113

Nerthus – eleven years ago

“Is this your true color?” the young woman sitting next to me asks, her Spanish accent heavy in her speech.

“Uh-huh,” I answer as I tear my eyes away from the bars of the cages we are sitting in.

She scoffs, a tired smile playing on her lips as she shifts on the cold floor we are sitting on. “It is beautiful.”

“Tha- Thank you,” I answer in a stutter, and scrunch up my nose.

Francis had told me not to talk to strangers because the people in a big city would be different.

‘Everybody will try to scam you,’ he told me before he finally let me board the bus which would be driving me into my new life.

Scared about her speaking to me again, I lower my head.

“Her family surely got a lot. Such color is rare!” Another girl with a similar accent says, scoffing.

Shrugging, I hug my legs to my chest. “I- I wouldn’t know. I’m ju-just a bo-boring country girl.”

“Oooh, you are good at rodeo,” a third woman shouts, making everyone in that cold cell laugh.

I smile but decide