The Child Zoo

Chapter 9

I sit hunched over the toilet after throwing up for the hundredth time in the past two weeks. People walk by, girls giving me disgusted and wary glances as they pass. Clutching my stomach I vomit yellow goo into the toilet again feeling the pain in my lower abdomen. Closing my eyes tight, so tight they hurt, I pretend for just a moment this isn't real , what happened to me didn't happen, and I'm not completely alone.

But when I open my eyes I am met with the harsh reality as some girls stand clustered together pointing and whispering about me. Nobody talks to me anymore, mostly about me. They don't know what to say, it's easier to act like they know how I feel, and what goes through my head then to actually ask. They don't know. There's a hollow emptiness so deserting it's like I don't have a soul, or a heartbeat or anything. I can't feel any of my humanity left.

I get up stumbling on my feet as my head spins and my vision blurs. Once the room stops spinning I take small and slow steps to my bunk stopping to rest my head on the latter. With a deep breath I climb slowly trying to resist the urge to vomit again. It's after zoo hours and I think back on the day. Emptiness.

I go and sit in the cave by myself, hiding from the outside world if you can even call it that. I sit for hours, staring into nothingness, I don't come out for lunch, I don't take a walk, I don't see Taylor. Taylor. We haven't said a word since then. She looks at me with sad and scared eyes not initiating conversation. Maybe she has some way of knowing that I can't talk, not about it, it's impossible.

Once I'm on my bunk I lay on my back, hands on my stomach, and stare at the ceiling. I can't sleep. Every time I close my eyes I see his. Every time I dream I relive the nightmare over and over. When I wake he's still there; it's a never ending cycle. I can remember the feeling of the pain, the look in his eyes, the way he used me and took what was mine over and over and over again. Then how I was left on the floor for everyone to see, and what I will never forget is how nobody did anything.

***

"The zoo will be opening in exactly one hour. It is time to prepare yourselves." I make my way toward the end of the line distancing myself, blatantly ignoring everything around me. That is until right when I'm about to walk out the door I am stopped by a younger looking woman in all white. "Hello, can you come with me?" Wow an actual question.

I don't respond to her as she looks at me before she starts walking, looking over her shoulder to make sure I'm actually following her. We travel in the opposite direction of the enclosure down the hallways into a small doctor office like room. She motions for me to sit and I do so willingly feeling dizzy and nauseous.

"Now I'm just going to run some tests and take your blood" she informs me and I give her a skeptical glance. "Why." I say my voice croaky from not using it in about four weeks. I almost forgot the sound of my own voice, I would have if the sound of my pleas and screams weren't engraved in my mind, working their way around like poison.

"Just to make sure you're healthy and capable of being available to the public" I snort. Of course, can't have defective slaves. "First I'm going to draw your blood." Giving her the deadliest look I can muster I warn her with my eyes not to touch me. However she disregards this with no emotion as if used to the hostile nature of captives.

She takes a vial with a needle attached to it and quickly presses it into my neck right above the collar. In a mere second the vial is full of blood, my blood. It was also my blood that ran down my legs after I was ripped open and never fixed. "I'm going to need you to take your clothes off so I can examine you." Her voice enters my ears sending panic into my brain.

"No." She looks at me as if taken aback. "What?" She asks stupidly. "No." I repeat again. Composing herself she doesn't say another word before walking towards me. She reaches out to touch me. As soon as her hand makes contact with the fabric of my bra it's like the memories I've been trying but failing to forget hit me all at once.

"NO!" I close my eyes and kick and fight. "Get off of me please! STOP HELP ME!" I run into the corner of the room hunching into a ball. I hold my head squeezing my eyes tight, tears streaming down my face as I rock back and forth. "No please..." my voice comes out as a tiny whisper as he comes closer.

I open my red puffy eyes slowly coming back to reality, realizing I'm not there but in the doctors room. She gives me a sad look before coming over and sticking something into my neck, then everything goes black.

***

I wake up in my bunk back at the room. How did I get here? That was the best sleep I've ever had as there were no nightmares coming to haunt me. I didn't have to see his eyes in my head while I slept and that alone was a blessing. Noticing I am alone in the room I realize it must still be zoo hours so I decide to go sit on one of the bean bag chairs and read in silence without all the stares and whispers.

For about an hour I am consumed in a land of fairytales and fiction as I let my mind drift, following the plot of the characters and for a little while, forgetting reality. My serine mental state is cut short too quickly as noise and people start flooding the room. The looks and whispers return and I sigh inwardly hating my reality.

With all of the kids the doctor also enters the room holding a white clipboard. As she approaches me the room goes silent as people stare, not minding their own f-ing business. "Serendipity? Yes the results of your blood test came back and as we had suspected you're about one month pregnant..." I don't listen to the rest of what she's saying as all of the air leaves my lungs. Gasps chorus around me but I can't see, I can't hear, I can't breath. My hand makes its way to me heart, clutching the fabric of my bra I fall to the ground. The room spins and my breath comes out in hard puffs. My body shakes and I look down at my hand the image splitting in two. I look at the ground in disbelief.

Pregnant?

***
July 30th 2112
7/30/2112