Page 7 of Voracious

The thought of searching porn sites and seeing her face amongst the sea of the other little girls who have now grown into women turns my stomach. It’s the natural progression to swap out one form of exploitation for another but it’s not their choice. You can’t make a choice when all you’ve been taught is that your body is used. The fuckers are too good at manipulating everyone and they manage to fit their videos amongst those of people who had all the information and take control while doing the same profession.

Dima pulls me out of my thoughts as he stops the car. I expect another warehouse as I open my eyes but it’s a house. A nice idyllic family-style home. It’s not as extravagant as the Vartanov estate with stables and its own lake but it’s private and bikes wouldn’t look out of place strewn across the driveway.

Sick fuckers always have the nicest things. The perfect image of family and respectability when they touch themselves to images of children. Someone must have studied the psychology behind it and found an answer that’s more succinct than my mommy was mean to me. Every study seems to have that answer. Behavioral disorders make sense, you develop a distorted sense of self because the primary caregiver skews it from reality. Fucking kids can’t have the same excuse and I can never find a reason when I search online but people have to have studied it. They study everything, it was the first thing I learned when I left Yulia, and it made it easier to fit into the world because every little thing had been examined and the questions I had about people had already been answered.

Dima’s grumbling starts when I don’t move, and he doesn’t give any information to who the sick fucker is. I know he seeks them out online by posing as a child, his targets are personal. He gets to know them before killing them. That’s more fucked up than mine, it takes a real crazy person to invest their timeinfiltrating someone’s life and gaining their trust just to kill them.I just make sure their death hurts.

My body goes on alert as I get out of the car and follow him down the path to the front door. He doesn’t tell me to shut up or take out a knife, he does something stranger and takes keys out of his pocket to open the door. I turn rigid when he inputs the security code, and his body relaxes. The fucking asshole has brought me to his house. I don’t want to see him in his natural habitat or have him assume I’ll fuck him because of how I grew up. There are already murmurs from the lower guards about my ‘skill level’ and rage blinds me as I go to walk back out.This is the second time one of them has forced me into their shitty house. Last time I couldn’t remember how I got there but all of the stupidbrotherhoodcan fuck off before I ever fucking touch them.

Arms wrap around my chest and waist from behind and I’m picked up off my feet. He’s a dumb fuck, giving me enough space to kick back. His huge hand wraps around my jaw and he pushes his thumb against the joint with a threat. I’ve already lived through the pain of having it broken, it was easier a second time, and if he snaps it, I’ll be fine a third time. I rock to create momentum as I throw my head back and catch his chin, but he doesn’t slow down, the ginormous freak.He turns, ignoring my fight and tightens his hold on me as I grab the back of his head and aim my foot into his knee.

His voice is harsh and there’s no twisted satisfaction in it.

“Do it again and I’ll shoot you in the head.”

Technically, he’s asking me to. So, I pick my foot up and hold his neck tighter, but he grabs my thigh and throws me on the sofa. My bag is yanked off my back, forcing my shoulders to burn as I land on my stomach. I quickly jump up so he can’t get on top of me but he blocks the exit and kicks my bag away so I can’t get a knife. I can take him, or I’ll die and everything will be over.

He raises both hands before I can take a full step and speaks instead of grumbling.

“We’re going through the rules, calm the fuck down, you little hellion.”

Ugly cunt. I hate him for that name alone. I’m not little, I’m a grown up. Little is the equivalent of a curse in my head, little girls wearing little skirts. It’s all I fucking heard for years, and it will never be associated with me.

Dropping his voice, attempting to be soothing, he approaches me calmly like I’m a wild animal.

“Sit down, I’m not going to touch you.”

I move back with each step he takes to maintain the distance between us. My back touches the wall and he stops advancing, allowing the gap to remain. My eyes are itching with wearing my contacts for twenty hours and I blink to stop them drying out. He copies me and shakes his head before clenching his fists and spitting out house rules that won’t apply to me.

“You don’t leave or sneak off like you do at Stasya’s. Eat whatever you want just clean up after yourself, I’m not going to be your fucking maid. Don’t go in my room but you can use the rest of the house. Don’t touch any of my shit or bring any of your victims here.”

There’s no sick fantasies in his eyes as he looks me up and down, it’s revulsion and I relax. I can handle the disgust, it’s my base line.

“I’ll pick your things up in the morning, are they at Stasya’s?”

His question is dumb, I don’t have anything more than I can carry. If you weigh yourself down with possessions, it’s more things that can be taken from you. There’s only one thing I have that holds any value and it could fit in my palm.

I don’t need to be adopted into their weird ass family. I’m not like them, they all grew up together. They have shared memories or experiences but I’m an outcast. I have been since birth, andI’ll die the same. It’s not a burden to be alone when it’s the default setting of your existence. I force my muscles to go limp, which Dima takes as acceptance when I’m waiting him out.

He feigns being hospitable as he hands me my bag then leads me through the house to show me each room until we reach the bedrooms. He points at his door beside the only guest room set up with an air mattress.

“Don’t knock or even touch it. You can have this room or move shit yourself if you want one of the others.”

I give the room he’s showing me a cursory glance because I’m not staying while he lingers like a creep. He gives a grunt in parting, and he finally fucks off.

The room is nice, it’s all white and clean. Even the floor is soft, and I don’t touch the air mattress as I pass it on the way to the adjoining bathroom. If I let myself get used to comfortable things, I’ll miss them. There’s a lock on the bathroom door and I quickly slide it across before taking out my notebook and speaking to the only person who actually knows me.

I stop myself from saying more than the few lines I allot each day and tuck the loose sheet between the full pages before slamming it closed. The resets are what Yulia taught me when she needed me to listen. All I have to do is stop breathing and then my body will turn off. When I wake up, it will be back on again and I’ll be able to breathe properly.

The next part is the best part of my day, and I carefully take out the smiley face sticker. The color has faded despite me trying to protect it with tape and I move my lips, mimicking the gesture. It’s the only time I can do it without blood on my skin and there’s someone doing it back.Someone is smiling at meagain, finally. But I can’t waste all of the smiles and carefully put it in my bag, so it doesn’t get ruined.

My eyes sting and it doesn’t help when I take out the contacts. It’s like looking at a different person as I stand at the sink and look at the person staring back at me in the mirror. Some cultures believe eyes are portals, they show a person’s soul. With or without the brown film, mine are empty. The blue is cold, and Marlo isn’t in the mirror physically but he’s there in my head. I can hear him, and my shoulders come up to block my ears as I quickly look down so I can’t see them.

‘You’re wrong, look at them. You have evil in you.’

An erratic hum fills the air and I close my eyes as it gets louder. The urge to put my contacts back in sits in my fingers while my eyes burn in refusal. So, I convince the air around me to shut up.

“No one can see me, they don’t know.”

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