The confirmation email arrives almost instantly. No flourish, no promises. Just a header: Virtue Exchange – Verification Required.
I read it twice before opening, waiting for the panic to settle into sense. It doesn’t. The message is brief, almost tender in its efficiency: “Your application has been accepted for evaluation. Please confirm attendance for your medical and psychological screening.”
No name. No contact number. Only an address downtown I’ve passed a hundred times without noticing.
I click confirm before courage can reconsider.
***
The clinic’s glass doors glide open without sound. Inside, the world becomes antiseptic. White walls, white floors, white light that erases depth. The woman at reception smiles with professional warmth that never reaches her eyes.
“Miss Knight. Welcome. You’re expected.”
Expected. The word lands like a verdict.
She slides a clipboard across the counter, pages thick with promises I don’t understand. Signature lines bloom like cuts. Do you consent… Do you affirm… Do you relinquish…
I sign. Again. Again. Until the word yes stops meaning anything.
A medical assistant collects me—a young woman with perfect posture and the relentless brightness of someone paid to soothe. “This way, please.”
We walk a corridor muffled by carpet that devours footsteps. The air smells faintly of alcohol wipes and silence. Every door we pass stays closed. She opens one near the end.
“Someone will be with you shortly,” she says, still smiling. “Please change into the gown. Opening in the front.”
I undress methodically, folding each piece of clothing into a neat square on the chair. Focus on the task. Buttons, sleeves, shoes. The gown rustles like paper when I slip it on—thin, impersonal. My reflection in the wall mirror looks translucent. This is what a product looks like before packaging.
The doctor who enters could be anyone’s mother—mid-fifties, salt-and-pepper hair, expression composed to neutrality. She doesn’t introduce herself, just snaps on gloves.
“Medications?”
“No.”
“Allergies?”
“None.”
“Previous surgeries?”
I shake my head. My own voice feels foreign when it leaves my throat.
She makes notes on a tablet, the stylus clicking softly. Each click sounds like a lock turning. Then comes the blood draw.
A phlebotomist replaces her—a man with gentle hands and dark eyes that avoid mine. The elastic tourniquet tightens around my arm. He studies the inside of my elbow with an appraisal that feels personal. The first vial fills, then the second, the third.
“How much do you need?”
“Standard panel.” His tone is mild, rehearsed. “Just a few more.”
But a few becomes eight. The room seems to tilt with every vial. Ask. Don’t ask. Asking means doubt. Doubt means delay. Delay means Alan dies. So I say nothing and let him drain whatever the contract requires.
The doctor returns for the cardiovascular exam. Cold metal presses against my chest. I expect seconds of contact, not minutes.
“Your pulse is remarkable,” she murmurs.
Remarkable. The word doesn’t belong to heartbeats. I don’t answer.
Another technician enters—a man older than the rest, ink stains along his cuticles. He adjusts the light, then studies my neck. Not my glands. Not my posture. My pulse. His finger hovers just above the artery, tracing its line without touching.
“Beautiful,” he says under his breath.
I want to ask what they’re measuring, what makes blood or pulse beautiful, but questions here feel dangerous. Instead I nod when the nurse returns with another form.
“Final consent,” she says. The heading reads: “By proceeding, the participant affirms that her bodily autonomy is voluntarily suspended within contractual limits.”
My pen hovers. The air hums. The floor seems to wait.
“Something wrong?”
“No.” I sign. Chains made of paper.
They leave me in a waiting lounge between tests. The room is overheated, meant to lull. A woman sits across from me, younger than I am, pale against the upholstery. Her wrist bears a small bandage identical to mine.
“First time?” she asks, voice steady.
“Yes.”
“They’re efficient here.” She smiles faintly, eyes glassy. “You’ll feel better once it’s done.”
“What’s it?”
Her smile widens, not kindly. “Whatever you need it to be.”
A door opens, a nurse calls her name, and she vanishes without a sound.
I count seconds until my own name returns to the air.
The psychological evaluation is next. A woman with soft features and a voice like honey sits behind a desk too large for comfort. “This is simply to ensure informed consent,” she says. “We ask a few personal questions.”
Her pen glides across the paper.
“Have you ever engaged in sexual activity?”
“No.”
“Do you have moral objections to transactional intimacy?”
“I don’t have the luxury of morality.”
Her brow lifts. “On a scale of one to ten, how attached would you say you are to your virginity?”
The question is so absurd I almost laugh. “It’s not an heirloom. It’s just… something I still have.”
She writes that down verbatim, and I realize I’ve given her the copy she wanted.
When she finishes, she sets the pen aside and studies me. “You understand the process cannot be reversed once verified?”
“I understand.”
“Do you require counseling before proceeding?”
“No.”
She nods, satisfied, and closes the folder. The faint scrape of paper against wood sounds like the shutting of a door I’ll never reopen.
By the time I leave, the sky has turned the color of metal. The elevator hums an off-key lullaby as it descends. On the ground floor, a janitor mops the tiles, eyes deliberately unfocused. When I step outside, the air bites cold. The smell of exhaust and rainwater feels mercifully real.
My phone vibrates before I reach the corner.
Virtue Exchange — Listing #2043 Verified.
So fast. I open it anyway.
Your listing is now live.
I follow the link. My initials. My city. Age verified. Anonymous, yet naked all the same.
Status: Active.
The part of me that once hesitated is gone.
It’s for Alan, I tell myself. A transaction. A means to an end.
But the wind hits the small bruise where the needle bit, and the sting reminds me how much they already took. And how much more I’ve agreed to give.