No English no McDonalds
I hated that school. I hated the nuns, my classmates, the Padre Nuestro recited before every class. Catechism felt like an unbearable purgatory—a spiral of hollow reflections that numbed my mind. Miss Pilar, young and beautiful, sat me in a strange chair and abused her position as director to mock me. Every day, I walked the halls and patios of Montini with those kids—rich, but not rich enough—while my brown skin stood out against their whiteness. Every day, I faced a cesspool of fake smiles from pretentious families. The pretty girls ignored me, and I, a boy who drew silly pictures just to make friends, was left behind. There was a teacher—one whose words scarred me—who told me I was uglier than someone wearing a hideous Halloween mask. I wanted to cry, to escape, but when I got home, I found no refuge, no solitude, only a house full of people. I wanted to be alone. Alone. Forever alone. I never fit within those glass palace walls, never understood the rules of their compet...