i.

He’d left her chained up naked to the big metal radiator in the old apartment, and it started banging, and she was afraid of it getting hot. But the banging was just some garbage trucks out back of the motel.

The sound of traffic made Girl think they were facing a main road. She was lying under the desk in a nest of puke-green blankets where He must have put her to sleep. The sun was just up, the taste of pussy still in her mouth. She saw the same color blankets on the bed, half kicked off. The slut from last night’s foot was hanging off it and she thought, guess He liked her. Usually He ran em out by sunup. Usually He slept alone.

He stalked out of the bathroom naked and pulled the desk chair aside and balled up the back of Girl’s hair and yanked her up to her knees by it. He was slow getting going, like He usually was first thing, not that she minded,— breakfast beej was a very meditative time of day for Girl; and the slut on the bed was awake and staring pie-eyed at them by the time He was ready. Girl didn’t mind anyone watching either. He pulled out like He always did and shot her His Load full in the face.

Girl stretched out with her back propped against the wall and listened to Him go back in and start the shower running. She dreamed a fleeting dream of herself as a bejeweled harem girl on a divan, each gem a drop of her Sultan’s Cum, while the slut crawled off the bed and crawled over and started licking Him off her chin. They got slick and got tangled up with each other but it was early still, and pretty soon the two drifted off unconscious together.

He was at the nightstand, stuffing His wallet in His jeans. It was full day. Girl squinted against the glare. He held up a couple folded bills between His fingers and made sure she saw them. “Two a yiz clean up, get yourselves a couple Grand Slams.” He bunged the money and a room key down in a shaft of prismatic light next to the alarm. “See the sign from the parking lot. It’s walkable.”

Once they were in the shower the slut started making out with her again, and they still hadn’t touched the soap by the time the hot water ran out.

ii.

“You wait His table last night?” Girl didn’t exactly have a wardrobe: the only things she could find for herself to wear out were thin denim cutoffs and a barely long enough crop top, so new slut had to make do with her last night’s uniform. Girl glanced about to see what the servers in the Denny’s had on. “Not here, though, huh. No skirts.”

New slut’s gaze drifted down and she pulled at the light-blue cloth over her chest. “Oh yeah, what’s it say on your nametag?” Girl asked, in a voice like she was trying to coax a kitten from hiding. The slut hadn’t said a word the whole way over. “See okay, that’s a B, fuck these little ones are hard though, nay? taay?” But then she started fumbling at the tag and it broke Girl’s concentration. “You know what? I guess Betty. Betty’s cute! That’s a good waitress name.”

“I’m … I don’t …” Betty tried twisting the nametag around so she could see it right side up. “Okay leave it alone though, you’ll mess it up,” Girl said, and caught her hand and pulled it away. On impulse she kissed it, feeling flirty. “My name’s Girl,” she said. “Just Girl.” She gave the hand a more lingering kiss before letting it go.

A large disapproving middle-aged woman plopped down waters and a couple menus. “OJ,” Girl said to her back as she retreated, and heard the woman cluck her tongue.

Betty looked confused. “It’s my slave name.” Girl blushed, afraid it would sound like she was putting on airs. “What He likes to call me I mean. Sometimes I almost forget I had a before one!”

“… I don’t … feel like I’m me,” Betty said.

“Ooh, that reminds me.” Girl lowered her voice and leaned out over the table. “There’s this stuff? God I’m so stupid, what’s it called? I can never remember it. Last time I took it was that bouncy little redhead, He’ll know. Anyway it’s like, it dissolves the boundaries of the self. I mean. When we fucked I couldn’t keep track which of us I even was.”

Girl sighed and pitched back against her bench, admiring how the pose made her nipples poke up. “I bet if we ask Him nice I bet He’d score us some.” She slipped off a flip-flop and reached her foot underneath Betty’s skirt. “He can be real sweet like that.” Betty was wet. At the motel she’d tried to put her underwear back on, and Girl had to remind her sluts didn’t go around in underwear and made her throw it away. She started teasing clumsily around Betty’s slit, and the girl scooched forward a little and spread her thighs a little to accommodate. Nothing else in her demeanor changed except the look in her eyes got somehow emptier.

The harpy waitress reappeared to bang a couple orange juices on the table; Girl was almost surprised not to get spattered. “Whaddaya have?” she barked, taking back the untouched menus.

“Two Grand Slams.” Girl winked at Betty. She found the slut’s clit with her middle toe and pushed at it and got her to jump. “Coffee.” The waitress stood there fuming. “Cooked … ?” she huffed. “ … however they cook em, I dunno,” Girl shrugged. She looked her square in the eyes. “Our Owner didn’t say.” She pushed Betty with her toe again, firm enough to make her whine. She pressed two fingers into the thin crotch of her cutoffs and drew them up slow from her taint, wedging the denim into her engorged pussy lips. She watched the waitress watch, her fat, blotchy face twitching like she was trying to work out some excruciating math puzzle. Then all at once the woman collapsed: her posture went slack, she cast her eyes down to the floor, and muttering something broken she turned away to go deliver their order.

“See that?” Girl whispered to Betty. “She won’t even remember it. He taught me that.” She’d never felt such a sense of triumph. But then she went ahead and took her hand back off her pussy, because Girl was a polite Girl, and didn’t masturbate in public without she’d been told.

iii.

The country they were driving through was flat and open, and you could see the signs coming at you from a long way away. Girl recognized the different kinds from their layouts: the one ahead was a GAS FOOD LODGING one. In theory that gave her a leg up, since two of those were simple, and she could tell where on the sign they should be. And big G was one of her favorite letters for reading. But there was all that movement to contend with: searching to hold onto the text while it kept getting nearer and the car kept jittering her eyes around, what she thought were words turning to smoke before she was even done assembling them. And then it’s on you and you haven’t figured any of it out and you’re not going to figure it out and the sign goes by whoosh! and you just … wink out.

That’s how Highway days went. Hand glued to her twat, mile on mile of signs stuttering past, each of them a balked orgasm. Times like now, she found herself a bit more awake. She felt like she was in the afterglow of a chant session. The Mantras themselves she never remembered, except in a general way, but there was that sense you always had coming out of being oversaturated with devotion: like the way she wished in her body she could be on that floorboard blowing Him right now.

He always worked it the same: some empty stretch of road, He’d tell her to go grab a toy from out her box under the seat and it’d set her heart racing. She’d take a swig of water if she had some and spit into her hand and rub it into her pussy, not that He couldn’t make wet on command but that was How You Did It; and sometimes, if she didn’t get too happy with the toy too fast, she could hear it that He was starting the Mantras going. That was her favorite moment: that kind of loose, slidey feeling you got knowing next minute your mind would be gone. He told her sometimes when she got real out of it He’d knock the toy aside and get in there Himself, just reach across and start fucking her hole with His hand, just for the hell of it. Empty-eyed in her seat, chanting whatever the Mantras gave her, too blitzed to even know she was being molested: whenever she thought now about what being a slave meant to her, that was the image she always saw in her head.

If she was awake it meant they were making a stop. Girl flashed back to a thing at a rest area and wondered if that was today, or weeks ago. Highway was like its own separate time dimension to her. She’d been wasted, more than usual, like maybe He was trying her out on something new. But he got out of the car and her wires got crossed: she was meant to stay but seeing him out the window triggered something, she worked the door open somehow and baby-ducklinged after Him into the building and before Girl knew where she was she was standing in the middle of the men’s room. The memory felt fresh. She smelt the bathroom smells, heard the tinny echo of voices rising. She’d got down on the floor and got her tits out pretty much automatically, because why else would she be there except to get groped and suck cock? Except she wasn’t and it wasn’t that kind of a gig, or any kind.

That was all there was of it. He’d laughed at her. Hustled her out to the car, laughing the whole way. And then he would’ve snapped his fingers, and that little bubble of mistake and anxiety in her head went POP! like a balloon. Who could tell when it happened? After that there was Highway again, now and ever after: the ceaseless tire drone, the unending cryptic file of Signs, the itch in her pussy that kept her trying fruitlessly to read them.

Girl missed them taking the exit ramp, but she noticed the Shell coming up and as He turned into it she tugged her skirt down below her crotch and sat on her hands. No playing with yourself at the pump. That was Programming, Girl knew, and she felt His harness tighten around her and felt safe. He went about doing gas things, cleaning off the windshield, going for snacks, while she squirmed her arousal against the vinyl and scoped the action. You couldn’t really predict who He’d go for—His only real type, He said once, was “ripe enough to drop on its own”—but when they were out in the world she liked to pass the time scouting possibles. Gas stations were hit or miss. A nice enough midriff over hot pants and cork-bottom wedgies strutted into view in the side mirror, and even as the chick passed and turned her head back and you saw she wasn’t, something about her walk or something made Betty! ring out in Girl’s head; and in the instant before her heart broke she seemed to live out a detailed fantasy of grabbing the slut from behind, dragging her in and pinning her in the back seat and sexing her down till they were back on the Highway, and He could re-brainwash her back to herself again.

How long now since she’d seen Betty? How long since she’d thought about her? Girl felt a tug of remorse. But you knew where it was going once the complaints started in: wrong attitude, broody, she didn’t train good; new slut was so much baggage. And it wasn’t Girl’s fault for being a natural slave. When He sold Betty off He brought her along for entertainment. Two of them scissoring each other on an old sprung couch in some NorCal rednecks’ filthy Confederate flag-hung garage, death metal going nonstop, cumming till they couldn’t cum no more while the Men dickered and dealt cards and barely paid heed. She couldn’t remember a goodbye. He got a pharmaceutical package out of the deal but without a Betty she had no pal she could to do the good drugs with. That whole way back He was in a mood: didn’t like the rednecks, didn’t like the deal; they wasn’t real Specials and couldn’t run em no slaves to save their lifes; He cast dark aspersions after them and seemed to forget Girl was even there, till He heard her whimpering and pulled off the road behind some trees and gave her what to whimper for.

He slid back in behind the wheel and tossed her over a Dr. Pepper, but before He turned the ignition He fixed Girl with a look. “Blue again,” He said. Abashed, she sniffled and nodded and cast her eyes to her knees. “Well.” He reached across her into the glove compartment and pulled out a vial. “Take,” He said, a small orange pill in his palm, and she bent down holding her hair away from her face and kissed it into her mouth. It made her feel very small and very pet-like, and she imagined curling up in His palm just like that little pill while He closed His fist and the dark closed around her and she folded with the light into sleep.

And that was all of Highway for the day. At the motel He put the Device on the TV and turned them both on, flipped the TV to an empty channel, shut the room lights and shut her in and left to go prowl the night. In a hush like church, heart pounding, Girl knelt on the floor on a folded-up bath towel a few feet from the screen, her nakedness shimmering, electric. She kissed the gag He’d picked out for her, her favorite, one she knew would leave her a puddle of drool and suck-need by the time He brought the evening’s playmate back. Her stomach growled as she pulled the strap tight and she tried to think if He’d fed her dinner.

A girl was doing Mantras. A really dopey girl, who couldn’t say the words straight. After a while she understood it was her, she was the dope, chanting stupidly around her gag. Like there’s anyone to even hear, she thought, feeling herself slide: and there wasn’t.

iv.

Girl came in shivering in a dirty, bunchy pink parka, legs uncovered, and took a stool at the end of the counter. No one was in the place, a couple isolated half-asleep customers in booths was all; the counter girl, a slightly worn-looking young blonde, occupied herself at the other, warmer end arranging glasses. “Whyn’t you come down here away from the door, hon?” she called over.

Girl put her elbows up on the counter and swaddled in her own arms. “You got any, um, like brewed tea?” she asked. The waitress sighed and retrieved a pot.

“Always this cold here?” Girl joked. The waitress put a cup in front of her and poured. “It’s literally Alaska,” she said. Girl took a sip and aaahed. “See them auroras?” she asked. “All my life I wanted to see them auroras.”

The waitress motioned to walk the pot back but Girl stretched across the counter and caught her wrist. “Come on, keep me company,” she whined. “Pour yourself one. Who else you gonna talk to this hour?”

The waitress shrugged and fetched herself a cup. “It’s solar minimum,” she said. Girl looked dubious. “The auroras. The cycle of … whatever, supposedly they’re weak right now. Sun’s weak. Wanna catch em you gotta go out where it’s darker.”

“Out further.” Girl took another sip and held her hands around the cup to warm them. “Here I thought this was the end of the road.”

“Shoulda hung that left at Albakoikee.” The waitress stooped to reach under the counter and came back with a bottle. “Irish it?” she asked. She dropped a glug of brown in Girl’s cup, and a larger one in her own.

“I seen you in here a couple times, you know,” Girl said. “Last few days. I dunno if you noticed.” She reached a hand out. “I’m Girl.”

The waitress cocked her head a bit. “Girl. Why not. Yeah Girl, I noticed.” She took Girl’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “Gladys,” she said, gesturing at her nametag.

“Gladys with a G!” Girl exclaimed. She leaned forward to inspect the nametag. “Yep! There’s that lil bugger. We’re G twins,” she said, beaming.

The waitress smiled lopsidedly and stowed the bottle away. Girl gazed into her face as she did, as if starstruck. “You look like one a the cheerleaders at my old high school,” she sighed. “You wadn’t a cheerleader at my old high school were ya?”

“Never a cheerleader at nobody’s high school.” But the way Gladys tucked a vagrant strand of hair behind her ear gave it away that she was flattered. Girl, warmer now, had undone her parka; she was wearing just a thin lace bra and a pleated schoolgirl tartan that barely cleared her hips. Gladys kept her eyes on the faded photo of Mt. McKinley on the wall behind her. “First time I’ve seen you out by your lonesome,” she said.

“Wonder if you’d a liked me back then,” Girl sighed. “Oh my Man’ll be along. Up with the sun, that one.”

Through the half-drawn blinds over the door Gladys could just glimpse the sky starting to lighten. She refreshed Girl’s tea. “Long night for you though, huh,” Gladys said, avoiding her eyes.

Girl glanced down her front. “Oh! Oh because—” She started giggling. “Oh honey you thought I was workin? Nah, I’m just antsy’s all.” She flared out the sides of her parka to give Gladys the full view. “Got my travelin clothes on! It’s a Highway day.”

Gladys’s cheeks were afire. “Jesus, I’m sorry, I—”

“Well it’s an honest mistake!” Girl reached for Gladys’s hand and patted it. “I had a couple dates since we been here, you prolly seen me out with one of em.” Girl had a glittery, flat-bottomed handbag on her arm that she took off and put on the counter. “But see that’s just … My Man’s always got somethin goin, some deal or other? So sometimes I’m like, a pot sweetener, He calls it. Party favor.” She looked shyly proud. “He don’t need me earning though. My Man’s always got somethin goin.”

Gladys let herself see the small, black-letter OWNED tattoo under Girl’s pierced belly button. She parted her lips. A weariness came over her.

Girl read the question from her gaze. “Yeah, I’m His sex slave.” She smiled sweetly at the waitress, straightened up on her stool and opened her handbag. “He totes me around with Him all over, we meet people, I get naked, get freaky, get brainwashed … We have a lotta fun.” She removed two stamp-sized squares of paper from inside.

Like a card player pushing in a raise, Girl held Gladys’s eyes while she slid the blotter tabs over the counter between their two teacups. They bore an old-timey looking imprint in red ink with an orange on a leafed stem outlined in the center, the legend CALIF / ORANJES in two arcs above and below it.

“There’s a G in oranges,” the waitress murmured.

“I can remember Him pulling up to the curb next to the sidewalk and popping the door and telling me get in. Didn’t know Him from Adam. But what’s a girl gonna do?” Girl dotted her index finger in her tea and touched it to one of the tabs. “Called me easy pickins. ‘Buckle up, Easy Pickins.’ Almost thought it was my new name.” She grinned and dropped the tab into her cup. “He says He can smell it on us.” She took a swig, dotted her finger on her tongue, tapped at the remaining paper and held it up for her new friend to see.

“I never actually reeled one in for Him before.” Girl dropped her eyes coquettishly. “But he could see I had a crush on you.” She dipped her fingertip in the waitress’s tea and let the tab detach from it and sink. “He can be real thoughtful like that. Still made me beg for it though.” She took her finger from the cup and made a show of licking it off.

One of the boothies, a rheumy unshaven white-haired man in green work coveralls, got up, dropped some cash next to his plate, and shuffled down to the door. Girl lifted herself partway off her perch and leaned into the waitress’s ear. “First time He gave me this stuff?” she whispered. “He told me it’d open up my god portal.”  The man passed behind them without a glance, eyes down, his arm raised in rote farewell.

The waitress stared into her teacup, watching the image disintegrate. “Where’d that bugger get to,” she said, and laughed a dry laugh.

Girl resumed her seat and finished her tea, eyeing the waitress avidly. The old man stepped through the inner door and caught his heel as it closed and he stumbled, right as someone else was coming in the outer. A brief confusion occupied the space. The waitress lifted her eyes to it, lifted her cup, and drained it at a go.

Sorted, the men in the entryway exchanged low good mornings. The waitress let the cup slip from her grasp. Both doors opened in concert, a slash of red-gold dawn piercing through to the counter and caging her in light. Dazzled blind, she clapped her palms over her eyes and held her breath, listening in a kind of agony for the newcomer’s footsteps. For a moment she blazed; then the light went, and her hands came away.