Toni
I wake up dead.
I’m on my back on a hard, concrete floor, in a little box of a room. I’m hungry and delirious. I must be dead. There can be no other explanation for this.
I roll onto my side and remember.
Gabriel, seeing me, knowing the truth, rejecting the both of us. His sister, that drugged-out flop of a girl. The blind rage in his eyes. The gun pointed at me.
Slipping my hand in my pants pocket only confirms what I knew already: My phone is gone.
Carlos must’ve taken it out. There goes my last chance.
Now there’s no knowing how long I’ve even been here: minutes, hours, days…
Really, who cares? I’m doomed in any case. I will be shipped, sold and screwed – over and over and over again - and there’s nothing I can do about it.
A low moan escapes my lips.
Why, oh, why did I have to stay? Why did I ever trust Carlos? Why did I lie to Gabe?
Frustrated tears spill down my face.
God, I’ve been so stupid.
I get up on hands and knees, then rise.
Maybe Gabriel’s sister missed something. Maybe Carlos isn’t as careful as he thinks. Maybe there’s a way out.
But all my circling around the room reveals are corners full of spider webs and dead spiders who’ve died waiting. Trapped in a box of an underground room with no flies, the unnatural life killed them. Just how the sex trade life will kill me.
My second circling of the room turns up the smallest of holes by the left corner.
I peer through to see my eerily undisturbed den: the closet door neatly closed, the Renoir painting straight. In the corner of my vision, on my armchair is a pair of men’s legs. The guard who has orders to kill me. As if that was something to really be afraid of now.
Leaning against the wall, I stare dully at the flap door, the one I know leads to the couch with the guard who has orders to kill me. My last chance that’s not a chance at all.
No, there’s no point in even trying.
I wipe away the tears.
It’s just too horrible, all of it – losing Papa, losing Gabriel, having Carlos win and deceive everyone with that lying piece of paper. Me having to become my worst nightmare. No, I can’t take it.
And I don't even want to think about what’s going to happen to Maria Fernanda and Jane.
My hand automatically slips back in my pocket and, feeling nothing, I sigh.
I don’t even have my phone to see if Gabriel changed his mind, considered believing me. No, I have been left to my fate – unavoidably, doomed.
I never had time to respond to his text, explain why I never showed up to the bar, though I’m sure he’s figured it out by now.
I glance at the flap door again, inch toward it.
There’s no point in even trying and yet, what do I have to lose?
I stop in front of it, glare at it, turn away.
Why not wait and see a bit longer? Why not try something else?
My starving belly rumbles out the answer: There is nothing else to try. This is all that’s left.
I crouch down and shove my leg through the flap.
Sure enough, it connects with a soft surface that’s my favorite armchair.
I throw it out again, then again and again, each time sending the armchair shaking, but not moving it.
I strike out with all my might, over and over and over until – suddenly – my feet hit nothing. I pause, then find my feet being shoved backwards.
As I watch in horror, Clarence crawls through the flap. Then, his face horrifically calm, he sits in front of my escape.
He’s holding a gun.
His deadly smile is saying, “I was hoping we’d get to see each other.”