Contest time

“Contest time,” my father announces. The words echo over the hollow hush of the room, and for a moment, everything freezes—the men, the sushi girls, even my own panic stutters to a halt, caught between a possible ending and another spiral into humiliation. I feel the men’s attention shift from their plates to the rows of naked women, their hands still greasy with roe and cream, their cocks already rising again under the tablecloths, hungry for whatever the contest might entail.

I hear my father step up to the head of the table, his voice amplified by a mic—like he’s hosting a reality show for sociopaths. “Gentlemen,” he says, “I promised you a little entertainment, and I always deliver. My boy here has a challenge ahead of him. There are ten beautiful women on display, but only one of them is the true star of tonight’s event.” A few men laugh, low and predatory. My father lets it hang a second, then continues: “Somewhere on these tables is a woman so depraved, so naturally submissive, that she signed a contract agreeing to breed a child for the club’s newest VP. It’s your job—” he looks at my brother now, with the kind of smug expectation that’s been in our family’s DNA since the first caveman picked up a club—“to find her.”

The men’s laughter rolls over us. I feel the table vibrate with the impact, the cold sashimi sliding down my sternum toward my crotch.

My brother stands, pushing back his chair with a groan and a clatter. I hear his footsteps moving down the row, then the squelch of wet hands on bare skin as he begins his inspection.

He starts at the far end, with a woman whose ribs stick out like piano keys and whose nipples are so dark they look painted on. He runs his hands over her body, not gently but not with real ****, either. He prods her stomach, spreads her thighs, pinches a roll of fat at her hip, and makes little clinical noises: hmm, ah, okay. For a moment, I think he’s embarrassed, but then he starts narrating his findings in a loud, cold voice.

“This one’s got stretch marks, but they’re old. Her tits hang a little, but the nipples look chewed up, maybe from a guy with braces, not a baby. I’d say she’s had a kid, but not in the last two years.” He moves on.

At the second woman, he pauses. “C-section scar,” he says, then pokes at the thin white line under her belly button. “But that’s healed up really well. No evidence of recent swelling. Her breasts don’t have the right tension, either.” He laughs, and a few men join him. “I’m betting she’s not tonight’s slut.”

Woman three is a young Asian, so petite she barely fills out the mask, but my brother grabs her thighs and bends her knees to see if her hips give. “Not even close,” he says, then parts her knees and pushes two fingers into her pussy, fishing for something I can’t see. She whimpers. He ignores it. “You see this, guys?” he says, pulling his fingers out and smearing her arousal down her thigh. “Dry as chalk. She’s not into this at all. No way she signed up for it.” He walks on.

Four, five, six. The comments get meaner, the touches more invasive, and the men’s laughter grows with each new inspection. At number seven, my brother spends a long time examining the woman’s ass, kneading the cheeks, and spreading them apart. “Now this is interesting,” he says, and I know exactly what he’s looking for. “No signs of recent anal, but there’s a faint red ring. Maybe she gets pegged at home, maybe it’s just the chair. Thoughts?” The men call out their guesses, and my brother shrugs. “Jury’s out. But the contract said she’d be into everything, so I’m leaving her as a maybe.”

He moves to number eight, the table next to mine. The woman is covered in freckles, her belly a little soft but not stretched. He grabs her tit and squeezes. “Good milkers, but the skin is tight. No evidence of recent pregnancy, and she’s got a birth control implant scar.” He holds up her arm, shows off the tiny white line, and then drops it. “This one’s ruled out.”

The laughter turns to a buzz, like the room’s waking up. I hear the men shifting in their seats, some standing for a better view, all of them tracking my brother as he makes his way to my table.