Chapter Text
The glaring red light outside of Yuki’s window shined in her eyes. 12am. The vibrations of the booming music downstairs shook the floorboards, waking her up. She turned around to where Yori was still laying naked and snoring in bed. “Hey sleepy head, get up. We’re going to be late for work.” She found her fishnet stockings and skirt thrown about on the floor. “I’m serious. Do you want Sara yelling at us?”
Yori finally stirred, kissing Yuki good morning before washing up in the bathroom.
The show had already started by the time the two finished dressing and headed downstairs. “Sara wants to talk to you after your shift,” Sharon yelled over the music. She handed Yuki a tray with drinks.
“Great, just what I needed this week. Who knows how much money she’s going to say I cost her now?” Yuki cursed while Sharon laughed. She’d already been yelled at this week by a customer who got too drunk and broke all the alcohol bottles after being told to leave. The damage came out of Yuki’s tab. And then yesterday she got kicked in the face by a dancer on accident. She didn’t blame her. Yuki got too close to the stage to collect the empty glasses of saki when the girl spun around on the pole, legs flying.
The men kept coming in, celebrities with disguises hoping to not get caught, politicians paying for secret rooms, yakuza members who saw this place as their second home, and men who went in secret while their wives thought they were at work.
“Head’s up! Those creeps are back again,” Yori said.
She pointed her chin toward the far corner. Yuki recognized them as yakuza members. She wasn’t too sure about the ins and outs of these syndicates–she just knew they meant bad business. They came here every so often, but more so lately. Last time they came, they harassed the dancers on stage. They always paid so Sara never kicked them out, but she had warned them that if the behavior continued, they’d be banned.
If Yuki served them as quickly as she could, maybe they’d get the hint and leave. She began her walk towards them when Yori blocked her path.
“Hey, what do you think you’re doing? I think we should call Sara, have her deal with it,” Yori said.
“Oh, c’mon and then have her take that out of my tab again. She keeps adding to our debt with the flimsiest excuses. She’s just going to come over here, cause a big fuss and then charge us again.”
“She’ll charge us no matter what. Might as well have an actual reason this time,” Yori said.
The lip gloss on Yori’s lips sparkled in the dark light. Several of her hairs got caught in the sticky mess as she blew them away from her face. Yori’s debt was worse than Yuki’s. Although Sara didn’t make them pay for the dorms because they worked out a deal to clean all the bathrooms in exchange, they still didn’t have a penny to their names. If they wanted out of here, they’d have to start being smart about their choices. She’d been hoping the rich kid who fancied her would be her ticket out of here, but so far he was all talk.
“I’ll be quick, don’t worry.”
“With you, all I do is worry.” Yori gave her a quick kiss on the lips and moved out of her way.
A chill ran down Yuki’s spine sending goosebumps to run across her arms as she neared the group of rowdy young men. With a notepad in hand and a pen in the other she stared at the paper, hoping if she didn’t make eye contact with them, they wouldn’t notice her. “What can I get for all of you today?”
“Oh, she’s hot,” one of them said. Even though they hadn’t ordered, they already smelled of booze.
“What are you supposed to be dressed as? A sexy vampire? I got something here you can suck,” another said. The table bursted out into laughter.
Clearly, they were in the mood to fool around. Yuki rolled her eyes and turned around to walk away when a hand yanked at her wrist and pulled her down into a stranger’s lap. She screamed when a pair of random lips attempted to cover hers.
Before it could, a beer bottle smashed against his head with a resounding thud. Yori stood atop, beer bottle in one hand and extended arm to Yuki with the other. Yuki leaped out of the man’s hold, taking an empty glass behind her as a weapon. “Stay back,” Yori shouted.
Instead, the men stood and pointed several guns at them. The man who had grabbed Yuki was now holding his bloody head as he pointed his gun. “You fucking bitches are going to pay.”
Yuki held onto Yori, unsure whether the trembling came from herself or from her girlfriend. What could a beer bottle and a glass do to a gun? She only now hoped that the group solely focused on her, which would give enough time for Yori to run.
“Killing them fast would be a shame, let’s have fun with them first,” a man at the back of the table said.
All the breath in Yuki’s lungs disappeared at the mere thought of the “fun” they wanted to subject them to. She clung onto her girlfriend, hugging her tight and wrapping her body around her in case one of them was trigger-happy.
“Put those fucking guns away before you scare the rest of my customers, you imbeciles,” Sara said. She stepped in between the group of yakuza and them, shielding Yuki and Yori with her body.
“You can’t talk to us like that!”
“I can and I will.” Sara said.
The confidence in her voice made Yuki proud of her. Without a single weapon in Sara’s hands, just the assuredness of her voice was enough for these young men to question their own strength.
“Get this through your thick skulls. You bringing violence into a neutral zone means you all are now banned here. Leave now before I tell your leader just how horrible you treated these fine young girls at this establishment and you’ll see cruelty like no other.”
Whether she bluffed or told the truth didn’t matter. These guys believed it and one by one put their guns down and headed for the exit. A group of Sara’s security followed them outside.
“Are you girls okay?” She cupped Yuki’s cheek and turned her chin to the side as if checking for bruises.
“You’re a lifesaver, Sara.” It wouldn’t have been the first time, either. When Yori and Yuki were living off the streets, it was Sara who took them in. Not for free, of course. She took on their debts with the promise they’d pay her back and any food, clothes or living expenses would be added on. They’d be servers, so they wouldn’t need to take off their clothes for money. Sara said she never made such young girls strip, but it didn’t hurt to put them to work. Even if the job was gruelling, it beat living in a shelter or on the street any day.
Sara only frowned in response. “Come with me, girls. I need to speak to you in private.”
Yori squeezed Yuki’s hand, and she squeezed back. They followed Sara down the carpeted hallway to her office, where the young, rich fellow who’d been trying to woo Yuki the past several weeks sat.
“Yuki,” he said. He smiled at her in the only way rich kids could, without a single worry weighing down on their shoulders.
She wanted to know what a smile like that would feel gracing across her own lips. Would it feel natural? Would she wake up with that smile instead of a groan from a hard day at work? Instead, she smiled a forced customer service one back. One she practiced in the mirror that showed all her teeth and got her to de-escalate a bar fight. “What are you doing here?”
“He said he’s come to pay off your debt. Yori’s as well. That you and him discussed this last time he was here? Is this true?”
A genuine surprise made Yuki’s eyes go wide. Wasn’t that just useless chatter from a rich client who visits the Pink House, gets drunk and says nonsensical things to the servers? She had heard so many stories from the dancers and escorts of rich men who claimed they’d leave their wives for them, but never did. Yuki herself had dealt with clients saying the same things to her, but it never amounted to anything. Except now. “Yes.”
“Hey, don’t I get any say in this?” Yori asked. She furrowed her brows. “Shouldn’t we discuss this first?”
The thought of being debt-free rang in Yuki’s ears. “What’s there to discuss?”
“How come this is the first time I’m hearing this?”
Sara laid a hand on Yuki’s shoulder, a move she did often when she wanted you to shut up. “Excuse us Kaname. Will you allow us a few minutes alone?”
“Of course.” He left the room.
“Yori’s right you now, this isn’t a decision you should make alone.”
Who was Sara to preach? The second they turned eighteen, which was right around the corner, there was no way Sara wouldn’t pressure them to swing around a pole. Once they started, Yuki knew that there’d be no out anymore. They’d be stuck there until Sara thought they became too old and sent to the back. She’d seen it before, too. There’d been a dancer here named Mai. She’d cook for them and teach the recipes to Yori, who loved spending hours in the kitchen. On her fortieth birthday, Sara told her to pack up her heels. She was done. The rest of the girls convinced Sara to keep her as a dance instructor, but begrudgingly so. How many dance instructors would she be willing to keep? “Respectfully, this isn’t your decision to make,” Yuki said to Sara.
“No, but it is mine,” Yori said.
“What you want to stay here all your life,” She pointed to Sara’s office. Okay, bad example. Sara wrapped herself in the most luxurious products on the market. Brands Yuki didn’t know by name. “I mean our roach infested dorm, cleaning messes on the bathroom floors and being harassed by the drunk of the week.”
“Of course not, but couldn’t we have discussed this first.” She held Yuki’s hand in hers, rubbing her thumb across her palm. “What does he want you to do for him in return? He’s not asking you to be his girlfriend is he?”
Yuki sighed. Is this what this was all about? “As if I’d accept something like that. You’re the only one I want, honest.” She kissed her on the nose and eyelids, something she liked doing when Yori would rest her head on her lap while watching tv.
“Then what does he want? They always want something?” Yori wrapped her hands around Yuki’s waist.
“Nothing. He just felt bad. He knew my dad and wanted to help. Something about school girls, should be in school and not in a place like this.”
“Your dad?”
“I don’t know who the fuck my father was, but who cares. He’s the reason we’re getting out of here!”
Sara walked over to the two, putting an arm on Yuki’s shoulder. “You remind me so much of myself.” She winced as she said those words, like being her wasn’t good. “Very well, if that’s what you want, I’ll call Kaname back in and end your contracts.” Yuki jumped up and down, squealing in her girlfriend's arms. “But listen to me. If it ever goes south, know you have a home here...with a price of course.”
They left the Pink palace free women, but as they walked out those front doors the group of yakuza men who harassed them waited for them outside. Before she could yell at them to get lost, Kaname spoke to them. “Men, this is Yuki, she’ll be living with me from this day onwards. Treat her well. Oh and that’s her friend.”
Kaname was a yakuza member, and an important one at that. Just what had she done?