Chapter 4
Lidiya
The black dress hangs on the back of my door like a mourning flag.
I’ve been staring at it for twenty minutes, scissors in one hand, a YouTube tutorial paused on my phone in the other.
The woman on screen makes it look effortless—snip here, fold there, suddenly you’re runway ready.
She also has sewing needles, an iron, and what looks like natural talent.
I have two hours, kitchen scissors, tape and a whole load of spite.
Bracing myself, I cut.
The hem falls away in a ragged strip, and I get to work on taping it up, patting it down and hoping for the best.
I hold the dress up against my body in the mirror. It’s shorter. Whether it’s better is another question entirely. The fabric hits mid-thigh now instead of below the knee, which makes my legs look longer but also makes me feel like I’ve vandalised the only decent thing I own.
The belt is easier. A thin black one I found in a charity shop six months ago for fifty pence. I cinch it around the waist of the dress and study the effect. It’s not terrible. It’s not Alisha-level, but it’s not the walking funeral it was an hour ago.
My reflection blinks back at me from the cracked mirror propped against the wall.
Blonde hair that needs a wash. Blue eyes rimmed with the kind of shadows no concealer in my price range can fix.
Cheekbones that have become more prominent lately, not from good genes but from the toast-for-dinner programme I’ve been on.
I set the scissors down and sit on the edge of my bed—which is a single mattress on the floor—because the frame broke two months ago and I couldn’t justify replacing it when the mattress still works fine on the floor.
My phone buzzes. An email from the auction organisers.
CONFIDENTIAL. Venue confirmed: The Alabaster Room, Mayfair. Arrive at 8 PM sharp. Use the side entrance on Bruton Lane. You will be met.
Mayfair. I’ll be spending bus fare just to get there, surrounded by women who probably arrive in cars that cost more than my entire existence.
I close the email and open my banking app out of masochistic habit. The number stares back at me, indifferent and brutal. A hundred pounds and twelve pence. At least I got paid. Fri-yay. Not.
My chest tightens, and I press my palms flat against my thighs until the feeling passes. Panic is a luxury I can’t afford either.
I get up and wash my hair in the kitchenette sink because the shower pressure in this place is a cruel joke, and I need it to actually look like hair tomorrow rather than straw.
The water runs cold after thirty seconds, as it always does, and I grit my teeth through it until the suds are gone and my scalp is tingling and numb.
Wrapping my hair in the only towel I own that isn’t threadbare, I sit back on the mattress and pull my knees to my chest. The room is small enough that I can see every corner of it from here.
Kitchenette with a two-ring hob and a mini fridge that hums like it’s in pain.
A window that overlooks a brick wall and a drainpipe.
A radiator that works when it feels like it, which is rarely and never on the days I can afford to put the heating on.
The dress on the door. The cracked mirror. Me.
This is it. This is the sum total of Lidiya Kareva at twenty-eight.
I lift my head and reach for my phone again.
The Bratva collector’s visit is still sitting in my chest like a stone.
Saturday. I need to have the payment ready, plus whatever sadistic surcharge he decides to slap on top.
That’s a hundred out of my account, minimum, before I’ve even thought about the twenty per cent.
A hundred and twenty, then. Plus, his “inconvenience fee.” Call it a hundred and fifty.
That’s fifty pounds that I desperately need, but he doesn’t give a flying shit. He just wants what he is owed.
I glance at the clock and start panicking.
I have to dry my hair, get dressed and make myself look presentable before getting on a bus to cross the river into the swanky part of London for 8 PM.
I blow-dry my hair with the second-hand dryer that sounds like a jet engine and smells faintly of burning, working through the tangles with my fingers because my only brush lost half its bristles last week.
By the time it’s done, my hair actually looks decent—smooth, falling past my collarbone in waves that almost seem intentional. Small victories.
Makeup is next. I own exactly four items: a foundation that will run out before I’m done, mascara that’s on its last legs, a lip pencil I sharpened down to a nub, and a tinted lip balm that Alisha left behind in the staff room months ago.
I layer them on with the precision of someone defusing a bomb, eking out the foundation, curling my lashes with my fingers after the mascara goes on, lining my lips carefully before pressing the balm over the top.
The mirror gives me its honest assessment. I look... fine.
Not stunning. Not tragic. Somewhere in the vast middle ground where women disappear into the crowd. But my eyes are bright, and the dress, now that I’ve put it on and cinched the belt, actually does something for my figure. The tape holds. For now.
I slip on my only pair of heels—black, bought second-hand three years ago for a job interview I didn’t get. They pinch, but they add three inches, and right now I need every advantage I can scrape together.
Grabbing my keys and my phone, I check the time.
6:47 PM. The bus takes forty minutes if traffic behaves, which it won’t, because London traffic has never behaved in the history of London traffic.
I don’t own a coat that goes with this dress.
I have a parka that goes with survival and a cardigan that goes with giving up.
I choose the cardigan because at least it’s black, and I can dump it before I walk on stage.
I lock the bedsit behind me and take the stairs quickly, my heels clicking against the concrete in a rhythm that sounds braver than I feel. The hallway smells like damp carpet and someone’s reheated curry, and I hold my breath until I’m through the front door and out into the evening air.
It’s cold. And starts raining.
The bus stop is a three-minute walk. I make it in two, arriving just as it pulls up with a hydraulic wheeze. I tap my card and pray it doesn’t fail. The reader beeps green. I exhale.
Finding a seat near the back, I press my knees together and keep my hands in my lap, so I don’t fidget the tape loose.
The bus lurches into traffic, and London scrolls past the smeared window like a film I can’t afford a ticket to.
Fried chicken shops give way to estate agents, which give way to boutiques with single items in the window and no price tags, because if you have to ask, you can’t afford it. The story of my life.
Mayfair announces itself in the way I imagined it would—quietly, expensively, and with the unspoken suggestion that I don’t belong.
The pavements get cleaner. The cars get darker.
The people get thinner in that specific way, which means personal trainers and nutritionists, rather than skipped meals and anxiety.
I get off the bus two stops early because I need the walk to settle my nerves, and also because I’d rather not be seen stepping off the bus in a taped-up funeral dress outside a venue where people probably arrive in helicopters.
Bruton Lane is narrow and cobbled, tucked behind the kind of buildings that house art galleries and private members’ clubs with waiting lists longer than my debt.
I spot the side entrance immediately. It’s an unmarked black door with a single brass handle, flanked by two bay trees in stone planters.
A woman stands beside it. Tall, dark-haired, dressed in something designer and expensive. She holds a tablet and doesn’t smile.
“Name?” she asks.
“Lidiya Kareva.”
Her eyes flick to the screen, then to me. The assessment is swift and clinical—dress, shoes, cardigan, face. I can’t tell if I pass or fail, and she doesn’t give me the satisfaction of knowing.
“Number twelve. Remove the cardigan before the stage. There are boxes for personal items, yes.”
“Okay,” I say, sounding feeble, and feel a ridiculous sense of relief when Alisha arrives on the pavement, alighting from a black cab without a care in the world.
“Lidiya!” she calls out, tottering over in heels that definitely aren’t second-hand.
Her dress is a sleek black number that fits as if it were sewn onto her.
Her hair is pin-straight and glossy, her makeup flawless.
She looks like she belongs here. I look like I’ve been smuggled in through the service entrance.
“You look great,” she says, and I can’t tell if she means it or if it’s the kind of thing women say to each other before walking into a room where they’ll be ranked.
“Thanks. So do you.”
The woman with the tablet ushers us inside without ceremony. The corridor is narrow, lit by wall sconces that cast warm gold across the dark wallpaper. It smells like expensive candles and old money. My heels sink into carpet so thick I nearly lose my balance.
We’re led into a holding room, which is a generous term for what is essentially a backstage area with mirrors, a rack of hangers, and a long table set with water, Champagne flutes, and a fruit platter that looks like it was styled for a magazine.
Eight other women are already here, and every single one of them makes me want to turn around and get back on the bus.
They’re beautiful. Not in the way that’s subjective or arguable.
Beautiful in the way that closes doors behind it and dares you to compete.
Long legs, sharp jawlines, and dresses that move like liquid when they walk.
These women weren’t born into debt. They were born into lip fillers and Pilates memberships.
I take a glass of water because the Champagne feels like a trap and find a spot near the mirror where I can check the tape situation without anyone noticing. It’s holding. Barely.
Alisha abandons me and gravitates towards the Champagne and the two tallest women like a moth to a designer flame. Within seconds, she’s laughing, touching someone’s arm, complimenting someone’s shoes. She’s a natural. I’m a forgery. Two more join us, and that’s all of us assembled like cattle.
A woman enters, not the tablet gatekeeper, but someone else entirely. She’s older, maybe seventy, with silver hair swept into a chignon so precise it looks architectural. Her dress is midnight blue, floor-length, and she moves through the room as if she owns it.
“Ladies,” she says, and the word lands like a gavel. “I am Madame Orlov. Welcome to The Alabaster Room.”
The chatter dies. Even Alisha stops mid-sentence.
“The rules are simple, and they are non-negotiable. You will be introduced by first name only. You will walk to the centre of the stage. You will stand for no longer than ninety seconds while bids are placed. You will not speak to the audience. You will not make eye contact with any individual bidder. You will smile. You will not fidget. When the bidding closes, you will exit stage left. Is that understood?”
A murmur of agreement ripples through the room. I nod because my throat has decided that speech is no longer an option.
“Your companion experience is dinner at a venue of the winning bidder’s choosing, within London. The experience is for two hours only. After that…” She shrugs. “Within the two hours, you will abide by every word of the contract you signed.”
She pauses, letting the weight of it settle.
“Your participation fee will be given to you in cash upon exiting the stage, regardless of whether you receive a bid.”
The reminder that we might not get a bid is the harsh reality I am now facing. There could be a polite silence while I stand there like a clearance-rack mannequin under stage lights.
“You will be called in the order you registered. Line up accordingly.”
She calls out names, and of course, I’m last, because I dithered about signing up. Alisha is first.
I have never felt more alone in my entire life.