The light in the club never truly goes out—not in the real sense of the word—because here nothing ever ends, nothing ever stops. It only transforms, decays, seeps from one grimy shade into another.
It just changes.
It turns redder, more violet, more tired, more false, as if it's trying to hide the old stains on the walls and the faces of the men who look at us as if we were part of the décor, like objects meant to complete the atmosphere. As if we didn't breathe. As if we didn't have names. As if our presence were justified solely by the fact that they pay and we exist.
The air smells of spilled alcohol, of cheap perfume trying to imitate things no one here can afford, and of something metallic, hard to identify, that sticks in my throat and won't let me breathe deeply. Maybe it's fear. Maybe it's just despair soaking into everything—into skin, into clothes, into me—until I no longer know where the club ends and where I begin.
I stand behind the bar with a smile glued to my face, a practiced, mechanical smile that no longer has anything to do with real emotion, pouring drinks I can't afford and would never drink, not even if they were offered to me for free.
The music is too loud—so loud I feel the bass slamming into my ribs in a constant, aggressive rhythm that never stops. Never. Here, silence doesn't exist. Only the noise that smothers everything that shouldn't be heard: refusals, sobs, broken promises.
"Hey, beautiful—pour me another one?"
A man leans over the bar—far enough to invade my space, to force my attention. His eyes are glassy, unfocused, and his hand is too close to my wrist, fingers sliding slowly, deliberately, as if testing territory he already considers won. I ignore him. I ignore the wave of nausea, ignore the instinct to pull away.
"You pay first," I say, my tone neutral, stripped of anything that could be mistaken for weakness.
His smile twists, spreads wider, uglier.
"What, you don't recognize my value?"
I do. I recognize it very well. It's the kind of value the club loves: dirty money, dirty looks, dirty intentions. Security stands a few meters away—close enough to seem present, far enough to be irrelevant. Two massive men dressed in black, watching over the customers' heads, not their hands. They intervene only when there's too much blood or too much noise. Until then, each of us is on our own.
I take his money. I pour his drink. His hand retreats, but his gaze lingers—sticky, appraising. I know the rules. I know what I am. I know what I'm not allowed to be.
The waitresses are the bait. Provocative, but forbidden. We're told that constantly, as if it were protection, not a thinly veiled invitation. The dancers on stage are something else. They're the displayed merchandise, the light falls on them, and the men choose. They can be taken to the private rooms, where refusal becomes relative—a word that wears thin quickly and disappears.
I don't dance. Not yet.
My stomach knots every time one of the girls vanishes from the floor, led away by a man or by one of Asan's people. Sometimes they come back, their eyes dulled. Other times, they don't.
The new ones are easy to spot. They have empty stares and a discreet number written on a wrist or the inside of an ankle. They don't have names anymore. Just digits. I see them for a few nights. Then they're gone. No explanations. No questions.
I asked once.
I will never do that again.
Asan owns the club. Officially. Unofficially, he owns everything that moves within these walls. Including me.
"Allа."
I hear his voice before I see him—low, calm, measured, a voice that doesn't need to rise to be obeyed. It makes my shoulders tense instantly. Asan doesn't raise his voice. He never has.
I weave through the customers and stop in front of his office, separated from the club by a thick, soundproof door. Here, the music is only a distant murmur. The silence presses harder than the noise outside.
"Payday," he says, opening a drawer.
I keep my hands at my sides. I don't ask for anything. I know better.
He slides a thin envelope toward me. Far too thin.
"It's less," I say, without looking at him.
He smiles. It doesn't reach his eyes.
"There were expenses. The club isn't doing so well. You know how it is."
I know. I always know. There are always excuses.
"That's not the agreed amount."
"The agreed amount adjusts, Alla. Depending on behavior."
I feel my jaw tighten.
"I worked all my shifts."
"At the bar, yes."
He leans back in his chair and, for the first time since I walked in, he stops pretending to look at me like a simple employee. His gaze slides slowly, methodically, from bottom to top—unhurried, unembarrassed—as if time itself belongs to him. It isn't rushed or impulsive. It's cold, calculated—the kind of look that isn't searching for beauty, but for potential. My youth. The raw strength of a body that hasn't yet learned how to break. The way I stand straight, tense, instinctively refusing to shrink under his assessment.
He smiles faintly, crookedly—a smile with nothing friendly in it, only that dirty satisfaction of a man who knows he has control and that things can shift at any moment in his favor. He calmly adjusts himself in the chair, a seemingly trivial gesture, heavy with meaning, letting me know that beneath the desk he's adjusting his fly.
"You could earn more," he says, smiling perversely.
My heart drops into my stomach.
"You know what I mean," he adds, winking at me.
If I had any power at all, I'd want to stab him in that eye—so he'd never be able to look at another girl like that again.
"I don't dance," I say firmly. Maybe more firmly than I should, because Asan frowns.
"Not yet," he corrects me. "But you could. And you could buy your freedom faster."
Freedom. The word sounds ridiculous between these walls.
"The debt isn't mine," I say. "It was my mother's."
His eyes darken slightly. Just for a fraction of a second.
"Your mother knew the rules. She chose."
She chose to shoot herself up until it killed her and left me carrying the debt for the drugs she took on credit.
"Your sister…" Asan says, seemingly absentminded. "How is she?" he asks, in a falsely casual tone, as if he were talking about the weather.
My breath catches.
"She's fine."
"I'm glad. It would be a shame for her to end up in unpleasant situations."
The threat hangs in the air—unseen, but unmistakable. I clench the envelope in my hand and grind my teeth until my jaw aches.
I stay silent for a fraction of a second too long. He smiles again, calculated.
"How old is she now?"
The question lands heavy and precise, like a piece deliberately set into a mechanism that has just begun to move.
"Few years," I answer, without looking at him. "Too few."
"Time passes quickly, Alla," he murmurs. "And sometimes… it catches people unprepared."
"Can I go?"
"Of course. Think about the offer."
I go back into the club, and the music hits me again—louder, more aggressive. The lights, the stares, the hands reaching out. Everything feels tighter, closer, as if the walls have shifted inward while I was gone.
I push my way back to the bar. A new girl passes me by. She has a number on her ankle. She avoids my gaze.
I think about my sister. About the money in the envelope. About the amount that isn't enough.
And about the brightly lit stage at the center of the club.
There is no exit. Only different versions of survival.
And Asan controls them all.