False Fates

Aurora didn't remember the night she was stolen. Only flashes, truth to be told it felt like an after life. She remembers mostly a woman's voice had once sung to her softly, wrapping around her very warmly. She could bet her limbs that it was her mom's voice. The last of her very nonexistent ones was of her being tucked into closet and so many screams and noises. Aurora cling mostly onto that woman's voice, that woman's melody had branded on her mind, even if that voice was gone now...buried beneath years of silence and survival. All she had now was a faded photo of her and her mom and a little boy tucked in her suitcase, plus a name she never truly belonged to.

She had grown up in the care of a woman called Diane, someone who wasn't blood but kept her alive. Diane had plucked her from whatever fate awaited her in the shadows of a Chicago's streets-wherever Aurora was taken after being ripped away from her mother's side. She knew in her heart that the soft melody wouldn't had left her by herself to die. Diane was no mother but she gave Aurora a roof, food, and just enough affection to keep her away from child protective services. There was never no softness in her touch, no bedtime stories or gentle reassurances. Diane wasn't cruel—just tired. She had taken in too many children over the years, most for a check, and Aurora knew she had been no different.

Still, Diane had kept her. Until her lungs gave out in the middle of a Chicago winter and her body was taken out on a stretcher covered in a blue sheet. Aurora, fifteen at the time, stood barefoot on the porch, her arms wrapped around her ribs, watching the snow fall as if the world hadn't just swallowed the only person who had ever claimed her.

Three more years in the system followed. Those years were full of cold homes and dinners. Even colder hands shoving her from one town to the next. Aurora stopped unpacking her suitcase. Stopped trying to speak to the care takers and anyone else part of the system that swallowed her. Stopped hoping someone might look at her and see something more than a pretty face and a problem waiting to happen or worst a waiting body for them to touch.

When she turned seventeen and completed high hook fasted then others, she took a trash bag full of her things and walked out of that home and never looked back. She had no money. Just a thin stack of graduation papers and  a lesson. The world's not kind to girls like you.

So she ran.

She walked three miles to the bus station, clutching the last of her savings—mostly tip money from late-night diner shifts before they fired her and cleaning motel rooms. She looked at the map behind the scratched glass of the ticket counter. One city called to her.

Las Vegas.

It sounded like a dare. A dream, maybe. A place where someone like her could vanish or be found—whichever came first. The city of neon lights, smoke-filled stages, and desperate ambition. She didn't want much. Just a stage, mic and chance.

People had always told her she could sing. That her voice could melt even the coldest man in the room. Diane used to joke that God had made her mouth for something more than backtalk. Aurora had clung to that, quietly humming herself to sleep when the foster homes were too loud, and when the nights stretched too long.

So when the bus wheezed to a stop under the blinding lights of Las Vegas Boulevard, Aurora stepped off with a duffel bag on her shoulder, a cracked phone in her back pocket, and nothing left to lose.

She hit the ground speed walking.

By noon, she had walked into every building that looked remotely related to entertainment. Talent agencies. Lounge bars and even strip clubs. The shitty karoke holes. Theater companies with dusty posters in the windows. She sang for a few of them. Got polite smiles. Blank stares. One guy offered her a job dancing in a private club—no singing, just skin without no clothes. She walked out.

Her stomach growled somewhere past 3 p.m., loud and insistent. She followed the smell of grease and spice to a narrow little dive with a neon sign that read: Mean Wings & Cold Beer. It looked rundown, the kind of place where time stopped and jukeboxes still mattered, but it was open, and more importantly, it had food.

She slid into a cracked red booth by the window, too hungry to care about the stale smell of fryer oil and old beer. Her feet ached. Her throat was dry. She hadn't eaten all day, and now that she sat still, she could feel the weight of rejection starting to settle on her shoulders like a winter coat.

A waitress with a fake tan and even faker smile dropped off a menu and a glass of water without a word. Aurora stared at the plastic covered pages, unsure if she could even afford a meal.

"Get the wings," came a voice from across the booth. "Best deal on the menu, and they don't skimp on the meat."

She blinked.

Sitting across from her, uninvited but somehow settled like he belonged there, was an older man with a wiry build and a face that had seen too many bar fights. His hair was silver, slicked back with something that might've once been pomade. One of his front teeth was missing, and his eyes were the color of burnt whiskey. He wore a faded leather jacket that didn't match the Vegas heat and had callused hands folded neatly on the table.

She stared.

"You always just sit down with strangers?" she asked, her voice cold as ice. She wasn't a fan of men, and less greasy ones.

"Only the ones who look like they've just had a chat with rock bottom," he said, grinning. "Name's Gutter."

Aurora almost snorted, he looked like one. She raised a brow. "That your real name?"

"No. But it's the only one that stuck." He leaned back, looking her over but not leering, just assessing. "You sing?"

Aurora tensed. If the man thought she would sling for him, she wanted more than some wings and fries. "Why do you ask?"

"You've got the look. Soft mouth and long throat. Good lungs, I bet. You either sing, or you should be." He gestured at the waitress. "She'll take care of your bill. On me."

Suspicion flashed in her eyes. "What do you want?"

Gutter chuckled, amused. "Not what you think. I help scout talent. Used to work for record labels, back when they still mattered. Now I work for someone else. You want a shot? I know a place."

Aurora hesitated. She had been warned about men like him her whole life. Smooth talkers. Sin wrapped in charm. But something about him didn't feel dangerous. Just old. Tired. Like someone who'd seen too much and come out with nothing but a nickname and a bit of mercy.

She nodded once. "Okay."

By the time the sun dipped below the neon horizon, Aurora found herself in the backseat of Gutter's rusted Lincoln, winding down a long stretch of desert road just outside the strip. The city's pulse faded behind them, swallowed by darkness and sand.

They pulled up to a building with no name. Just a sleek black awning, velvet curtains behind the doors, and a line of gold script etched into a plaque.

Las Fantasy Girls

Inside, the club was velvet and smokey. A stage dominated the center, framed by heavy red curtains. Dim chandeliers cast golden light over leather booths and mirrored walls. Music played low and slow, all brass and longing.

Women danced on stage—not in the way Aurora had expected, but with elegance. Burlesque. It was classy and seductive in the way a poem might be if it had curved hips.. Each woman was a vision with gowns, gloves, and glitter. Every eye in the room stayed on them, hungry and anxious.

"Place is old," Gutter said as they stepped in. "Been here since the '60s. Managed by a woman who knows real talent when she sees it."

As if summoned, a woman emerged from the shadows. She was tall, graceful, and commanding—draped in black silk gown with silver in her hair and red on her lips. She looked like she'd been born backstage, kissed by stage lights and darkness. The of her expensive perfume and cigarettes was like a fragrance on its own.

"Vanessa," Gutter said, tipping his chin. "Got someone for you."

Vanessa looked Aurora over once, and the spark in her eyes said it all. She didn't need a second glance.

"She'll do," Vanessa said. "What's your name, sweetheart?"

"Aurora."

"Fitting." Vanessa offered a hand, elegant fingers and lacquered nails. "Welcome to Las Fantasy Girls."

Gutter gave Aurora a pat on the back. "You're in good hands now."

And just like that, he was gone.

Vanessa didn't waste time. She walked Aurora through the velvet maze—past dressing rooms, the backstage corridor, the costume closet with more sequins than fabric. The club pulsed with history in every wall, there pictures of girls dressed like Hollywood stars. So many candid pictures of different women in stage. The pictures spoke a story, it had been alive and breathing before Aurora had been born.

"You ever perform before?" Vanessa asked.

"Only school recitals at school. Church for a little before I moved, but I can sing-I learn fast."

"You'll watch the girls tonight. Serve drinks, get a feel for the rhythm. We don't throw anyone on stage until they're ready."

Aurora nodded. "And after that?"

"If you've got the spark," Vanessa said, pausing at a door, "we'll make a star out of you."

She opened the door to a small studio apartment at the back of the building. A twin bed, a chipped dresser, a shower that probably groaned when it turned on—but it was clean.

"You'll pay rent. A fair cut of your check every week. The others do the same, depending on how big the check is well-we cut more. Keeps things simple..Mm you don't seem like the type to own any worth seeing clothes. Don't worry, I will have an outfit delivered here for to night. Apart from that, you have any questions?"

Aurora stepped inside, her eyes wide. It was the first space in her life that hadn't been borrowed. Not a foster room. Not a stranger's couch. Just hers.

"It's perfect," she whispered.