Being an entrepreneur isn't as exciting as it sounds in TED Talks and YouTube Ads. Mostly it's a lot of late nights with only the dying blue light of a computer screen and empty cans of energy drinks (and sometimes alcohol) for company. The worst part is she doesn't even spend the long hours immersed in smug satisfaction that she's taking overtime pay out of the boss' pocket because she is her own boss. Instead she just stews in despair over the thankless work and the ever decreasing customer base.
It's no wonder, with her sad state of affairs, that Ramona looks for an escape. Something to make the days more bearable, ease the pain of her failing business venture and empty bank account. In all honesty Ramona does not have to do much looking. She has her escape already at hand, a warm and trusty friend from childhood, high school, college and now well into adulthood.
Books.
Ramona remembers seeing a slogan long ago at some school book fair, 'reading is an escape'. And it's true. The well worn spine and yellowed pages of every novel in her collection can attest to it. It's simple to fall back into the roles of dragons and princesses, concubines and emperors, wizards and witches, cops and robbers. Her head reels with each sentence building palaces and cityscapes in her mind. Losing herself to pretty fiction is the easiest thing she's ever done.
It helps.
After all, why should her empty stomach pang with hunger when she's immersed in a languish banquet feast? Rich whole roasted pig swelled with tangy stuffing, sweet persimmon cake, acidic lemon tarts. These make up her meals in her head. Not instant noodles and plain bread or, god forbid, nothing at all.
And why should it matter that her siblings and parents no longer bother to call? She has a thousand concubines, a hundred rich domineering CEO's, to pamper her to the heavens. There's no reason to feel an aching pit in her heart with all this love so visceral she can almost feel it through the flimsy pages of her novels. The worlds are so vivid and beautiful Ramona just wants to sink into them.
It eats away at her. One bite at a time. One thought at a time. Like ants in the dark, intrusive thoughts squirm along her skin at night and devour her flesh.
Why is my life like this?
It shouldn't be this way.
I should be a princess, a rich girl, a beloved child. Not Ramona, the family outcast, the business failure, the drop out.
I wish I could live in a novel.
The thoughts are an incurable sickness, a stain she just can't scrub away. They follow her like a shadow.
And then they come true.