Red Lights, Black Hearts

by Fabiola Francisco

  Disappointment. Deception. Denial.

  We all walk in the shadow of something. A shadow of expectancy, of pride, of ego, of memories. For some that shadow is the companion to the loneliness. My shadow has been my company for so many years. It has pushed me to fight and win. It has talked me into doing things and talked me out of them. Tonight, my shadow dances along with me with the peaked interest of my visitors. One in particular. My shadow seeks his across the snow-covered street, but it’s nowhere to be found.

  I have come to terms that Max and I are connected. I have come to accept he is bound to my life for now. What I have not come to realize is my need to see him. I search for him among the audience in awe of the window of pleasure and pain. I shut him out with the thick scarlet curtains that adorn my palace, but seek him in the darkness of the night. The moon traveling in search for the light of the sun to give it purpose.

  For a long time I haven’t had a purpose besides survive in a world that I know how to control. I use what I have to move and seduce, destruct the power of some for a little while. Make them beg for something only I can give them. It may seem twisted to some, but it gives me a high to know I can control them. It pushes me forward knowing I have the upper hand. The other option is unacceptable.

  Now, my mind is starting to rouse with new purpose. I’m familiar with the symptoms, but I can’t diagnose the disease. This purpose can give new meaning or destroy the little I have left. It could shatter that glass window, or keep me enclosed forever.

  “Don’t think too hard.” His voice is gruff. The cold from outside still swimming within him.

  “I’m not.” When did he cross me to enter?

  “The wheels are turning. Don’t exhaust the mouse running on the wheel.”

  I hadn’t noticed how much I missed his cologne as the scent invades my room. He’s been away more. Now he’s here, but who knows for how long.

  “Your comments are trivial.” I want more of his meaning. I want some of his purpose.

  “I’ve just arrived. You’re already insulting my choice of expression?”

  “Insulting is a harsh word if I speak the truth.”

  “It’s your opinion, not the truth. I think my comments are humorous.” He’s light today. Playful. His blue eyes shine with brightness as he smiles and sits in my corner chair.

  “Well? Are you going to dance for me?”

  “Once a customer comes in, I don’t dance anymore.”

  “I’m not a customer.”

  “Do you pay for my time?”

  He nods.

  “Then a customer you are.”

  “Since I’m paying, I choose the service. I want you to dance.” He leans back and extends his body. He’s serious.

  “Private shows are extra.”

  “Once that curtain closes, everything is a private show.”

  I dance for him. Not because he told me to, but because this is what I do. I bring you in, butter you up, and eat you whole. I move to my internal beat, moving my hips and letting my whole mane flow. He watches attentively, his eyes following mine, his hands tucked in his pockets.

  When the tune runs out I stand in front of him. We have never taken it this far inside of this room. For the first time, I’m uncertain about what my client wants. This client isn’t just a paying customer; he is the soul that tries to bring light into mine.

  “You’re a great dancer.” He still sits on the chair.

  “Thanks.”

  “Why do you dance for an audience in the middle of the Red Light District instead of another outlet?”

  “What makes this inferior to Broadway?”

  “I never said it was inferior. Those are your own judgments shining bright.”

  “I don’t judge what I do.”

  “You just did. Your choice of words betray you.”

  “Are we done?”

  “Not quite. Tell me, what brought you here?”

  “That’s not a story I tell. Story time is for children who play on slides and swing freely on swing sets.”

  “I can be that child.” He smirks. His playful mood mixed with determination annoys me.

  “You’re not a child,” I say absentmindedly.

  “Tell me your story. I want to know who you are beneath the hair and lingerie. I want to know the person who hides behind the glass.”

  “She’s the same person you see in front of you now and dancing when you’re across the street.”

  “No.” He contradicts me at every turn. “There’s more than that. Everybody’s journey is paved with reason. I want to know yours.”

  “My reasons are part of the past.”

  “Not if they continue to influence you in the present.”

  “Are you a psychologist?”

  “No, I’m an accountant.”

  “Numbers,” I say, curious.

  “I’m walking you home tonight.” He stands and leaves abruptly. I have a feeling this conversation will continue later.

  My interest in the rest of the people that come in is off knowing Max is waiting. Or maybe he goes out and returns. His persistence shuts me down and pulls me in at the same time. I find myself wanting to give him some of me, but I know the damage that can do.

  I am a fire that burns, but can he be the water that extinguishes me?

  “Goodnight, Bale.”

  “Be open, babe.” He winks and smiles. For someone who has suffered like him, he sure is hopeful of my love life.

  I walk into the brutal cold, a contrast to the heat inside the room, and see his shadow approaching.

  “Ready?”

  “Are you going to corner me into answering your questions?”

  “I’ll corner you for another reason.” His fingers tickle my neck.

  I shiver and tense my shoulders.

  “Now, while we have time until I can do that, tell me what brought you here.”

  This was his first question to me when he entered my room unsure of his actions. He wanted to understand. I don’t know why.

  “Max, there’s nothing to tell. I like what I do.”

  “Then what brought you to Amsterdam?”

  He’s persistent. I see the speck of determination in his eyes.

  “I’m not a story you want in your anthology of life.”

  “Again, that’s your opinion.”

  “My opinion is what matters to me. I know the depths I’ve gone to get where I am. You’re good, Max. One of the only goods I’ve met in life. Don’t let me stain you with my ugly.”

  “We all have ugly. It’s how we deal with it that brings us back to good or keeps us prisoners of the night.”

  “Sometimes it’s too deep for us to deal with.”

  “Sometimes you just need the right person to help you along the way.”

  “I don’t need saving.”

  “I know that. You’re too wild to tame, but I don’t want to tame you. I want to join your wilderness and explore the depths of your exotic interior.”

  I look over at him and all I see is pure honesty on his face. It’s almost as if he understands me but still wants to hear the tale that brought me to such a narrow road on my path. Max is light, and I want to breathe him in whole.

  He’s peeling off my layers without his knowing, an internal purification that I never thought was possible. I resist it. Resisting the unknown urge to follow the light when I know the black within me will only taint him. Scar him. Hurt him.

  “Sometimes the wild is a dangerous place.”

  “Just the right amount of danger is necessary to create a balance. Be my wilderness and I’ll be your safe haven.”

  “Max, my safe haven is behind that glass. It keeps me protected.”

  “It keeps you hidden.”

  He has a way of challenging me, a way of giving things a different perspective. Then again, it was him who said it’s all relative. What I know is that he is lifting the peace from my life and causing a whirlwind of sand like a midnight desert wind, blinding me from the view
I’ve known for so long. And I’m slowly letting him.

  “Do you see the beauty of the moon?” He points up to the crescent. “On certain days she only shows part of herself, keeping half of her beauty hidden from the world, only for the stars to admire in the universe. When you’re behind that glass, you keep half of you hidden, but when I go in, I see that part. You show me your darkness even when the red lights are shining on part of you. We are from the same part of the universe.”

  “You see what you want to see.”

  “You expose yourself to me. For whatever reason it may be, and I’m grateful.”

  We arrive to the door of my apartment building and he raises his eyebrows as if saying, what are you waiting for. I open the door and he follows me.

  “In that room, you’re for the world to see and enjoy. Here, you’re mine.” He walks into my bathroom and turns on the tub, plugging the drain so it fills.

  “Get in and relax.”

  Kind. That describes Max tonight. He’s determined to know my past, but his compassion is too great to push me beyond my limits.

  He sits behind me and grabs the sponge, washing my body with a tenderness I didn’t know any man possessed.

  When he’s done, we rinse and dry ourselves. Max carries me, my legs straddling him as he walks through the narrow hallway, and lays me down on my bed. He climbs on top, our soft breaths the only sound, and positions himself over me. Grabbing my hands and placing them over my head, he laces his fingers with mine as he pushes into me. It’s soft and slow, gentle and satisfying.

  His blue eyes shine down on mine, holding my black ones captive as he moves inside me. A silent claim of all he wants to possess vibrating off him. It’s an understanding and agreement. It’s a feeling I’ve never known, and as I stare into his eyes unblinking, it triggers within me memories of a time I knew the light. A time I used to run beneath the sun and soak up the rays. He triggers memories I had buried with other memories I tried to escape. He brings back the part of me that died when the horrid truths of my family were revealed. He elicits a time when I knew of the good in the world and believed in fairytales.

  I call out his name as the waves of pleasure drown me, my voice hoarse with realization. He’s doing more than offering a helping hand; his presence is reminding me of who I was before the storm swept it all away.

  Max bends down to kiss me and I relax into the mattress, sucking in his breath so that it can revive that part of me I briefly got to see. Life is a series of experiences that mark us. They lead us down paths that shape us, not to manipulate us, but to help us survive the brutal truth of this world. In uncovering my reality, I also entered the depths of life that are sordid. A part of me, no doubt, but as I uncovered this part, I covered up the part of me that had a different idea of the world.

  “Are you okay?” Max asks.

  “Yes,” I whisper and lay in bed staring up at the ceiling and the specks of light dancing in happiness.

  “One day you’ll tell me your story.”

  I close my eyes and try to sleep. Flashes of my childhood running behind my lids like an old home movie—the images blurry, but the emotions palpable.

  “Goodnight, Mond,” he whispers in my ear.

  “Goodnight, Sun,” I reply. Max has permanently etched himself into my life for however long he’ll stay.

  Tired of thinking and fighting myself, I close my eyes and sleep profoundly for the first time in weeks.

  How do you begin to live when all you’ve known is indifference? I have coal for a heart, so how can I feel the emotions running through me? I like indifference. It gave me control. It gave me peace. It made me a master within its danger for surviving it.

  However, if we seek justice, if we seek to control, are we really indifferent? The indifference I felt was just geared towards the result of my actions, but when I wanted revenge for other people’s actions, I cared. I cared enough to react.

  A dream. I had a dream. I was running around a field. A park? Someone wanted something I had. A girl. No, a young woman. She was thrown to the side of the street unconscious. She meant something to me. I wanted to help her but no one would. All I remember was carrying her and taking her with me. I don’t know where. To a building with people. She was prey for everyone to hunt on, but I tried to keep her safe. Why wouldn’t anyone help me?

  I carried her undressed through stairwells in search of refuge, but she wouldn’t wake up and I couldn’t find a safe place. Children roamed around me. I was invisible to them. Only the adults could see me. We were being chased. Desperation. I felt desperation. That’s why I can’t sleep.

  They say that when you dream you are every person and thing in that dream. Then, I was the person trying to save the young woman. I was the young woman who needed to escape. I was those who wouldn’t help. I was the predators hoping to feast on her. How could one person possibly be so many things? Because throughout my life, I have been all that, I think to myself.

  I remember more of the dream. Children playing outside. A couple seeking revenge for unfinished business from their childhood. Revenge from this woman I was carrying? It’s unclear. Are we really everything in our dream?

  Thirteen. That was how old I was when the light within me was suddenly shut without understanding why. It was an internal switch that was provoked by unknown reasons, yet I felt the consequence.

  Now I understand. I was feeling what was going on around me even if I didn’t consciously know. Now I know. Now I know what it was that my world was struggling with. Truth. What I did not know at that point was that the rest of my life would be an extended effect of that day. That everything that would happen from then on would be a result of my little girl confused as to what caused her to shut down.

  Anger begins to surge. Confusion. Betrayal. I was happy. Why was I stripped of that? What did I do to deserve it?

  I look at Max’s sleeping face. My wilderness is too great to fit into his safe haven. He won’t survive it.

  My mother didn’t survive her own wilderness. She kept the humming secrets to herself. Maybe in hopes that she would forget one day? Bury the memories. She must have suffered. Of course she did. Living with the knowledge that someone who is supposed to protect you would act in such a way. As much as I loved my mom, I didn’t want to end up like her.

  “Good morning,” Max interrupts my thoughts.

  “Good morning.”

  “Did you sleep?” his question expresses concern.

  “Yes, I woke up a little while ago.”

  “Do you only sleep a few hours each night?”

  “It depends.” I don’t need to tell him there are nights I don’t sleep at all. It will remind him to continue his series of questions to get down to the root of my problems.

  “Can I take you out for breakfast?”

  “Don’t you have to work?”

  “It’s Saturday.”

  “Oh.” He looks at me quizzically. Working the job I do, it doesn’t matter what day of the week it is. I don’t keep track of days. I don’t keep track of time.

  “I don’t really go out around the city.”

  “Well, you need to eat. You either have to go to a market or restaurant.”

  “My breakfast consists of a run and coffee.”

  “Then we’ll have coffee.”

  When he sees my hesitation, he continues, “Sam, just go with it. I promise not to badger you with questions. Just open up to someone who won’t judge you.”

  Judgment. That’s what he thinks this is about. Judgment is the last thing on my mind.

  For whatever reason, I agree. Maybe I hope to get more glimpses of that person I was. Maybe I hope to feel some other emotions besides hurt and resentment and hatred. Maybe I hope to scare him away.

  He’s willing to give me what I want to take from him. Except, when I begin to take and take, I won’t be able to stop. It feels too good, and I’m too bad to care what it will do to him.

  We just walk. We don’t hold hands. He doesn’
t put his arm around me. We stand side by side, together but not. I see him looking over at me from time to time, trying to understand what’s on my mind. He’s trying to secretly analyze the reasons why a woman like me would end up in a place like this. There’s nothing wrong with a place like this, and I’m not the woman he thinks I am. I see it in him. This need to understand. It’s greater than him. He asks and I rebut. He pulls and I push. It’s a force between us. Some may call it balance. Light and Dark. Sun and Moon. I see it as dangerous. All I’ve worked hard to build can crumble, burying him with it.

  After breakfast, Max leads the way through the city at a leisurely pace. He sits at the edge of low stonewall and pulls me in. I don’t push.

  “What makes you beautiful isn’t how you dance or show yourself off, it’s your rawness. That’s what gets you so many clients. Not that I like to think about that. I hate it. But your rawness is captivating. It shows there’s something about you that is deep, yes dark, but entrancing.”

  I shift on his lap. “What you see that so entrances you should not. You don’t want to dig too deep.”

  “I’ve already started my excavation. There’s only one way out.”

  “Turn around.”

  “Why do you feel you don’t deserve me?” His words are a slap in the face. As much as I can pretend to him that it is he who does not deserve me, Max has found a way to read me. It makes me wonder if I was wrong about him. Only someone so wise must know more about life than happiness.

  “What has made you so wise?”

  “You deserve things in life.”

  We both dance around the other’s questions.

  “All people have things they hide. What’s yours?” I ask.

  “We’re getting nowhere. This isn’t a Q&A session. I want to get to know you. I want to know the person you are and the person you were. I want to know who you want to be.”

  “I’m the person you see every night. I can’t expose myself more than I already do.”

  “You can. You choose not to.”

  “Some things are too forgotten to resurface.”

  “You haven’t forgotten anything. In fact, you live with it day in and day out. It has carved a path for you. Controlled you. As much as you think that you are leading the way, your past is leading it for you. Making you a member of its cult.”