Authors note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, events and incidents are the products of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.
Rock Bottom: Part Two
Recap:
There has been a gap of two years between this story and part one so I thought I should start with a short reminder of what had already occurred...
A young woman called Meg Packer has gone through her life suffering setback and disappointments at all turns. Orphaned at the age of two, her paternal grandparents wanted nothing to do with her. Her maternal grandparents raised her as best they could but from her tenth birthday onwards, she found herself transitioning year by year into a full-time carer for both her grandfather and grandmother as they began to get frail and ill. At eighteen, they died, their medical bills and the mortgage on the house forcing her to sell up. Her schooling was erratic at best due to these circumstances, but she was a good worker and in five years she had managed not only to get herself a small place with a roommate, she'd also began building up a nest egg of $15,000 for herself.
At this point her roommate and her meth addict boyfriend stole not only all her savings but they also ran up bills to the tune of $17,000 before abandoning Meg, leaving her to face the music.
Now at twenty-five, she lives in the worst part of the city in a small one bed apartment, cleaning offices at night to make ends meet. She was lonely, sleeping away her days.
Behind on her rent, Meg then found herself fired for 'stealing' food from where she worked. To her it had seemed okay, a half-eaten box of crackers beside a waste bin but the canteen manager in the office building had taken a dislike to her, insisting she be fired. With no way to pay her rent, she accepted an offer from her landlord, Mervin Smith. This offer was to become his 'sex doll' for a night. Mervin had a particular kink, the black man enjoying styling, dressing and positioning her, turning her into a living embodiment of his particular fantasy.
Chapter One:
Meg remained in her apartment for two full days after she had traded her body to clear her overdue rent. This was time that would have been better spent in search of a new job, not hiding beneath the covers of her bed, reliving over and over the night she had become a living doll for Mervin, his 'Toy' as he had enjoyed calling her. The young woman couldn't understand what she might have done in this existence or perhaps a previous one that would account for the cataclysmic bad fortune she had in her life. Karma, it seemed was indeed a bitch.
Two days of mental flagellation, forty-eight hours of regret and misery. Meg even found herself embarrassed by the fact that the multiple orgasms she'd experienced that night, a the product of her selling herself. Raised by decent, clean-living Grandparents, her moral compass had failed to find due north that night and she wallowed in the shame of her actions, regardless of the desperation that had prompted them.
It was hunger that finally drove her out of her cocoon of misery. Her stomach required more than tap water and the piece of stale bread that was the sum total of the provisions in her apartment. Meg had managed to save some of the money Mervin had given her to 'beautify herself', money that she could spend on groceries. She pulled on an old dress, oversized and shapeless, the original black now a faded charcoal grey in colour. Her heavy winter coat and knitted hat went on next so that, hunched over as she was in misery, she looked like a homeless person rather than the sex toy of the other night. Passing a reflection of herself in her window, Meg felt a pang of regret about cloaking her attractiveness this way. Up until Mervin had used her, she hadn't really seen herself as being particularly attractive. Now she knew she was but the comfort she drew from the familiarity of anonymity was a balm, so she stayed as she was, heading down the elevator and out into the cold evening to buy food.
The Wahlgrens on the corner was closest so Meg went there, filling a basket with tinned food, getting some milk, cheese and bread as well. She filled two bags worth of shopping and she still had change left over. The novelty of having money to spend along with the sudden lurch of weakness as she left the store, hunger sapping her strength, made Meg turn left rather than right, heading away from the tower that held her apartment. Half a block up the glowing blue and white of the sign outside the IHOP restaurant beckoned her in, Meg sliding into an empty booth with her shopping at her feet.
"Help you?" Meg looked up into the bored face of the waitress who's greeting was lacklustre at best.
"Pancakes... blueberry pancakes. And... and a coffee... and a side of bacon please" Meg hadn't even glanced at the menu, her gurgling stomach making her selection for her.
"Mmm-hmm, 'kay, I'll bring you that coffee first" the waitress scratched at her voluminous backside as she departed, moving so slowly that Meg felt she might be waiting a few minutes on her coffee.
When the coffee did come, Meg dumped five packets of sugar into it, stirring it in quickly before raising the overly sweet drink to her lips, taking a tongue singeing sip. She'd finished it before her food arrived, so she ordered a second cup. The sweet drink had taken the edge off her hunger, meaning that instead of wolfing down her food in an orgy of consumption, Meg managed to eat it at a pace that was just on the fast side of leisurely.
Finished, she actually felt good. A full stomach, a warm place to eat. Simple pleasures for most. Almost heaven for her. Even her mind had grown calm, allowing her to think about what she would do next.
Her former employer, Mrs Martinez had promised to get her another cleaning job with her brother although was a month away. Meg would just have to pick up some cash working part time till then, some place that would pay under the table and probably below minimum wage. She had a month clear before having to worry about rent. If she was careful, her shopping would last her a week, maybe even two. She had time, she wasn't at rock bottom yet.
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Almost buoyant, more sugar rush than anything else, Meg headed back to her apartment with a sense of optimism. Things weren't great, they never were, but there at least existed some possibility of hope. Apart from finding some part time work, her other goal for the next few weeks was to keep a low profile. She didn't want to run across Mervin Smith again. Not till her rent was due. The sex had been frightening, exciting, shameful. She didn't want to meet his eyes for some time to come, didn't want a fresh reminder of the lustful gaze he'd held as he'd fucked her hard. The sugar rush was wearing off, morose thoughts intruding into her mind again.
"Hey-hey bag lady, haven't seen you about much." Meg didn't need to pull her eyes away from the path she walked on to know who was shouting at her. Zeke and DK, two young men who's only purpose in life outside of pushing drugs to the residents of the two tower blocks that loomed over them, was to torment her it seemed. She shuffled on a little faster, raising her head to see that the door to her tower block was just a hundred feet away.
"Yo, yo, hey! Don't you fuckin' ignore me." The voice was closer now. Zeke maybe? She wasn't sure and wasn't going to look to check. She wanted to run but with the instinct of prey she knew that a display like that would only have the hounds chase her with greater intent. Still her shambling gait increased some.
Too little, too late. A hand grabbed her arm from one side. Meg tried to move on, almost shrugging free when a second figure set itself in her path, blocking her escape. She subsided, keeping her head down, praying that some other resident would venture out. Even if they did, most who lived here either bought drugs from the two young men or gave them a wide berth, fearing for their own safety.
The man beside her pulled at her woollen hat, tugging it free so that Meg's straw blonde hair that she'd tucked up beneath it fell about her shoulders.
"De fuck? I thought she was a fuckin' dog bro, look at this shit!" The man beside her, it was Zeke, now tugged on her arm to face her, DK's startled words prompting his friend to have a proper look. He tapped her with a gloved hand under her chin, Meg raising her head meekly, her eyes still downcast.
