Page 8 of Warrior

His parents are absent, but the lingering smell of cigarette smoke hints that they’re not far.

He’s already shirtless, and I can’t decide if it was restlessness that made him preemptively strip it off or eagerness. His fingers curl into his palms and release, over and over.

This isn’t the first time we’ve met.

Not the second either.

The guard pricks my skin with that devilish drug. The one that begs me to beg for touch. The need of it crawls along myskin, waiting for any sensation to satiate it. Pain, pleasure, I’m starting to think it doesn’t matter.

He leaves, too, and we’re alone for the first time.

After all of this, after feeling him fumble his way into me, learning the curves and planes of my body like memorizing a roadmap, I still don’t know his name.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers.

I shake my head, because I don’t know what he’s sorry for. Being here? Being shirtless? Choosing me again?

Truly, I don’t know if he’s ever gone with another girl. I don’t know how often he comes—I just know that sometimes I walk into a room and he’s waiting, and other times it’s scarier, bigger monsters.

The numbness I cling to is being replaced by desire, and I run my hands along my hips.

“What is it today?” I force the words out.

I do not usually talk, not to him or anyone else. There was just that first time, asking whose permission he received to touch me. And the punishment that followed after…

Well, I decided not talking was safer.

There’s a camera in the upper corner of the room. There are probably more than that, but it’s the obvious one. The one that sometimes draws my attention, no matter what room I’m in. It’s all the same anyway.

He hesitates, then steps forward.

I let him because I have to, watching warily as he plucks at the ties of my lingerie. It comes apart easily, the strings unraveling from around my hips and between my legs. They pool around my feet, but I don’t step out or away.

His fingers drag along my hip.

I’ve lost weight. I’ve lost track of time, too. My skin is paler than it’s ever been, because I cannot remember the last time I’ve seen the sun.

Even that touch, the soft pads of his fingers, aches.

His body is scrawny, but it’s easy to see the changes in just a few weeks. The definition of muscles on his upper arms, even when he’s not flexing. A hint of abdominal muscles. He’s already lost the baby fat from his face, his square jaw sharp and green eyes examining.

Apologizing?

It’s in my imagination.

He just touches my hip, sweeping his fingers back and forth, until goosebumps break out across my stomach.

“Why did you pierce one nipple?” he asks under his breath.

“I didn’t.” My gaze falls to the brassiere that’s more underwire than anything else. The cup is sheer fabric, doing nothing to hide my pebbled nipples and the silver hoop through the one. “It marks us as property, I think.”

I don’t know why they do it.

Maybe it’s to track us? Or just humiliate us?

His warm breath touches my shoulder. I’ve come to realize that they’re using me to teach him how to be a man, and I hate it more every time I’m put into a room with him. It’s been different each time, his technique altering.

Sometimes too rough, sometimes too gentle.

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