The Diary of Vanessa Rocoso

I woke up, once again, next to Shae, seeing both Bob and Johnny up already. However, they were sitting at opposite sides of our cell, not speaking. They weren’t even looking at each other. Benjamin was still immobile, he looked barely alive, I’m surprised that he is after the beating that he took. Mike’s getting worse, sinking deeper into depression, he refuses to eat. The mood was tense, none of us could deny reality any longer. With our breakfast came The Lady, who gave us our instructions for the day. She told the guys that they had they would be fighting in the evening and would rest until then. The rest of us were given our, ‘assignments’ for the day. Cathy was given Mr Kudzora; she was told that she would be with him the whole day. Cathy was excited, like a kid whose about to go into Movie World for the first time. Melanie was given three different customers, Shae had two, and Gwendolyn had none. Apparently, no one wanted her, which is good, if you don’t think about what they will do to her for not being, ‘profitable.’ My assignment was different to the others. I was handed a script along with a school girls summer uniform. I was told to put on the uniform, and to put my hair into piggy tails. Cathy was taken immediately to Mr Kudzora, while Melanie, Shae and I were taken to the communal showers. I got changed into the uniform, which was very small, and obviously worn. Shae did my hair, as I read the script. The instructions on the script were as follows: • Refer to the client at all times as, ‘Daddy.’ • Act and speak as if you are nine-years-old. • Say, ‘I love you Daddy.’ • Play whatever games he wants you to. • Refer to the fact that it is just the two of you. • Never break character. Reading the list made me nervous, it honestly made me scared. Shae tried to comfort me, as did Melanie, but that didn’t help. I remember thinking, I’m a virgin, this is not how I imagined it to go, I just hoped that it would end quickly. A guard overheard me say this and mocked me, saying, ‘with a mouth like yours, I’m sure he won’t last long.’ Shae told him to shut up, but he kept laughing. It echoed in my ear, repeating in my mind, that laugh. I wanted to make him stop, but I couldn’t, I just had to take it. The guard then turned his attention to Melanie, ‘Hey blind girl.’ Melanie stood silently, though she turned her head towards the guard. ‘You probably don’t need any help; your kind was made for this. Don’t forget to breathe through your nose.’ He burst into laughter, but Melanie stayed quiet. ‘Thank you for your advice,’ Melanie calmly said. The guard, along with us, was shocked. The guard was speechless, and quickly moved us from the showers to see our clients. I don’t know how Melanie stayed so calm, but she genuinely seemed not to care what he said. She seemed peaceful, how could she be like that in a place like this? I was taken to a room, where I was told to play with some toys while I waited for the client to come. The room was small, about the size of a cheap hotel room. The toys were in a box on the floor central to the room, so I sat down and started looking through them. There were two naked dolls, they had been abused with pens. There was also a pink fluffy teddy bear that had an eye missing, and a hole in the middle of it. There was also a plastic tea set, it was in reasonable condition, despite the pot missing its handle. At the bottom of the box I found a colouring-in book. I grabbed some of the crayons that were also in the box and began colouring. Despite pigs not being blue, I thought I did rather well. I laid on my stomach with my legs to the door and tried to remember the instructions.