by TorreS, Pet
“Congratulations, Mr. Serafim!” I said and smiled at him. Then I handed him a gift wrapped in beautiful paper.
“Thank you, my dear.”
“I hope you like the little gift,” I replied.
“I’m sure I will.” He smiled at me and held my chin. “I appreciate you making this kid here happy!” He said referring to Natan.
Mr. Serafim hit his grandson’s legs playfully.
“This kid looks more like me than his own father.”
Natan looked at me and a shy smile played on his lips.
From afar, Natan’s parents watched us. Natan's mother was dressed in a light blue dress and his father wore a gray suit and tie. Lurdes and Jairo looked at each other and made faces. They hated the idea of seeing Natanael and I increasingly passionate and inseparable.
Natan glanced to one side and saw a man in a white suit with his back to us. He smiled saying, “Come with me Peta. I want to introduce you to someone.”
His hand pulled mine and we walked among the guests who were standing around drinking and chatting. Some were seated on round tables with white tablecloths and navy blue ornaments. The party guests were also being entertained by a group playing lively music. Natan's grandfather loved popular music.
Natan promptly stopped walking behind a man in a white suit. “Uncle Isaac!”
Slowly the man in his forties turned around. Natan smiled at him and held my hand again, saying, “Peta this is my uncle Isaac, my father’s younger brother.”
The man looked at me and I looked up at his face. He smiled at me and I saw the gold tooth in his mouth.
“Uncle, this is my girlfriend Peta.”
Isaac smiled at me again and shook my hand soon after that. Hastily I pulled my hand from his.
“Pleased to meet you, Peta!”
I remained silent, looking at his image in white. I could not believe it. I stood before the man who was the owner of the Club of Virgins nightclub. Natanael’s uncle. And probably his family did not know that. They were so conservative and would never admit that Isaac could be the owner of a luxury prostitution nightclub.
My body shook with fear. I felt like crying, running, screaming for help or asking to die. The last thing I would ever want is to see that man again in my life and bring back to my mind a bitter past which I could not change.
But I tried to forget every time I put my head on the pillow at night.
“Natanael, could I talk to you for a second?” His uncle asked.
“Certainly, Uncle.
Excuse me, Peta!” Isaac said to me and smiled politely, putting his arm on Natan’s shoulder and pulling him away from me.
I turned my back to them, feeling completely lost. My gaze sought all directions as I muttered to myself, “He will tell Natan everything.”
Isaac, walking beside Natanael, looked back and saw me standing there. His eyes stopped on the tattoo of my butterflies. It was as if he was making sure that I was the girl of the Club of Virgins.
Natanael
After the conversation with my uncle Isaac, I returned to the garden. Other guests had arrived. All the tables were occupied.
Feeling dazed I walked among the guests, looking for Peta. Soon enough I realized she was not there. I glanced quickly at each table in the garden but did not see her.
My hand touched the back of my neck as I was starting to get nervous. I saw my parents in the distance and went to them.
“Have you seen Peta?”
“No,” they answered without concern.
I marched over to my grandfather who was still sitting in his chair, talking politely to some guests. I bowed to him and talked discretely in his ear.
“Grandfather, have you seen Peta?”
He looked around and saw hundreds of cheerful people in his party.
“No, my dear.”
Serafim realized I was tense.
“Has something happened?”
“No.” I held his shoulder. I did not want to worry him without a confirmed reason. “Continue enjoying your party.”
I pulled away from his chair and began to walk through people at the party. I entered the farm area and started screaming Peta’s name numerous times but no one answered. I stepped off the farm and went into the orange plantations. The place where we made love for the first time was empty.
I figured she would have been there, waiting for me to repeat our time again. I despaired when I looked around and saw only darkness and thousands of orange trees laden with oranges almost ready to be picked.
“PETA!” I shouted loudly. All I got back was just the silence of that colossal orange grove.
Chapter 25
Peta
Seven in the morning
I opened my eyes, listening to loud banging on my house’s front door. Someone was shouting desperately. It was Natan.
“PETA! PETA! ARE YOU THERE?”
Barefoot, I got out of bed and walked hurriedly toward the passage. Opening the door I saw Natanael standing before me, still wearing the same clothes he had on at Mr. Serafim’s party.
“Why did you leave my grandfather’s party that way? I was worried about you. I looked for you around the whole farm.”
I reached out and hugged him tightly but said nothing. I imagined that perhaps Isaac did not say anything to Natan about the Club of Virgins. He probably would not do that or his nephew would find out that he manages a prostitution business.
Natan seemed shocked by my strange behavior. I embraced him strongly, afraid of losing him.
All the strength I had I put into in that embrace. Natanael could feel how firmly I held him around his body, as I nearly crushed his ribs.
“Peta, you still did not answer my question,” he insisted. “Why did you do that? What happened? Did my parents insult you?”
My hair was unkempt. I had also been crying the entire night. My eyes were swollen.
Natan’s hands slid down my nightshirt.
“Answer me, Peta,” he insisted again.
I began to sob, holding onto him even tighter, almost climbing his body. Natan stiffened. I could tell he was shocked by my behavior.
“Please just hold me tightly!” I commanded him. “Just hold me! I want to stay quietly in your arms.”
Natan’s arms started to press my body against his. For a moment I relaxed within them. The fear of losing him had weakened inside me for that instant.
Then I raised my head and looked into his dark eyes. Natanael’s skin was flushed by the sun. My fingers gripped the side of his face and I said to him with a cowardly voice,
“Never doubt our love, even if a wave of disappointment tries to drown it inside you.”
Natan frowned, completely confused by my words. Slowly one side of my face touched his chest another time. I closed my eyes, feeling his warmth, his heart pounding in his chest.
His arms tightened around me. Natan gave me the protection I lacked at that time. Even with my closed eyes, a tear slowly rolled down my face.
Chapter 26
Natanael
05:00 pm
I left the bathroom wrapped in a towel from the waist down. In this moment I had finished taking my bath. Before putting on my clothes, I looked on the table beside my bed and saw a yellow envelope. Someone had placed it there when I was having my bath.
I held the envelope and realized it was meant for me, but there was no return address.
Apprehensive, I opened it and then I saw a note in block letters.
Angrily I squashed the note and looked up.
What kind of practical joke was that?
Could it be my parents doing to separate us from each other?
I wanted to run screaming through the house and make them confess to that despicable act. My parents were going too far. They needed to learn how to respect the feelings of others.
Without thinking, I threw away the yellow envelope.
A stronger noise echoed as I saw a black memory stick falling out of the envelope. I f
rowned and walked towards it. I bent down and picked it up between my fingers.
“What is this? What game is this?”
I approached my desk, took the flash drive and connected it to my notebook USB. My fingers slid down the keyboard and I accessed one file folder from within named Natanael’s file.
I decided to click the folder, since it contained my first name. After two clicks, something appeared - the video of the notebook screen. They were black and white images of a security camera inside a partially dark and private location.
After a few moments a young woman dressed in a white garter belt and lingerie with a white mask on her face appeared. She had red hair and blue eyes. Soon she was walking down the hall and stopped in front of a stage, around which there were hundreds of finely attired men in a club. The young red-haired woman turned around and I saw a tattoo of butterflies on her back.
It was identical to the tattoo that Peta had on her back.
“It cannot be true!”
I kept looking at the pictures and saw a man sliding his hand down her body, checking her private parts. On this occasion the girl looked toward the camera and her face appeared more clearly. Those were definitely Peta’s blue eyes under the white mask. Now I had no doubt about that.
I hit the notebook cover with rage and shut the video. Feeling completely nervous, I took my notebook and threw it against my wall. I ran my hand through my dark hair. Despair had grown inside me. I put my forearm in my mouth and bit it. I felt repulsion and disgust.
Those scenes were hurtful.
However, I tried to suffocate my sob. My urge to cry.
Peta
08:00 pm
Natan walked through the door of my house like a lightning bolt. I could not even look at his face and give him a goodnight kiss. I closed the front door and he remained standing in the living room. He was dressed in his blue jeans, navy blue shirt and dark shoes. In his hand was a red bag.
I walked barefoot to meet him. I was in a white nightshirt. My hair was pulled into a bun almost falling toward my neck.
“What’s up?” I asked, realizing he wouldn’t look at me but just stared down at the floor all the time, completely silent. His breathing was strange, as all his actions seemed strange to me that night.
“I brought this for you.” He raised the red bag and threw it at me. I found it odd, his uncivilized behavior. Natan had never acted that way. He was weird. Even his gaze was cold, dark, distant.
I opened the red bag and saw something white. I pulled it out of the bag and saw a white garter belt and lingerie and also a white mask. My mind immediately went to the Club of Virgins. Flashes of that damn night in the club came directly into my mind. Because those pieces in my hands were identical to the clothes I wore in the club more than three years ago.
“What’s this?” I questioned afraid, looking at the white pieces in my hand.
Natanael stood still and stared at me with a look even stranger and domineering.
“I want you to put it on!” He said angrily.
I shook my head. “I cannot do that!”
Natan came up to me and shouted into my ears, “Put it on, damn it! I'm ordering you!”
I moved back but he insisted.
“Peta do not make me lose my temper!”
His hand pulled my nightshirt and tore it in half. I was scared. My breasts were out. Natan was unrecognizable.
“Now wear this crap!”
Scared, I ran to the bathroom and started doing what he had asked me. Moments later I left the bathroom and Natan looked at me. I came out in the white garter belt, white lingerie and the white mask hiding my face.
Natan approached me and observed me for some time. He realized that I was sobbing quietly and under my mask a tear ran down.
His hand slid down my body with no respect. At that time I felt like a worthless object to him.
“Turn your back to me!” He commanded me.
Afraid, I turned my back to him. I could feel Natan’s gaze analyzing my buttocks which were in a thong panty and his gaze was going slowly up.
He froze his eyes on the image of the tattoo of butterflies.
Flashes from the video on his notebook came into his mind and Natan made a perfect comparison of my image with the girl from the video. We were identical in every way. His hand gripped my arm and he turned me to face him with violence. His cold eyes found my blue eyes under the white mask. Before, my eyes always fascinated him, now they nauseated him.
“I know everything!”
I cried and he violently hit my face with his open palm. I was thrown back and started to cry harder. I never expected that Natanael could prove himself to be so violent against me.
“LUXURY PROSTITUTE!”
He looked down at my feet at my nails painted in red.
“I feel sick looking at you!” He said and spat on my feet.
Natan turned his back to me and walked out of the house. Quickly I ran desperately behind him. He went through the gate and I continued screaming at his back.
“Wait! You need to hear my version!”
He tried to open his father's car door and I prevented him by standing in front of it. Some neighbors came out of their houses to see what was going on but of course, all they could see was me in my lingerie and white mask. They all looked horrified.
“Listen, Natan. I only did that once! I did it to try to save my mother’s life! I needed $15,000 and I could only get all this money prostituting myself.”
Natanael looked even more enraged. He pulled my arm and threw me to the side.
“Get out of my way, you bitch! I hate you!”
I fell onto the ground. Natan got into his car, slammed the door and accelerated violently. The smoke rose above. I was crying, sitting in the middle of the street.
Seconds later, Denise parked her father's car and got out in a hurry, leaving the red car door open. She ran to me and hugged me tightly.
“Peta, what happened? Why are you dressed like that on the street?”
She looked up at my gossipmonger neighbors and shouted at them, “What are you staring at? You’ve never seen a woman in panties before? Go back into your homes and find something else to do! Bunch of gossipmongers!”
She looked at me again and wiped my tears. Denise almost cried with me.
“Peta, let's go inside, friend!”
Her arms lifted me up and she took me back into my house, protecting me with her friendly hug. I can say that Denise was always at my side whenever I needed her most.
Chapter 27
Peta
Weeks went by and I did not hear any news of Natanael. The second semester in college was about to start and somehow we would end up crossing each other’s path on the college campus.
I confess that sometimes I tried calling him, but I kept getting the message that his was a non-existent number. He had probably exchanged its chip.
But I needed to see him. Natan needed to forgive me. He needed to understand why I made that one serious mistake in my past.
I was suffering a lot with his absence. I considered him a living loss. He was someone I wanted to have but could not have, perhaps ever.
“Hello, I would like to talk to Natan,” I informed Natanael’s parents as I stood in their doorway. The one who opened the front door was his father, Jairo. He looked at my clothes and realized that I was dressed decently that day. I was in a pair of jeans and a short-sleeved blouse. That day was like a fresh start.
Mr. Jairo scratched his mustache and said as he stood in the open door, “My son is not here.”
In this moment, I frowned and tried to look into his house, imagining that his son might be hiding in there and did not want to see me.
“What time will he return?” I asked.
Jairo looked pleased and said, “He will not.”
He stared into my blue eyes.
“Natanael has traveled abroad. He will study agronomy in Europe.”
“Oh, no!” I muttered put
ting my hands to my lips.
Jairo pulled the door again and said something before closing it in my face. “Leave Natanael alone! I did not educate my son to be with a whore!”
The door slammed in my face. I lowered my head and thought that Natan’s parents were now aware that I had prostituted myself in the Club of Virgins.
They would never forgive me for that.
I was labeled for making a mistake only once in my life.
Chapter 28
Peta
I looked up at the sign outside and saw:
CLUB OF VIRGINS
Moments later, I went inside through the back door. I knew there was this secret door and I would not be searched by security guards from the nightclub.
In my old jeans, sneakers, black jacket with hood over my head, I could easily reach the club hallway.
Some women were in dark lingerie and colorful masks on their faces. I looked at another dressing room and saw a girl in white lingerie and a white mask on her face. She probably was another victim and would sell her virginity for a few thousand dollars as I had done one day.
Walking a little further, I came to the ballroom which was packed with well-dressed men. A song came on at that moment from Sia called Elastic Heart.
Realizing that this was right time, I removed the hood from my head and looked around. The lights blinked quickly, everything changed color, and white smoke rose within the site. Looking around, I stuck my hand inside my black coat and pulled out an iron bar.
I turned and started breaking all the objects inside the club. Cups, bottles, tables and any breakable objects I could feel the wrath of the iron bar as I wielded it. The people inside were scared and some distanced themselves from me. I hit the iron bar on everything and screamed out as I did so.