(no subject)
Title: Lotteries And Lyrics
Characters: Pete, Ryan
Rating: pg
Wordcount: 1339
Summary: No one ever thinks they'll be the one picked for unpaid labour.
Warnings: suicide attempt, slavery
Disclaimer: This is a non-profit, non-commercial work of fiction using the names and likenesses of real individuals. This fictional story is not intended to imply that the events herein actually occurred or that the attitudes or behaviors described are engaged in or condoned by the real persons whose names are used without permission.
Pete isn’t exactly known for taking things well. There’s a reason he was sent to a boot camp when he was a teenager. While it could be argued that the six weeks of physical and emotional abuse didn’t make him a better, more rational person, attacking everything in his room with a baseball bat probably wasn't the best way to deal with the disappointment of not making the varsity soccer team. At the very least it was a mixed metaphor about sports.
Still, that news is nothing compared to his lottery summons. His name is officially in the hat for unpaid services. Otherwise known as slavery. There’s an actual big cylinder that spins until a hand is plunged inside. For a period it was all digital, but that didn’t last long. Turns out it’s easier for the human psyche to trust a human hand to randomize the draw than a computer program behind closed doors.
The cylinder fills with new names each Monday, and the slips of paper are chosen from every day. The draw is filmed and Pete, along with countless others, watches the last five minutes of prime time news with clenched fists. He can’t help but hold his breath, even though depriving himself of oxygen does exactly nothing to affect the outcome. His mom tells him there’s nothing to worry about, which is almost true. The chance of being pulled is low. It’s like jury duty, a huge pool of not so voluntary volunteers whittled to a select few. Except there’s no lawyer asking probing questions to see if he’s suited for it. Pete’s not, but probably no one is. No, this system is run by the impersonal hand of chance.
Getting picked seems kind of unreal. He doesn’t even freak out at first. He reports to the house that owns him, and for the first few days acts like his owner is merely his boss. Then it sinks in. He’s never going to be able to do anything he likes to do without permission. He’s never going to have a wife, or kids, or friends with benefits or travelling buddies or bar acquaintances. He’s never going to be able to say no. That’s when Pete starts collecting pills. Any pills. Even vitamins. Surely there has to be a fat soluble vitamin that he can overdose on.
It’s harder than one would think to swallow a full bottle of pills. Once when Pete was a teenager he pinned a friend of his to the floor and tried to pour a full package of M&Ms down her throat. It made sense at the time, and after she finished coughing she got her revenge. It would be like that if he tried to down them in one go. His throat is not a slide, and the pills aren’t happy children. And he’s not quite dramatic enough to swallow them one at a time, placing each perfectly in the middle of his tongue.
He wakes up, which is a disappointment. Waking up is pretty much the opposite of what Pete intended. But he wakes up in a room that isn’t Henry’s. It’s easy enough to tell, Pete’s cleaned all of Henry’s rooms and none of them had walls this shade of blue. Henry had one robin’s egg room, but these walls are a dark blueberry blue. For a moment it’s pure relief. Pete wasn’t sure he’d ever see a room not belonging to Henry again. Then the reality hits. He’s damaged goods now. The kind of person that wants him is the kind of person that buys dented cans at the supermarket. The kind of person that picks potential death over safety. This probably isn’t a better place to be.
Pete doesn’t get up. Going exploring uninvited in a house built for rejects is just a little too crazy for him. Which is saying something. Better for now that he just not move until someone tells him the new rules, and he can decide whether or not they are something he’ll be following. He stays in the bed pretending to be asleep until someone comes in. Pete can tell immediately the man is another slave. It’s not just that he’s dressed in all black, like a uniform, or that his steps are precise like he’s been taught how to be present without being noticeable. There’s just something on his face.
“The master wants to see you.”
“You mean the owner?” Oh. There he is again, saying things he doesn’t need to, and probably shouldn’t. He'd wondered where his gumption had gone. Not too far away, apparently.
“You’re not going to believe me now. They never do. But he’s not nearly as bad as you think.”
Pete snorts. He’s property and the man who is demanding his presence bought him. Yeah, it’s bad. He stands up and follows anyway, because what else can he possibly do?
The room he’s led to is painted another ridiculous colour that makes him think of velvet. All the wood is so dark a brown that it’s nearly black. “Hello Pete. I’m Ryan,” the man behind the ornate writing desk says. Pete doesn’t know what to say back. He can’t tell if it’s worth it to himself to say something and get in trouble for it.
“Sit down,” Ryan gestures. Pete would prefer to stand, prefer to pace, but this is just the first of hundreds of thousand of orders he’ll have to take with a smile. Or whatever other expression Ryan wants from him. He sits down.
“You’re probably wondering how I acquired you. The truth is I troll the caregiver forums, putting offers on any unpaid worker that seems displeased. I have a lot more unpaids here than most caregivers. It’s almost like a collective space.” Ryan pauses, like he’s waiting for Pete to congratulate him on hoarding slaves. Pete doesn’t say anything. “Henry knew of your stockpile. He didn’t confiscate it because he didn’t care what came first, your death or my pick up. Luckily, I travel with a doctor.”
Dying would have been luckier, Pete thinks. He doesn’t as much as make a noncommittal grunt. The time in which people want his opinions is over.
“Do you have anything you want to say?”
Pete blinks. He continues blinking until Ryan lets him leave. He employs the same strategy the next three times Ryan asks over the course of the first week. By the fourth time it’s all Pete can do to not scream at Ryan about how bizarre this is. He hasn’t been asked to do anything. Not housecleaning, not work brought home, not cooking meals or fielding calls. He hasn’t even been asked for sexual favours. It’s driving Pete up the wall.
“What does he want?” Pete finally bursts out, exasperated. Surely one of the almost twenty slaves Ryan keeps on this floor of his house can tell Pete what the fuck is up with Ryan Ross.
“Didn’t he tell you? We’re his muse. Muses.”
There’s no instant ‘oh’, no sudden second Ryan’s behaviour makes sense. So in a voice louder than the first time, Pete demands “what the fuck does that mean!”
Alex explains. “When he was teenager he made friends with three other unpaids his apartment block owned. Behind everyone’s back they formed a band. They were really good. We’ve heard recordings. Except of course they could never do gigs, being unpaids. When Ryan got old enough he was going to buy them from the landlord, but two of them refused. I mean you can’t really refuse but they made it clear they wanted different things.”
“Yeah, like for their friend not to own them-” Keltie interrupts.
“So Ryan didn’t. Jon came, but it didn’t really work, the two of them. But he still likes music, so he figures if he gathers enough fucked up unpaids they’ll inspire something to write lyrics about.”
“Has he written anything?”
“No.”
Well, looks like Ryan’s future is as fucked as Pete’s is. It’s a Pyrrhic victory.