Boys and Girls

The Auction

I wake up in the dark. I don't know where I am, so maybe it's not dark, just empty, like space. I squint into the absence for a moment, before my eyes adjust and I realize it's not absence but a room. I was up on a stage, the red curtains hiding the rest from view. Before the curtain, I'm barred in. We're barred in, I realize, as I see dozens of other children and even adults waking from their sleep on the floor.

I'm wearing a black dress that sweeps the ground, as well as all the other girls and women in the room- the boys and men are clad in a black dress shirt and black dress pants. Our feet are bare.
I hear a man's voice speaking outside, with a slightly less prominent accent than Syringe Man, but still very similar. He spoke loudly with grandeur, like a circus announcer.

"Welcome, Ladies and Gentlemen, to the Auction! Here we present you the loveliest in all of France, why, all of Europe! And you, my esteemed guests, are awarded with the honor of taking one as your very own!"

The other people around me stood, most looking about my age or above. As we all stood and stared at the bars, only one thin girl remained on the shining plank floor. She coughed, and I could make out a dark liquid soaking through her midnight dress. With a shudder I realized it was blood.

The man had been talking during my observation, announcing the highness of our quality, and so on. His booming voice quieted, and a polite, mild clap followed. The sound was a bit muffled, like all the clappers' hands were smothered in fabric. I didn't know what was going on, but I didn't like that I was behind bars at an 'Auction'.

I gasped as someone screamed from somewhere beside me, and turn to see a woman standing over the bloody girl- the woman clapped a hand over her mouth and and her whole form shook as she silently sobbed. The bloody girl was dead. In the dark I could just make out her eyes, a lovely blue, staring at the high ceiling, wide open and glazed over.

A boy held the woman's shoulders as plump tears rolled down her face- slipping over her sharp cheekbones and gathering in the crook of her chin. The woman falls back into him, and he holds her, whispering soft words I couldn't make out.

A strange tense silence was beyond the curtained bars, like the people on the other side were waiting for something. Suddenly, two large men in black suits hurried in from a black iron door I hadn't noticed before- one of them heaved the dead girl over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes, while the other shoved people out the way to get through.

When they left, the curtains opened with a hazy, adagio pace- revealing an abandoned looking theatre filled to the brim with men and women in all sorts of richly attire, sparkling ruby necklaces and flowing layered dresses, along with detailed suits and spiraling tail coats.

They were all in black, just like us.

And they were staring at us with cold smiles or thin-lipped lines.