The Seventh Sin | Wattys2016

☩ Chapter One ☩

Sometimes I dream of being normal, good even, but it's places like this when I remember I am not.

The scent of booze, cigarettes, and lust makes my senses sharpen. I thrive off of this: the scent of human misery. Just beyond that, if I focus hard enough, I can smell the country where cows graze peacefully and grass grows up to my knees and sun shines on green fields.

But this is the city, and this is where I belong.

My heels clack over the asphalt with a reassuring click. They are deep red with a pointed stiletto heel, just the thing I need to remind me of what I am. The cool night does not bother my bare arms, and neither does the short length of my dress. This is what I'm meant to be.

The bouncer to the night club, Seven Sins, is leaning in front of a red velvet rope. A cigarette hangs between his lips and smoke curls off the glowing end.

I walk up to him, passing the others in line. They yell at me and cuss, but when I shoot them a glare with my strange eyes they quiet and back off. I would expect nothing less.

"Hey there, little lady, why don't you move yourself to the end of the line?"

I pass a cool gaze over the bouncer. He's relatively young, maybe around mid twenties, and obviously new if he didn't recognize me. Tattoos curl around his biceps in intricate tribal patterns, and a scar makes his upper lip snag upwards at the end.

I smile at him, and he gets a dazed look on his face, like he won the lottery or is drunk. I pluck the cigarette from between his lips and put it between my own.

"How about you be a good boy and let me in," I suggest quietly to him.

I exhale a cloud of clove smoke into his face and he blinks slowly like a dumb cow. He nods in agreement.

"Alright," he agrees, and he pulls back the rope to let me pass.

I flash him a smile and hand him the cigarette back.

"You're a doll," I say, winking and patting his arm.

Seven Sins is the most exclusive club in New York City. Alcohol is served with shaved gold, and designer clothes are about as easy to find as leaves are in a forest.

Inside the club, my senses sharpen even more. Lust, gluttony, greed and sloth hang heavy in the air. It wafts off everyone in thick, pungent clouds.

I revel in it.

White leather couches line a wall, with couples doing a little more than kissing on them. A guy slides his hands up a girl's silver dress, and lust rises off him in a scarlet red haze.

The opposing wall is decorated with everything from the finest chocolate spilling out of a fountain to hamburgers and cake. The food is limitless; I even see a pig with an apple in its mouth, peacock feathers decorating it like some kind of absurd mutant.

A staircase sweeps up to the second floor, each step inlaid with diamonds and gold. I follow it.

Slaves hustle up and down the stairs, wearing the required uniform: black slacks, a pair of intricate steel shackles, and a steel collar. One girl, no older than thirteen, is feeding grapes to a man while another girl massages his feet.

The second story is a long hallway with doors leading off of it. They are bedrooms for the lazy and the lustful. I can feel the sin seeping out under the door cracks and into my pores. At the end of the hallway there is a white door.

I walk up to it and place a hand on the handle. Boss is tacked on in gold cursive lettering.

I open the door. A man sits behind a dark desk, hands folded behind his head and a lazy smile on his face. The Boss.