I knew without being told that this was Grant’s section of the compound. It was far more orderly than Este’s was. Each field fenced neatly, each section of garden aesthetically perfect, but there was no feel of life. While Este’s seemed like it was a home for madness and nonsense, Grant’s was stiflingly regimented.

As we rounded the curve, Superior Grant’s house came into view, all angles and sloping roofs, sitting atop a grassy, man-made hill and lording over the ground below. It was nothing like Este’s and nothing like home. The whole front was glass. My eyes scanned the floor-to-ceiling windows, and I jumped when I saw that Grant’s shadow graced one of them. He sat in his wheelchair, staring down at me, his apathetic expression coming into focus as we neared the house. Warm, golden rectangles of light shone down on us from inside, and I found myself stepping over the shadows like they were solid. There was no gate to pass through, no extensive security measures. We walked down a short driveway and straight into an underground garage. The doors were already rolled up, waiting for us to enter.

Snake eyes pressed a button on an intercom on the inside wall and hissed, “Where do you want the, err, her?”

Grant’s voice sailed through the speaker and itched at my ears with its twangy sound. “First floor, second guest bedroom.”

Guest? I trembled at the thought.

“Lucky girl,” the guard snarled.

I turned around slowly and spoke, my voice still wire-brushed and new to me. “Why am I not going to a prison? What does he want from me?”

They both laughed and didn’t answer. I hoped it was because they didn’t know.

One guard pressed the up button on the lift. The doors opened, and I caught a flash of hot, red, and shining chrome through the double doors of the lift before they closed. I leaned towards them in curiosity. The guard grabbed my shoulder and pulled me away from the view.

“Stand back,” he said warily, his eyes searching out the corners of the lift. They both behaved as if they were being watched all the time. They probably were.

The lift glided upwards, strange moaning music playing, the singer caught in a trap he couldn’t get out of by the sound of it. One guard clicked his fingers in time. The doors chimed and opened. A female guard stood to attention in front of the lift, jumping to life when she saw me, her red roots poking through her light brown dye job shone hopelessly under the round lights punched into the ceiling. She leaned in, grabbed my arm, and squeezed, yanking me out of the lift and away from the men.

“Thank you for delivering Miss Rosa.” She eyed my clothing or lack thereof. “I’ll have your jacket cleaned and returned to you.” They nodded, and I caught one of them anxiously pressing the down button. He wanted to get out of there.

“Keep it,” he shouted nervously as the doors closed on his narrow face.

I found myself missing them as soon the door closed. This woman’s tight hold, the sleek décor, the fact that she called me Miss Rosa, were all more unnerving than the outward hostility and punches in the back. That, I understood.

She marched me down a hallway, lights glowing along the floor, and carpet the color of bruised lips and blood sinking between my toes. I looked up to see a large painting of a can of tomato soup and laughed. The squeeze got tighter, and her expression pulled her face in like purse strings. We came to a polished, wooden door with copper wall lights on either side. The woman, Red, as I had already nicknamed her in my head, punched in numbers on the keypad and scanned her wrist. The door unlatched, and I was dragged towards the bed.

My bony butt sank warily into the most comfortable mattress I had ever touched. A satin bedspread swirled around my dirty legs, which were striped with dried blood, the patterns almost wanting to eject me so I didn’t sully their beauty. I gazed down at my hands, clasped over the heavy canvas jacket. The tarnished buttons and frayed pockets were almost a comfort. I put my hand into one of the pockets and fished out a folded piece of paper. Hope flowed through me too quickly, warm and golden. I had to clamp down on these feelings before they destroyed me because as I opened the paper, while Red was busy locking the door behind her, the short list of items caused my heart to shrivel inside me along with my faith. I remembered the last time I’d read a list like this. Black words scrawled on lined paper encompassed death, love, hope. This was just a grocery list: Tinned tomatoes x 2, rice, beef, tampons. I quirked my eyebrow at the last item. The soldier had a wife and maybe a daughter. It was something I needed to remind myself of—everyone had a family. Something, someone to lose.

Red huffed, standing over me with her hands on her hips. She held out her hand for the note, and I gave it to her. She scrunched it in one hand without reading it and shoved it in her pocket, her skirt so tight on her hips that I could see the little ball of paper bulging under the fabric.

Eyes wide and critical, she drew a breath and lunged at me.

I leaned back on the bed, frightened of this enormous woman pressing her breasts into my face. She dragged her fingers through my hair, and I struggled not to suffocate.

“Sit up!” she barked impatiently. “I’m not going to hurt you, child.”

Still naked under the jacket, I felt vulnerable to say the least, but I sat there like a good girl, like someone else, and let her run her hands through my hair, inspect my eyes, and pinch at my skin like I was an animal on show. Because I promised. Even though every part of my dark, scrawny body wanted to smack her so hard I’d leave a bony handprint on her cheek, I knew I wouldn’t get far.

“What are you doing?” I asked, my voice muffled through a curtain of my own hair.

She looked over the top of my head as she replied, “Getting your colors right.”

“My colors?”

“Yes. What you need to change, what you can keep.” What I could keep?

I gripped the quilt on either side of me like it was cement that could hold me in my place. Maybe I could hit her a little?

She seemed indifferent to my reaction and continued inspecting me, but when she made a move for my jacket, I put my arm up to block her, pushing back at her assault. I wasn’t doing this again.

Her large head gave a tiny shake. I didn’t have time to react before she whipped her hand into her breast pocket and tapped a black device to my arm. My body jolted, feeling and sounding like it had cracked in half like a dry branch.

My eyes rolled, my speech thick in my mouth. “Wha… why…?”

Her fuzzy image became larger in my eyes until she filled the whole room. Her thunderclap voice slammed against the walls.

“You didn’t do as you were told.” The words ‘do as you were told’ echoed and ran down the walls like dripping paint.

My arm stung with the familiar prick of a needle. My body slumped and gave in to a familiar feeling. I was right back where I started.

GRANT

I watched her treading or rather storming towards my garage. The look on her face was not what I had expected, and it irritated me. She should be afraid, trembling. Uncertain. Instead, her large, uneven, young eyes took in my home, my world, seeming more curious than afraid. That would soon change.

I cursed my inability to escort her myself. I imagined my hand clamped around her thin arm, my legs strong and quick. I would have dragged her here and heard her whimper. My ghost foot stamped and of course, there was no impact, no sound. But soon, I would walk again. I could almost feel my height growing. I would look down on everyone. Never again would people stoop to meet my eyes. It had not been so long that I couldn’t remember what it felt like to stride through my own garden, to stand above most. Now, I looked up and despised my view.