Slave Girl (9 page)

And so the day and the night passed. For some reason no one came to fetch me. Whatever the unseen men knocking at the door wanted, it seemed that I wasn’t going to be given to them.

In the end I fell asleep where I sat – confused and utterly exhausted. I hated Sally, I hated Reece and I think I hated myself for allowing myself to become caught up in the terrible web of lies and crime they had spun for me.

But when the morning came that fear and exhaustion changed to something far worse. Terror. Sheer, blind terror.

E
ighteen streets; three canals, dozens of little alleys, hundreds of flats and apartments, all within the boundaries of eighteen streets. Welcome to de Rosse Buurt, the world’s most famous Red Light District. Welcome to Hell.

It took less than an hour to drive to Amsterdam. I’d woken that morning where I had fallen asleep: leaning against the wall of the dingy flat, still dressed, but cold and stiff. I opened my eyes and for a moment I was utterly confused. Where was I? Then I saw Sally sitting and watching me from across the room and reality flooded in on me like some awful, overpowering tsunami.

‘It’s time. John will be here any minute.’

She spoke quietly, calmly even. As if we were old friends, getting ready to go out on a pleasant day trip. But I knew today wasn’t about anything as normal as that; and it wasn’t about pleasure – not mine, at any rate. Today was the first day of the rest of my life – the life of a prostitute.

Suddenly terrified of leaving the dirty flat, I asked Sally where we were going: why couldn’t we stay here? Even though I knew this was some kind of brothel, at least I hadn’t been touched here. Compared to the idea of being taken somewhere else these four sordid walls seemed like a sanctuary.

‘Amsterdam. The Red Light District. John’s got a contact who rents out rooms there. That’s where you’re going to work.’

I started crying – I couldn’t help it. I felt powerless and trapped, and like I was being dragged towards an inevitable and all-enveloping darkness. And once the tears started I just couldn’t stop them. Sally grabbed my shoulders and shook me hard. She held my face by the chin, moved her head to within a few inches and made me look directly into her eyes.

‘Shut up. Shut Up. Just shut the fuck up. You hear me? Shut. The. Fuck. Up.’

She spoke slowly and deliberately, pausing between each word to ram her message home. And as she did so her eyes drilled into mine. How long she held me like that I don’t know. The sound of a key being turned in the lock of the door made her let go of me and sort of jump back across the room.

Reece pushed the door open and walked in. He glared at her – she must have had that guilty look of someone almost caught in the act of doing something she shouldn’t – but he didn’t say a word. Instead, he pointed the gun at me and gestured towards the corridor outside. I stumbled through the flat and out into the street. The car was parked just outside the door; there was no one else in it. Sally got into the passenger’s seat, then Reece gripped my arm and forced me in the back.

‘Remember, try anything and I’ll do you – fucking do you. Got it?’

We drove towards Amsterdam along the motorway, then through the suburbs and into the city centre. As soon as we left the motorway we seemed to be surrounded by people on pushbikes. Everyone seemed to be cycling; the whole city felt like it was in slow motion. It took us almost as long to get into the old part of the city as it had to drive along the motorway from The Hague.

We drove down a tiny street with a canal on one side and buildings overhanging it on the other. At the bottom there was a big church and then suddenly John stopped the car. He and Sally got out – but not before he showed me the gun again and warned me not to try to escape.

The three of us walked quickly into what seemed like a maze of little alleyways. Almost as soon as we entered the first one, the whole atmosphere changed. The place felt oppressive and menacing; even the air tasted rank and dirty.

And then I saw it.

On the corner of that first alleyway was a big glass window – floor-to-ceiling with an equal-sized glazed door set into it. Red curtains framed the glass and a reddish-pink neon light glowed inside the top of the window-frame. On top of a tall metal stool sat a woman with long dark hair, wearing a leopard-skin print bikini, one leg crossed over the other at the knee. She was smoking a cigarette and staring out at the people passing by in the street. It was just before midday.

I stopped, rooted to the spot, staring at her. I had never been in a red-light area and I had never seen a prostitute. I’d always had the vague impression, probably from watching TV programmes, that ‘going on the game’ meant wearing provocative clothing – short skirts, high-heeled boots, that sort of thing – and skulking around on street corners, late at night, afraid of being spotted by the police. But here was a woman standing behind a glass door in just her underwear, seemingly without any fear of being caught, in the middle of the day!

And then it hit me. I wasn’t looking at a stranger; I was staring into some kind of looking-glass or mirror – one that could see into the future. This woman in the bikini was me. I was going to be like her, trapped inside a glass cage, peering out at the world and waiting for someone to pay to have sex with me.

I dragged my eyes away from the window and looked around in terror. Reece and Sally must have spotted the signs of my panic because both were suddenly next to me – one either side, their arms locked around mine – and steering me deeper into the maze.

We must have walked for between five and ten minutes like that – a bizarre little group, like something out of a surreal three-legged race. During that time, we passed dozens and dozens of people on the streets, yet no one gave us a second glance. The only person who even looked at us at all was a dirty-looking young girl – she could have been no more than 15 or 16 years of age – who lay sprawled against one of the little bridges crossing the canals. The bridge was filthy, strewn with litter, beer cans and bottles. I was shocked to see a used syringe lying next to her. Was it hers? Was she a drug addict? Why was she lying there? Where were the police? In England someone – anyone – would have called them and she would have been arrested. What was wrong with this place that a child could be allowed to lie in such very public squalor?

I barely had time to think all of this before Reece and Sally stopped and pushed me through a dingy doorway. It was dark inside and my eyes took a few seconds to adjust. When they did, I could see we were in some kind of narrow passageway or ante-room. There was an old couch, a broken-down table and a gas ring with a kettle. There was also a closed door in the left-hand wall. Reece spoke. Not to me – to Sally.

‘Get her ready. Show her the ropes. Make sure she does the business, and don’t let her get away. You know what’ll happen if she ain’t here when I get back – and there better be some fucking money too.’

He reached down beside the couch and pulled out some underwear – black bras and panties – and handed one set to Sally and a second to me.

‘Put these on. Do what she does. It’s 100 guilders
1
for a blow-job – 120 if they want you naked. Full sex is 150 guilders; condoms are in the room. With that, he walked out, leaving Sally and me on our own. He locked the door behind him, though.

Sally looked at me and told me to change into the underwear. She quickly slipped off her own clothes and pulled on the little bra and panties. Then she opened the door in the wall. It led into a tiny room with a little bed at the back and one of the big glass windows at the front, looking out onto the street. She pulled me inside and quickly closed the curtains so that no one could see in.

‘It’s alright, don’t worry: I’ll cover for you today. I’ll do the punters – but when John asks I’ll say you did some too and give you some of my money; we’ll pretend you earned it. Just don’t go causing any trouble or we’ll both pay for it. You know what I mean, don’t you?’

I didn’t, not exactly, but I could guess well enough.

My job that day was to sit with Sally and listen to her talk while she stood in the window, trying to hook a punter. She seemed to have a sixth sense about who was a likely customer from a hundred yards away. At first I couldn’t tell the difference between someone who was looking for sex and all the other people who walked along the alley – everyone seemed to have the same furtive, creepy way of passing by and half-looking in the windows.

As soon as she saw a likely prospect Sally would press herself against the glass, swaying her hips or touching herself provocatively. I couldn’t take my eyes off her. It was horrific to watch – even in the roughest pubs in the north-east where men and women got completely blind drunk on a Saturday night, I’d never seen anyone behave so disgustingly in public. Was it just her personal way of going about this business, or was I going to be expected to do the same thing later?

Within half an hour she whispered to me out of the side of her mouth.

‘Got one. He definitely wants business. Watch what I do from there and when I get him inside, watch from behind the door. Leave it open just a crack: it’s always safest to have someone watching in case he turns out to be one of the funny ones.’

One of the ‘funny ones’? What on earth did she mean? But I didn’t have time to ask her, because she hissed a new instruction at me.

‘Pass me my stuff, will you? It’s in my bag just inside the other room.’

‘Stuff? What stuff?’ I asked her. Sally looked at me as if I were mad.

‘The “Charlie”, stupid. There’s a wrap at the bottom of the bag somewhere. Should be enough for a line or two. Oh, for Chrissake, the Charlie – the coke, the cocaine.’

She pronounced the last word extra-slowly as if speaking to an imbecile or a small child. I grabbed her handbag and rummaged through it until I found a small folded piece of paper. I handed it to her without a word, then watched as with one hand she tipped two little white lines out onto the back of her other hand and inhaled each one deeply. Then she wiped her nose and rubbed her index finger against her teeth, making a little sucking noise.

I had never done drugs; I had never been anywhere where drugs were passed around. And I had most definitely never watched anyone snort cocaine. I must have looked completely gob-smacked because Sally snapped at me.

‘Stop staring, and close your mouth. You look like a fucking goldfish. The stuff helps us get through. You’ll see when it’s your turn. Now get behind that fucking door and keep an eye on this fucker.’

She seemed suddenly aggressive and angry. I turned away from her and saw that the punter she had spotted was standing right up against the glass window and watching us closely. He must have seen Sally do her lines of coke, but he didn’t seem remotely bothered. She opened the door and gave him a rundown on the price list that Reece had spelt out. I heard him say ‘full sex’ as I hid myself behind the door to the other room. For some reason I was most shocked that he was quite young – in his thirties I would have said – and very evidently English.

It took 10 minutes from start to finish. He didn’t seem bothered whether Sally was naked or not; maybe he just didn’t want to pay the extra for her to strip off. Whatever the reason, after taking his money, she picked up a condom and went over to the little bed. He undid his belt, dropped his trousers and pulled his Y-fronts down just enough to free his penis.

After a brief conversation, Sally undid the condom and briskly put it on him; then she got on her knees facing me. He knelt behind her and she pulled her bikini bottom to one side.

I stood and watched as he took her, roughly and quickly. Sally’s face was blank, as if she were bored or completely disinterested in what the man was doing to her. But how could she be? Surely she had to care?

Neither of them said a word to each other until he had finished. Only then did Sally acknowledge him again, turning round and removing the condom. She seemed to give it a quick check, then threw it into a bin beside the bed. He pulled up his pants and trousers and was out the door so quickly I barely saw him go. There was a little sink in the room: Sally gave herself a quick wash and called out to me.

‘It’s OK. You can come out now. And bring me a joint; there’s one in my bag.’

I found it and stepped gingerly into the room. The curtains were still closed, hiding us from the sight of people in the street. I felt unclean – filthy – from what I’d just seen, and desperately wanted to wash myself clean. But I couldn’t face the thought of the little sink in that room – not after watching Sally wash herself there – and anyway, what on earth could I wash that would erase the sort of dirt I felt?

Sally took the joint from my fingers. It was a big one, rolled into a sort of fat cone shape. She lit it and dragged the pungent, sickly smoke deep down into her lungs. Then she took a few more long drags, her face tilted up towards the ceiling, her eyes tightly closed. She opened them, smiled slightly and offered it to me. I shook my head, dumbly.

‘OK, but you’ll need it soon enough. It’s good shit, stronger than anything you’ll be used to.’

I found my voice and told her I’d never done drugs, not even cannabis. She smiled again – but grimly this time.

‘Well, there’s a first time for everything. Now, what did you see back there?’

I didn’t understand the question. What was I supposed to have seen? Or had I seen something I wasn’t meant to? A wave of fear ran through me again, making me dizzy. I felt physically sick with fear.

‘Nothing. I didn’t see anything. Not really. Just that man – but I didn’t see his face or anything. Honest, I didn’t see anything. Don’t tell Reece, please.’

Sally sighed, pulled again on the joint and looked at me as if I was an idiot.

‘Don’t be so fucking thick. Of course you saw something – that was the whole point. You were meant to be watching so that you understood how to do it. Now, think, what did I do?’