02. The Shadow Dancers (25 page)

Maybe Daddy didn't cry for her, and so she left for the streets. Or maybe she just didn't hear, or didn't go in. I knew I'd hesitated long and hard before doin' it. Was that it? Was the world, all the worlds, all the lives of all the people in them, like this? A single moment, a single decision in the heat of anger and emotion, a little thing

goin' one way and not the other . . . How much good and ad in anybody's life turns on moments like that, without even thinkin' 'bout them? Somebody too busy with their taxes to play with their kid, or lettin' the kid cry 'cause she had to
learn
-or maybe not lettin' the kid cry. Too proud to make up after a fight with your husband, or goin' back to a husband even though he keeps beatin' you. All that.

Sure, we both wound up in the same hole in the end, but think of all the good things and good times I had before then. She got the same shaft, but she never knew anything but.

She couldn't stay long, and seemed almost apologetic about the whole thing, but she took the tray and left the room and made sure that door was locked. After a while, it got dark again, but I didn't bother to turn on no lights. What was the use when I couldn't even clearly see the bottom of the bed from the top of it? She left the little plastic cup, and I couldn't believe how thirsty I was. Drink four or five cupfuls, then pee about fifteen minutes or three songs later, then drink more.

I checked my chain and nearly burned myself, but it was real clear that the other end was welded on to that radiator. Short of a welder's torch or a hacksaw and a lot of time, I wasn't gonna break it easy. I went over to the window; the blinkin' lights from the Purple Pussycat signs gave off real pretty patterns and constantly changed the look inside the room. I thought the windows themselves were frosted over from the cold outside and the heat within, but with my eyes I couldn't be sure. With luck I might break the glass but I'd never get them bars out-they was sunk in concrete sills. All I'd do was wind up freezin' my ass off when it already was uneven in the room and if I caught anybody's attention at all down there it would probably be the wrong folks. If I had my glasses and a lockpick I might have been able to pick the lock on the leg shackle, but probably not.

Later on, Brandy Two came again, this time with what seemed to be a coldcut sub, a piece of chocolate cake, and two opened bottles of beer. I found I was real hungry now, and it went down just fine. I coulda used cigarettes, though, but she told me they was not allowed. Too much danger in givin' me a fire. They didn't even give me silverware, and the beer bottles turned out to be clear plastic and fairly soft.

I could smell her perfumes and tell she was real made up and all now, and she had on her show outfit, which wouldn't last on her long, and her heels. The early show.

"Cain't talk now but I be back lata on," she promised. I listened to the show as I chugged the bottle.

It was late when she came back, but we talked for a little bit. Not about us, though; I don't think either of us was ready for that yet. They had to blame somebody for the breach so they blamed Deb; she was bein' shipped someplace out of state. Word was she'd be lucky if they didn't kill her just to make an example out of her.

She was probably too well known locally for that, I tried to tell myself, feelin' guilty about it. If she turned up dead there might be eyes turned this way that couldn't be bought so easily.

I was also right about Brandy Two. She-we-didn't exist in this world. She'd been in a string in a Camden that sounded frighteningly close to my old world when some mob men had come for her. They drugged her and she woke up a prisoner in an awful place that sounded a lot like Vogel's estate. There they both hooked and conditioned her, but then she was brought down here and kept for a long while at the country estate in what I thought of as central Pennsylvania. They didn't hypnoscan and made no attempt to brief her or rehearse her to be me, which was another thing that didn't make sense. Then she was brought down here and with her larger size and distinctive looks she was rehearsed and worked into the show act. It wasn't a whole lot more information than I had before.

Then, late in the evening, she gave me the second shot. If anything, it was better than before and seemed longer and it also seemed slower coming down. The dizziness was worse and I had diarrhea bad, but that was all.

From Brandy Two I also learned about the life of a shadow dancer. She had not heard the term but liked it. You always felt a little high and a little turned on and mostly great, but during the coming down period you was
suggestible,
at least that's how I see it. A new shot of juice in under twenty to twenty-four hours had no real effect. It was like injecting distilled water. Withdrawal, for Brandy Two, started at thirty hours and got worse and worse. By forty hours she would be in hell. That's how they "conditioned" you. They let you go into withdrawal, then told you what you had to do and gave it to you. When you woke up in that
mellow, suggestible time they reminded you of what was expected. They didn't need to do this too much, 'cause while the juice wasn't smart or nothin' it kinda pushed you to do whatever it took to keep gettin' a new supply as needed. No matter how crazy or against your nature it was, it became just like normal to you in no time.

I thought 'bout Donna bein' forced to go through that barracks, day after day. Them patterns was damned hard to break.

After the third day they didn't give me a regular shot. They waited to see if withdrawal would come on. On the fourth day, it did. In its early stages it was almost as bad as heroin withdrawal; you got real sick, bad sick-upchuckin', the runs, hot and cold spells, everything at once. I was hooked and I knew it.

Fast Eddie Small was blunt about it. "Until they decide when or if they're gonna use you and for what you're stuck here," he told me. "Until your hair grows out enough to get styled decent, you'll have to wear a wig. Wear it any time, all the time, you ain't in these rooms. Brandy'll get you all the right jewelry, cosmetics, perfumes, powders, and like that. Use what she don't. You
never
leave here without ‘em on and on right. You want to work into the act, fine. You don't, then you go down after wearin' nothin' more than the girls do at the end-and nothin' less-and you get customers. Two a night minimum, twenty-five minimum a trick. If you don't have enough in the club, then you go out and get 'em. They pay the barmaid, satisfaction guaranteed, get it?"

"Yeah, I get it," I replied, wishin' I could rip his guts out. "You mean I got to work the streets in nothin' but shoes with it twenty degrees out there?"

"Naw, I got heart. A big heart." One of the girls- Lambda, I think, the blonde-went when he snapped his fingers and brought back absolutely the most
gorgeous, sumptuous
fur coat I ever seen. It was gray, but otherwise close to the coats the girls were wearin' when I made my fatal bump into them. It was silver fox, mink lined, and it had a belt around its middle and two deep pockets inside. "You wear this and you take care of it. If it needs repairs or cleanin' you tell the barmaid. Now, you get this straight. You want more of a wardrobe, you
earn
it by goin' over
your quota. You don't handle money,
never.
You want somethin', you come see me or one of my people and you convince us you're worth it. One way is to follow all our rules. You all got the same rules. You follow them and you'll learn fast enough. You break the rules, any of 'em, or you see one of the other girls breakin' the rules, and you get real hell."

He was really enjoyin' this. It was a real turn-on for him. I hated his stinkin' guts. The only thing worse than big Hitlers was little Hitlers.

I was unchained, unlocked, and left on my own. I didn't know if there was any guards around, but I never saw none. He didn't need 'em. Brandy took me under her wing, though. "Can't call you no Brandy, too. Both of us'll go nuts," she noted.

"That's okay, just call me Beth. I kinda feel like I come full circle on this case now anyways." And that's the way we agreed it would be.

In a way, it was worse, 'cause now I was the property of
two
masters, one allegedly human, the other inside me. I found out what that was like real quick. First, my sniffles, which I'd had since God knew when, just went away, as did all of my old sinus problems, but that was only the tip of it. You sure followed a routine, like it or not.

When you was supposed to eat, you got hungry-and I mean
hungry.
It became an overpowering urge, the only thing you could think of till you ate, but it was a little specific. You got more irresistible and otherwise repulsive cravin's than a pregnant woman. Pumpkin washed down with pickle juice. Raw hamburger with chocolate sauce. Steamed fish a la mode. Now, it wasn't always that way, but it often was, particularly the first few weeks. The other girls swore to me that it stopped after a while and only popped up after that occasionally, but until then I could tell one of the bar staff what I wanted and they'd hold their nose and go get it. I had to fix it myself, though, in a neat but antique kitchen they had. And when you wasn't hungry, you couldn't even look at anything at all.

The upstairs of the club went over into the row house next door, I found. Even after workin' there I hadn't knowed that before. They was kinda like dorm rooms, but
each one had a double bed, small closet, a switched speaker that would bring the bar music in with volume control, and some fancy lights. There was two bathrooms with both tub and shower on each floor, one attach end. The sheets were pink, purple, or crimson satin with down comforters. We was all responsible for keepin' our rooms absolutely clean and neat and perfect, and either Eddie or one of his boys could pop in at any time to inspect them like some Army sergeant. All of us was responsible for keepin' up the inside of the house, includin' scrubbin' halls and common areas, vacuumin' with real antique-style cleaners, kitchen, bathrooms, and the rest.

On the top floor was a room that was somethin' of a gym, with weights, exercise machines, and all the rest.
That
was 'cause this
thing
inside us wanted a perfect house to live in, which was us, so just like the meals you got these-well, not urges, really, more like
compulsions.
To run, to lift weights, exercise every part of your body you could every day. It wasn't easy at the start, but when you did what this thing wanted you got little pleasure jolts; when you didn't, you got misery. You did it.

Likewise, I no longer wanted cigarettes. Couldn't stand to have one in my mouth, though it didn't bother me none to be in a smoke-filled bar. You could drink, but the more you drank the more you went to the bathroom and you never got drunk or even tipsy.

And when it decided you was to have sex, you got so tense and worked up that nothin' else mattered. You
had
to have it. Male, female, horse-I don't think it mattered none. Only the knowledge that you had to turn two tricks to get the juice kept your mind in the act.

Of course, I was still a naughty and disobedient girl at the start with anything this shit inside didn't force me to dp, like Fast Eddie's rules, but they took me down a few pegs in a hurry. They let you go real deep into withdrawal, just to the edge of where it might really start causin' brain or nervous system damage, then they'd stand there and keep insistin' that you repeat all the rules and swear to obey 'em. There was no way you couldn't. The sickness was bad enough and got worse and worse and you knew it could never get no better but that you could be all well and feelin'
great in just a minute or so if you swore on your mother's grave to obey, and then that thing would start pushin' the pain button in your head slowly down, more and more, till you couldn't stand it no more.

You didn't get that far but once.

They reinforced it when you came out of the pure pleasure high and loved the world by havin' somebody there whisperin' all the rules and havin' you repeat 'em and swear to act just that way. One day you just wake up, and doin' everything
their
way is the most normal and natural thing in the whole world. You know it's not the way you used to do it or think about it and not the way other folks do, but it's the norm for you and you do it automatically. It wasn't like no hypnosis or conditioning they could change the rules any old time and that would be the new normal thing.

Turnin' two tricks in Atlantic City deep in winter wasn't always possible no matter what the decrees. There was snowstorms and power outages and bad rain and ice storms, and not many people. Christmas through New Year's was great, though, with lots of parties and winter getaway specials and the like, although it was real depressin' for us to see the Christmas lights and displays and people shoppin' and feel isolated, alone, and left out.

By "us" I mean Brandy two and me. The other girls, they didn't seem none too touched by Christmas or much else. They didn't seem to remember no past at all, no growin' up, nothin' but bein' what they were. Even with the never-ending compulsions there was time, and thinkin' was still there, and memory, too, good as old. My eyesight gradually improved to where I could see pretty good from a distance and close up was blurry. It was much better for gettin' around, but it was hell to read anything like a book. To Brandy, the idea that anybody'd read books for fun was near impossible for her to her in her head. As I suspected, her own readin' was on the Dick and Jane level.

After New Year's they moved us up to New York, which was a surprise, to a club in the Manhattan entertainment district where almost anything went so long as you gave the customer value for his money and didn't roll or stiff him. The district's boundaries were pretty clear but unwritten; the law and the adult entertainment district kept their ends up. Outside the district,
wham]
Inside-well, just keep it there. Of course, it wasn't immune from things like robbery, murder, rollin', and hard drug sellin', but the fact was it was pretty well self-policed and while there was drugs aplenty there was no big scorin' to be done there. You did that uptown in Harlem or over in The Bronx.