Boy for Sale

by Icaro Trindade

  “Are you serious?” Eric asked, sounding scared.

  “Yes,” I answered, drying my tears. I had to be firm one more time.

  “Is he alright?”

  “I don’t know. But I wouldn’t worry too much about him if I were you.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I can explain it thoroughly to you in another occasion. I don’t have much time now.”

  “Of course not! Are you crazy, Ianto? They can kill you any minute now!” he yelled from the other side.

  “They won’t. I managed to take the chip off with a knife.”

  “A knife? You really are out of your mind. Where are you? I’ll take you to the hospital right now.”

  “You don’t have to worry about me, I’m fine. That’s not why I called you.”

  Eric got silent for a few seconds.

  “Why did you call me, then?” he asked, sounding unsure.

  “I found out where is the agency that sold me and I’m going to tell everything to the police. Since the Central is just 20 minutes away, I doubt that they will have much time to hide what they actually do in there,” I said. Eric stayed quiet and didn’t make any comments. I could hear his heavy breath on the line. “I called you because I want 2 million dizus. A million, which is how much you paid for me, and another as Paulo has paid you. You can charge him later. Consider it as a rental fee for the time you believed you could use me as it pleased you.”

  “You can only be joking,” Eric remarked.

  “I’m definitely not joking, Eric. You have two hours to create a bank account under the name in the fake documents you made me and deposit 90% of the amount I requested in it. You are influent and powerful enough to manage this without too much hassle. The rest, I need you to bring it to me in cash, otherwise…”

  “Otherwise, what?” he asked, sounding as if he was crying.

  “I will tell them about the two of you. There might have no contracts involving your names in there, but you have travelled with me. We slept in the same bedroom, Eric. If I prove to the police that these documents are fake and that I had been sold to you guys, you will be executed together with Laurel and his employees,” I threatened with a firm tone.

  “You are bluffing. You would die with us.”

  “Yes, I will. However, unlike you, I wouldn’t have much to lose anyway. I will never be able to live with my family in Alendor, even with these fake documents. The money I got from Paulo’s wallet is not of much use and it’s too dangerous for me to keep walking on the streets, risking to be recognized and accused of faking my own death. That is why I’m absolutely not bluffing and, if I have to die, I will take the two of you with me. Two million is nothing compared to everything you made me go through. You have two hours starting now, Eric, to bring me a card with 1,800,000 dizus on it and 200,000 dizus in cash. ”

  Eric didn’t answer for a moment and I waited patiently for his response.

  “I believed that you had been happy with me for a while,” he said in a heartbreaking tone.

  “I was, Eric, very happy indeed. However, during this time with Paulo, I had time to think and consider what we had together and the thing is, no matter how much you have loved me or how kind you were to me. The truth is you have bought me, Eric! That is just awful, no matter the context and, for many times, you have really treated me as your property. You have also tried to rape me and even abused me more than once. Not to mention the most important thing: you kept me locked inside a bedroom! I could have gone nuts! Well, that is if I wasn’t already suffering with the Stockholm Syndrome. Therefore, yes, I have the right to demand this money from you in order not to denounce you.”

  “Fine, you are right,” Eric said in a tearful voice. “I will do as you demand. Where can I meet you to give you the 200,000 dizus?”

  “Divine Coffee Shop; four blocks from the agency,” I answered.

  “Right, I know where it is. I will be there soon.”

  “I’ll be waiting for you,” I said and hung up the phone.

  My heart was in pieces and I felt the urge to cry, but I would only allow myself to do that when I managed to conclude my plan. So, for the time being, I went back to my chocolate cake, which I ended with a spoonful.

  I asked the waitress for another piece of cake with double its size. Eating always helped me when I was anxious.

  When I looked at the phone screen, I calculated that Eric would have until seven o’clock to meet me, bringing the money. Otherwise, instead of calling the police about the agency, I would go there in person, telling them about the whole scheme. I had given Eric a choice and I really meant it. All I could do was hope for him to make the right choice.

  Chapter 23

  I waited impatiently for Eric, while feeling my skin getting hot. I was very concerned about the cut in my belly, but I had nothing to do besides wait for him.

  New clients were coming and going from the coffee shop and only I remained. I was afraid that the nasty waitress would shoo me away at any minute. Every time I took a glance at the counter, she was staring at me with disdain. Has no one ever told her that it was wrong to judge people by their clothes? Her attitude and that endless wait only made me more anxious.

  I looked at my cellphone to check the time every minute and they seemed longer every time. I was wondering if Paulo had already awake. I wanted so badly to see his face when he realized that he was hurt and chained to the bed, with not a chance to move away from there. Although it wasn’t the revenge I’ve been looking for, he would undoubtedly learn a few things after that.

  Finally, when it got to the deadline for Eric’s arrival and he wasn’t there yet, I felt my heart racing and my body shivering in anxiety. What if he betrayed me? What if he decided to tell Laurel about what I was about to do, so they could get rid of the evidences and, as soon as I left the cafeteria, they would be there to exterminate me at once?

  I wanted badly to believe that Eric wouldn’t be that cruel, but, before I knew, five minutes had passed and nothing. I tried to keep myself calm and give him a few more minutes.

  Ten minutes.

  Fifteen minutes passed.

  Twenty.

  I tried to call him, but he didn’t pick it up.

  I called him a second time and once again nothing.

  Three times I tried to call him with no avail.

  Eric wasn't going to come.

  My hands were shaking so much that I couldn’t even hold the cup with the tea I had ordered. I was afraid of leaving the coffee shop to find someone outside, ready to kill me. However, there was no time to hesitate. I had to do as I said and go to the police station, even if just to be executed with them as well. I didn’t want anyone else to go through the things I’ve been through. Being treated as a slave or an object wasn’t much better than death.

  Then, when I felt there was no reason to wait any longer, I gathered strength and courage and stood up. I was ready to go to the police station and put an end on that. As soon as I started walking towards the counter, I was surprised to see Eric entering the shop. I felt instantly relieved when I saw him and he seemed to feel likewise.

  “Thank God you are still here,” he said, taking my arm and looking into my eyes.

  “You were lucky; I had just given up waiting. You took so long and didn’t even pick up my calls,” I remarked, feeling my legs wobbling. I haven’t seen him in so long that I had forgotten how much his presence affected me.

  “I’ve lost my cellphone in the rush, but…” he raised the briefcase he was holding and gave it to me. “Here you have the money and the card,” he explained, giving me a platinum card. “It wasn’t that easy to get this at such a short time, but now you have it.”

  “Thank you, Eric,” I couldn’t dodge my eyes from his.

  “Aren’t you going to check?”

  “I trust you.”

  Eric smile forcibly.

  “Now that you’ve got what you wanted, what are you going to do? Where will you go?” he asked me,
his eyes wet with tears. He seemed to be about to hold me at any minute, in order not to let me go.

  At the same time that I wanted to leave as soon as possible, so that I wouldn’t hesitate and give up on my plans, I felt the urge to talk to Eric and clarify some things before saying goodbye.

  “What about a last cup of coffee together?” I suggested, with my face wet with tears.

  “Sure,” Eric agreed with a sad smile. We walked to the table where I was before and he sat in front of me.

  We both wiped away the tears and I made a sign for the nasty girl. She seemed surprised to see Eric there with me; most likely, she had recognized him from a magazine and now she was beating herself for having stared at me with so much disdain the whole time.

  “Two cappuccinos,” I asked her.

  “Right away,” she said with a huge smile and ran to prepare them. What a fake!

  “Are you alright? You look a bit red,” Eric asked, sounding concerned.

  “I’m fine,” I lied. I knew I couldn’t afford to lose that time, but I would never forgive myself if I didn’t have that last talk with him.

  “You said you took off the chip with a knife. That is much more dangerous than you can imagine!”

  “I’m fine, Eric, I swear. Just drink this last cappuccino with me, please…”

  “All right,” he said, defeated.

  “How have you been?” I asked. I wanted to know how he had endured the time we were apart from each other.

  “I’ve suffered a lot…”

  “I know. Me too.”

  “What do you mean by that, Ianto? You left me to live with the man you loved. I can’t even understand the reason behind all this. Why are you running away from him if you wanted to be together?”

  I laughed at the question, but I had to get a hold on myself when the waitress arrived.

  “Do you need anything else?” she asked, smiling and clearly flirting with Eric.

  “No, we don’t; get away from here. We will call you if we need anything,” I answered coldly. She wiped the smile from her face and went back to the counter wordlessly.

  Eric faced me with surprise and I took a deep breath before getting back to the subject.

  “Eric, I’ve never loved Paulo. It has always been you.”

  “Then, why did you say you loved him and dumped me?” he asked, confused.

  I waited for a moment, preparing myself psychologically to tell him the truth. I would probably crush his feelings even more, but he had to know. Therefore, when I felt strong enough to do it, I started talking.

  “During the time I was convinced of Lucy’s lies, I did a huge mistake. Maybe this isn’t the most pleasant moment to find it out, but I have betrayed you, Eric. I had sex with Paulo in Sarnaut, while you were in that meeting with the owner of Lauzon. I was dying to take revenge on you at that time,” I confessed, making Eric cry once again. “When I found out Lucy had been lying to me all that time, I felt terrible about this. I had been completely unfair to you! The worse, though, happened after that. In the same day you asked Paulo to find someone to kill Lucy, he entered the apartment with the keys she gave him and told me he was the one who asked Lucy to manipulate me. They had a deal: she would help him take me away from you in exchange of money. However, once his plan had gone wrong, he decided to blackmail me with violence and a video from the day we had sex, so that I would tell you those lies about loving him and wanting to go live with him.”

  Eric heard everything in shock and showed no reaction to those words.

  “Why would he do this?” he asked, sounding confused.

  “Paulo has always loved you, Eric, and not as a friend or a brother, the way you do. He has nurtured this love for too long, never losing the hope for you to notice that the person who loved you the most was right there beside you. However, as the time passed, you fell in love with other people and involved him in your problems, not realizing how much you were making him suffer. It got to a point where he couldn’t hold any longer. He realized you would never love him in the same way and that meant he had suffered a long time for you in vain. Thus, he decided to take revenge by preventing you from being happy at all costs, even if it meant to take me away from you.”

  “That’s horrible! Why did you accept this blackmail? Why didn’t you tell me the truth?” Eric asked, crying nonstop and not even once touching his cup.

  “I was afraid of your reaction. He said he would do anything to convince you to erase me and I knew you were capable of such a thing.”

  “This is why you cried so hard when I said that, if you ever hurt me again, I could get rid of you.”

  “Yes…”

  He laughed nervously for a moment.

  “I didn’t mean it, Ianto. I said that to scare you and to make you think twice before making any choices that could endanger any or both of us,” he explained.

  “I understand, but that scared the hell out of me, Eric. Therefore, it seemed more reasonable to accept Paulo’s terms and try to escape him later.”

  “Now it makes sense for you to run away from that son-of-a-bitch.”

  “Yeah. My days beside him were awful and I had to go through lots of things that I want like to forget. But I’m free now.” Mentally, I added if I could survive to the end of the day.

  “What kind of things?”

  “Don’t worry about it, it doesn’t matter anymore.”

  “Of course it does! Tell me what he has done to you, Ianto!” Eric asked me, almost yelling. He really wanted to know.

  “Fine,” I agreed and took a deep breath. “Let’s say that he wasn’t as gentle as you were and, most of the times, he didn’t care if I wanted to make sex to him or not,” I said, standing up and lifting my shirt so he could see the cuts and bruises made by Paulo, beside the one I made myself to take off the chip. Eric was enraged to see that.

  “I can’t believe that I considered sending someone to his apartment to help him. As soon as I set eyes on him again, I’m going to kill him with my own hands!” He said, angrily.

  “Calm down, Eric! Don’t go ruining your life because of him. You will give him exactly what he wants,” I said, holding his arm.

  “He can’t get away with it, Ianto!”

  “Then, just give him a good spanking and find a way for him to never want to see you again. Just don’t do anything reckless. Even though I have blackmailed you, I don’t want you to die.”

  “A good spanking? I will make him lose all his teeth! I can’t believe he had the guts to hurt you like this,” Eric was crying with anger.

  “Please, calm down. You have also hit me once.”

  “You are right,” he admitted, covering his mouth with a hand. “I’m sorry, Ianto. I’ve gone crazy when I heard those things. You were telling me I couldn’t live any longer with the man I loved. I couldn’t refrain from all that anger and frustration.”

  “I’ve forgiven you, don’t worry.”

  “Thank you.” He said, already calming down.

  “So, you have really loved me?” I asked him, looking straight into his eyes.

  “I still love you, Ianto. Please, don’t go!” Eric begged me, holding my hands.

  I remained silent for a moment, watching Eric’s feelings crumbling down together with mine.

  “I’m sorry, Eric, but I really have to go. I can’t keep on living in prison or hiding away from the police. This is no life at all. You said yourself that I had to grow up and this will only be possible when I manage to have a real life again.”

  Eric tried to wipe his tears a bit, but they kept falling down his face nonstop.

  “Where will you go?” he asked me.

  “I’m going to trust your company’s prediction and I will live and invest this money in Sarnaut. Who knows? Maybe I will become as rich as you someday,” I said, forcing myself to smile while my face became wet from the tears. I never thought it would be so hard to say goodbye to Eric. I felt as if I was leaving a very important part of me behind, but I needed
that distance to be able to move on.

  “I’ll be praying for your happiness, Ianto. Thank you very much for all the happiness you gave me during the time we spent together! It was undoubtedly more intense than all the suffering we had to face. No matter what you think: to me, our love has been and will always be pure and loyal.”

  “I love you, Eric!” I said, losing ground.

  “I love you too, Ianto!” he said back. How much I loved to hear those words coming from his mouth.

  I felt I could freak myself out and give up on everything, therefore, I stood up quickly before doing it.

  “I have to go,” I announced it.

  “You need to go to a hospital. Your cut looks serious.”

  “I will, but only when I get in Sarnaut. I can’t risk being caught, Eric. Not after everything I did in order to escape.”

  “Then, let me take you to the airport,” he offered, getting up quickly.

  “No! I have to do it by myself.”

  “Fine, then,” he said, with a sad tone. “Can you at least give me a last kiss?” Eric asked, not blinking or dodging his eyes from mine.

  I looked at him in silent for a few seconds.

  “No, Eric,” I answered. That seemed to shake him even more.

  “Why not?” he asked me, confused.

  “If I kiss you now, maybe I will lose the will to leave. I really need to do it, though. I’m desperate to be free, so… goodbye, Eric!”

  “Goodbye, Ianto!” Eric’s goodbye made my heart break in a million pieces.

  I looked at the man I loved for the last time and, after taking the briefcase with the money that he had brought me, I turned my back on him and walked to the exit without looking back.

  When I passed the counter where the nasty girl was, I left two notes of 50 dizus on it and left the coffee shop with a crushed heart.

  ***

  After trying to calm down and control my tears, I took a cab parked near the playground and asked the driver to take me to the airport.

  I couldn’t believe that after being arrested for stealing food, being sold as a property and being used as a sexual slave I was finally turning the table and leaving Alendor with 2 million dizus.