This isn’t a punishment manual.
It’s a reward system.
A fuckingdoublingreward system that escalates with mathematical precision.
Day 1: $250 — For completing full day with 0 demerits.
The amount seems trivial compared to what follows, yet it’s still more than I made in a day at the bakery next door.
I would call myself speechless here, but my internal monologue is actually going crazy as I read down the rest of the list…
Day 2: $500 — Double the previous day’s reward for the same requirement. No demerits. Just follow whatever rules are hidden in that Italian notebook.
A deposit on a studio, right there.
And if I add in day one, that’s seven-fifty. Hell, in this town, that might get me a one-bedroom.
For two days of compliance. Forty-eight hours. Less, actually. Because I’m only here for eight hours each day. Sixteen hours. Seven-hundred-and-fifty dollars.
Wow.
I keep reading.
Day 3: $1000 — A grand. Onethousanddollars for an extra day of whatever Giovanni Bavga expects from me. That’s a down payment on a car. Added up for a grand total of seventeen-fifty. This will get me utilities and groceries with enough left over for the luxury of not checking my account balance before every purchase.
Day 4: $2000 — The page continues its relentless upward trajectory. Two thousand dollars. That’s more than my whole one-month paycheck from the bakery compressed into a single perfect day under his watchful green eyes.
But it just keeps going. The prizes for my compliance become outrageous.
Day 5: $4000 — My fingertips tingle as I stare at this figure. Four thousand dollars is more than I’ve ever had in my checking account at one time.
Day 6: $8000 — Impossible money. The kind of sum that would make me feel rich, untouchable, secure in ways I’ve never experienced.
Day 7: $16,000 — A semester of college. A down payment on a condo. A reset button on my entire financial existence. My hands tremble slightly as I force myself to breathe normally, the zeros blurring before my eyes.
I blink. Read it again. Blink harder, like maybe I’ve developed some rare ocular condition that makes me hallucinate zeros. I even rub my eyes with my knuckles, childlike, as if that might reset my vision to something more believable.
My stomach does a complicated gymnastics routine that would score a perfect 10 at the Olympics. Heat flushes through my body in waves, making my palms sweat and my mouth go dry.
This isn’t fear. This iswant. Raw, unfiltered economic desire crashing through my carefully maintained wall of dignity. The kind of visceral need that makes rational thought impossible.
$31,750. In one week.
That’s not a salary. That’s a fucking miracle. That’s rent for a year plus a security deposit plus furniture that doesn’t come pre-stained by strangers. That’s a used car that actually starts in winter. That’s the difference between surviving and actually living.
I’ve never seen that much money listed anywhere near my name—not on a bank statement, not on a tax return, not even in my most delusional daydreams where I somehow become a BookTok romance author and get a publishing deal. The closest I’ve come is calculating how much debt I owe, which is its own special form of financial nightmare.
I glance back at the demerit book, and suddenly its meticulous Italian takes on new meaning. The elegant script no longer seems merely judgmental—it’s the counterweight tothis impossible bounty. One error—one single mistake—and the entire reward structure collapses like a house of cards in a hurricane. One moment of human weakness, one slip of concentration, one rebellious impulse, and it all vanishes.
The equation is brutally simple: perfection equals payment. Failure equals nothing. The mathematical progression makes the stakes higher with each passing day—each hour bringing me closer to either windfall or devastating disappointment.
And I’m standing barefoot in a parking lot, technically late for an errand, with shoes in my hand instead of on my feet where they’re supposed to be. The potential demerits hover over me like an executioner’s axe when you add in the ten I’ve already earned and not officially burned.
The stakes snap into place with the cold precision of a guillotine blade. One week. One rulebook. One reward. The game is rigged for failure, designed to tantalize with the impossibility of human perfection measured against Giovanni Bavga’s exacting standards.
$31,750 reasons to be perfect.
$31,750 reasons to ignore my bladder, my blistered feet, my wounded pride, my instinct for self-preservation.