They're trying to clear up some doubts.

The telephone’s ring cut off in both booths almost at the same time. A heavy silence, broken only by the ragged gasping of the girl in the adjacent booth, filled the space between the two glass compartments.

Driven by a **** need to confirm she wasn't hallucinating, Jessica pushed open the creaking door of her booth and stepped onto the sidewalk. The black gauze drifted around her, a specter of smoke. Instantly, the door to the other booth opened as well.

The other girl—blonde, blue eyes wide with terror, skin marked with the same silver discs—peeked out like a wounded animal. Seeing Jessica in full view, with her mask, scarf (still covering her chest), gloves, fishnets, and now the gauze cape, her expression shifted into a mix of envy and deepened humiliation. She had nothing. Only her raw nakedness and the metallic markings. Instinctively, she flinched back, using the frame of the booth door to try and hide her body.

“Do you… do you know what’s happening?” the girl asked, her voice a trembling thread of sound. She had a local accent, a voice younger and more fragile than Jessica’s.

Jessica shook her head, unconsciously adjusting the scarf over her chest. “No. I’ve just… I’ve just been following instructions. Messages.”

“And that?” The girl pointed her chin at Jessica’s mask, scarf, and gloves. Her gaze was almost accusatory. “Why do you have… things?”

“They gave them to me. For doing… things,” Jessica replied, feeling her own shame double as she confronted the other girl's absolute nakedness. Her “outfit” now made her look like a veteran, a complicit witness to this hell. “Didn't they ask anything of you? Just… the paint?”

The girl nodded, hugging herself tighter. “In the gym locker room. I found the paint and a note. Then the phone rang in my locker… and told me to come here.” Her eyes filled with tears. “What do they want from us?”

“I don’t know,” Jessica whispered, and it was the most terrifying truth of all.

The interaction—charged with shared panic but also a strange distance between Jessica, "dressed" and marked by more complex experiences, and the other girl, raw and freshly torn from her normalcy—lasted only a couple of minutes. There were no answers. Only two islands of confusion and fear on a deserted sidewalk.

It was then that the low growl of an engine approached.

A black car, long and silent—a luxury sedan, high-end yet anonymous—glided to a halt at the curb, right in front of them. The doors had no markings; the windows were tinted an impenetrable black.

Both girls froze, instinct screaming at them to run, but their legs wouldn't respond. Where would they go? Naked, painted, in the middle of a ritual?

The driver’s side door opened. A man stepped out. He wasn't tall, but he had a solid, authoritative presence. He wore an impeccable black suit, white shirt, and black tie. He wore black leather gloves as well. His face was stern, with sharp features, and his eyes, hidden behind thin-framed sunglasses, scrutinized them both with impersonal efficiency.

He didn't look like a monster. He looked like a chauffeur. Or a collector.

“Ladies,” he said, his voice deep and polite, without a trace of emotion. “I am pleased to see you have both reached your meeting point. It is a sign of… commitment.”

Jessica and the other girl exchanged a look of pure terror.

“The vehicle will take you to the place of initiation,” the man continued, opening the rear door with a broad gesture. The interior was black leather, deep and dark as a mouth. “Please, step inside.”

The other girl took a step back, pressing herself against the booth. “No… I’m not going to…”

The man’s expression didn't change. He simply turned his head slightly toward her. “The alternative is that your evaluation material—the photos of your progress since the locker room—will be shared with your immediate contact list. Starting with your mother, right, Chloe?”

The girl—Chloe—let out a choked moan. Jessica noticed her turn even paler. The man knew her name. He knew everything.

“Get in,” he repeated, this time with a firmness that left no room for doubt.

Defeated, Chloe took a hesitant step toward the car. Jessica, her heart about to burst, did the same. But before she could enter, the man raised a hand.

“One moment, Jessica. A final detail of protocol.”

She stopped, staring at him with wide eyes behind her mask.

“The scarf,” he said, extending his gloved hand. “It must be repurposed for the next step.”

Jessica felt a new jolt of panic. The scarf was the only opaque thing she had. Without it, her chest would be completely exposed again, the chain and silver paint on full display. But the order was clear. With fingers that felt like lead, she untied the knot at the nape of her neck and handed him the square of black silk.

The man took it, examined it for a second, and then, with a movement surprisingly brusque for his composure, he tore it in half with a sharp snap. The Italian silk gave way effortlessly.

Then, he approached Chloe first, who was shaking from head to toe. “For the journey, a measure of privacy,” he said, as he placed one of the strips over her eyes and knotted it firmly—but not brutally—at the back of her head. Chloe let him, a sob escaping her lips.

Next, he turned to Jessica. She didn't resist. She felt the silk, now narrower, cover her eyes, plunging her into absolute darkness. The knot was just as firm. Beneath the blindfold, the lace mask pressed against her face.

“There,” the man murmured, his voice now closer to her ear. “No distractions. Only the journey toward what comes next.”

He guided Jessica into the car, then Chloe. The interior smelled of new leather and a discreet, woody cologne. The doors closed with a soft, airtight click. The outside world—the street, the booths, the last light of the afternoon—vanished.

They heard the man get into the driver’s seat, the engine start with a barely audible purr, and the car begin to move with a ghostly smoothness.

Jessica slumped against the leather seat, the black gauze useless over her shoulders, her breasts now exposed to the cold draft of the air conditioning, her eyes blinded by the silk she had bought with the deepest humiliation. Beside her, she felt Chloe trembling; she heard her shallow breathing.

The journey, in the darkness, had begun.