Chapter 3: June's Story

June couldn't cry any more. She'd cried all she could cry. There were no more tears left. Erica was spooned up behind her, trying to comfort her, but it wasn't enough. Mummy had gone years ago. That scar had never properly healed, just scabbed over. It was too easily broken open again. Daddy had gone earlier that day. That new scar was red-raw and bleeding. It felt like it would never ever heal. The two people she loved most had both gone. She was even sucking her thumb – something she hadn't done since mummy had died. She knew in her head that daddy was trying to help, but what was the point of living longer if it was going to be like this? She lay awake, unable to sleep, listening to Erica's quiet breathing behind her.

Tina and Erica were nice to her, sometimes too nice. She tried to be nice back. She smiled and said thank you, but it was all on the surface. Could she ever trust anybody not to leave her? Maybe better not to trust anyone too much. Hugh was nice too, but he was often away on his training. Now that they'd landed in the colony, he was a lot busier. Erica had got pregnant on the trip from Earth. That only meant a potential rival. Erica would obviously have to spend a lot of time looking after her baby. June's CAP test was due before the baby, so she might be able to use that to avoid the problem.

School wasn't too bad. Nobody expected anything long-term from school. You studied, took the CAP test and went off to do whatever your CAP result said. You could keep your relationships shallow if you wanted and nobody minded too much. You could always give the excuse that you needed to study or practice or something.

One day in school June accidentally cut herself during a cookery lesson. She was slicing some meat with a sharp knife, when her hand slipped and she cut her finger. It wasn't serious, just disinfect it and bandage it. Not worth the time in a med-tube. In bed that night she felt the pain from her finger. It was an ordinary pain, an easy pain. Much easier than her other pain. If she concentrated on the easy pain in her finger, then her other pain didn't seem so bad. The easy pain distracted her from the difficult pain. Things didn't feel quite so bleak.

June remembered. Whenever the pain got too much, she'd cut herself. Deliberately. She used the easy pain to mask the difficult pain. The easy pain gave her a retreat, almost a safe place, somewhere she could escape to. It meant she had to wear long sleeves all the time, so her scars and scabs didn't show, and she had to give up swimming. You could wear long sleeves playing football, so she changed to that. She found that she enjoyed it more than she'd expected. Everyone had their role in the team: goalkeeper, defender, midfielder, striker. You performed within your role, and nobody expected any more from you. You knew how long the match would last. You didn't expect it to last forever, so you were ready for it when the final whistle blew. The football helped. She cut herself less after she joined the team.

June thought long and hard in the weeks before her CAP test. She knew she'd be a concubine, that much was obvious. That would be difficult. Any sponsor could reject their concubine at any time. She couldn't bear that uncertainty. Mummy had left her and then daddy had left her as well. A sponsor could do the same any time he wanted. That would probably kill her. The pain from two rejections was so bad. Three rejections would be worse. At least death wouldn't reject her, ever. That was difficult though; daddy wanted her to live. He wanted her to live so much that he had left her behind and gone back to Earth on his own. That was almost as sad for him as it had been for her. Dying might solve her problem, but it wasn't what daddy wanted. She still loved daddy, despite ... No, death was for later, not for now. She still had the problem of what to do after her CAP test to solve. She could distract herself a little by thinking about that.

She scored 4.9. Below average. That got to her more than she'd expected. She thought she'd score in the low fives, just above average. She didn't, she was below average. That didn't feel good. Tina and Erica smiled and congratulated her of course. They were both really nice. It was such a pity that she couldn't truly connect with them. She made all the right noises, but she was still alone inside the invisible box she shared with her pain.

Hugh was away on his first deployment, but he'd left behind an offer to take her as his concubine. She'd expected that, and she already had her answer ready. She refused. She liked him, he was nice, but she couldn't bring herself to trust him not to reject her. It wasn't Hugh's fault, she couldn't trust any sponsor not to reject her. Trust was dangerous for her, it made her vulnerable.

Tina and Erica were both astonished of course. They each loved Hugh and couldn't see why June wouldn't want to be his concubine. The tried to persuade her to change her mind, but June knew she wouldn't. In the end she promised to think about it overnight just to get them to stop bothering her.

That night she made a mistake. She cut herself again; her CAP score had affected her more than she thought it had. She cut too deeply. She woke up in medical. The AI had noticed the blood seeping out from under her covers as she slept and had called the emergency medical team to their apartment.

June's secret was out. Well, one of her secrets was out. The medical people saw all the old scars on her arms so she couldn't claim she'd only cut herself once, because of her CAP score. No pills here, so they gave her some nanites, which dulled her real pain a little. They also made sure she came in for regular checks to see that she wasn't cutting herself. That made it more difficult; she would need to find other ways to hurt herself. She still needed occasional doses of easy pain to hide the real pain.

She still lived in Hugh's apartment, but she didn't belong to Hugh. She was put on the 'available for selection' list, and she did get a few offers of interviews. She turned them all down. Any sponsor could reject her and she didn't want to risk having that happen to her. Going to an interview was pointless if she was going to say 'no' at the end anyway.

She ended up having a video conference with Signifer Wei, one of the Civil Service people.

"Don't you want to be selected?" the Signifer asked. He was Chinese, as his name implied, and spoke English with an accent.

"No."

He looked surprised. "Why not? You'll end up with the Civil Service if you don't get selected. That's not a good option for you. You'll be much happier with a sponsor."

'No I wouldn't, ' June thought. That was the thing about the Civil Service, they couldn't reject her. Any unselected concubines ended up with the Civil Service, there was nowhere else to go. "I want to work in the brothel."

The Signifer looked dumbfounded. "That is not a good choice. We normally have to order women to work there. We even use it as a punishment sometimes."

"I want to work in the brothel," she repeated. She'd worked it out a few days before she took her CAP test. Any other sponsor could reject her. The Civil Service couldn't. It had to take all the concubines that nobody else wanted. The Civil Service would never reject her.

"You're just going to keep refusing interviews until we take you, aren't you?"

"Yes." June knew what she wanted.

"We might assign you somewhere else, not the brothel."

"I'd prefer the brothel."

"I'll get back to you," he said and cut the link.

She got her wish. The brothel Madame, Lorna, was nice. She thought June's choice was strange, but she didn't comment on it much. The few girls who volunteered were usually sex-addicts, which June wasn't. Lorna didn't want a long term relationship, or any emotional involvement, which was good. June could deal with an employer-employee relationship. Those relationships started and stopped. You didn't expect them to be permanent and you weren't emotionally involved. You weren't disappointed too much when they ended.

The same with the johns. Those relationships were very temporary: you met, you fucked, you parted. Simple. No complications. No emotional involvement. June could cope with that. There was no new pain when the relationship ended.

Sometimes there was pain, easy pain. June couldn't hurt herself, they were watching her too closely for that, but she could get someone else to hurt her. The other girls talked about what to look for, the danger signals, when a guy came through the door. When she needed some easy pain, she'd go with one of the dangerous ones. She knew which buttons to press to get what she wanted. Sometimes it was difficult to judge. If she pushed him – or occasionally her – too far she'd end up in a med-tube, which was no good at all. That fixed everything so she didn't hurt. She needed the easy pain as a distraction. If the johns were hurting her, then she wasn't hurting herself, so she didn't get into trouble.

The brothel wasn't perfect, but it wasn't as bad as many outside people thought. Everything was detached. Relationships weren't emotional, and nobody expected them to last. June certainly didn't expect them to last. She could even get a bit of easy pain when she needed it. The easy pain helped a little.

She made another mistake. Actually, she made too many small mistakes. It was difficult to judge the johns, especially the ones she hadn't seen before. Sometimes they overdid it and she ended up in medical. The AIs noticed – they noticed everything in their strange way. She was being treated in medical too many times. A "statistically significant excess" the AI told Lorna. She checked the videos of June's encounters. Lorna wasn't stupid, she knew how to deal with the dangerous clients herself. She could see that June was, sometimes, deliberately pressing the wrong buttons and inviting the pain.

June was back talking to Signifer Wei again. Her earlier interview with the signifer had meant a change in her life. This one probably would as well.

"You are seeking out pain." He wasn't asking a question, he was making a statement.

June stayed silent. A statement didn't need an answer.

"You're not a masochist. The AI tells me that your reactions show that you're not getting any sexual pleasure from the pain."

"No, I'm not a masochist."

"So, why do you provoke the pain?" he asked.

'Because I hurt so much inside, you silly man. If you can't work that out for yourself, then I'm not going to tell you.'

He saw he wasn't going to get an answer to his question. "Your records show you self-harmed before."

June nodded.

"You need to find a better way. Some of your clients got into trouble for damaging Civil Service property. I don't want that to happen again. They are a lot more use to us than you are. Since I don't trust you not to go back to provoking them, I'll be assigning you away from the brothel."