Seth felt like he was living in a dream. He had been living with Juju for almost six months, and Maggie was there whenever she wasn’t working, which made him feel as if she lived there too. He and Joey had become close friends.
Seth was working for Rock, and all the exchanges of money and drugs were coordinated through Juju. After a couple of months, Juju talked to Rock. “So, we need you to give Seth some money for his work. I mean, I can’t afford to pay for everything. Maggie chips in a little, but you know Armando is tight with his allowance to the girls,” Juju explained.
“We didn’t have no deal on the boy getting paid. You and Maggie should’ve thought about how you were gonna feed him before ya cut a deal. So, I ain’t cuttin’ no deal wit’ cha now,” Rock told her. “I don’t care if that little shit stain starves to death. He ain’t my problem.”
Juju wasn’t surprised by Rock’s response; she’d expected as much. Plan B was for Maggie to find out if Armando would increase her allowance a little. Maggie wasn’t looking forward to asking him, but she figured it was worth a try. Maggie approached Armando on a rainy Thursday morning. “Hey, Armando,” she sang in a sweeter voice than normal.
“What the hell do you want?” Armando asked defensively.
“I wanted to talk to you about my allowance.”
“What about it?”
“Well, I was wondering if you could increase it. I need to help Juju out with some of the expenses for Seth,” she said honestly.
“Ha! You’re fuckin’ kiddin’ me, right? Get the fuck outta my face before I knock the shit out of you. I don’t care about Juju and that little asshole kid of yours.”
Maggie remained silent and angrily left the house. When she walked into Juju’s apartment fifteen minutes later, the two girls looked at each other, and Maggie shook her head.
“You know what? This is a bunch of bullshit,” Maggie said, stomping her foot. “We’re making these jerks a lot of money, and they won’t share any of it with us. This is really pissing me off.”
“Yeah, I agree. We know Rock isn’t going to give me a bigger cut of the profit from selling, and I can’t charge more for my dope to keep more money ’cause I’ll price myself out. My customers will buy from someone else,” Juju said thoughtfully.
Then an idea began to form in Maggie’s head.
“That’s it! I know what to do. I’ll turn a couple of extra tricks a week and just keep the money. You know, nothing big, just two or three tricks would give us enough money,” Maggie said with confidence.
“Um, yeah, that sounds like a shitty idea. Do you know what would happen if Rock ever caught you doing that? It’s happened before, and he found out about it. The girl disappeared, and we never saw or heard about her again. That’s too risky. There’s no way you’ll keep it a secret. They have a lot of people who work for them, and you never know who’s watching you,” Juju warned.
“I would never tell anyone, so there’s no way Rock would ever find out. That girl must’ve told someone what she was doing, and that’s how she got caught. I mean, the new girls would never get away with it, but Armando only cares that I meet my weekly quota. I think the risk is low. We both keep our traps shut, and no one knows any different,” Maggie persisted.
Maggie felt an obligation to Seth, and it was her intent to keep him safe, fed, and loved, just as she had promised him. If it meant taking a small risk to earn a little extra cash, then that’s what she’d do. She told herself that it wasn’t like she was stealing from Armando. After all, it was her body being sold and her skill earning the money. The way she saw it, she was the one who was being robbed, not Rock or Armando. With her mind made up, Maggie assured Juju that everything would be fine.
That very night, Maggie sold herself to one more customer before finishing her shift. When she was done, she went to Juju’s apartment and gave her the thirty dollars. Then she walked back to the house of whores to give Armando her earnings. He took the money and counted it in front of her, something he did routinely with all of the girls. Content because Maggie had earned her quota, Armando walked into the room where the other men sat drinking and smoking.
Well, that was easy, Maggie thought as she stretched out in her “spot” on the dirty living room carpet. Piece of cake.
During the months that followed, Maggie turned a couple of extra tricks each week. This made her capable of earning enough money to help Juju with the expenses. The two girls even were able to stash away a bit of money for the future. Everything seemed to be working as planned, and Maggie was proud that she was able to help all of them.
One Sunday afternoon, while they were eating Chinese takeout in Juju’s tiny apartment, Maggie talked about expanding her profits.
“Look, Juju. No one is even noticing a couple of times a week. It’s really simple; if I just turned one extra trick a day, it would give us extra money. We could save it all and someday get the hell out of this rotten place. No one has noticed me doing it so far, and they’re not gonna notice if I do a couple more,” Maggie explained.
“What happens if you get caught? Huh? What will happen then?” Juju argued, with no chance of winning.
“I won’t get caught. I have it all figured out, OK?” Maggie insisted.
Maggie truly believed she could do it without anyone noticing. But Maggie was dead wrong.