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Actually, I do, but I don’t want to reply to your pathetic cries for help. Twenty-one girls have cried. Nothing I do or say can comfort you.
I remain still, going over the number, until I can see the grey marble that sits beneath the old crumbs. Twenty-two. I write.
I finally sit up, resting my back against the wall.
The girl’s eyes come to mine. They’re brown, the same color as the floor on which we sit. Her wrists are bruised by the shackles that keep us locked to the walls. Water drips down my back from the crack in the concrete above us. She’s pretty. But they all are.
“You’re pretty,” she whispers, swiping her long brown hair away from her face. Tears have left cleaned streaks down each of her cheeks.
I don’t speak.
She tilts her head. “I gather we’re probably going to die in here.” She leans her head against the wall, drawing her long legs to her chest. I want to be nice to her. Tell her that maybe they won’t kill her. Tell her that I don’t know what happens after this. But I don’t know. I never know. They come and they go, and I stay. For twenty-one girls. Some girls are in here for longer, some only a short time. Time. Something I’ve lost track of. The sun sets and the sun rises, but my world remains still, confined to these walls that keep me locked inside.
I examine the new girl closely. I’ve noticed how all girls are similar in one way. Age. That’s as far as I have gotten.
“I take it you don’t speak.” She exhales, her head bowing. “It’s fine. I guess it makes sense in a way. My name is Rose; I’m twenty years old, and up until yesterday, I was a dancer at—” I jerk forward, my eyes narrowing. “Wow!” she murmurs, flinching backward. I don’t blame her. I probably looked crazy. But all the girls who have been in here, none of them have spoken much to me. Mainly, they all cry. Scream. Then there was the one who tried to claw her way out of the bars on the door, her fingernails detaching from her flesh as blood seeped down her hands. None of them directly blurted their story to me. Were they all dancers? Like me? Maybe.
Rose searches my eyes, her face morphing. “You understand me?” She must think, because I don’t speak right now, that I don’t speak English.
I nod.
She licks her dry, cracked lips. “Why did you jump? Are you the same age as me?”
I shake my head.
“No?” she mutters.
I nod.
“You are?”
I roll my eyes, getting tired of this. I want to speak. I open my mouth, the words teasing the tip of my tongue gently, but like always when faced with something I don’t want to deal with, I choke, and my mouth slams closed.
“You’re broken, Dove. You will always be broken.” I shiver, The Shadow’s voice echoing over my flesh. He followed me everywhere. I woke during the night and swore I saw him lurking in the dark corner of my room. Everywhere I went, I could sense him. Is he here, too?
“Wait!” Rose interrupts my internal meltdown, inching forward. “Dancer? You were a dancer, too?”
My head snaps up, my eyes eating up the distance between us. I nod, my long red hair falling over my shoulders. I lick my swollen lips, wanting to force words out, but they don’t come. They never do. But then—“Yes.”
“Wait!” Her hand comes up to silence herself. “You do speak?”
I chew on my lip. “Yes. I just don’t like to, and I have issues when I’m faced with unfamiliar trauma. It’s a defense mechanism that happens when I’m scared.” I shake my head, forcing myself to be quiet. I don’t want to sound weak.
Rose seems to understand, without understanding. My chest begins to flutter. Can I like her? I don’t like anyone. “Well, I danced at a hip-hop club. For money. Having no family and being broke as shit isn’t always fun, but fun doesn’t pay the bills.” Rose is beautiful. Her skin is a few shades darker than mine, but more on the lighter scale. She’s clearly part African American. When she smiles, her straight white teeth beam. “I’ll go through the dance styles, and you tell me what yours was?”
I nod, excited with the new lead.
She eyes me up and down. “Hmmm, ballet?”
I freeze.
“Ballet?” she asks, smiling. “I was right!?”
I shake my head. “No.” She was right, in a sense, but it has been a long time since I hung up my slippers. Now, I don’t dance for pleasure. I dance to live. Literally.
“Damn. I was sure you looked like a ballet girl.”
I roll my eyes at her judgment. “Okay.”
She laughs. “All right, all right, I know, that was bad. Okay, how about hip-hop?”
