Violet Grenade

by Victoria Scott

  She bumps my shoulder. “I think Cain really does like you. He totally lingered.”

  I avoid her stare. “You’re imagining things.”

  “It’s rude to whisper at the table.” A girl with crooked teeth shovels French toast into her trap and chews with her mouth open. She turns her attention to Cain and holds up her plate. “Hey, King Kong, I need more syrup.”

  Cain’s shoulders tighten, but he moves toward her with the bottle.

  As he pours it on, the girl continues talking over her mouthful of food. “How many towers have you climbed, ape?”

  The girl sitting next to her mimics an ape call and scratches under her arm.

  “Stop it,” I mutter.

  The girls turn toward me and scowl. “What was that, freak?”

  I don’t get a chance to respond before Raquel speaks up. “Hey, Domino, you thirsty this morning?”

  The room explodes in laughter, and heat rushes through my body. Only five girls pulled me from my bed last night, but right now it feels like a hundred people are laughing at my expense. My fork shakes in my left hand, and I feel myself rising. Why am I standing? What am I going to do? Run? Cry?

  And why am I still holding my fork?

  Mercy yells something about deep throating and Raquel makes a crude gesture toward her mouth. The laughter grows in volume until it’s inside me, eating my insides like an army of maggots. They have to stop laughing. I can’t hear myself think and it’s too early and they’re going to wake up Wilson.

  Poppet tugs on my empty hand, the one without the fork, and I look down at her. She’s begging me with her eyes to do something.

  Hurt them, Wilson says, rising from his slumber. That’s what she wants.

  Is that what she wants?

  Is that what I want?

  No. No, no, no!

  Mercy throws a balled napkin, and it hits me in the left breast. That makes everyone laugh harder. So hard they’re pulling in great heaping breaths and pinching the bridges of their noses. Aren’t I hysterical? The girl who drank water straight from the place they piss.

  Cain picks up his closed fist and slams it four times against the kitchen counter.

  One, two, three…FOUR.

  The girls are stunned silent. Even I don’t know how to react. It’s the girl with blue nail polish, the one whose hand is bandaged, who speaks first. “I’m going to tell Madam Karina about that Cain. You can’t go trying to intimidate us just because we’re having fun.”

  “God, what a monster,” someone else adds.

  Though I’m fuming, I sit down. Poppet squeezes my knee under the table, and I let her. Cain is a mystery to me, but I know enough to realize that outburst was out of character.

  The girls start to yell over one another about Cain the monster until Mr. Hodge waddles into the room. “What’s going on? I could hear your yapping two stories up.”

  Everyone ceases talking.

  “That’s what I thought. Nothing in those skulls except cold, dead air. Not when someone asks you a direct question, anyway.” Mr. Hodge takes a cup of coffee from Cain and scratches the underside of his belly. “Well, what are you doing stuffing your faces? Placements are up early today.”

  The girls lunge from their chairs and storm out of the room at once.

  Poppet grabs my arm and we run, too.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Placements & Payments

  I’m not sure why we’re running, but it’s like herd mentality. The ten of us rush into the entertainment room and watch the digital ticker above the bar. It’s blank, just like it was last night. I wouldn’t even have noticed the thing had I not been sitting at these stools with Katy.

  A moment later, there’s a beeping sound, and the board glows with a red light. The color fades, and three names scroll across.

  1. Raquel

  2. Mercy

  3. Georgia

  Raquel bursts into a dance and whoops loudly. The rest of the girls glare, but none so much as Mercy. Raquel turns on Mercy and points a finger directly between her eyes. “Better watch your back. I’m creeping up, chica.”

  Mercy grabs her finger, and Raquel yelps with pain. The girls pull and shove against each another until Madam Karina enters the room. Then everyone falls silent. She holds in her right hand a stack of pink envelopes. In her left are three violets.

  The girls line up, Mercy at the front.

  Madam Karina whispers words to each girl and hands each her envelope. Mercy, Raquel, and Georgia—the girl with blue toenail polish—each get a violet as well. I’m last to receive an envelope. Before Madam Karina hands it to me, she takes me by the shoulders.

  “I’m proud of you, Domino,” she says into my ear. “I just knew you’d be great.”

  Her words sink into my belly like chicken and dumplings. When she leans back, there’s a smile on her face that swallows me whole. She’s proud of me. She thinks I’m great. Try as I might, I can’t build walls fast enough to keep Madam Karina out. What’s more, I don’t want to. When she releases me, my rational mind returns quickly enough. I’m no different to her than the other girls, I remind myself. Why would I be?

  A memory of my mother slinks in. Soft hands, softer words, guiding me down the basement stairs in our house. I can’t take my eyes off her, my mother. She’s so charming, so convincing.

  Wilson jerks the memory away, and I’m thankful.

  The girls have slinked into separate corners of the room to open the pink envelopes. After Madam Karina leaves, I do the same. Inside mine, I find two sheets of paper. The first includes but a few lines.

  Personal Placements

  Sunday, July 22

  Daily Placement: 9th out of 10

  Accrued Placement: 9th out of 10

  Daily Coins Earned: 1

  Total Coins Earned: 1

  A grin touches my lips. I wasn’t in last place. And I earned a bronze coin. It must have been from Katy. But then again, maybe it was from someone different. She wasn’t the only guest I talked to last night.

  Around the room, girls are celebrating or groaning. As for me, my mind explodes with possibility. If I can earn a bronze coin after one night, armed with clumsiness and a stack of napkins, what could I do with a can of spray paint? Maybe I could captivate two guests at once. Maybe an entire room.

  I look at the second sheet of paper.

  Personal Earnings

  Week of July 16

  Carnation Total Earnings – $934.77

  Total Customers – 17

  Coins Earned – 1

  Percent of Earnings – 5.88% (1/17th)

  Initial Earnings – $54.99

  Minus Carnation Household Fee – 90%

  Total Earnings – $5.49

  *Less Supplies – $10.00

  *Sheets, pillow

  Total Weekly Earnings – ($4.51)

  Total Accrued Earnings – ($4.51)

  My head spins and I silently mouth the numbers over and over again. I hardly understand half of it, but in the end, this is what I come up with.

  The customers who came in this week spent a total of $934.77 to see the Carnation girls, and I’m assuming, to have drinks. There were seventeen customers in total, and because I got only one coin, I earned 1/17th of that amount. Then, because Carnations apparently retain only 10 percent of their earnings, I get to keep a whopping $5.49. That’s not what has my blood boiling though. It’s the cost of the sheets and pillow Madam Karina was so thrilled I took.

  She charged me for them.

  I didn’t even know they cost anything, and yet there’s the fee.

  I melt into the floor, overwhelmed with the realization that I have less money now than I did when I got here. My stomach twists and my teeth grind and I’m about to start screaming for answers when Mercy yells that Angie is here.

  The girls scramble out once again.

  Something else is happening.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Market

  Poppet must see how upset I am, bec
ause she approaches with caution.

  “Don’t be upset, Domino. I’ve been in last place before. Several times, in fact.”

  I shake my head. “I’m not in last place. It’s not that at all.” Fury builds inside my chest as I ball the sheet of paper in my fist. “This thing says I owe money. All because I took bedding. This is such a scam! How does anyone make money here?”

  “Oh, Minnow.” Poppet tilts her head. “Just watch how much you make next week. I mean, you must have already earned a coin. So you only worked one night with no tools, and you made money. That’s great! Next week you’ll have a positive balance, and you can have Mr. Hodge hold your money. Then you get extra, which he calls interest…or interested…or whatever. So that helps. Anyway, it’s not like we have any expenses here.”

  “Yeah, we do. We pay 90 percent of our earnings toward them.”

  Poppet thinks about this. “Well, I guess we’ll have to work our way up then.”

  I sigh, some of the anger leaving me at this possibility. “How much do the other girls get to keep? Is it always 10 percent?”

  Poppet nods toward where the other girls went, and we walk in that direction. “Well, the next step is to become a Daisy. I think they get to keep twelve.”

  I groan.

  “But their customers are charged more, and they usually spend more at the bar. So they get a bigger piece of a bigger pie.”

  Dizzy springs to my mind, and frustration returns to me swift as a car crash. I grab Poppet by the arm to stop her. When I realize it’s me who’s touching her, I drop my hand. “Poppet, we have to become Daisies. For real.”

  She laughs. “I think you should concentrate on earning your Carnation first. Though Mr. Hodge will probably give that to you soon, considering you earned a coin on your first night. Now come on, it’s market day. This is the fun part of getting paid.”

  Outside the entertainment room, I see the Carnations who received Violets racing up the stairs. When I ask where they’re going, bitterness lacing my words, Poppet says, “They’re paying tribute to Madam Karina. She gives them violets for doing well with the customers, and they lay them outside her door in thanks for their place in her home.”

  It takes everything I have not to roll my eyes at this. What’s the point?

  We file through the kitchen as I stew, and go through a door and down some stairs. When we reach the bottom I see girls with white daisies and yellow tulips pinned on their blouses alongside the Carnation girls.

  A cage separates us from Cain, who’s busy organizing merchandise, and Eric, who’s dressed in a police officer uniform. I didn’t realize Eric was a cop. I guess that should make me feel safe. It doesn’t, though. It just makes me think of the officer who arrested Dizzy, and about where my friend is now.

  Cain slides a window open and holds up a clipboard. Behind him and Eric, I spot a thin woman I’ve never seen before. She has hard features, small wrinkles around her mouth that tell me she’s a smoker, and brown curly hair shaping a makeup-free face. The woman mumbles to herself as she unloads boxes, moving about as if she’s sixty when she’s probably only late thirties.

  My eyes fall to her hands. They look soft, ill-matched to the rest of her. I bet when she holds a palm to your forehead to check for fever, it feels like silky-soft reassurance. I do this thing in my head where I imagine she holds her hand to my own forehead, pulls a blanket to my chin, and tells me I’m home.

  Then I roll my eyes and shake my head. I do this sometimes. Imagine entire scenes between me and someone I’ve never spoken to. I’ve had boyfriends who brought me peanut brittle, friends who helped me find rare vinyl at an outdoor flea market, and fathers who…well, fathers who did things my real father didn’t.

  “Come on, Minnow.” Poppet guides me into line. “Look at all the cool stuff.”

  I follow her gaze and spot shelves lined with goods. There’s clothing, toiletries, stuffed animals, and bottles of pop to name a few. Farther up are more glamorous items: musical instruments, handbags with brand names I don’t recognize, and high heels that make my mouth water. These are all things I can’t afford, even if I didn’t have a negative balance.

  “Do you guys ever go into town?” I ask. “You know, for price comparisons?”

  Poppet shrugs. “Nah. The Violets can have Eric take them places, but that’s about it. The town is pretty far away, I think.”

  I look at Poppet, uneasiness mounting in my chest. “You mean you haven’t left the house once in the last year?”

  “It’s not like I couldn’t. But you have to help pay for gas if you want a ride. And I’d rather save my money.”

  I think about this. That so many of the girls don’t go anywhere, and if they do, it costs them their precious savings. I look at the items for sale once more, and then start to leave the line.

  That’s when my eyes fall on a sketchpad.

  It’s wrapped in cellophane and includes two sharpened graphite drawing pencils. I stare at it like a cat that’s spotted movement among a bed of grass. Last night I held pen to napkin, but with those pencils, that paper…

  My fingers twitch imagining holding those pencils.

  My mind counts the coins I could earn with them in my grasp.

  And my feet, well, they shuffle forward without permission.

  Poppet goes first, buying only a dainty bottle of perfume. She asks to see a small hairpin that holds a pink pearl on one end. For several seconds, she turns it over in her hands, admiring the jewelry. Then she hands it back, her shoulders slumped. “Just the perfume this week.”

  Cain raises his head when I reach the window. Something flashes in those brown eyes, though I can’t place what. He flips through the papers on his clipboard until he comes to a copy of my earnings.

  “Can I buy on credit?” I ask.

  Cain shakes his head, but Mr. Hodge opens the door to the cage and lets himself in. He hears my question, but asks me to repeat it anyway.

  “I asked if I can buy something on credit.”

  Mr. Hodge smiles and pulls his head back like a turtle escaping inside its shell. His neck truly is invisible when he does this. I’ve overheard other girls calling him The Neck, and there’s no doubt why. I briefly wonder what a baby born from him and Raquel would look like.

  “Let her do it,” he says. There’s spittle in the corner of his lip. He licks it off. “She’s new. And here at Madam Karina’s House for Burgeoning Entertainers, we are hospitable.” He laughs like what he said is hilarious. I’m not sure who he thinks he’s fooling. I know this will put me further in debt and tie me to the house, but I also know I need it to have any sort of chance.

  Wilson sits up. Domino, you really don’t need—

  “How much is it?” I ask.

  Mr. Hodge reaches for the sketchbook package. He looks like a bowling ball from the back. “Don’t worry about that, rabbit. Leave the math to us men. You just think about all the pretty drawings you can make with this here notebook.” Mr. Hodge elbows Cain. “Isn’t that right?”

  Cain stares at his feet, but I don’t miss the way his jaw clenches. He has half a foot on Mr. Hodge and is built to destroy people like The Neck.

  “How much?” I repeat.

  Mr. Hodge scowls and hands me the sketchpad, muttering for Cain to notate a ten-dollar purchase on his clipboard under my name. I clench my teeth at the price, and then say, “Wait, one more thing.” I point to the pearl hairpin. “How ’bout that?”

  This time it’s the woman—Angie, Poppet said her name was—who hands it to me with a curt, “Three dollars.” She hardly looks in my direction because she’s focused on Cain. Reaching into her pocket, she withdraws a peppermint covered in lint and shoves it into Cain’s hand.

  He mumbles a thank-you, but she waves away the pleasantry.

  “Gotta load the excess onto Betty,” she tells him. Her voice sounds like a tractor rumbling down the road. Yeah, a tractor. No need to search my brain for a better word in this situation.

  I tu
rn and hand the pin to Poppet, and she throws herself around me. I lock every last muscle in my body, but manage not to push her away.

  “I’m going outside,” I tell Poppet, but she’s already racing toward the bathroom to try out the pin I bought her.

  On credit.

  Because I’m an idiot.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Angie and Black Betty

  It’s nine o’clock in the morning, but already it’s balmy outside. The sun beats down on the cracked soil and gold sedan. Beside it are two other vehicles, a cop car that must belong to Eric, and a black tractor.

  Angie, the woman from the market, is loading boxes onto the back of the tractor. Angie, the woman whose voice I compared to that of a tractor, owns a tractor.

  I start to sit on the patio bench, but decide I’m being rude by not offering to help. “Is there something I can do?” I call out.

  Angie straightens. She must be a touch over five feet. Not so much taller than me. She wipes a hand across her cheek and leaves a smudge of dirt in its wake. “You talking to me, Minnow?”

  I startle at her use of a nickname Poppet gave me only last night. “How do you know—?”

  “That they call you Minnow?” She lifts another box onto the tractor. “Those girls are loud.”

  That’s all the explanation she gives. Angie appears callous, but she’s answering my questions and that means a lot, comparatively. So I keep talking. “You live around here?”

  “You need to speak up. You’re too damn quiet.”

  I smile, because no one has ever accused me of being quiet. Especially not Dizzy. Of course, it was easier to be loud when Dizzy stood behind me. “I asked if you live around here.”

  She stops working and puts those soft hands on her hips. “Yeah, I do. My place is down that way, in the park by the flagpole. Prettiest yellow trailer you ever saw.” I laugh when she says the last part, but she purses her lips. “What are you laughing about? You got a place that’s better?”

  My smile shatters. “No, I…I’m sorry. I thought you were being funny.”

  We stay this way for a few minutes, her loading boxes, me watching her work. Wanting to ask questions but afraid to say the wrong thing. I thumb the piercing in my eyebrow until Cain walks outside and lights a cigarette. When Angie sees him, she pants harder than she was before and yells for Cain to get his no-good rear end out there and help.