Chapter 5 New Life

CASSANDRA ~*~ I quickly grabbed the napkin, it was the first bit of evidence I could grab so far. He waved his hands, beckoning me to follow him. I did it quickly. “The men you will be working for are only my best. I expect you to be pleasant at all times.” He explained as I followed him out of the heavily populated room and into a dimly lit and long hallway. My chest tightened each time we passed another crowded room and didn’t enter it. “You will be pleasant looking, pleasant smelling, and I’m sure this last one will be rather difficult for you.” He stopped at the end of the hallway before a set of glass doors, inside I could see another lounge-styled area and bar. “I expect you to act pleasant, friendly, and attentive like a First Lady.” “Right… wait, why would that be hard?” He ignored my question and continued, “You don’t speak unless spoken to. The men back here are not like those out there. They aren’t here to blow off steam, they aren’t a temporary piece, and they aren’t looking for a good time, not that they’d be opposed to it either. We are here to work safely. You don’t hear anything, you don’t see anything, you don’t know anything. You don’t interrupt, you don’t question, you don’t talk back. If we look to be busy with something important, we are. If we look like we aren’t, we still are. Got it?” Before waiting for an answer he turned swiftly, pulled the doors open, and moved through them, not bothering to hold the door for me. He moved quickly, and it took me a second to catch up with him. “You’ve talked a lot about what I’m not allowed to do but haven’t told me exactly what I am to do…” He stopped abruptly, I was so caught off guard I nearly bumped into him. Thank the heavens, I caught myself at the last second. He stared at me, shook his head, and continued walking again. “You serve.” Serve? The look on my face must have been something horrible because when he glanced back at me his face contorted into an odd expression, initially, I mistook it for annoyance, but then he seemed to register what I was envisioning and looked almost apologetic. “Drinks and food. You serve drinks and food, Cassandra.” He clarified. “So, I’m just a glorified waitress?” I asked slowly. “Nothing about you has been glorified, Cassandra.” He replied flatly. I could have easily lost a few moments being offended by this, but I chose to rejoice instead. This was going to be a lot easier than I had initially thought. I could do this, easy as pie. Serve a few drinks tonight and be home writing my story tomorrow. Sure, there’d be a few people who saw a little more of my tooshie than I’d prefer, but I was a reporter, and we always did what we had to, to get the scoop. And what else could I do? Reveal that I was a fraud and probably get shot on the spot here? No way! I mean, I was undercover, deep into the bowels of a real-life underground mafia group. This is what I had always wanted, and here I was. I just had to pull this off. Make it through the night, and go home and write the best d*mn story this country has ever seen. There was just one tiny, minuscule, minor, almost nonexistent problem… we didn’t f*ck*ng go home. I mean, like at all. After the night was over, a typical eight-hour night, Christiano told me he would escort me back to my quarters. “M-my quarters?” “Yes, your quarters. Where did we place you?” He asked, sounding impatient. “I-I-I-“ I hadn’t prepared for this. Any of this. I was in way over my head. They had not placed me anywhere, he had every intention of taking me to my room, if I told him a room, and it was incorrect, as it obviously would be, I would be done for. “Oh, for God’s sake!” He groaned, “Where is your room, Cassandra?” “Oh, she’s with me!” The redhead woman I’d met in the dressing room said, suddenly coming to my rescue. Christiano turned around to face her and raised an eyebrow. “Mia? I didn’t think we’d partnered you.” “Ya didn’t.” She said and snapped her gum loudly. “But she seemed lost, and the hoe you had her with wasn’t looking to be a big sis.” Christiano glanced at me, my head was bobbing to and down nodding in frantic Agreement with this red bombshell who was saving my life, and then back at Mia. “Alright, you caught me. I saw you taking an interest in her, and it peaked mine.” She admitted at the end. He sighed, “Fine.” He turned back to me. “Don’t think I don’t have eyes and ears everywhere.” I swallowed the lump in my throat and nodded. Mia grinned immediately, pleased with her easily earned victory, and grabbed my wrist. “Come on girl.” She said and dragged me along. When we got to our ‘quarters’, it was just like a dorm room, but underground, of course. I looked around the room briefly, the beds were either a queen or full, I couldn’t remember which was bigger. It was already made up nicely with more pillows than I ever had on my bed and a satin comforter that I already knew would be sliding off me all night. I let out a world-breaking sigh, “Thanks, Mia, right?” She crossed her arms over her chest and glared at me. “What’s your game?” “What do you mean?” I asked as innocently as possible. Of course, failing horribly. I had tried my hand at acting once, back in high school I had joined the drama club. It didn’t end well. “You’re not from around here, are you?” “That’s an understatement,” I sighed and dropped onto the bed, “Listen, Mia, I want to leave, go home and all that. So if you could just tell me what I have to do to accomplish that.” I pulled off one of my heels and rubbed on my tender foot. “You don’t leave,” She said, sounding like she was in disbelief. “How’d you get in?” “Same as anyone else, I’m sure.” I lied. “It’s not like I could just… waltz in.” Lied again. “True.” She said thoughtfully, sitting down on the bed that was hers based on all the trinkets and stuffed animals on it. Her bed had color, a red bedspread, while ‘mine’ was white with nothing of interest on it. She had her name above her bed in pretty script letters and heart-shaped pillows and other sort of things on her side of the room. “Will you just help me out?” “Nu huh, sweetie, I wouldn’t cross Christiano like that. Y’all know, he’s doing us a favor letting us be here. You know that as well as the rest of us. When we’re done doing our time, we get a whole new life.” “And what if we click out early?” Her eyes met mine and I swallowed hard. “We don’t.” “Understood,” I muttered and looked away. “So, tell me more. What’s up with the uh, what did he call it… pink girls?” “The pink ladies. Those are the girls who put out.” “And I don’t have to do that?” “Certainly not!” She lifted her leg suddenly, “The pink ladies wear some kind of jewelry with this pink P on it.” She pointed to a silver ankle bracelet. A single charm pendant hung from it. True to word, it was a pink P. “So you…” “Where’d you think I got so much stuff?” She teased and winked. Had she not just saved my life some mere minutes ago, I might have confessed how the idea of sleeping with the guys down the sounded so utterly disgusting that it made my skin crawl. My expression must have given it off though regardless of my silence. Told you I was a horrible actress. “There’s no commitment, sweet. Look, when I came in they offered me three years then a new life, I figured ‘Okay, I’ll serve a few drinks, no rent, no bills, it’ll be great.’ A few months in, wearing all these dirty outfits, having guys looking me up and down, a couple of smacks on the *ss, and I’m like ‘Mann, I’m missing s*x!’ So I told Christiano I wanted to be pink. If I don’t take the bracelet off I’m untouchable. It’s totally up to you, and you can say no to anyone. I am not sure why you’d want to, but seriously.” “This is like a prison.” “So, you, what’d you do to get in?” She tensed. “The stupidest thing you could ever imagine,” I said in complete earnestness.