Little Peach (8 page)

“That hurt?” I shake my head no.

“Good. Lie down.”

She pushes my knees apart and looks between my legs. Devon types into his phone, a toothpick in his mouth. I fix my eyes on the ceiling, wishing she’d stop or I could just disappear. I don’t want him to see me like this. I don’t want her looking at my body.

“Anything hurt?”

I shake my head no. She lifts an eyebrow.

“You sure?”

I nod.

From her suitcase she pulls out a small plastic bag. Inside is something that looks like a bracelet, but soft and wet.

“I’m gonna put this inside you. Like a tampon. After three weeks, take it out and you’ll get your period. Understand? I’ll bring a new one every month. If you feel sick, or if you don’t bleed when you should, tell your daddy and he’ll call me. Deep breath.”

Fingers. Hold still. Where’s Baby?

“You know how to put on a condom?”

I shake my head no. Kat tried to show me last night, but I wouldn’t look.

“A’ight. Well, you gotta learn. Kat’ll teach you. Always use one, so you won’t catch nothin’. Understand? Tricks hate ’em, but too damn bad. They wanna freestyle, they can drive themselves down to the track. All done. Sit up. Take this.”

I swallow another half a pill and wait for the warmth.

Devon smiles. “All good?”

“All good,” she says, and grips his hand, their chests touching as Devon brings her in for a hug.

“Queen Bee,” he says with shining eyes.

He’s not wearing a shirt. On the left side of his broad chest is a red star. “Kat needs a re-up on Oxy.”

“A’ight.”

“C’mon,” he says to me. “Ink’s waitin’.”

I lie on the couch, the man’s sweaty face just inches from my chest, the buzzing needle tight between his fingers. It digs into my skin, burrowing like an insect.
Buzz, buzz
. Stop. Wipe.
Buzz, buzz
. Stop. Wipe. Dip.
Buzz. Buzz
.

Flecks of blood hit my cheeks.

“Damn, yo. This girl can bleed. She get high last night?”

Devon shrugs.

The man looks annoyed. “Can’t hardly see what the fuck I’m doin’ here.” Wipe, wipe.
Buzz. Buzz
. “Fuck. Don’t get ’em high before you call me, D. They be bleedin’ all over my shit.”

There are four locks on the door. Four bolts, one that needs a key.

Devon flips on the stereo. Music thunders in the room. He opens my book bag, searches it, pulls out my school ID, and slips it in his back pocket.

Baby peeks over the shoulder of the man tattooing me.

“Aww,” she says, and her forehead scrunches up.

“Show her yours,” Devon says. Baby pulls down her white tank top.

There is a red heart. And underneath, in dark, flowing letters it says, “Devon’s Baby.”

Devon looks at Kat. She stands up, rolls her eyes, and pulls down her shirt.

There is a black paw print. Devon’s Cat.

Mine will be a peach.

Devon’s Peach.

Buzz buzz buzz
. Stop.

The ink shoots into my skin, but it’s like he’s draining me. With each sting, I feel less and less. Like the morning after Reek. Like last night at the Litehouse. A little more of me, leaking on the floor, on bedsheets, on this table, till I am empty as a vacant house. My roof is caving in.

There are four locks on the door. Keeping me inside. Keeping out the world.

Devon comes over and gathers my face in his hands, his eyes bubbling with pride. “You a good girl, Peach. You one of us. You get to work, you make your money, and you got a life.”

A kiss on my forehead. I fill up a little. I smile.

Devon cranks the music.

Kat holds my gaze for a moment, then fixes her shirt, turns, and begins to dance.

Devon unlocks the front door.

“You must be hungry,” he says, pulling twenty dollars from a fat roll of money in his hand. “Go get us some dinner. You and Kat. You like Chinese?”

I stare at the door. It’s wide open.

“Go ’head.” He types into his phone, nods at Kat.
“Boost’ll meet you there.”

Down the humid stairs, through the heavy metal door, into the parking lot. Two guys linger out front, one in a red hat, the other in a sleeveless red basketball jersey. Across to 27th Street, make a left onto Mermaid Avenue.

Follow Kat. She takes big steps, her shoulders back like,
Bring it
. Up ahead there’s a line of stores. An old woman shuffles past, pushing a cart stuffed with laundry. We pass a guy on the sidewalk. He’s tall, with thick arms and clean red sneakers. He nods at Kat, who lowers her head. Then he traces me with his eyes. I put my head down, too, and hurry behind her.

We stop at the Chinese takeout. Two guys linger beneath a dirty yellow sign that says
HAPPY DRAGON
. The taller one, with black shorts and a red jersey, steps toward us. “Kitty Kat,” he says, slapping her hand.

“’Sup, Boost,” she says, arching her back a little. I remember him from last night. He was in the parking lot, howling with Devon and the others.

He steps toward me and pulls down the front of my shirt. The tattoo is slathered in Vaseline. Kat shoots me a look that says
let him see
, so I do. I do what she tells me.
I do what Devon says. I let them tattoo me. He looked so proud.

Boost leans closer and squints. “That an apple?”

Kat takes my hand. “It’s a peach,” she says. “C’mon.”

Inside, a blurry man stands behind the thick plastic window that runs the length of the small room. It’s splattered with grease and scratch marks, a stained menu taped to the front. The air hisses with steam and heat. The tile floor is stained and gritty. I don’t know what to get, so Kat orders me the same as her. Shrimp fried rice. Devon likes lo mein. Baby likes sweet and sour chicken. A pint of each, slide the money through the small square opening.

Outside again, past Boost, down Mermaid Avenue. A siren wails behind us. The same old woman is pushing her laundry, the wheels squeaking creepily, her head bundled in a white scarf.

Through the heavy metal doors, past the boys outside. Up the stairs.

Our footsteps echo. Kat speaks softly. “Remember, they all wear red. Understand? The tattoo, it tells them you belong here.”

Night.

Room 5.

I take the pill and drink the juice and wait for the warmth to swallow me. Kat takes hers, too, and we sit together on the edge of the bed. Waiting.

“Where do they come from?” I ask.

“Who?”

“The men.”

“The tricks?”

“Yeah. How do they know where to find us?”

Kat stands, checks herself in the long mirror by the door. Dark-blue jeans like tights, ankle-high boots, a white shimmery top draped across one shoulder. She arches her back, like she’s practicing. “Online mostly. Daddy sets it up. That’s why he always checkin’ his phone.”

“How much do they pay?”

“Depends. Daddy takes care of the money. Why you askin’ so many questions?”

I’m starting to feel warm. “Sorry,” I say, and I laugh a little though I’m not sure why. “But we’re saving, right? He said we’re saving money, so we can go somewhere better. All of us.”

She shrugs.

“We’re gonna save up, right? So we don’t gotta do this?”

I picture a big house with grass and food inside.

“Where will we go?”

But Kat doesn’t answer. A shadow falls across her face, sits on her shoulders. They sag.

My eyes are dissolving. The room gets soft, my blood all cozy in my veins.

Knock knock
.

Kat draws a smile on her face. Her skirt flips all happy-like as she opens the door.

“Hey, sweetie,” she purrs, and trails her long fingers down his shirt.

There is a man, a white skinny man with baggy light-blue jeans and a bony face that looks like it might cave in. Behind him in the darkness on the gravel by the road, in this place called Coney Island, with its fake moon, are Devon, Boost, Reek, and the others. One of them barks into the night. The others answer.

You see me, Mama? You see me, Calvin? Here I am, circled by guys who want me to be here. Devon wants
me here. He put his name on me.

Try to touch me now. I dare you.

“What’s wrong with her? She don’t do nothin’.”

The trick lies on top of me, pressing me into the saggy mattress.

We are naked. I can feel him down there. I don’t look. I don’t move. Just hurry up, please, and get off me.

His hands grab at me. His sticky skin clings to me like we’re glued together. He kisses, licks my face, wiggles around. The pillows smell like smoke and a thousand sweaty men. His breath is rotten and hot.

Shove. Shove. Shove.

It burns so bad between my legs. It hasn’t stopped, not since three days ago when I had sex with Reek. Hold still. Just hold still and he’ll finish.

“Oh, c’mon. You gotta be kidding me.”

Kat lies next to us, strokes his sweaty back, and glares at me. “She’s just new, baby. She learnin’. C’mere. I’ll take care of you.”

The man peels himself off me and I roll onto my belly, smushing my face into the pillow. My tattoo is raw against the scratchy sheets, still scabby like a wound.

“I ain’t payin’ for that,” he snaps, climbing onto Kat. “I didn’t come here to be no teacher.” And then he’s moving fast on her, her legs up around his back, her mouth saying words—embarrassing words that make me want to hide.

Harder
.

You like that?

“Yeah, girl,” the tricks yells out. I close my eyes, but Kat’s sharp elbow hits me.

Sit up. Pay attention
. Her mouth keeps talking to him, but her eyes lock with mine and I can see deep inside them, to the tiny corner where maybe she can curl up like I wish I could, away from him. Away from what he’s doing to her.

I watch them, Kat pinned beneath the man’s pink bony body, and pull the sheet over my own.

“You can’t do that again,” Kat commands once he’s gone. “You gotta learn to act the part. Word gets back to Daddy that you ain’t doin’ shit, he gonna come down on both of us. Take another half a pill if you need to. Whatever. Just quit actin’ so sad. Tricks, they want happy. They want girls that smile and know what they
doin’. Understand? That’s how we get paid.”

I swallow another half. It fixes me right up so I’m not too scared. Like Kat. I gotta be like Kat.

“He was nasty,” I say. I don’t want him shoving himself into me.

“Yeah, he is. He don’t know what he doin’, neither. But it don’t matter. You gotta pretend, Peach. You wanna get outta here? Then you gotta work. You ain’t gotta like it. You just gotta act like you do. Think I like doin’ this?” Kat pulls her shirt on, kicks the side of the bed with her bare foot. “I hate it. But they don’t ever know that. Far as they can tell, seein’ them is the best damn part of my night. That’s how we do, Peach. That’s how
you
gotta do if you wanna survive.”

Kat’s smart. I’ll try to do what she tells me.

“Okay,” I say.

And when next trick comes, I smile really big. So big that Kat laughs. The trick looks at me like I’m crazy, then at Kat.

“Guess she happy to see you.” Kat grins. And he smiles at us too.

He turns me on my stomach. I wince. It burns, but not as bad as it did before. I clench my eyes shut and
count in my head.

One. Two. Three. Four.

He keeps going. I try to say the words that Kat would say.

“That’s good,” I mumble at the pillow.

Five. Six. Seven.

I’m gonna be sick. I look at Kat.

Eight. Nine.

She looks at me.

Ten.

Throw-up fills my mouth. I spit onto the pillow. More of me, leaking out.

Eleven. Twelve.

“Stop, yo. She’s sick,” Kat says. But he doesn’t.

Thirteen. Fourteen. Fifteen.

On and on, the counting drones till I’m slimy with his stink and sweat, my mouth nasty from puke. Even my blood is filthy.

Twenty-seven. Twenty-eight. Twenty-nine.

Kat shakes her head, her lips tight and angry.

Finally, finally, he’s done with me. I don’t move. I am pounded flat. Once he leaves, Kat covers me with a sheet and hands me a cold, limp washcloth.

“Wipe your face,” she tells me, then goes to the door and yells for Devon, but Boost and Reek show up instead.

Reek. He doesn’t even look at me.

“That trick ain’t right,” Kat says, her chin pointed up at Boost, who towers over her.

“What he do?” he asks. “He hit her?”

“Nah. He’s just . . . rough.”

Boost shrugs. “It’s a rough game.” Kat rolls her eyes. Then Baby walks in.

I sit up and cover myself with the sheet. “Hey,” I say to her, forcing a smile.

She wrinkles her nose. “You don’t look so good. It stinks in here.”

“I’m okay,” I lie. I don’t want her to be scared. I try to stand up, but I fall back on the bed. It creaks beneath me like it’s sore.

“C’mon.” She smiles, and puts her hand on my bare shoulder. “Let’s go home.”

Then Devon is here, kneeling in front of me. “You good?” he asks, his voice soft like a pillow. I nod.

“Good girl. C’mon. We done for the night anyway.”

We drive home at four a.m. Baby falls asleep in the car, her head leaning heavily on my shoulder. My eyes droop, too, the Ferris wheel turning in the foggy distance. I need to sleep.

Kat showers first. Then it’s Baby’s turn, but she’s already in bed on her stomach, her mouth open, snoring softly, her hand in a fist by her face. I try to wake her, but she won’t budge, so I cover her instead.

Devon brushes his teeth, spits in the sink, rinses thoroughly. He kisses my forehead and goes to bed with Kat.

I climb beneath the hot water. It singes the peach on my chest like a wet flame. I plunge into the heat and let it burn me away until I’m clean.

I wake up at four p.m., hungry and fuzzy and cold. Baby’s still asleep. There’s a towel tacked across our window. Daylight leaks around the edges.

There’s not much in the kitchen: a bag of Doritos, leftover Chinese food, a bottle of Coke. Kat’s on the couch watching TV. She looks different without makeup. Soft and cozy in Devon’s big sweatpants and T-shirt. She doesn’t talk to me, so I sit on the other end
and eat the rice cold from the container. She flips channels and sighs like she’s bored. Or annoyed.