Sin City

Back on earth, I was a prostitute. I was born and raised in Sin City: Las Vegas, Nevada. When I was young, my dad left me. One day, he was there with my mom, smoking a cigarette and the next, he’d disappeared. I remember, vaguely, that he was a drummer. He played in a band, so he wasn’t around much even when he was part of the family. He was obsessed with his art and with himself. He didn’t have time for anything or anyone else aside from that. Instead, he felt himself drifting away and, I suppose, he went with that feeling, letting it take him away on its wings. I remember a lump catching in my throat, my heart sinking to the floor when I realized that the man who was supposed to look after me was gone forever.

My mother, Georgina, was always there, even when I didn’t want her to be. Needless to say, she was a single mom, struggling to make ends meet. She worked three jobs: She was a housekeeper, a janitor, and a mariachi singer in the evenings. The last one, surprisingly, made her enough to buy groceries. She loved it. I later learned that her and my dad had met at a club while they were both playing music. It was a little tough, but not too much. She practiced regularly. That was her passion really.

Poor woman. She’s devastated that her daughter died before she did. I didn’t want to go this young.

The flames are always there, in that large fireplace in the living room, begging to escape and burn all of our souls at any moment. It’s Hell, so I shouldn’t expect anything else really. I’ve had sex before marriage too many times to count. I was a prostitute and, for all intents and purposes, I guess I still am. I’m stuck in a vicious cycle. I can’t do anything except fuck, fuck, and fuck again. I’m rail-thin, I haven’t eaten a thing and I can’t. I’m not allowed to. All of the men are old and wrinkly with grey hair. Some of them even have beards. Not manly beards that make them look gruffly handsome, but those exceptionally long ones that bits of food get stuck in. The kind that are unkempt, like they don’t give a shit. I have to kiss that, every day and night.

I thought—hoped, I suppose—that I could maybe have sex with handsome men when I left my body. Maybe that’s why I’m here. Actually, I know that’s why I am here. It was my client’s fault, but I doubt he’ll ever get caught. Amelia is the name. Amelia Sin Claire. I can’t seem to remember the way it felt, when I was younger. I can’t seem to remember much these days, except cold, shallow, hollow sex with countless men. None of them wanted me, but all of them wanted it. The intercourse, I mean.

Billy is a bit kinky. Okay, Billy Madison is really kinky. He likes all sorts of twisted stuff, like choking me and tying me up. He believes it’s all in good fun and, for the most part, it was, until it wasn’t. That fateful night was the end of my life.

Billy Madison had put his fingers around my neck and pushed. Normally, he’d let go right before it was too late, getting a rush of dopamine or whatever it was from nearly killing me. On this particular evening, he continued until I completely lost oxygen and strangled me until I died right there.

I know what you’re thinking: I should’ve said no, right? I shouldn’t have let him do something like that. I shouldn’t have let him risk my own life just for kicks, but it was tough to pay the bills in Vegas. It’s an expensive city and nightlife is thriving, so there’s a lot of competition. Billy Madison was my one consistent client: We fucked every night and we had some level of fondness for each other even though we knew our relationship was purely transactional. The man paid well, and I always looked forward to the cash that would land in my pocket after seeing him. For all of these reasons, I obliged him, and that was the end of me.

My mom, Georgina, already disapproved of my lifestyle and, frankly, I didn’t blame her. She was working three jobs so I could have what she hadn’t when she was young. She wanted the best for me. She’d hoped that, since we’d moved from Mexico to the United States, I could get my education here and maybe become a doctor or a lawyer or something like that. All of this made my life extremely pressurized. I felt like I was about to explode. I tried to work as a cashier, but that went nowhere. I couldn’t keep track of the cash transactions to save my life, so I quit. Then I attempted to go to school for film, but we couldn’t quite afford that and I hadn’t gotten enough money from scholarships to carry me through, even though I had received some financial assistance.

After that, I met this guy who seemed really nice at the school. He was a film teacher. His name was Rock Don. Rock Don was a made-up name, which I should’ve guessed, but I was too young at the time to know any better. All of this was the beginning of the death of me. He introduced me to the scene of prostitution and I’ve been there ever since.

I still am. I’m in the flames of Hell fucking old men forever. Lucifer truly knows how to punish a soul. How to make a person’s life here ten times worse than it was on earth. It was already bad there.

Sometimes, I think God is a bit judgmental. Sure, I had sex before marriage, but it’s not like I killed anyone. Someone else killed me. I never hurt a soul, not once. Well, okay, I’d be a little mean or dominant sometimes to turn a guy on, but he liked that. He literally asked for it. Aside from that, I was never a bitch or anything, not even to my mom, who was vicious sometimes because she clearly disapproved of my life, and I knew why.

Nope. No slack for me. I’m stuck here fucking old men forever. At least, back in Vegas, they were handsome sometimes. I could enjoy myself some of the time. Not anymore. Not here. I will forever be a toy to be used and receive no pleasure from the experience myself.