Trafficked (11 page)

Chapter Seventeen

I
t was the middle of the night. Light drifted into the garage from the hallway. Sergey was standing in the doorway, holding his hands behind his back. Hannah closed her eyes so he'd think she was asleep. Even from the sofa, she could smell the vodka on his breath.

She heard his footsteps cross the room, and then he crouched by her and brought his face close, as if he was about to kiss her. She jerked back and let out a short scream. He pressed a calloused hand to her mouth.

“Shhh,” he said softly. “It's only me.”

Only
you
? Her heart pounded in her chest. Why did he think she wouldn't be afraid of him?

“Don't scream,” he said. “Promise?”

She nodded, fully intending to scream if he tried anything.

He lifted his hand. “I'm sorry I scared you.”

“What are you doing in here?” she asked, tears in her voice, despite herself.

“I have a present for you.”

She sat up on the sofa, holding the sleeping bag up over her chest. She was wearing a T-shirt, but she'd taken off her bra to sleep. “Can't you give it to me tomorrow?”

“No.”

“Turn on the light then,” she said, thinking that it had better be a real present, not the present of his middle-aged body. Maybe he was going to pay her.

He pulled the long cord on the bare fluorescent lightbulb in the center of the room. She blinked and pulled the sleeping bag even higher. He walked back and picked up a pink rectangular box from the floor next to the sofa, not unlike a cake box, and handed it to her.

It was surprisingly light. She opened the lid. Under a mound of pink tissue, she discovered seven pairs of cotton underwear, all with different colors and designs. She rubbed the fabric between her fingers. It was soft, not scratchy, and had a thick elastic band with a brand name written on it. Not cheap. But she would have preferred money.

She thought of how Lillian would react if she learned he'd bought her underwear and tried to hand back the box. “I can't accept it.”

He stepped back, refusing to take it. “I saw your panties hanging on the rack.”

Hannah glanced over at the old wooden rack where she hung delicate clothes, including her own underwear, not because they were fancy like Lillian's, but because the dryer had already destroyed four pairs and she had only two left.

“They are not the kind of panties for any girl to wear.”

If these were the sexy kind, lace or silk, or even bikinis, she'd refuse, but they were simple cotton underwear. She picked up the striped pink pair and stretched out the thick elastic band. At least these panties wouldn't slide down while she was cleaning the floor.

“What will I tell Lillian if she sees them?” she asked.

“Tell her that you bought them,” he said. “The store is by the Russian store on Santa Monica Boulevard across from the Whole Foods grocery store.”

“Good luck getting her to believe that,” she said sarcastically. “Lillian doesn't let me leave the house or the yard. Ever.” Despite her attempt to act like it didn't matter, her eyes started to tear up. “And she hasn't paid me yet, so I wouldn't have the money to buy anything.”

Understanding dawned on Sergey's face, and he seemed to feel a little guilty. He cleared his throat. “Tell her you brought money from Moldova, and I'll try to arrange for you to go out of the house, maybe to do an errand.”

“Okay.” She waited for him to say more about the money, but he hurried to the door and turned off the light.

“Wait!” she said. “What about my pay?”

He cleared his throat. “Lillian deals with all the household expenses, but I'll talk to her.”

To him, she was just another household expense. Soap, toilet paper, Hannah.

“Thank you,” she said, hoping that if she seemed grateful for what he had given her already, perhaps he'd give more. “Thank you for the underwear.”

“Good night, Hannah,” he said, speaking her name through the dark with a tenderness that surprised her. She realized he cared for her, at least a little bit, and she wondered why.

Chapter Eighteen

T
he next day, Hannah was standing at a bus stop with a bench. She wanted to sit, because it was so odd to have a bench at a bus stop, but she didn't, for fear that the bus wouldn't stop. She couldn't mess up this opportunity. She wasn't going anywhere exciting, just to a store, but it was more freedom than she'd had for the month and a half since she'd arrived in America.

She'd been sent to buy madeleines, little vanilla sponge cookies. Paavo's wife, Rena, loved them, and since she was coming over in half an hour, Sergey had been able to convince Lillian to let Hannah go.

It was her first time standing on the sidewalk of a busy street in America. Cars were buzzing past her, but the sidewalk felt ghostlike compared with the crowded sidewalks of Chişinău. All she could see was one homeless man with a shopping cart full of cans half a block away. Lillian had warned her not to talk to anyone, because people might try to steal her money or she could be arrested if anyone suspected she was illegal, but there was no one to talk to anyway.

The number 14 bus came up.
A female driver? Strange,
she thought, and started to walk past her, but the woman held up a hand with long painted nails to stop her. “Money?”

In Moldova, on the big buses, a money collector came around and gave change, and on the small buses, people would sit down first and pass their money up to the person in front of them. The money would travel over many sets of hands until it reached the driver, and the driver would pass the change back in the same way. Hannah looked down at her map and instructions. Lillian had written only that it cost one dollar thirty-five, which seemed like a fortune, compared with two lei, the equivalent of seventeen cents, which she paid at home.

Hannah fumbled in the small silver change purse Lillian had given her and tried to give the money to the driver, but she waved her hand in front of her face. “I can't take that. Here.” She pointed one of her long fingernails at a metal contraption.

Embarrassed, Hannah searched for a place in the side to put the money, but she couldn't see any holes. The driver tapped a long, obvious slot on the top and gave her a look like she had to be the stupidest person who ever lived. The money slid down, made a couple of beeping noises, and the driver raised her eyebrows as if to ask why she was still standing there.

Hannah continued down the long aisle and the bus rolled forward. She sat down in the middle of the bus and shrank down into the seat. She'd thought taking a bus would be no problem, but nothing was familiar. In Moldova, the bus always held a blend of businesspeople and students, Romanians and Russians, young and old, poor and middle class. But on this bus, everybody looked poor with old clothes, and they all had dark skin. She was the only light-skinned teenager, and it seemed dangerous to stand out.

At the front of the bus, in the seats for old people, a Latino man with a strange fishnet stocking on his head was staring at her. What if he sat next to her? She slid her hand in the wrist strap of Lillian's change purse and looked out the window. The bus was passing houses now, but ahead it looked like there were more stores. She looked back at the man with the fishnet stocking, but he'd lost interest in her and was now looking down at his basketball shoes. Above his head, a bee was crawling along the window. Its behind bent in and kissed the glass. Hannah winced, worried for him. She hated bees more than anything. In the village, there were so many bees that it was scary to go to the outhouse.

The bus stopped at the corner of Santa Monica Boulevard and Highland. There was a doughnut shop on the corner called Donut Time. A tall, muscular woman strode out in a short, hot pink dress. Hannah stared at the woman's square jaw and realized she was a man. Her first transvestite.

She thought of her uncle Vladi. When she was just eight, she'd gone with her parents to visit Vladi and Babulya in Gura Bicului. Hannah had been so excited to see them that she'd run from the mini bus stop, like she always did, down the dusty road, and through their front door, yelling, “I'm here!”

Vladi was standing in the middle of the living room next to his Ukrainian egg art table, kissing a skinny dark-haired man, his gentle fingers clenching the man's jeans. He stepped back quickly, but Hannah had seen everything. Her mouth hung open. Vladi held up a shaking hand, as if he was stopping a bus that was about to run him over. Perhaps he thought she was about to scream. She could hear her parents outside, talking to her babushka as they came toward the house. The other man hurried out the back door.

“Please don't say anything,” Vladi had begged.

“I won't,” she'd promised, and she never had, not even when he went missing.

The bus honked at someone. Hannah looked at the street sign outside—La Brea. Up the street, she could see the Hollywood sign.

Hannah sighed. The bad agent's words came into her head. “You don't know how to listen, do you? You're just like your uncle.” She had been opening the door to the taxi at that moment, her whole body shaking, and she blinked back at him. “Petru?” Volva gave her a look. “The other one. The sick one.” Then he told her to get out of the taxi.

She looked back at the bee. It was crawling toward her. Someone had found out about Vladi, that was for sure. If Volva knew, that was a bad sign.

“Hi,” a voice said.

She looked up to see the neighbor boy standing right next to her, smelling of baby powder deodorant. He looked down at her and smiled. She gave him a quick smile back, making sure to keep her lips closed and her teeth covered.

He was so close, she could see every detail of his face. His nose curved to the side, just a bit, something she hadn't noticed from far away. His blue eyes were framed with long blond eyelashes, each separated and glossy, and his cheeks were red as if he'd just been running, maybe to catch the bus.

She forced herself to speak. “Hello.”

“What's up?” he said.

She really didn't know how to answer that. She stared at him, feeling foolish.

“You live next door to me,” he said, as if he were reminding her.

“Yes,” she said, surprised that he'd said she lived next door, instead of that she worked next door. She realized he didn't know she was just a maid. For all he knew, she was still a girl with possibilities. She moved over into the empty seat beside her, and to her relief, he sat down.

“Where are you headed?” he asked.

She didn't know what “headed” meant, but he'd said “where,” so she figured he was probably asking where she was going. “Store,” she said, making sure to keep her lips curled over her crooked teeth as she spoke, well aware that American girls did not have teeth like hers.

“Oh,” he said, glancing out the window. The street was lined with restaurants, banks, shops, and grocery stores. Her mind was clogged with Russian, and she feared if she tried to speak in English, he wouldn't understand her at all. In Russian, she wasn't as talkative as Katya, but she certainly knew how to have a conversation.

She thought of a question in English. “You go to school?”

“Not in the summer,” he said.

Of course not. She winced at her own stupidity.

He continued, “I thought I'd go to Santa Monica, maybe hit the beach.”

Almost nothing made sense.
Hit the beach?
She couldn't even have a basic conversation. There was an uncomfortable pause. His nose twitched and his cheeks turned red. She realized he was just as nervous as she was, and this realization helped her find the words. “The beach? I no go to beach. I—”

The bee zipped around his head, straight toward her.

“Aaah!” She waved her hands in front of her face.

It landed on the window by her head. She jumped up in her seat and fell backward onto the boy's lap. His hand fluttered near her, as if he was afraid to touch her, and then he patted her arm tentatively. “Take it easy.” He let out an embarrassed laugh.

“Oop, sorry.” She slid back into her seat, but the bee came back, buzzing around her head. She screamed, waving her hand in front of her face.

“Come on.” The boy pulled her by the elbow, she jumped up, and they ran down the aisle, away from the bee.

The bus jerked to a stop. He grabbed a pole and steadied her. Through the window, she saw the Russian store across from the Whole Foods Market where Lillian bought all her organic things. This was her stop! She had to get off. The doors started to close and the bus rolled forward.

She ran to the front. If she got lost, she'd be in a lot of trouble. “Stop!” The driver put on the brakes. The doors opened and she ran out.

The silver purse—had she left it? The bus was pulling away from the curb. She yelled to stop the bus and then realized the strap was still twisted around her wrist.

She searched for the boy on the bus. He probably thought she had mental problems after that. He was standing by the window, grinning at her. He lifted up a hand in a wave and made a face.

She still hadn't introduced herself, but maybe it didn't matter. She waved and laughed with him, forgetting for a moment to hide her teeth.

Chapter Nineteen

T
he moment Hannah stepped into the Russian store, she felt comfortable, safe even, because everywhere she looked, she saw something familiar.

A thin layer of smoke filled the room from the lack of air circulation. She gazed through the smoke at the cookies and orange juice with Russian labeling, and above her head, at the New Year's garlands, pink fabric flowers, and Russian dolls. She breathed in the smells of vinegar eggs and salty fish and lard and felt for a moment she was back in the market of Chişinău.

A pretty woman in her mid-thirties with dyed blonde hair, dark roots, blue eyes, and thick makeup was setting out trays of sea bass and skewered chicken. Lillian had told her not to say anything to this woman. Apparently she was a busybody who would cause her trouble. “You don't want to get arrested,” Lillian had said. “The INS could pick you up anywhere. Or they might knock on our door one morning and we'll have no choice but to give you to them.”

Hannah found the madeleines and placed them on the counter. The woman finished organizing the trays and finally looked up. “What do you want?” she asked in Russian.

Hannah ordered the salami and coleslaw that Lillian had put on her list.

“Nothing more?” the woman demanded.

Hannah had spotted the spicy carrot salad, the same kind her babushka made, in the glass refrigerator case. “Can I have some carrot salad?” she asked.

The woman put her hands on her hips. “Do you think I'm going to take it out for you?”

Hannah opened the refrigerator and pulled out the smallest container of carrot salad. Lillian would want a receipt, but if she complained about the extra three dollars, it would give Hannah a good opportunity to ask about her wages.

The woman gave her a fork. “I've never seen you before,” she said.

Hannah remembered Lillian's warning not to speak to this woman. “It is my first time in this shop,” she confirmed, stepping away from the counter. She opened the lid to the carrot salad, took a bite, and immediately regretted spending the money. The salad was at least three days old, and the woman had added too much vinegar and not enough sugar or red pepper spice.

“You are Lily's girl,” the woman said, as if it was written on her forehead.

Hannah forced herself to swallow. She wiped the corners of her mouth with the tip of her finger and shut the container. “How do you know?”

“She brings this purse,” she said, waving her hand at the purse Hannah held. Hannah had never seen Lillian use it, but maybe this woman had an amazing memory. “I'm Berta.” She continued, “Your name?”

She started to say Hannah, but then remembered, “Elena.”

Berta asked, “Where are you from? Not Russia. Ukraine?”

“No,” Hannah said, not thinking.

“Her husband is from Ukraine. Sergey. He is your uncle?”

“Yes,” she said, realizing her mistake.

“You don't sound like him.” Berta narrowed her eyes suspiciously. “You're not Ukrainian.”

Hannah thought she could just say that she'd grown up in Moldova but decided it was best to nothing.

Berta continued, “He said he's going to bring your whole family.”

“Who said that?”

“Your uncle.” Berta gave her a funny look.

Why would Sergey have said he was bringing her whole family? Was it just a lie for this busybody? Or was he going to bring her babushka too? Maybe her uncle was already here. Then she remembered what the bad agent had told her, that her “sick uncle” had not listened.

“You don't look like your uncle either,” Berta said, blinking her long eyelashes, which had so much mascara on them that they stuck together. At first Hannah thought Berta was talking about her real uncle, but then realized she meant Sergey. “You're a beautiful girl,” she said, gazing up and down Hannah's body. “Good thing he's your uncle. Otherwise, that Liliya, she would never let you stay.”

Hannah wished she'd worn her sweat suit instead of the monkey T-shirt and blue slacks Babulya had bought her. She crossed her arms over her breasts. “Why?” she asked.

“You must know your uncle, he's got eyes for the women.”

Hannah rolled her eyes like she knew. “Oh, that.”

Berta leaned in, whispering, “Last year, he had a very open affair with a socialite. Not as beautiful as his wife. I don't know why Liliya stayed. Must be the money.” She shrugged. “I haven't heard anything lately, but these men, they don't stop once they start. One cherry is never enough.” She laughed.

Lillian's extra cell phone started to ring from the little purse. “Excuse me,” Hannah said, unzipping the purse and pulling out the phone. It said “Home.” Lillian was calling her. Hannah's face turned red. Now that she knew all these things, she didn't know how to act. If she answered in the store, Lillian might suspect the woman had been gossiping. Best to go outside and say she was waiting for the bus.

The phone rang insistently in her hand. She hoped she remembered how to answer it. Lillian had told her that all she had to do was push the talk button, but she'd never had a cell phone. She wondered if she could call Moldova on it, but figured it was probably blocked like the home phone. In any case, Lillian would know if she tried. Best to use a pay phone once she had her wages.

It rang again. Berta looked at her curiously.

She hurried toward the door, but before she got there, a sign on the bulletin board by the door grabbed her attention. Free English classes! On the sign, there was a phone number. She stared at it, memorizing it. Lillian had to let her go. After all, it was free.

She ran outside and answered the phone.

“Where are you?”

“I'm waiting for the bus.”

“Well, hurry,” Lillian barked, then hung up the phone.