Timid and shy, I walk through the tiny studio apartment. Is she gonna give us a place to stay? I wonder. John has his briefcase open and the base pipe out. In the bottom, floating loose, are a few of his Swedish erotica playing cards. The queen of spades faces me. A dark-haired, naked woman, provocatively posed, catches my attention. It’s her… this lady. She’s the queen of spades. I know John is in the deck of cards, and now I know they must have worked together in the past.
Michelle’s dishing out the white crystalline rocks onto the screens. Choking back the smoke, he passes down part of his exhale to Michelle and the rest to me. I let it out quickly; my lungs still feel the need for air after being in the trunk.
John notices me and lights the pipe again. He takes his time holding in the hit, pondering the bitter smoke as if it possesses wisdom, then blows the rest into Michelle’s mouth. “Dawn needs a place to stay, uh, for a while.” The bubbles purr as they run through the water in the pipe again. “She’s willing to work too.”
I look over at John and say nothing. I don’t want to live here, in this strange lady’s place. I want to go to my mother’s. I want to leave. The dialogue in my mind is angry and stern; full of power that I wish I had.
Frowning, Michelle glances toward my crouching figure on the bathroom floor. “Oh yeah? Shit, John. Do you see how small this place is?”
“She’ll work for it,” he interrupts. “Now come on. Here—have some more of this.” He holds the pipe to her lips.
It takes a few minutes for the smoke to clear. John dismantles the pipe, places it back in his briefcase, and stretches, straightening his pant legs. “Well, what do you think?”
“Yeah. All right. I’ll work something out. But that dog can’t stay here.” She reaches into the bra of her gown to hand him a wad of money.
“I owe you one,” he whispers into her ear, his voice syrupy sweet and loud enough that I can hear. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.” John pockets the money, snaps his briefcase shut, and tucks Thor under his jacket. He plants another kiss on Michelle’s cheek and makes a straight shot out the door, not a word to me or even a glance my way.
“So,” Michelle sneers. “You better get cleaned up. I got someone coming over in half an hour, and you can take him for me.”
“What?”
“What do you mean, ‘What?’” she snaps, whipping her body around like a tiger ready to attack.
Slowly… I grasp her meaning. Oh shit. That’s why she’s dressed that way. That’s why John took Thor with him. Oh my God, no. This is why he put me in the trunk of the car! I can’t do this anymore. Degradation chokes me. Ready to throw up, I grab my stomach.
“Oh, don’t look so pathetic!” she snarls. “Why else do you think he brought you here? What’s the matter? Scared? Here. Go take a bath and wash your face. Christ, I can’t stand crybabies.” She storms out of the bathroom and chains the lock on the front door.
Oh God! I don’t want to be here. I don’t want to be here. Where am I? I don’t even know where I am. Who is this woman? Why is she so mean? I can’t understand how someone I just met can spout such hatred. Is she like Eddie? I am scared of her right away, and she knows it.
“Hurry up… and don’t touch anything!” she yells from the other room. Again, I have nowhere to go. I am trapped. A cold chill runs down my spine and quickly, fearfully, I do what I am told.
Almost a week has gone by in this dungeon of a place. I am nothing more than a prisoner. Michelle watches my every move every minute of the day and night. Right away I find out what kind of a businesswoman she is—one who works out of her home and who now expects me to work for her. This small studio apartment has little more than a bed in the center and small tables on either side. A tiny kitchenette is sectioned off in the far corner of the room with a counter and a few bar stools. At the far end of the room is a sliding glass door that leads to an undersized patio surrounded with stucco planters that are filled with curtaining shrubs and trees for privacy.
Michelle tells me what to do, when to do it, and how to do it. She gives orders sharp and coldhearted, like an Army sergeant, and has no patience for back talk. Don’t mess with me or else is the message she sends. Stick-thin and hard, drug-driven and mean, she reminds me of John but in a female’s body.
There is a list. A list of “visitors,” a “date book,” that names each person scheduled to arrive that day. A special coded knock signals when a customer is here. Michelle simply checks her book and gives the order to either hide in the closet until she is done or to answer it and “welcome” the visitor. I do as I’m told, scared out of my mind that I might be hurt if I don’t, remembering I’m completely lost somewhere in LA and don’t know how to get away.
John returns intermittently and rushes into the bathroom with Michelle to get high. He doesn’t look at me sitting there on the bed, skinny and pale, in a shabby beige negligee Michelle threw at me to put on when I work.
“John?” I try getting his attention at the bathroom door.
“Hey, baby. How’s it going?” he answers sweetly, stepping out of the bathroom jumpy and wired.
I can hear Michelle flicking a lighter and the bubbling of the freebase pipe behind him.
“John? Where’s Thor? I want to leave. Go to my mother’s. I, I, I just want to go. Please give me my dog!”
“Okay. If that’s what you want. He’s with me, in the car. He’s okay. He’s safe. They don’t allow pets in this building, baby.” His emotions and words are erratic.
“I just want to leave, John. Please!”
“Fine!” he yells, packing up his briefcase and storming out, leaving me behind.
John makes a few drug drop-offs to Michelle, and I figure she is giving him the money from the men who come to the door.
Michelle is mean, but when she is out of drugs she gets meaner. “Whatever you do, don’t eat anything when I’m not looking,” she orders while I make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich that she has allowed. “I can’t afford to feed you too! That’s up to John.”
“No? Okay.” I feel badgered, guilty, and obligated for taking anything. I eat what she gives me because I am starving, but there is no taste; it’s like forcing down cardboard.
I don’t know my days anymore; the drapes are always drawn, keeping any light out of the tiny living space. It is confusing, but I don’t think about it. I don’t think about much. There is no more poetry in me. I’m a zombie… the walking, lying, breathing, living dead. I know weeks have gone by.
Michelle sometimes has to leave me in her apartment alone. “I’m going to see the manager,” she tells me. “I’ll be right back. Don’t answer the door for anyone while I’m gone. I’ll fucking know if you do, Dawn. And don’t fucking touch anything!”
I listen to the locks of the dead bolt click behind her and feel caught in an inescapable trap.
Time is nothing to me now, but I know it’s there. John is skipping days before he shows up with any drugs, and Michelle is getting pissed. She doesn’t like how John comes in loaded out of his mind with only scrapings to show for the money she’s given him. She throws fits and flings shoes against the wall. It isn’t long before she hatches a plan.
“Where the fuck are my things? Where is my money?”
“What things? I, I don’t know about your money.”