Traffic

Chapter 1

I woke up on the floor of a steadily moving van. My hands were tied with thick, scratchy ropes, and there was a burlap baggie over my head which turned out to be a blessing in disguise because when I tried to open my eyes, I was blinded by a sharp hot flash of pain in the back of my head that spread fire into my eyes.
I could hear voices, low and soft but audible. They were rattling off numbers and talking about money. I tried to lift my head and one of them whispered loudly,
"She's awake. How far away are we?"
Another voice responded that we would pull up in ten minutes. I didn't know where we were going but I was suddenly overcome with nauseous anxiety in the pit of my stomach.
I squeezed my eyes shut harder and tried to ignore the rolling nausea as the van shuddered and rolled around a tight corner.

"Get her up. C'mon! Just fucking grab her!"
I felt my arms being grabbed, hard and calloused hands squeezing my thin, bony arms. I was hoisted up and lifted roughly out of the van and onto my feet. I could feel the sunlight on my skin, it was incredible.
I stood for what felt like a good few minutes soaking in the warmth before the hands around my arms began dragging me, I couldn't see through the burlap baggie, but we were about to enter my own personal hell.

Disguised as an extravagant strip club, my home was now the Dembro Brothers brothel slash human trafficking ring. It was a large three storied hotel, only the ground floor housed the nightclub, "PLASMA" instead of the usual hotel lobby. It was pristine inside the club, cleaned top to bottom every night. Inside the hotel-turned-dormitory was a different story though. No one seemed to care much at all there. The only difference I would discover was the fact we were given real food to eat instead of being starved or given scraps.

The Dembros' were both tall, dark, and handsome but these sleazeball identical twin brothers scammed poor and struggling families into selling off their young daughters for money. They promised three thousand dollars per daughter, providing the girls fit the strict screening requirements.The Dembro boys made grand promises in order to get their girls, but they rarely paid up more than a couple hundred per body. The only reason they hadn't been caught is purely that they were so deeply connected and dangerous causing the whole city to be utterly terrified of them. They could kill a family-extended included-in just one night with little more than a few short phone calls.

But like I said, the girls had to fit the requirements. Unfortunately for me, I was perfect and my dad was a broke junkie.

Charlotte Boyce, barely 23, tan skin and long dark hair. My eyes were brown, I was five feet five inches tall, and I was a little chubby-but after spending so long in the Hostel with little more than scraps to eat, I was now barely more than skin and bone. But still, I fit the bill and my dad was withdrawing and desperate.
It was as common in our city for the poor to sell their children as it was for a dealer to sell pot.
Money was scarce since most of the city was sold off and snapped up by the Dembros'. They bought out nearly every business, keeping on the staff but paying under the legal wage. Still, no one said anything because they were scared to lose what little money they had.
Once the usual businesses grew tiring they needed something more, so they took daddy's money and found a way to keep it interesting, they realised that in this city if you needed money, you did whatever you could to get it. So there hatched "PLASMA" and the not-so-secret trafficking of the girls they practically stole.

I was pushed down a long hallway and into a room where I was forced into a plastic folding chair. I could hear at least three different voices speaking in low hushed tones.
"Jesus Christ, get the fucking bad off her head." One of the voices spoke up.
In one swift move, the bag was whipped off my head and I was dazzled by fluorescent light.
Once my eyes adjusted I saw that we were in a small office type room. In one corner there was a small desk with a large leather wheelie chair next to it.
I was seated in the middle of the room and there were three men staring at me.
"Fucking Christ, Sal," the guy on the far left spat, "you could have cleaned her up first." he flicked the middle guy on the back of the head and they all chuckled.
"Relaaaax Mike," he sang back,
"she'll be golden."