I shook my head. “No.”
“I give you exam.” He pushed my shoulder until I was laying, hesitant and unsure. I tried not to pull away or fight him as he lowered the front of my dress and prodded my breasts, or lifted the fabric and nudged open my legs. He felt around, and though one spot stung a little, it didn’t feel too bad.
“You are good,” he said.
He listened to my heart and did all the checks: throat, eyes, nose, and ears before turning and grasping a syringe. I shrunk back.
“You get shot. Every three month. No baby.”
At first I thought he was telling me not to be a baby, but then I realized he was talking about a birth control shot.
Birth control. Because I’d be having unprotected sex with strange men. My stomach rolled and I fought a bout of nausea. This was really happening. It all came crashing down at that moment and I clutched the edge of the examination table. If I let myself imagine the possible things to come, I would be snowed under by fear and panic. I had to breathe and take everything one moment at a time.
As much as I hated to let them have this kind of control over my body, I really didn’t want to get knocked up by some rapist sleezeball either. So I stayed still when he injected my arm. Then he took two vials of my blood.
When he was done, Luis was nice enough to take me by the other arm to lead me through the house. We ended up in a rectangular dining room with workers bustling around to set the two long parallel tables. A large gap was between the tables with an oriental rug, almost like a staged area. Luis stopped me.
“This es your Master’s seat, yes?” He pointed to the chair at the end of the table. “You stay on your knees and you don’t leave his side.” I nodded and he kept going. “You don’t speak. You do nothing unless he say. Understand?”
“Yes.” But I felt jittery. What would happen if I messed up?
“Lunch es soon,” he said. “You stay here.”
He led me to the wall behind us, which I hadn’t seen when we first came in. It had a line of ten lightweight chains attached to the wall. Luis motioned me to my knees, and then to my horror pulled one of the chains and attached it to the collar around my neck. I reached up instinctively and grasped his wrist as he was securing it.
“It won’t hurt,” he said, securing the collar lock with a key.
I sucked in a breath, and reached up to feel how tight it was. I could push my fingers between the leather and my neck—snug, but not strangling. Still, this wasn’t safe. What if there was a fire or something? I almost laughed at myself and my stupid thoughts about safety. As if anything in the entire place was “safe.”
“Hands down,” Luis said. I dropped my hands to my thighs.
Two of the worker women glanced at me, then whispered to one another, making me self-conscious. I couldn’t believe I’d be sitting there, chained like a dog as people came in to eat. I swallowed another lump in my throat.
“Put on the mask,” Luis said.
I’d been holding the mask this whole time. I brought it to my eyes and tied the ribbons behind my head. Being partially hidden brought me a measure of comfort as people began filing in, chatting and laughing as if a chained woman against the wall was okay. I kept my head down, kneeling in the position Luis showed me. After a few minutes I felt a warm, dry hand against the back of my neck and the clinking of a key unlocking my collar.
In a low voice Marco said to me, “You will crawl by my side and remain there silently the duration of the meal. Do not meet the eyes of my patrons. Try to relax and enjoy the entertainment.”
Crawl? I hesitated for one moment as he walked to the table, then I followed behind him on my hands and knees, feeling the eyes of the people around him as their conversations hushed. I knelt at his side with my head down.
“Una nueva chica?” asked a man with a deep voice. A new girl?
“Sí, sí,” answered Marco, sounding almost bored as he spoke in Spanish. “It was time. I’m still breaking her.”
“Is she very green?” the man asked. He seemed too excited about the prospect.
“Sí,” Marco answered. “Muy verde.”
“A virgin?”
“No.” Marco sighed, though I couldn’t get a read on his mood. It was beyond disconcerting to have two men talking about my sexuality in front of me, so crudely, and not be allowed to say a word.