by Sandra Raine
It actually took Bo a week to finally smile at me. Anna and the rest of the girls took turns smiling at me days later. And would you believe I cried as it made me understand that I wasn't exactly alone in all my pain. While some of the smiles were full of hope, others were full of doubt. And despite how these smiles were presented to me, I locked them all away in my heart like a treasure's chest where they couldn't be taken, destroyed, or stolen by the filth tearing my soul apart; these smiles were all mine to keep, and I treasured them every morning when I awoke and each night when I went to bed.
Beatings were also routine amongst the girls, including me. One afternoon, after my snack, my stomach took a turn for the worse. And since I had already taken my afternoon bathroom break I was forced to endure the cramps building in my stomach. And as much as I tried to hold my bowels in for my next bathroom break, I couldn't, and so I ended up soiling myself. Abel got so fucking enraged with what I had done, he dragged me out of my cage by my hair and dragged me to the bathroom and tossed me beneath the showerheads and turned on the hot water full blast. The hot water then scorched at my skin like fire blazing coals while I laid there on the dingy tiles cowering and screaming and crying and begging for forgiveness. And just when I thought the nightmare had ended after the water had been turned off, Abel then callously leaned over my wet trembling body and yanked me back up by my hair. And instead of dragging me back to my cage he instead dragged me to the Discipline room.
Cain was already in the room waiting with a long brown leather belt tugged snug in his hand. Abel then dragged my body toward the center of the room that was no bigger than three cages put together. The room was extremely dim, densely cold, and empty of any life - right then and there I couldn't help but to pee all over myself from the terrifying site gripping at my body particularly at the thin dingy white rope dangling from an above exposed rafter. Abel and Cain wasted no time binding both my wrists together with the rope. And together they strung my body up like a lynching, pulling the rope foot-by-foot until both my feet were barely touching the cold cemented ground beneath me. I anxiously glanced up, hoping that my weight would be the miracle to break the rope and set my fragile body free but I was blinded briefly by the dim light shining down on me like a spotlight. . .then it was to late.
By the time I had regained my vision, Cain had already swung the belt across my backside catching me completely off guard and forcing my vocal cords to wail from the top of their lungs. The burning tinge radiating off my still dampened skinned was just the very beginning of what had truly awaited me. So for the next few minutes my body had been whipped repeatedly; each welt embedding itself deeper and deeper into my skin. And no amount of screaming and writhing around to avoid the torture nor the amount of my begging for mercy was enough to convince Cain to stop. The pain was beyond immense, beyond unbearable - ten times worse than Dominic's beatings - that in the end I passed out.
Abel was already hovering above me when I finally came to. I was no longer in the Discipline room. I was in my cage, laying on top of my bed with Abel still hovering like a bee, ruffling his evil wings in absolute disgust, buzzing incoherently while his black stinger threatened my very existence: "You were such a gem, Diamond," Abel grunted in a state of grim disappointment, "Now you're just an animal who shits where she sleeps! What a shame. A fucking shame, wouldn't you agree?"
October, 2011 -
The majority of the men we had sex with were usually between the ages of thirty and sixty. Occasionally there were twenty-something year olds. The men came from all walks of life and from all nationalities and they always came to our place to have sex. We were rarely, if not, taken to other men's houses, or other parts of the states, yet there were two separate instances that occurred the same.
On the first instance, five of us girls - including myself - were taken out of our cages and escorted to an awaiting van that was parked in a garage in the back of the house. As soon as we stepped into the van both our hands and eyes were immediately bounded in rope and bandanas. And once we were secured, we were then driven off.
The drive seemed pretty far but wasn't. And it was extremely unnerving for me - and I also assumed - for the other four girls because once I felt the van decreasing speed, I knew right then and there that it was just a matter of time before the van would come to a dead standstill somewhere. I figured we had been driven across a state line, perhaps into Mexico 'cause the atmosphere outside the van suddenly altered from clean desert air to wood burning fires backed by the endless smell of Mexican food and Spanish conversations.
Someone grabbed a stern hold of my hand when the van came to a complete standstill and the cargo doors opened. Within a matter of seconds I was escorted into a building smelling of more Mexican food accompanied by cigar smoke and fresh paint. There was Mexican music and the voices of Mexican men blaring all around me, some heavy, some low, some pitched, and there was laughter all around, too.
Still bounded and blindfolded, I was then escorted into another room that instantly grew silent as soon as the door closed behind me. The bandana and the rope were immediately stripped from my wrists and eyes with Cain ordering me to get naked and get into bed. He then told me to wait before he walked out the door. Soon after, those masculine voices I had heard throughout the building began to carry into the room and onto the bed.
I had no idea what part of Mexico I had been in and I wanted to desperately know 'cause it would've told me where I was exactly in my new life. I had thought about asking one of the girls, particularly TJ Anna but since we were forbidden to speak to one another I decided to leave the issue alone thinking she probably had no recollection considering she had been blindfolded and bounded, too.
It wasn't until the second instance came when me and the same four girls were taken back to Mexico. But on our way back from Mexico however, is when I got lucky when Abel and Cain unconsciously slipped in their conversation:
"I hear the Gadsden Hotel is haunted?" Abel mused.
"Really?" Cain laughed. "Man, I didn't know that. Who would have thought, huh?"
"Yeah!" Abel chuckled. "You figured we'd know that shit considering we were born around these here parts."
My eyes had lit up with exuberance beneath my blindfold 'cause The Gadsden Hotel was located in Douglas, Arizona. I remembered studying the history of the hotel back in eight grade for a school project. So home was not that far away.
Several days later, since my imprisonment and loathing the absolute fact that I had literally lost track of the days in the months, fate - however fucked-up - was on my side one evening as another girl and I were entertaining a couple of men upstairs. Since the majority of the sex took place in the formal living room and in front of other "John's", the John who chose to have sex with me decided that he wanted me on all fours. As I was leaned up against one of the three sofas adorning the room while the John banged away on me, I involuntarily glanced up and my eyes casually swept over a nearby end table. And there on the table sat a newspaper. Suddenly my shamed expression faded into an expression of exuberance, particularly when I decided to seize the opportunity for a quick peek at the date however, I wasn't close enough to grasp the tiny lettering. Already aware that both Abel and Cain's eyes were frequently on me, carefully observing my every move with the John's, I played safety and pretended to appear uncomfortable in my position. So I anxiously, yet casually bucked my hips away from the John and slinked my body further up the sofa toward the direction of the end table and repositioned my hips. The John then kissed one of my ass cheeks, took hold of my hips once again, and continued to fuck me. As for me, I got a clear view of the weekday, month, the date and year as well as the name of the newspaper: Monday, October 24th, 2011, The Explorer, Marana, Arizona.
October 29th, 2011 -
Today is Saturday, and China Bo was lying half-naked on her bed hemorrhaging terribly from her rectum. The blood was vibrantly visible through her bed sheet, and there was nothing any of us could do to ease her obvious pain. She ha
d been summoned upstairs the night before and I don't remember hearing her return back to her cage 'cause there was always crying and whimpering whenever one of us returned, and China Bo was no exception.
It wasn't until I woke up in the morning and glanced toward her cage had I saw her just lying there on her bed which was odd 'cause she was always the first to be up and around. She wasn't crying nor was she either moving. And this began to frightened me.
The blood, at first seeping slowly, soon began to trickle from her bed onto the floor leaving a puddle that grew bigger and bigger by the passing minute. And Abel just stood there shaking his head and mumbling all his profanities beneath one frustrated sigh after another. Several minutes later, Cain walked into the Dungeon with an older man trailing loosely behind him. Abel stepped aside, and both Cain and the old man stepped into China Bo's cage. The old man hovered over China Bo's lifeless body for a few minutes feeling around her neck and wrists for any sign of a pulse.
"Well, how is she?" Abel grunted suddenly, impatiently. The old man unnervingly pulled back his hand and shot Abel an icy stare.
"Dead."
"Great." Abel groaned.
"I told you them two hung niggers were going to tear her a new one." Cain then scolded Abel.
"Pft!" Abel scoffed the least bit offended. "Let's get her into a bag. Take her to the incinerator. Get some of them bitches back yonder to help scrub down this filth."
Within minutes both Abel and Cain stuffed China Bo's lifeless body into an oversized black plastic bag along with her Teddy Bear and bed linens.
And just like that, China Bo disappeared from all our eyes, forever.
None of the girls seemed to cry particularly the two who were chosen to scrub China Bo's blood from the cold cemented floor. Both girls remained neutral, emotionally catatonic and unphased by the passing of one of their own. . .and I didn't understand it.
Satisfied with the work the black girl and another Asian girl had done to China Bo's cage, they were then both rewarded with two canned sodas and a full size Hershey bar for lunch. The rest of us girls, we, too, got candy for lunch, and they weren't as big, they were actually the fun sized, mainly M & M's and the Peanut Butter cup. The wrapper on my candy indicated that it was Halloween, and then I remembered that Halloween was just a couple of days away. Then I remembered Bree and the Halloween's we had spent together dressing up and Trick-Or-Treating before all my bad misfortune. My heart then sunk 'cause it weighed heavy in both sorrow and loneliness of not being able to share this Halloween with Bree.
"We have to get out of here!" a voice whispered suddenly from out of the blue forcing my head to spring up like a Jack-in-The-Box toy. Anna was facing me on her bed only her gaze was to her lunch tray.
"Anna?" I, too, whispered suddenly, anxiously, yet my tone was full of doubt, skepticism that she would even bother to break the rules and risk a severe beating by talking to someone like me. And my presumption was right - Anna said nothing.
I then glanced into the other cages with that same anxiety clinging to my tone but the girls were busy eating which left me thinking that maybe my conscience was speaking to me out loud.
"Shh! Keep your head down, and listen!" Anna - much to my shocking surprise - scolded as she busied herself by popping the cap off her bottled water. I bit back my jovialness and quickly bowed my head and fumbled with the wrapper to my candy as my heart thumped fast with my ears aching to hear more of her voice which sounded surprisingly innocent backed by a hint of maturity.
"This is the only way we can talk, understand?" she said.
My heart continued to thump even as I cleared my throat calmly and hummed, "Uh, huh."
"We have to make plans on getting out of here, Diamond. I mean, since it seems to be that we are the oldest ones here; the others are just girls, and extremely terrified."
"And you're not?"
Anna ignored me for a few seconds allowing me the opportunity to look up but toward the direction of China Bo's empty cage. From the corner of my eye I caught Anna taking a bite of her sandwich. After, she gulped down some water leaving me to casually shift my attention back onto my lunch tray.
"You're learning fast," Anna praised with a slight jovial to her tone.
"Has anyone ever tried to escape from here?" I pried, cautiously.
Anna chuckled quietly. "This isn't Alcatraz, Diamond."
I had a sudden recollection of a very young Clint Eastwood dressed in prison garb. It was one of my fa. . .it was one of Mr. Parker's favorite movies. Whenever it played on TV, he would literally stop what he was doing to watch it. I think the movie moved him somehow. Maybe that's why he sent me here 'cause this horrid place reminded him of Alcatraz. And maybe he was waiting for me out there somewhere to escape. And just the thought alone actually began to inspire me a bit.
"How long you've been here?"
"I don't know, really? Hmm. . .maybe two. . .three years now?"
Suddenly I stopped eating. I wasn't hungry anymore. And instead of experiencing another bout of food hitting me bad, hitting me hard, I settled my lunch tray aside, got up from my bed and stood at my cage door and stared toward the double steel doors leading to salvation.
"People die here, don't they?"
Anna cleared her throat. "Bo's the ninth girl to die here since I've been here."
I gulped back my fear and clenched my eyes tight; my mind trying hard to visually grasp the bodies having been carried out of here in the past the way China Bo's had been carried. The thought was utterly unsettling.
"If we did escape, where would you go?"
"Home."
I turned back around and swept a curious gaze over Anna who continued sitting there barely eating. I turned back around and settled my gaze on one of the other girls. She wasn't of American culture. She was from somewhere Middle East. . .jet black hair, extremely fine to the touch. Her color was a jaundice yellow. She was petite and resembled the likes of a gifted ninth grade nerd. Perhaps she was snatched up from a single widowed mother or from some slum she was forced to live in, perhaps promised a better life in America if the mother let her go. She smiled at me, yet I couldn't find the strength to smile back. Instead I lowered my gaze and curled my dirty fingers tightly around two of the cage bars to keep my body from collapsing.
"Where about is home?"
"It isn't TJ." Anna joked seriously. I smirked. "El Monte, it's near L.A. in California," she said softening her tone. "My family owns a bakery there. . .or at least I think they still do. 'Panaderia Anna'. . .that's what it's called. My parents named their bakery after me."
"Then how did you end up here? I mean, it sounds like your parents were successful?"
"A guy I liked owned a motorcycle. He would visit the bakery frequently. He was twenty-two. I had just turned fifteen. My parents forbid me to see him. One day he promised me a ride home from school, and I haven't been home since. His brother gave me to his cousins - the biker bitches - to pay off a hefty debt. Then I ended up in TJ being sold off to these monsters. How did you end up here?"
"I disobeyed."
"Obedience is a mother-fucker, Diamond. I mean, it's hard to obey someone who can't keep their fucking hands off you."
"Hmm," I droned. "You don't have to call me 'Diamond', Anna, my name is Jane. Anna Jane Parker."
"Really?" Anna's voice abruptly lit up, and I smiled. "You're name is Anna, too? Gee! We could be sisters!"
The steel doors suddenly opened. I quickly shuffled back to my bed and took the bottled water off my lunch tray and settled it on the table next to the other bottled waters I had been collecting. At least we were permitted that tiny luxury.
Cain collected our lunch trays one-by-one. And he always walked into our cages and he always smirked down at us with that devious, conniving demeanor of his. And it always felt like I had just been brutally raped and left for dead by the time he walked out of my cage.
In the bathroom I thought about how I was grateful that Cain, including Abel, never stood th
ere in the bathroom watching us girls use the toilet; they actually waited outside the bathroom with the doors creaked open, of course. I figured they detested seeing our pretty asses glued to a toilet seat knowing very well what came out. I guess little whores to them were meant to look pretty, to smell pretty, inside and out.
I was in the middle of washing my hands when something from the corner of my eye caught my attention. There, hidden beneath the base of the utility closet was a shiny object. I quickly knelt down on one knee to have a closer look, and to my absolute surprise it was a butter knife. Right then and there my heart began to race frantically 'cause a million things started going through my mind like a million ways to escape this place, for example. I quickly stood up and held the knife tightly against my chest which was heaving fast and hard like I had just ran a marathon. I could literally feel tiny beads of sweat forming around my chest and forehead 'cause the anxiety of possessing some form of weapon had kicked up my heart that soon I began to panic on where to hide it. My eyes, as blurred as they were 'cause having been blinded by hope, darted around the bathroom frantically, searching in vain for a place to hide the knife but everything was so white and open and obvious. Then, like a brilliant flash of light, the idea came to me but then I froze when I heard Cain at the door.
"One minute, Diamond."
"O. . .o. . .okay," I stammered. I quickly rushed back to the sink, ran the knife beneath the warm water for a few seconds, then I stepped back, hiked up my sheet, buckled my knees a bit, and gently, yet swiftly slid the knife as far up my vagina as I could, making sure I left a gap between the soft jagged tip and my vaginal lips.
The walk back to my cage however, was a frightening ordeal as I feared making a wrong move like walking to fast and cutting myself in the process. But then I had breathed a long sigh of relief once I was back in my cage 'cause I made it back unharmed. But then I became overwhelmed with fear, over the task of taking the knife out without being caught by the cameras or by Cain who manned the cameras that were all hooked up against the wall right outside the double steel doors. But then fate must've been genuinely on my side for this month 'cause an opportunity had presented itself: Cain walked back into China Bo's cage, occupying himself with a new fold up bed. It seemed the bed was giving him a hard time 'cause he was having trouble balancing one of its legs so his back was to me as well as to Anna's. And without giving my actions a second thought, I hiked the sheet back up over my hips and pulled the knife out in one swift move. My hand suddenly began to tremble uncontrollably, and I was glad to see that my vagina was bone dry 'cause the knife would have surely slipped out of my hand if I had been lubricated. As I clutched the knife to my chest again my eyes involuntarily faltered toward the direction of the other cages and caught the shock of the girl's gazes on the knife, but most importantly, I caught their awe 'cause they were seeing what I had first seen: Hope.