We’re all quiet as her words sink in.
* * *
Bela
We spend the rest of the day going back and forth from our nooks to the closets across the room, collecting linens and quilts. We take bolts of colorful fabric, sweet-smelling wax candles, rugs, and whatever decorative things we come across that might make our new spaces a little more comfortable.
After doing all we could for our rooms, we pillage the closets for clothing. Most are garish or too revealing for my tastes. Surprisingly enough, I was still able to find a few more functional outfits in my size, including a couple of the scrub-like sets we were given on the madame’s ship.
At the end of the day, Nita and I have ourselves a cozy living space. Skylar, on the other hand, has barely done more than find some sheets and a soft blanket for her bed.
“Don’t you want to decorate?” I sit beside her on the edge of the pallet. As soon as the words are out of my mouth, I wish I could take them back, and I’m rewarded with a surly look that can only be truly pulled off by a teenager.
“Why would I want to decorate?” she snaps at me. “I don’t want tobe here!I want my old room, my old bed, my old clothes and my glasses.”
“I know,” I sigh. “I just thought it might help make things a little nicer, a little more comfortable while we’re here.”
“You say that like we have a chance of leaving.” She turns to face me, and I can’t help but wince at her hopeful expression.
Shit. I don’t want to give her false hope, because the truth of our situation is this is it. This is our life now.
“I’m so sorry, Skylar.” I put my arm around her tense shoulders and draw her against my side. I can’t just dash all of her hope, either. Because I haven’t given up yet. Not completely. A part of me is still hoping for a miracle. A way to somehow escape. “I’m just trying to make the best of a really shitty situation.”
“I don’t want to be here,” she sniffs, resting her head on my shoulder. “I don’t want to …do itwith an alien.”
God, neither do I!
“I’m supposed to wait until I’m married. What man will ever want me if… if…”
She starts sobbing, and I pull her against me, holding her and rubbing slow circles into her back.
“Hey, first of all, you are so much more than just your virginity,” I tell her sternly. “Only men think it’s some kind of magical portal to heaven, but we know better.”
“We do?” Skylar looks up at me with wide eyes.
“Hell yeah, we do. Sex is all about feeling good, and losing your virginity isn’t usually something that feels good, so men turned it into some special thing to makethemfeel better about it. You don’t even need a man; my best friend used her hairbrush.”
Skylar’s mouth drops open, but then she giggles. “Do I even want to know?”
“Probably not,” I whisper, nudging her shoulder. “What I’m trying to say isyoucan be in control of your pleasure. No one else, not your parents, not your church, have any say in what you choose to do with your body. Have you ever touched yourself?”
“What?No!That’s sinful!” However, the way she averts her eyes makes me think she’s not quite so pure as she’d like me to believe.
“It’s not. It’s perfectly normal.” When I look over at her, Skylar’s cheeks are bright red, but she’s listening. “It’s good to know your body. To know what feels good and what doesn’t.”
She nods but keeps her eyes locked on her hands, which are clenched in her lap.
“I’m not about to just accept any of this either,” I assure her. “If there is a way to get out of this, you bet your ass I’m going to do everything I can to get all of us out of here. At least I was able to buy you some time, just in case.”
* * *
It’s quiet.
Cybele and Elara disappeared into their rooms hours ago to get some sleep before their shifts, leaving Nita, Skylar and myself to entertain ourselves.
I’m sitting with Skylar in the recessed lounge, and we’re scrolling through one of the tablets when the door swings open, startling us. Instead of the madame or the surly green woman, this woman is tall and lithe, and her skin is the color of chalk with bioluminescent stripes that run across the sides of her face and down her arms and glow electric blue. Large golden eyes that remind me of a lion’s focus on us, and her blue lips part in surprise.
“Ynez,” Cybele calls out to her from the doorway of her alcove. She’s dressed in a gauzy robe with nothing underneath it. “These are the new girls.”
