Chapter 1 – Appearances can be deceiving

The Snows family, one of the first families to arrive in Westchester County, settled very quickly, buying up a lot of land in the region and distributing it after the death of its patriarch Obedayas. Obedayas left, leaving seven children among whom the lands acquired in the municipality were divided. The family was very traditional in its division, leaving the most valuable lands to the men of the family and the less valuable ones to the women. From there we begin with the story of Dona Maria, married and mother of five children, two boys and three girls, starting with the oldest, named Nora, Noel, Nívea, Marlin and the youngest Ben, recently abandoned by his husband at a time when women still did not have much space in society, she raised her children with the help of her oldest daughter. Working as a cart driver all day, Maria had no other alternative but to trust her oldest daughter to help raise her siblings, Nora took turns helping with the siblings' lives and selling coal, a business that her father had abandoned before leaving. As the years went by, Nora became more adept at raising her siblings as they grew up and each went their own way. Noel joined the military, Nivea studied and worked and was set to get married. Mario worked but didn't want to continue his studies, and Benjamin decided to go to the seminary to become a priest.

With that, Nora's worries eased, she was able to have relationships. From this relationship came a daughter who was not to Nora's family's liking, which was completely opposite to Nora's relationship with a truck driver, making it very clear that she did not want this relationship. This relationship took her suitor away from the town, and she discovered that she was the mother of a young daughter and had to work to raise her. Nora decided to work at a transport company as a ticket collector, where she took a lot of time off and hardly saw her daughter. One fateful night, the bus Nora worked on ran over a citizen, causing Nora to return home very late, unable to believe that her family had thrown her out of the house, leaving her with her oldest daughter. Desperate to be homeless and without her daughter, Nora decided to live with a boyfriend she had who she intended to marry as soon as she had more financial stability and from this relationship her second daughter was born. Nora thought she was complete but life still had big changes in store for her. As expected, her family still did not support her in this new family that Nora was trying to form and once again she ended up alone with her daughter when her mother promised to return her oldest daughter if she made her current relationship available to Nora. She did so and returned to her mother's house, the two daughters happy again, even though they were alone.