Drew's background story (part 1)
Aphrodite met a high corporate businessman. His father had a company in Japan, and he himself continued that company with a couple of buildings in the United States. He had handsome features, was smart (as to be expected from a businessman) and rich. Aphrodite met him during a night out on the town in New York. He was immediately taken by her beauty and soon Aphrodite was pregnant.
He kept going on and on about how it would be a boy. He wanted a boy. He sided with the name Andrew. Aphrodite knew it would be a girl and tried for a different name, but he wouldn't bulge.
When the little girl was born and Aphrodite gave her to him, he had a look of disgust on his face. He felt it was a cruel trick. She was a Goddess. Sure she could have made sure that the sex of the baby was the way she wanted it to. Which meant she must have never really loved him to begin with. Aphrodite felt terrible. She would have to leave her little girl behind with a dad who preferred a son. She would live a though life. But she couldn't take her with her. She kissed her little girl a last time for a long time saying "Until some day, my beautiful Drew."
Aphrodite had hoped that naming her a shorter version of Andrew would help Drew's dad to accept her a little more. But she couldn't have been more wrong.
In the first 10 years of her life, Drew only got to see her dad with special occasions. The Christmas dinner, his birthday (when she was allowed to give him one present, but then had to leave dad to work), the 4th of July (when she would stand outside in the garden with her nanny and she could see her dad for about 2 minutes when he would stand in front of his homeoffice window) and when there was a party at the house. With the parties, she would be put in the most beautiful dresses and her dad would be loving to her. She always longed to these parties as a little girl. Because her dad would hug her once or twice and he would tell everyone how beautiful she was. She felt proud to be his daughter and for a small moment he seemed to be proud of her.
But that was only for a little while. Half an hour or so. Then she would be brought to her room by her nanny and not see her dad for a while.
The first time when she got to celebrate her birthday was when she turned seven. Her dad had told her that in Japan the called it the occasion of shichi-go-san, which was a certain kind of festival for children there when they were three, five or seven. She didn't really care about the meaning in Japan. All she cared about was that she had a day to have a party for herself.
But her dad used the day to speak to all his business associates and spent little to no time on her. She got a present of which she was sure her dad's private secretary and her nanny had bought for her. She decided that if this was what a birthday was like, she didn't like it very much.
When she turned 12, her dad shipped her off to boarding school. The Brooklyn Academy for the Gifted. She was sad at first, but thought that this may be a way to finally make her dad proud.
When she came home from her first year, and showed her dad all the amazing grades she had gotten, all that came from her dad was laughter. He told her that she was a girl, and her only goal in live would be to have influential friends, make her husband happy and look beautiful.
He told her she was lucky that he had already made one of those things true by having a child with Aphrodite herself. But that if she had really been as powerful as she had told him, she would have given him a son and not a poor excuse for a daughter.
Drew was broken up after this and spent the entire summer vacation in her room. In the last week she decided that it was enough. She took her father's creditcard (one of many) and asked her former nanny, who still worked in the house, to take her to the mall. She got a new hairdo, bought new clothes and make-up. When she got back home, she changed her entire look and decided that she would never let anyone make her feel inferior again.
That year in school she found out about her power of charmspeak. When a group of popular girls kept looking at her and mocking her, she found herself walking up to them and said; "You all just want to be like me, but you can't, so you try to make me feel as miserable as you are. But guess what! It's not gonna work, hon. So maybe if you're nice, you can be my friends." The girls repeated half the words and the next day Drew walked into school she had a squat of five girls behind her.
Her grades started to drop. And Drew didn't care. She enjoyed the attention she got. Boys looking at her and girls wanting to be part of her group. She got addicted to the power she had over others for once. She started to use her charmspeak more and more to get what she wanted and made most of the school feel like they were nothing. This is what a Goddess must feel like.
At the beginning of summer vacation, when she was 14, her mom showed up at her door. She was the most beautiful woman she had ever seen. They sat down and Aphrodite told her how she and her dad met.
"Why did you name me a short version of Andrew?" Drew asked her when she was done with the story. "Did you want a boy as well?" Aphrodite was shocked at this. "No sweetie, of course not. I would love you either way. But your dad was so stuck on the name, and I couldn't change his mind. I thought that it was a good way to give you a name that would fit a girl and might also give him some peace with the choice of name. But it didn't really…. But if it helps, I think the origin of the name is perfect for you. Your dad chose it because in some cultures it means masculine and manly, but in some it also means courageous and wise. And I thought that was perfect."
Drew still wasn't sure about this. You wouldn't get anywhere in live with being wise.
But when her mom told her about a camp, she decided that she would go. It was a new way for her to present herself. To be confident and strong.