☕︎Vacancy☕︎

~3~

It was cold and dark, and the only comfort I had was the sobbing boy, hardly any younger than I, in my arms.

It had been a really rough night, for the five of us. But poor Fenry definitely had it the worst tonight.

There was so much shit that came with this awful lifestyle, and you get taken advantage of so many times, and you just have to bend over and take it.

It was illegal, for us to be in the line of work that we were in. But it was all we had ever known, we had no father figure if he wasn't pimping us out or even still alive, buying up other whores to torture them as they did to our mothers. Mothers who could no longer call themselves mothers, because they were too far gone with all of the drugs and alcohol clogging their systems.

They probably didn't even remember that we existed, knew that we were still alive. And we would probably never know if we had siblings floating around out there or not.

Well, I had a sibling. An older brother, but he pretended we weren't related. Treated me like absolute crap sometimes. Maybe that was just his way to cope with everything that was going on. Maybe pretending made him feel better about the situation, that he couldn't save me, and that he couldn't even save himself.

I was almost certain that we had different fathers, but we clearly had the same mother. We had her hair texture, I think he actually had her color too. We had her lips and eyes and physique. Otherwise, he was much taller than me. But we shared other things in common too. We were both gay. Both stuck in this hellish life.

But there were things that we had not so in common. He was much taller than me, leaner, although we were all skinny, malnourishment looming over our heads. But he also knew our mother. He had a chance to start bonding with her. He remembered her pretty little face before it got all messed up, she felt familiar to him.

And I would never have the chance to know that same familiarity. Because our mother didn't even bother with me, let me get taken away. She didn't fight to keep me as she did for my brother. She sold me as a baby to my pimp to get money so that she could keep buying her drugs and taking care of my brother.

And my brother made sure that I knew that. Made sure that I knew our mother never loved me as she loved him. Made sure that I knew that I was never considered her child like he was, that I was never really her baby like he was.

He was an asshole, but he was all the family I had and I wanted to stay around him. I needed him, no matter how much he didn't care, mistreated me, spat venomous words at me. He was still my brother and I wanted to be his.

No matter how much he hated me.

"Fucking pay attention whore!" I jumped, accidentally jostling Fenry in the process.

I raised my head quickly to the man towering over me and I felt my body tense, "Y-yes sir?" My lip trembled and I wanted to smack myself for being afraid.

"I said there's a John waiting for ya outside," he jutted his thumb towards the back entrance, voice booming in the darkroom, not caring that he woke everyone up.

"O-okay," I gently moved Fenry, who whined and curled up where I was sitting after I stood up.

I started heading for the bathroom to clean up and prep before a large, calloused hand bared down on my shoulder.

I gasped and snapped my head around, eyes widened fearfully. "No prep, he wants ya dry, full night." He informed me and I wanted to cry and go back to bed.

This was going to hurt.

My shoulders slumped and I ducked under the man's hand, making my way for the front door of the apartment instead.

I didn't jump as my ass was slapped on my way out, and off I went to meet with tonight's final client.

--------

I lay on my side in the tub as the lukewarm water poured over me, breathing shallow and throat constricted tight with pain.

My hips and my lower back burned and ached and I couldn't tell if I was going to throw up or pass out. Though, I hoped it was going to be the latter because I didn't want to be awake anymore.

Bruises and rope burns set my skin alight and my vision kept going in and out.

Everything was all quiet until suddenly, the bathroom door burst open and in pushed three people. One going to throw up at the toilet, the other at the sink.

And of course, the asshole who decided to piss in the tub all over me.

I was so over everything.

I squeezed my eyes shut and let the water mask the tears falling down my face.

I slowly slipped into slumber with one last thought on my mind. If there's a god out there, please, don't let me wake back up...

———

I wasn't completely coherent when it had happened. The yelling, the arguing, the crying. But I had heard almost everything.

And I felt it when the water was shut off. When I was dried and picked up out of the tub.

And I felt it when I was dressed and placed on the floor before the warmth of a body, slightly longer, skinnier than mine pressed against mine.

I just wanted out...

——-Back to Granger——

"It's okay sweetie, at least you tried." Deane said, almost mockingly as he typed away on his laptop. He was likely answering an email from someone about the bar.

I rolled my eyes at him and sunk further into the couch I'd only left about an hour ago. I didn't last very long in public by myself, if it wasn't obvious. I went to a park and sat on a swing for about fifteen minutes before a couple of kids ran up and asked to use it. I walked down the street to the convenience store and pondered over snack choices for another few minutes and then went back home.

Pathetic... I was absolutely pathetic and extremely grateful that Deane didn't full on laugh at me for it.

I pressed my forehead against the backrest as I opened up a pack of gummy bears, picking out the blue and green ones to eat them first. Deane proceeded to ignore me for the next hour and a half before he'd decidedly shut his laptop, tidying up his things and proceeding to wander over to me on the couch. I looked up at him to find him already searching my face until our eyes met, and he quickly glanced away.

I furrowed my brows as he stood before me with his arms crossed and a small smirk on his face. "You're actually a child," he snickered and leant forward to ruffle my curls.

I groaned and smacked his hand away, waving him off to let me rot in my embarrassment. He wasn't keen on that idea though and grabbed my arm, pulling me up off of the couch so that he could drag me down the stairs with him.

"Come on, Deane, we can try again some other time!" I tried to reason because I was not mentally prepared to leave the house again today.

"We don't have to go anywhere," he scoffed as he half turned to glance at me. "I just need you to sit downstairs so I can babysit you while I get your work done."

His smile returned to his face as he gingerly urged me into a large black and fluffy beanbag chair he'd recently purchased for his new at-home office.

I just plopped down into it and sighed, reaching back into my bag of candy. This was much better than being outside alone in my opinion. If those kids hadn't come to ask for the swing, I may have stayed sitting in the park for much longer. I was incredibly embarrassed, but I just simply wasn't used to going anywhere alone. Even when I was quite younger and had chances to go out alone, I'd often reject the opportunity to just go spend time in my room.

"You could've at least let me grab the rest of my snacks." I muttered to myself as I shook the half-empty bag with a pout.

Deane placed himself into the beanbag chair beside me and shrugged his shoulders as he clicked on a tab of emails, pulling the laptop closer so that I could discern what was on the screen.

"The kitchen is about fifteen feet away from you, doll."

💋