Under My Skin (6 page)

Even though I’d eaten my fill, my stomach quaked and churned with each passing minute. The prospects of being sold didn’t sit right with me. Even if my family got a stipend out of it. Who in their right mind wanted to be bought by someone else?

I’d be separated from Zoe, too.

A red-haired servant girl came in to tend the fire and pour a cup of tea. She had the most pretty amber-colored eyes, but she didn’t speak or look my way. I attempted to strike up a conversation with her yesterday and got about three syllables. The servants didn’t look at the Water Bearers, especially people like me who’d be auctioned off today.

While she worked, I stirred the food around my plate. I missed my parents and the conversations we used to have before school. I bet they’d eaten breakfast already, and Mom left the house by now to tend our garden. I often helped her pull weeds before heading off to school. She’d stoop in the dirt, with her long blonde hair haphazardly piled on top of her head, and yank out the meddlesome plants. Her light blue eyes sparkled with excitement from such a simple task.

And then there was high school. On the southern coastline where I lived, we didn’t have much, but the class sizes were smaller and everyone knew each other. I even had a few friends.

Two older Water Bearer girls entered the room and interrupted my thoughts. One had a large bag over her shoulder while another carried a bag with what had to be a dress. The two brunettes sized me up while I drank my tea. With a smirk, one discarded the dress bag from over her shoulder and then snatched the cup of tea from my hand.

“Hey!” When I tried to stand, she pushed me down.

“Mealtime’s over, little girl. Time to get ready for the big dance.” She glared at me, almost daring me with her eyes to say something, but I held my tongue.

“Who are you?” I glanced at the bag with the hanger and my voice quieted. “It’s time already? I thought the auction didn’t start until this evening.”

The girl pushed the rolling cart to the side. “We work as beauticians for the Water Bearers. You need to be ready to join the procession at three this afternoon. That means we have a million things to do and not enough time to do them.”

My mouth flapped a few times before words tumbled out. “Can’t I just finish my breakfast? It won’t take long.”

The other girl groaned. “What’s the hurry, Claire? She doesn’t look half bad.”

Claire smirked. “I refuse to lose out on another premier assignment, Karin. They want this one dolled up, so we have our work cut out for us.”

Work cut out for them?
What was that suppose to mean? Even I knew I wasn’t as put together as these two, I had clearer skin than most. My grandma Ida on my father’s side had the most beautiful brown skin. Nice skin aside, I did have bitten off fingernails and hair that hadn’t seen a brush in a while. They also wore make-up, had on glitter fingernail polish, and their hair was curled in the latest style I’d seen on the communications console. Claire and Karin’s uniforms weren’t the standard light blue but a beautiful teal color. Still fashionable in contrast to my clothes.

Karin sorted through the items in her bag. “I’ll wash her hair first. That’ll take the longest.” With her supplies in hand, she ran her fingers through my hair. “Quite soft. Too bad whoever cut it didn’t do a good job.”

I bit my lower lip. My mom had cut my hair. Even if my hair weren’t as easy to manage as hers, she had done a great job, thank you very much.

“Let me get started—”

Claire grabbed me by the arm. Her fingernails bit into my skin. “I got it. I need to double check her measurements for the dress anyway.”

Karin shrugged. “Whatever. More time for me to prep everything.”

As Claire led me to the bathroom, a sinking feeling came over me. Why was she moving so fast? This feeling turned to dread as she shut the double doors and engaged the locks.

“Sit down on the stool over there,” she commanded.

None of this made sense so I waited next to the old mahogany stool and watched with curiosity. Claire turned on the faucets over the tub.

“We could wash my hair in the sink,” I offered. “It’d be much easier.”

She shrugged. Steam began to fill the room. “This’ll be faster. You can get clean and get your hair washed at the same time.”

The water rose at a leisurely pace in the tub. Claire continued to face away from me, her head bent over while her hands messed with something beeping I couldn’t see. I craned my neck to see what beeped in her hands. Then as fast as a viper, she closed the space between us, holding a small black box in her hands. A buzzing noise, like the sound of angry bees, came from the box.

“Look, I don’t have much time,” she whispered. “I have too many things to tell you.”

My face wrinkled in surprise. “What?”

“You need to get the hell out of here!”

I jumped back. “Out of here? But wha
―
”

“Just shut up!” She sighed and took a deep breath.

“I have about three minutes before my cover’s blown, especially in a room like yours. You’ve got tech all over this place. Even the damn uniforms are bugged.”

I nodded. She was so close I could make out the light freckles on her forehead, the soft sheen of the lip gloss on her lips.

“Everything here is not what it appears: the Water Bearers, the Guild. It’s a front. I want to throw up every time I think about it.”

The air in my throat caught and refused to go down.

“You’ll have an opportunity after the auction to escape. You must take it.”

“Will I get help to go home?”

Claire shook her head. “You can never go back home, Tate. The Guild chose you and there’s no escape from them—unless you make a run for it.” Her gaze darted to the door twice as if she expected someone to come any minute now.

“I don’t understand any of this,” I said. “I can’t go back home. I can’t stay here to be bought by the Guild. Why should I believe you?”

Claire groaned and wildly gestured around her. “Does any of this make sense to you? Why would a group like the Guild who’ve oppressed people for hundreds of years have an auction and bid on people?”

“Servants? I even heard we might be trained as their apprentices to take their place.”

“Apprentices? Oh, c’mon. Do you think they would pluck anyone off the street to do that kind of thing?”

“I don’t know.” I searched for some reasons and they came fast. “We’re young—harmless. Wouldn’t they want people they could trust? That they could train?”

She roughly grabbed me by the chin. “Everything you’ve heard is nothing but lies. To them, you are
cattle
,” she said between clenched teeth. “You’re something they
allow
to grow along the countryside before they bring you here to—” Heavy footsteps in the suite made us both look toward the doors. The doorknobs shook.

“Not another word. Open the door, immediately!” A man's voice ordered.

Claire turned to me, her eyes pleading. “Don’t forget what I said. Don’t let them use the Vorhees Unit on you.” She touched my forehead with her fingertips as someone rammed against the door. Eventually, the beautiful doors bent inward and broke. Enforcers rushed the room. The steam swirled around us, filling the space with screams and flailing arms as Claire fought against them. Her legs kicked and jerked, causing an antique mirror to crash on the floor. A delicate vase followed not long after.

“Get back, Ms. Sullivan!” one of the enforcers barked. Part of me wanted to intervene, but instead, I backed into the corner.
Do as you’re told
, I could hear my mom beg.

Sweat poured down my forehead and entered my eyes, but I wouldn’t blink—couldn’t tear my gaze from the horror in front of me. One of them slapped Claire’s face to subdue her. Again and again. The sound reverberated against the marble walls.

Another enforcer tried to cover Claire’s mouth, but she managed to scream, “You can’t hide the truth forever!” They grabbed her from behind and by her legs. “We will free them! We will—” The sharp snap of a las-gun filled the air along with the stench of burned flesh. Claire went limp in their arms.

Locked in the grip of fear against the wall, I watched them carry her away. Her chest continued to move with each breath, but her eyelids drooped. Her mouth hung open. Was she okay? I’d never seen someone like that before. The enforcers in my town rarely had to use violence.

My tears mingled with the heavy steam in the room and I couldn’t help myself. My chest shook and I sobbed. In the background, the water continued to run. It almost felt like a lifetime since Claire’s words bounced around my mind. I could see the corners of the room, but I didn’t feel alone anymore. The room had sufficient light, but after what happened, the dark eyes of strangers stared at me from every corner. They slid down the ornate vanity and slithered my way. Moved across the fine rugs on the floor. Ever since I’d come here, they’d been listening to everything and seeing everything. At this moment, the cameras were no longer something I brushed aside as a persistent warning from my parents. It was all very much real. And now I knew the truth.
Something bad will happen to me very soon.

Time passed. Eventually, someone entered the bathroom and turned off the water. It was Karin.

“Get in the water, Tate.” Her voice was quiet.

I never got in that tub. Instead, I used the sink to wash myself as best as I could. I shook all over, but soon enough, with clean hair and all, I entered my bedroom. Karin combed through my hair. I sat in a chair in the main room while she clipped the ends. At first, she considered using the bathroom, but we both quickly vetoed the idea. No need to rehash the memories from that scene. No one came to replace Claire, so Karin continued to work magic on my skin with luxurious lotions. She filed and added fingernail polish to nails, which had never seen such a beautiful shade of gold. I relaxed a little and kept my gaze away from the bathroom door. Karin used the majority of our time to do my hair. She brushed and yanked, drawing up my thick hair with pins. The few strands that she didn’t pin up were coated in red glitter and curled to perfection.

“Your hair is quite cooperative,” she said. Soon enough, Karin finished my hair and it was time to put on the dress. As Karin unzipped the dress bag, the red-haired girl arrived with my lunch. Everything proceeded as if Claire had never been here.

“Is Claire coming back?” I whispered.

I almost missed when Karin shook her head. Her focus rested on the dress she pulled from the bag. When I saw it, I understood why. It was gorgeous. A long, glittery black gown with an empire waist. I’d only seen gowns like this on the comm-console on women far prettier than me. I touched my scar and rubbed the ridge.

“That’s so beautiful,” I murmured.

Karin smiled for the first time. “Only the best for certain members.”

My curiosity drew me to where she handled the garment. A cloud of vanilla perfume surrounded the dress. Grandma Ida wore vanilla oils. Those weren’t cheap in the south where I lived.

I reached over to touch it and stopped myself.

“Go head. I plan to put it on you in a bit.” Karin pushed it closer to me.

I touched the delicate beading on the front. Shiny black beads flowed like a dark river. All of this was for me? Why would they dress people they planned to use for nefarious reasons in something so expensive?

“Did my sponsors pay for this?”

“Of course. They paid for all of this. The make-up. The clothes. They even paid for surgeries for some people.”

My hands paused. Why hadn’t they paid to take care of my face?

Karin grabbed me gently by the shoulders and turned me to face her. “Let’s get this on. Take that robe off.” She continued to speak while she unhooked the back of the dress. “Some of the other beauticians have clients who’ve had dental surgery. And, boy, did they need it. There were mouths full of decayed nastiness on a few of the boys.”

I took off the robe and covered my breasts. What little I had. Carefully, I stepped into the gown and allowed Karin to finish fastening the back.

She went on and on about the clients of other beauticians while she applied my make-up. To be truthful, part of me wanted to experience wearing make-up like all the girls I’d seen around here. At least once—even though I didn’t like drawing attention to my cleft scar. No one wore make-up back home. Not that many needed it. My mother had a natural beauty that would’ve looked ridiculous with all the glitter and lip gloss most of these girls used. As Karin applied gloss to my lips, she didn’t say anything about my scar. She dabbed glitter on me as if nothing were wrong. For that, I was grateful, but that didn’t take one obvious fact away.

“Why didn’t my sponsor pay for a procedure to take care of my face?” I gestured to my ridge. I didn’t want to touch her handiwork.

“Oh that? I don’t know. I do know you had
specific
orders on your records that no one was to alter your face. One of your sponsors paid a hefty fee for you to keep it, since everyone else wanted it taken care of.”

I bit the inside of my mouth. Hard. My face would’ve been repaired by now. I could look like Karin, but one of the Guild, the people Claire had warned me about, had some crazy idea I didn’t need to look normal. All of this opulence around me—the food, this humongous room, and one of them thought I needed to look like
this
? What kind of person treated people that way?

My throat dried painfully and tears threatened to fall, but I refused to cry after Karin had worked so long on my make-up. Not long after, she presented me with a mirror. I sighed and gave her a warm smile. The girl in the mirror was a princess from a fairy tale: soft, blemish-free skin. Perfect make-up. Mesmerizing brown eyes and a prominent scar that would accompany me to my cattle call. I’d never looked so beautiful in my life.

Just as the Guild promised, the evening had the pomp and circumstance of a ball. The beauticians handed us off to the older Water Bearers who escorted us from our rooms into a hallway decorated in streamers and balloons.

Even with the festive mood around me, I wondered if the enforcers had taken Claire away through these very halls. Had they nonchalantly carried her limp body past all these decorations?