Luxie Maxwell

Trust is hard to come by.

Kindness and candor speed up the process.

Don’t say or do anything that you wouldn’t be proud of.

And for the world to know.

There were billboards along the roadside telling her she was a slut and a whore. They didn’t use those words exactly. But they did feature her likeness reflected onto the face of a humanoid form that was not her own.

The figure’s neck and hands were adorned with gold gilded diamonds. The costume was minimal. A trademark of the skimpy lingerie days of the late 80’s and early 90’s that were now long past.

The composition of it was an odd combination of women’s empowerment and the pin-up era; one knee propped higher than the other and a fist gripping the diamond gold necklace, the figure absently staring open-mouthed into the arid vista before it.

She sighed. All these years and still it hadn’t changed. Sex still sold. Women were still a commodity. And, despite the product of all humanity’s rebellions against it, the result was naught but an increased imbalance in favor of man kind.