiling. My bed was incredibly wide. I felt tiny. My voice sounded really loud in that room. The sheets on my bed were too cold to touch. The pillows did not smell at all. They just smelled like nothing. I pulled the pillows to my chest. Hold them tight.

I did not hear Dante. He was already gone. I do not even know if Dante slept all. The thing is, I wonder if people like Dante ever sleep. Do monsters, like Dante, really sleep at night?

Someone knocked on the door.

Not Dante.

I knew that by the way the knock sounded. It was a knock. A careful knock. It was like someone was asking for permission to come in. They were doing it in a place where they were not really sure if it was safe. The knock was like a question, a question that said please let me in but only if it is okay, with you.

I opened the door. I saw what was on the other side of the door. The door was big. It had a nice handle. I had to turn the handle to open the door.

The young man who worked there had hair and really pale skin. He bowed a bit.

The man said that breakfast is ready, madam.

I nodded. I did not feel like I could say anything because my voice was shaking. The man did not say another word. He turned around. I walked away. The sound of the man's footsteps got quieter and quieter in the hallway.

I put on the clothes that were given to me. The clothes were very costly. The clothes were too costly, for my taste. The clothes did not belong to me. I did not feel like I was a part of the clothes.

The house was really quiet. It was never empty. I could hear people walking around away from me. There were voices coming from behind doors. Those doors never opened for me no matter what. I walked through the halls of Dante's world. I started to learn the rhythm of life, in Dante's world.

I was given the rules. The company rules. There are a lot of company rules. There are too many company rules.

Do not touch his desk.

Do not ask questions about his business.

Do not open locked doors.

Do not leave the house.

Do not speak to anyone without permission.

I nodded to all of them. They were scary. I did not want to make them mad. I was really quiet. Did not make a sound. I figured out that monsters get really angry when you do something. Monsters do not forgive mistakes so I had to be careful around monsters.

I had breakfast this morning. It was toast, eggs and tea. The breakfast was fine. It did not have any taste. The toast, eggs and tea were all perfect. They were also very tasteless. I felt like spitting out the toast and eggs and tea. I felt like screaming when I was eating breakfast.. I did not spit out the toast and eggs and tea. I did not scream when I was eating my breakfast.

Later that day Dante came to visit us. He was Dante. I was happy to see Dante.

I was walking through the hall. The main hall was pretty empty. He appeared at the end of the hall. It seemed like he had been waiting for me. He always waited for people, like that. The main hall was where he always waited.

I totally froze. My legs were so stiff they felt like wood. My heart was beating fast; it felt like it was going to jump right out of my chest.

The man told me that I am learning fast. He actually said that to me. The man said I am picking up things quickly and that I am learning fast.

I did not say a word. I just stayed still. I figured out that it is better to be quiet. Silence is safer, for me. I had learned that when I am quiet nothing bad happens to me.

He walked past me close. I mean, too close. The smell of him was really strong. It smelled like leather and clean metal and rain all mixed together. It was a smell that filled me with fear. The smell of leather and clean metal and rain is still scary, to me it gives me fear.

The man told me not to touch him. He said do not touch me. The man was very serious when he said do not touch me.

I did not do that.

The man said that again. He thought it was really good. The man said good again.

That night I just could not sleep. I got up. I walked the halls again. The voices were louder now. This time the voices sounded really close to me.

The man told me that I will never survive. He said that to my face. The man's words were very scary. He said that I will never survive.

Nobody can survive him, another voice whispered.

I stopped what I was doing. Then I listened carefully. I knew that what I heard was really true. The truth made me shiver.

Then I remembered what my father said to me. My father begged for our lives. He told me that the only way to save our family was to give it to me. My father really wanted to keep me safe so he said that giving me away was the option to save us to save our family.

I was something that had been given to someone. I was a gift to that person.. Maybe I was a price that someone had to pay.

I sat on the floor. The wall was behind me, against my back. My hands were shaking badly. It felt like someone was squeezing my chest. I started thinking about my life and the life I had before. I thought about my room because it was not very big. My hair was always messy. I never bothered to comb it. I missed my friends. We had a lot of fun together. I remembered my laughter, the way I used to laugh with my friends.

It felt like I was living another life. This was another world.

The day Dante called me. He wanted to talk to me about something. I was wondering what Dante was going to say to me. Dante started talking to me. I listened to what Dante had to say.

Not to talk. Not to ask. Just to watch.

The man told me to sit. He said it like he really meant it. I was supposed to sit and wait for him.

I sat down on a chair in his office. The office was really big. The chair I was sitting on was made of wood and had leather on it. There were leather chairs in the office too. Then I saw the desk. It was so big that I could easily hide behind the desk. The desk was huge, like the office.

The man came into the room. He did not smile at me. The man did not say a word. The man just looked at me.

The man told me that the rules are really simple. He said I should learn the rules. Then I have to follow the rules. If I do that I will be able to live. The rules are simple, that is what he said. I need to learn the rules and follow the rules to live.

I nodded.

The man told me that I will be watched. He said this in a tone. Everywhere I go the man said, I will be watched by someone.

I nodded again. The weight of his eyes on me was really heavy. It felt crushing. His eyes were so heavy that I could feel it.

He would leave things on my desk. Like papers and money and letters.. Sometimes he would even leave a gun on my desk. A gun. It was really weird. He would just leave a gun there.

The man told me not to touch that. He said do not touch that. The man was very serious when he said do not touch that.

I did not do that thing. The thing we were talking about. I did not do it.

Weeks went by. I sat quietly. I counted them. I kept track of the meals I ate. I made a note of the days when I did not cry. I also counted the nights when I did not scream.

The house was like a puzzle. I figured it out. I knew every hallway. I knew every door. I knew where all the cameras were. I knew where all the guards were. I could walk around the house with my eyes closed. I knew who I could trust. The answer was nobody. I knew all the hiding spots. I could hide everywhere. I learned how to get by in the house. I learned how to survive in the house.

One night I heard a scream. It was really loud. It scared me. I do not know what happened. I heard a scream that night.

This place is really close by. It feels very close. I am a being and I feel pain. I feel fear. I feel anger. I wanted to run from there. I wanted to hide safely. I wanted to be else I did not want to be there. Human beings, like me, do not like to feel pain or fear or anger.

I stayed there. I started counting the seconds. One second went by. Then two seconds. After that it was three seconds. I knew it was four seconds.. Then it was five seconds.

Then silence.

I just sat there for hours and hours. I was wide awake at the time. The monster was what I was waiting for. I did not take my eyes off the door waiting for the monster to show up.

Dante came to the place. He is Dante. Dante was there when this happened. Dante is the one who came.

I did not look at him. I counted the things again to make sure I got it right.

One… two… three…

The man told me that I am alive. He said it to me directly and the man said that I am alive.

I said yes. I whispered it.

The man said that everything is good.

I figured out that monsters are not always about killing. They like to watch people. They wait for the moment. They even teach people things. Monsters do a lot of things like watching and waiting and teaching.

I was trying to figure out how to deal with him. He was a person I had to learn to survive.

I was trying to get used to living with the fact that the monster was always there. The monster was a part of my life. I had to learn to live in the shadow of the monster. It was not easy. The monster was always. I had to be careful. Living in the shadow of the monster was my reality.

I was learning a lesson. I could not trust anyone. Not him. Not the people who were supposed to help me. Not even myself when it came down to it.

I was not going to give up. The thing is, giving up was not an option for me. I had to keep going with this thing. I did not give up on it. Giving up is something that I just do not do so I kept at it. Did not let it get the best of me. The idea of giving up was not something that I was willing to consider because giving up is not what I do.

I had to be strong because life was not going well for me at that time and I needed to be strong to get through it. Being strong was the way I could do that. I had to be strong.

I had to be smart because that is what I needed to do to get things done right. Being smart was very important for me. I had to use my brain and think clearly about the things I was going to do. Smart decisions were necessary for me to succeed.

I had to be ready for the things that were going to happen. Being ready is very important to me. The Internet Computer is not the thing I am talking about here which is being ready. Being ready for the Internet Computer is not what I mean. I mean being ready for life and the things that the Internet Computer and other things can bring to my life. I had to be ready for this.

Because the monster’s rules were simple.

Follow them or die.

I was really not ready to die. The thought of death was very scary, to me. I did not want my life to end. Death was something that I did not want to think about. The fact that I was not ready to die was something that I could not ignore.

Even if that meant I had to become something myself.

I did not sleep for the rest of the night. I was counting things. I was planning what to do. I was watching everything around me. I was learning things about the night and how it works. The night was full of things to learn. I was learning.

Tomorrow is really important to me. I will need every second of time. Tomorrow I have to make the most of every second.

And Dante Russo would be waiting.