My Dark One

Chapter 1: True Succession

As I pull the cigarette from my lips and blow out smoke, I think of my life. I had everything. Two loving parents with jobs to support a family. A mother who cared and loved her husband and children. A father who would show love to his wife and k-ids, play with them as a father should. A brother who, was a pain in the ass but loved his family with all his heart. A home on the best street in the city, white pick-it fences and all. But so easily how that was stripped away be one action. A dark action.

One can make many decisions; whether it be a good decision or a bad one is up to the person with the offer. It's never the person making the offer. You would think it would be, but how if the person offering is giving the other a choice?

My father had a choice. My mother had a choice. And they both picked wrong.

How that perfect life was taken within days, weeks, with one decision that would, not could change, everything. Would change my whole life forever.

Some would say, 'sometimes that's the life God chose for us.' choosing a higher power over the power of human will, human want, and human desire. These very human ability's shape how that choice is a fate way worse than death.

How can you have a fate worse than death when you are dead yourself?

I drop the cigarette on the ground and stomp on it. The streets on this part of the city are filled with them. They should be. After all, we are in the worst part. The hood is what people with money and power would call it. If only they knew how their money and power was made from these streets and not by their fake, ridiculous, scam of businesses they call 'friendly'.

The alley way is empty. Only me, a woman, by myself to fill it. I'm not scared of it. The darkness that surrounds this alley. Why would I if my soul is already as dark as a rotten fruit?

I make my way back to the building, working a job no women would dare to work. But it's better than any job that would keep me still on the streets, begging and pleading for even a dollar to survive. Shivering and froze like I have the worst of worst colds.

I knock three times, loud the first two and quiet the last. The person on the other side, one of the men I work with, John, opens the door with no problem.

As I step inside and give John a nod or acknowledgement, I head straight for the boss. I pass through the kitchen first, seeing the guys at a round table most likely playing porker of some sort. Which, they're probably losing all their money to Mo, who is really good at his job, gambling everyone's money away.

The hallway I walk in is dark. It has a few lights but are very dim like a singer about to walk on stage. The next few doors I pass through are, let's just say, Entertianment rooms. I don't think more needs to be said.

As I slowly hear the beat of the music and the flashing lights, I know I'm almost to the boss's table. I enter the main part of the club, where there are dancers on poles all over the room. People, mostly man, are drinking and drunk as can be. The booths are filled with honest to God drug dealings and lap dances. And then as you step down a step and turn to the left, is the biggest booth in the club. The bosses seat. That's where I'm headed.

No man would dare to touch me. First of all, it's bosses' orders. Second, unless they want their arm either broken or shoot off, by either myself or the man I work with, they keep their hands to themselves. I don't want to say I'm spoiled in my line of work. But I am one of the best.

I step around all the sweaty dancers and desire driven man, and reach the boss's table. He doesn't even have to look to know who it is.

"There you are, il mio oscuro." It means My Dark One. Only fitting that-that is what my name means.