So. Long(206)
Sadie flounces through the heavy wooden door of the lingerie shop as though she lives here. Hell, for all I know, she might.
Six feet into the store, I stop at a rack with some lacy things. I lift the hem of a see-through nightie.
Sadie dodges around a display of Porn-to-go videos and grabs my arm, yanking me along behind her. “Not those. You need the stuff back here.”
The dread in the pit of my stomach spreads into my chest and through my limbs.
No.
Suck it up and press on.
I can do this.
I mean, it’s not like it sits right around the corner from Aunt Delores’s place. It’s a good forty minute drive from my hometown and all these years later, I doubt I’ll see anyone I know, or anyone who’ll recognize me.
Besides, the pay sounds good—amazing actually. So much more than I’d make even at a good job. And Aunt Delores needs the money to fix all the shit going wrong with her house. Gold may not fall out of my pussy, but maybe a few dollar bills will—if I’m willing to show a little skin. A lot of skin.
Fuck, who am I kidding? I’ll have to show all the skin. That’s what strippers do—bare it all.
Sadie grabs three skimpy outfits off the rack, one of them a pair of camouflage shorts with Velcro at the side seams. “Oh, look! This is perfect.”
I fake a smile. “Nice. My color too.”
She pulls my hair up, holding it at the nape of my neck. “I bet all the guys were after you. Probably not too many Marines that look like you. Do you get a lot of dick?”
I close the door to the changing room. “Sadie. I appreciate the career advice. And if the money is half as good as you say it is I’ll be really be grateful for it. But I’m not telling you how much I get laid.”
Never. I never get laid anymore.
“Aw, c’mon, Cuz. Well, at least tell me about the guys. Were all those Marines muscled and hot?”
I wriggle into the shorts. “Some of them are pretty to look at. Some are only pretty to look at. Trust me. I got a lot more respect from the ones I didn’t fuck.”
I step out of the changing room and pirouette in front of the three-sided mirror in the corner. The camo shorts let my ass cheeks hang out and are about as tight as Dick’s hatband, but I guess that’s what I want if I’m going to get this job.
Sadie giggles and rolls her eyes. “Maybe I should join up and see what it’s like.”
“The guys at my duty station were great—until they sunk their cock into you. Then they became one of two people. Either complete assholes or the kind you can’t get rid of, even with cockroach spray, neither of which do I have the time or the inclination to fuck.”
Sadie’s jaw drops for a moment. “Now that is just sad.”
“All I’ll tell you is this: after a few months of banging pretty much any guy old enough to buy booze, I gave it up. I did date this one guy a few times, but—well, let’s just say he wasn’t who I wanted. And if I can’t have who I want, I’d rather do without.”
She turns side eyes on me. “That must be some cock.”
“Yeah. It wasn’t just the cock though.”
Sadie darts away and reappears just as quickly with a pair of platform fuck-me shoes with heels no less than six inches long.
She pushes them against my chest. “Here, try these on.”
“No fucking way. I’ll break my damned ankles in these things.”
“All the girls wear them,” she sing-songs.
I snatch the shoes from her hands. “Fuck all the girls.”
* * *
The outside of the place doesn’t look like much. Plain building, no windows. Glass doors, blacked out. A neon sign perches high on the rooftop. The blinking XXX alternates with LIVE GIRLS.
What the fuck? Like someone’s gonna pay to see dead girls. Then again, there probably is some sick fuck out there that would.
I follow Sadie inside. Darkness fights for dominance over flashing lights and more neon signs. Music blares, sending vibrations through my bones. A bar takes up half of one wall, topped by glass shelves. Back lit liquor bottles neatly glow in rows over the beer taps.
A large stage takes up the center of the almost abandoned room, surrounded by four smaller squares off each corner, creating a pinwheel pattern that’s reflected in the mirrored tiles on the ceiling. Shiny brass poles connect the stage to the mirrors above, one for each section.
Three of the five poles have girls hanging off them in various positions. One girl has her legs pointed to the ceiling. Another is near the top, one leg wrapping the pole as she slowly spirals toward the bottom. The third looks like maybe she’s trying to do a headstand, using the pole in place of a wall?