The silk of my robes slid pleasantly along my bare skin as I moved, shifting positions while one of my hands fluttered up the collar near my neck, pulling at it as the smile on my lips grew a little more endearing, fluttering my eyes in a silent call to the man across from me. He had been sitting there stupidly for the past forty minutes, trying to “get to know me”, trying to get me to “open up” to him, as if he was my friend and not just a client who was there to fuck me and leave. It was the only thing that bothered me, the formalities and friendliness. I had no need to know his name, his age, what he did for a living, how many kids he had, and I did not need to know if he was married. All I needed was for him to take his clothes off so he could hurry up and leave.

He didn’t seem to get the hint, so I stretched out one of my arms, letting the soft green sleeve pull back to show the pale skin of my wrist as I curled a finger at him. Finally, his dark eyes seemed to light and register, and he shifted his own position so he could stand and walk closer to me, getting to his knees in front of me and immediately fumbling with the sash around my waist.

I let him do as he pleased, placing my hands onto the mat behind me and tilting my head back as I curved my back, biting my lip as the sash came free and the sides of my robe were pushed aside to reveal my bare skin and nude body. I didn’t want to look so I closed my eyes, doing my best not to cringe as the man put a hand on the back of my neck and pushed me onto my back. The bed he laid me on was hardly a bed, I was not allowed a bed; instead they bought me this strange padded mattress from across the sea to the east. It came cheap, they told me, and it wasn’t entirely uncomfortable, so I dealt with it.

In any case, it wasn’t as if I slept much anyway, not with men like this constantly buying my company. I kept my eyes closed as my hands curled into loose fists beside my head, my bottom lip slipping between my teeth as the calloused fingers grazed over my sensitive skin, across my chest where he twisted my nipples painfully, then down my stomach and thighs, hooking his hands behind my knees and hoisting my legs up so he could reach beneath me.

His rough hands seemed to scratch at my skin as he spread me and spit, which I did cringe from, biting harder at my lip as his fingers started to prod at my entrance. He thrust them inside without much warning, wiggling them around and stretching me for a few seconds before drawing them out, and a ragged breath slipped out of my mouth when I realized he was going to be one of those clients, the kind that really do just fuck, disregarding the fact I was male and needed a little bit more preparation than what he’d given me.

Translation, this was going to hurt me, and was I allowed to say anything, ask him to prepare my body more before pushing in, warn him he was probably going to tear me? No, I wasn’t. I had to stay completely silent unless he told me to make noise. Lie still like a board, let him play with me, smile, laugh, wink flirtatiously, because I was an object, I was born to serve the people.

My body fought him as he started to push in, I could feel myself stretch painfully, my head titling back as I bit down even harder, eyes screwed closed as I struggled to contain my whimpers and the trembling of my body. When he started to draw out I started to sigh, but it rose to a scream when he pushed my knees further apart and shoved himself down to the base of his rod.

He gave me no time to get used to the feeling before he started to pull out and thrust. Judging by how loud my scream had been, Lien-Hua probably heard me, and I would be punished for disrupting my client, so I did my best not to make any more noise as he pressed his sweaty face against my neck, nibbling at my skin and grunting loudly in my ear, his unkempt nails digging into the flesh of my thighs and his hips slamming clumsily against me as he moved.

Biting my lip and curling my hands into tighter fists were my only defense against the pain. I couldn’t tell him to stop, so I just stared across the room towards the open door that showed a small bath house, a garden, and a grove of trees. I was grateful that my little shack didn’t open towards the house, or I would be even more humiliated; with the way the building was made, the only door opened towards the very back of the yard where no one could see me.

Despite the fact I was good for business and brought the jìyuàn more money than Lien-Hua herself, I was still nothing but an abomination. I was outcasted, alienated, untouchable, and why? Because I was a bastard? Because no one knew who my father was? It wasn’t that surprising, there were many orphans and bastard children living on the streets, I’d seen them many times, watched the girls chase them from the yard with brooms, but me? I was different. The son of a prostitute and one of her clients, abandoned by one and unacknowledged by the other, seventeen years old, and a male for that matter.

Lien-Hua would say it often, “If you’d been a girl then business would be better,” yet I still brought in more profit than any of the women in the jìyuàn. I think she’s jealous of me though, because of how many men line up to lay with me. At one point, she herself had been a very popular hostess, she was the best in fact, then I came along. Long hair blacker than hers was, skin like the porcelain dolls sold on the Silk Road, eyes that took the color of precious metal, and a slender body some men would compare to a woman’s. I was a threat, and that is why they kept me out here in the cold.

The man leaning over me pulled himself from my body and positioned his prick to aim at the concave of my stomach, my eyes closing again as he jerked himself off until he gave a pathetic noise and heat pooled in and around my naval. After a few moments of heavy breathing he moved away from me, muttering a thank you as he prepared to leave.

I moved slowly, pulling my robes over my body to hide my hips and legs, pulling one side higher to cover my chest as I kept my head bowed, my eyes moving over to where the man dropped the small sack of money. The jingling sound the coins had my stomach tying in knots, and I lifted my head just in time to see him disappear out the door.

It took me a moment to swallow the urge to cry so I could inch my way over to the pouch, taking out a single coin before tying it back up, then inched back to the mat and laid down, hiding the coin under the mattress and staring at the ceiling, waiting. Lien-Hua appeared a moment later, dressed in elegant silk, her dull black hair tied into a high bun that was held in place by a jeweled hairpiece.

Her dark eyes seemed even darker from the lack of light, and the full moon gave her an eerie look as she stood in the doorway, stooping to take the bag and shaking it, smiling greedily, “Thank you for your business, Zemin,” she sang, hiding the money in the sleeve of her robes before taking a few more steps into the room.

I saw the crop before she used it, the sting spreading across my chest so violently I jolted where I was lying, a whimper escaping as she hit me a few more times, then took a step back to admire her work, red welts that decorated my chest and stomach. They hurt badly, stung like nothing else, but they would be gone completely by the time my next client came tomorrow.

“Please, niáng,” I panted to her and immediately knew I made a mistake.

Her eyes seemed to flash in her rage as the riding crop came down on me harder, “You do not address me as your mother!” she screamed, “You are filth! You are nothing!”

I pinched my eyes shut and curled my fingers into the sheets of the mattress, not moving an inch as she punished me. I knew trying to get away or curling up would make it worse, so I just didn’t. I simply laid there until she’d worn herself out, a few strands of hair hanging in front of her face as she panted and stepped back, smiling sweetly and holding the crop with both hands.

“Sleep well, child,” she ordered in that same melodic voice, and a trembling breath passed my lips as she left me.

I forced myself to remain in the same position until I was certain she was gone before sitting up, a groan tumbling from my lips as agony raced through my body. Moving was a chore as I got to my feet, letting the soiled green robes fall away from my body before I retrieved something cleaner, holding it against my chest as I left the little hut, stepping off the porch so my bare feet could feel the full sensation of the grass.

It was night time, behind me was the main house, beyond that was the city, and turning to look over my shoulder let me see the lights, the music a little louder now that I was paying attention to it. I’d never been into the city more than a few times, as Lien-Hua didn’t like it when people knew I existed, so all the celebration, whatever it was for, was foreign to me. I didn’t belong in a society like that. I was born into this life, my mother’s life, the life of a whore, and there was nothing else that I could ever be.

Turning away from the lights, I picked up the lantern sitting on the porch, lighting it before stepping forward. I wasn’t allowed to use the same bath house that the women used, but luckily there was a small body of water hidden by the trees, nestled at the foot of the hills that trailed behind the jìyuàn like an inky backdrop of watercolors. I went there when I needed to bathe, which I did often. It was necessary for me to cleanse myself after every night spent with a client; it wasn’t healthy to let their essence stay on my body, so I cleaned it off as soon as I could.

With that, I was probably the only member of the jìyuàn who exercised good personal hygiene. I may be dirty on the inside, but I would never let the outside cake with dust like some of the prostitutes who worked here.

The water of the little lake I came to was cold in the night, freezing, but it was just as well. The chill would numb the pain of my hips as I cleaned myself, hanging my robes over a branch that protruded over the water before stepping into the shallows, wading out to the middle where the water went the deepest. The water came up to my naval when I stopped, the moon casting silver light over the water and reflecting off my skin as I cleaned away the humiliating substance stained on my stomach.

Just like I was hoping, the dangerous cold of the water numbed the pain enough that I could move normally, letting my long hair veil around my shoulders and pool onto the surface of the water with the pretty white flower petals blown from the trees. In fact, much of the surface of the water was covered with the petals, but I didn’t mind as I ducked my head under the water, pushing my hair back away from my face as I rose back up, water droplets sliding down my face as I smiled against the refreshing feeling.

These quiet moments were what I lived for, when my mother wasn’t anywhere to be seen, when the women weren’t harassing me, and when I wasn’t silently afraid of when my next client would come for me. All that existed was the cold water around me, the fragile white petals and the moon that glowed in the night sky above.

I was so entranced with the silence that when I heard the branch snap I didn’t immediately react. When I did I spun quickly, the water sloshing around me as I covered my chest with my arms, eyes wide as I panned around the area, not seeing anything. Confusion filtered through me as I nibbled on my bottom lip, settling with the decision that it was probably nothing, perhaps the wind or an animal.

It was getting late, however, and I’d be in trouble if Lien-Hua came to the hut and I wasn’t there, so I waded back over to where I’d draped my robes, stepping out of the water and wrapping the clothes around my shoulders, arms slipping through the sleeves and tying the sash before I pulled all of my hair from the robes and let it hang down my back, turning on my heel and walking back towards my hut.

While the girls in the house used new, beautiful combs for their hair, I had to use an old one to brush my hair out and clear it of tangles, kneeling on the porch outside of my hut and listening to the beat of music coming from the streets. Whatever the people were celebrating, it must have been important, and that usually meant extra clients for the beautiful women waiting to service the men in town. Me on the other hand, you had to know Lien-Hua very well to get to me. Not because I was coveted, more like no one really knew I existed. I wasn’t a poster board like the rest of the girls, I was just…. There.

The first time a man requested me was when I was very young, eight if I recalled correctly. I was cleaning the yard, hanging up the laundry I’d just finished so it would dry in time for the women. A merchant from another town was there for Lien-Hua, paying good money for her, and they were taking a little walk through the gardens before she showed him to her room, but before they could get to the house he saw me.

According to him, he originally thought I was a girl, due to my slim body and long hair, but learning I was male didn’t exactly deter him. That was the first day my mother pulled me aside and told me what I was born to do.

“Zemin, your name means for the people, do you understand? You were born for the people.”

I was born for the people, for rich men to use as their dirty secret against their wives and lovers. In all honesty, I don’t remember much from that night, only a burning pain that had me screaming, and every time I thought of it I started to shake and cry. I quickly wiped the tears away with my sleeve and set the comb down before easing myself onto the mattress in my hut, pulling a single sheet over my body and curling into the fetal position as I stared outside the door, watching the leaves dance in the wind as the festivities continued.

This was my life. Paid for my body, otherwise I was ignored or abused. My own mother resented me because I was abnormally beautiful for a man, but I didn’t choose this. I didn’t want to be a prostitute. I wanted to run away, and hidden in the very back of the bottom drawer of my wardrobe was a small sack of coins I’d been saving for the past nine years.

Lien-Hua would have noticed if I’d taken more than one of the coins, so I only took one. Each coin in that bag represented every man who had ever bought me, every man who had violated me, raped me, made me bleed, scream, moan, and cry. The thought made me sick, and I rolled onto my other side, holding the covers with both hands as tears flowed from my eyes.

I didn’t want to be a toy any longer.

I wanted to be free of this.

That’s all I wanted.