La Buena Vida 6

[WP] Ten years ago you took a vow of silence. Today you broke that vow.

******

There really was no hope for me in this four-walled hell, that I became aware of a week into my ‘detention’ there.

The next night after my mom’s depressing visit, I was given some clothes by an old-woman. Some very skimpy, revealing clothes; the kind I was used to while I was still working for pay under Silva.

“Boss says you’re to begin work today.”

“Wh…”

She banged the door shut. I just stood, looking at the clothes before sitting down on the bed, refusing to wear them. In a few minutes, the door opened and a man in suits with a strange black stick walked in.

“Put on the clothes.”

“No.”

“I won’t ask again. Put on the damn clothes!”

“I said n…”

He walked over quickly and jabbed the stick into my side. It was an electric Taser, and the pain was something out of this world. “We do not tolerate insubordination here, newbie. You should be aware of that; I don’t think you were fully debriefed when you were brought here.”

He jabbed it into my other side, smiling as I writhed before leaving me to fall to the bed, dizzy and exhausted. “It won’t get you unconscious. Just enough pain to make sure this registers in your brain: Pain is what we use to regulate people like you here. It’s the tender, the currency, the mode of transaction for you stubborn b!tches. It’s either you behave and do as you’re told, or you experience pain.”

With that, he dropped the Taser and asked me to put on my clothes. I picked them up immediately.

“Good. We’re getting somewhere,” he said, bringing out a plier from his inner pocket, “I really hope you’re one of those who learn from just one experience, at least for your sake. The next time you cause me to have to come here, I’ll use this to extract your tooth.”

It was torture. I had to undress in front of him, and he groped me; not like I was surprised he did, the pig. When I almost raised my hands to strike, he flashed the plier before my eyes and I calmed.

“Good. Follow me.”

He led me to a room. A room where Silva sat, playing cards with 4 men.

“Ah, there she is. Marco, Marco, did she give any problems?”

“She’s untamed. A feisty one. But I schooled her a little. Hopefully, she’ll not put up any problems now.”

“Hopefully, huh? Well, I’m not surprised that she put up a little resistance, seeing as she successfully escaped my club. But she should know by now that this place is a lot different, don’t you, Mariela?”

I looked at him with as much hate in my eyes as possible.

“Marco, the plier.”

“I know it’s different! I do! I do! Please I do!” I screamed, pleading.

“My dear, actions have consequences,” he said, beckoning Marco to force my mouth open. “You need to understand this so that you’ll not make any more mistakes.”

He put the plier in the right corner of my mouth. “I hate to see you like this, I really do, but you have to learn to respect me. Learn…”

*****

I lay naked on the bed, my skin and hair caked with dried semen. I was sure I smelled like dirt, saliva, urine, and other bodily fluids. I never felt so used in my life.

“Do you regret this, Mariela?” Silva asked, staring at me.

“I’m sorry, I don’t understand you. Regret what?”

“Oh, look at you! You now speak politely, he said, grabbing my chin before recoiling, his face a picture of disgust as he took out a handkerchief and cleaned off whatever it was he touched on my body.

“Do you regret offering yourself up to those men? Do you regret doing what caused you to look like this?”

“It was what I had to do to prevent my tooth from being extracted.”

“And…”

I stifled a tear. “It is who I am. A whore. It is my pleasure; my greatest desire to be of service.”

“Atta girl. You get an extra piece of bread tonight.”

I sobbed loudly. “Thank you, sir.”

“Aww, you don’t have to thank me, I’m just trying to be nice to my…slaves. There’ll be a big party tomorrow, and a lot of my friends will be there. I’m looking for business partnerships with them, and in exchange, I’ll have to provide some entertainment.”

I just sobbed quietly.

“So you’ll need to be at your full strength and looking your best tomorrow. I don’t want you to turn them away with scary eye bags, and you certainly don’t want me to use a branding iron to give you a few marks here and there, would you? So stop crying, eat and sleep.”

The tears rolled down my cheeks for a while, then stopped.

“Oh, the door will be unlocked for the next thirty minutes. There’s a bathroom opposite this room. Use it. A lady will be there to watch you; not that I feel you’ll have any smart ideas, but just in case you forget where you are, she’s got a plier.”

I took a few minutes before going ahead to the bathroom.

“Oh, so you’re the famous escapee?” the lady asked. She was dressed in a black tee and black baggy trousers, a pile of clothes in her left hand, “I’m honored to meet the first person to ever escape that club, even if you still got recaptured.”

“Thanks.”

I didn’t know if it was safe to ignore anyone, so I just thanked her and got into the bath. She could see me as I bathed, but there was no self-consciousness anymore. I’d been used and abused my whole life; why would it need to matter now?

“You look pathetic. Tell me, is this the best you can do?” she asked again. I kept silent as I rinsed off soap suds on my body. “Or have you lost the guts to try again because you got caught the first time?”

“I’ve lost everything. Everything I’ve worked for, everything I’ve believed in. Someone like you who help Silva destroy people like me would never understand. I just want to spend the rest of my life here praying for death to come. If you really want to help me, get me a knife.”

“I’m just like you,” she said.

I looked at her quizzically.

“Ten years ago I came here because Silva uncovered my plot to escape with some other girls. He brought me here to stay, but one of my friends entered here undercover and filmed what Silva was doing to us. He threatened to send out the video and expose Silva if I wasn’t left alone.”

“So were you left alone?”

“Yes.”

“Then…”

“I chose to stay here. To work here. Good pay and all with just one condition – that I never tell anyone this story and that the video is never released. I could have gone anytime, but there isn’t any hope of a better paying job out there than this one for people like me.”

"What?"

"I prevented my friend from releasing the video so I could work here, survive, eat. Live."

“So you’re another slave of situation?”

“Huh…funny choice of words. But yes, you’re right.”

“So why are you telling me all this?”

“I don’t want you to be like me, a pathetic loser who had to stick to such a measly deal to survive. Silva still messes with me because he knows I live off his money. I’m breaking that vow I made because I want you to be truly free because I know that unlike me, you won’t make this stupid choice – this greedy choice that I did. I want you to free yourself, and free others.”

“So what? How can you…”

“All I’ll give you is this instant camera and a hairpin. It’s all I could get and conceal in these clothes without rousing any suspicions.”

“What am I supposed to use those things to do?”

“You escaped the first time, genius,” she said, handing me the clothes, “surely it wasn’t the first and last?”

******

@Leo_kitti, @Hanzell, @gertu13, @Gwenie what do you think about the story so far?