He looked up at her and shook his head quickly, his face a dim outline lost in the muted lighting and neon-flecked shadows.
Christ. Trading down on a lap dance.
A fucking car salesman.
“If you change your mind, honey . . .”
She smiled and let her hand linger on his knee, a last moment of contact, a last chance to work him. As she moved away her hand trailed down his thigh, filling his mind with a charged suggestion, covering his leg in invisible electric cobwebs. By the time she let him go he had already stood up, fists and eyes flicking towards the main stage as one, a handful of dollars tightly clutched in his sweaty fist.
Fucking toad.
She looked over to see who was dancing.
Siren.
Fucking Siren.
All legs and tits. That smile. Vapid. Every movement singing a song- “Fuck Me” in G minor. Perfect.
She stared.
Those legs.
That body.
That heat.
Her eyes wandered, looking past the masculine heads and feminine curves.
She used to feel that heat. Eyes. Breathing. Hands. Trying to touch, wanting to touch, thwarted. The frustration.
The worship.
Now those same eyes, the same hands, the same dollars, they saw right through her, to the next set of legs, the next pretty.
She went to the back, followed closely by the acrid smoke and pulsating bass. In the bathroom she checked her makeup, fixed her hair, tried a quick spin in her heals, put on her Friday top, and waited for her song.
The other ladies came in and out, chatted, traded cigarettes, gossiped, and politely avoided her. She knew the feeling. Age. A disease. Could be catching.
Better wear a mask, girls.
Turning thirty eight tomorrow.
Thirty eight.
She nodded at a girl who waved sheepishly, almost apologetically. Thirty eight. Most of the men who came here were two decades older, but she was “the old one.” A pariah.
A thing.
Pariah.
How many of them even know what that word means, anyway?
In spite of herself, she managed a half smile.
The bass hit a crescendo. She felt the vibrations sweep through her like a wave of nausea. There was a smattering of applause and Siren walked in.
God, she’s gorgeous.
Can’t blame the girls after all. I was like that once. Good figure, great tits, perfect plan. Strip, college, real job, family. In that order.
She remembered when she started. Laughing at the older ones.
Should’ve saved your money, grandma!
Don’t forget the walker!
Plans.
For a second, she was alone.
Silence.
“Gentleman,” the voice boomed throughout the club. “Give it up for the next beautiful lady, one of our regular attractions here, ain’t nothing she hasn’t seen, nothing she wouldn’t do, you guys know what I mean . . . the always lovely, always wet and ready, Amber!”
She tightened the lace on her boots and came onstage to a few scattered and mildly interested applause. Without breaking her momentum she walked forward and grabbed the pole with her left hand, spun around tightly and lifted herself off the ground. With one fluid motion she completely inverted her body, her legs wrapped tightly around the top half of the pole and holding her in place.
She began her slide slowly, carefully, her legs gradually loosening and easing her down to the stage as her eyes scanned the crowd. Her pelvis strained with the weight. Her left leg started to cramp up right above the knee.
She tried to catch an eye or two but Siren had already climbed onto the second stage.
It used to be different.
She finished her descent and spun around, crawling on all fours down the length of the poorly finished runway.
That used to be me.
They would line up.
She licked her teeth at a table of college boys sitting near the stage. They pointed to their crotches and spread their hands wide apart, repeating a timeless fish story.
She arched her eyebrows in time with her back, daring them to come forward.
“Id love to see that, boys.”
She laughed and tousled her hair.
I didn’t use to beg.
They would line up.
I remember.
She smacked her thigh and rolled onto her back, pulling herself towards the edge of the stage with her hands, careful to keep her nails safe. She felt a damp cigarette wedge itself between her body and the stage. She thought about the time when her brother put a caterpillar in her hair in camp, right before arts and crafts.
She smiled again, at the college boys, but not for them.
God, what a stereotype- the old stripper.
Her music hit the bridge and she stood up, turned around, and pulled off her top. She stroked her breasts playfully with one hand, the other slipping down towards her thong.
She looked up.
The boys were gone.
They were at the second stage now, where Siren was rhythmically thrusting the top of her head into the fat one’s crotch while he fumbled with some bills.
Spinning around to the music, she fell to her knees and arched her back again, a figurehead on a long dead ship, lost to the waves, its luck long since run dry.
Her hands.
A new wrinkle here, the skin bunched around the knuckles more than before.
She clenched her hands into hard fists and pounded the stage to the bass line.
She heard laughter.
Siren was sitting on a man’s lap, writhing epileptically as he talked on a cell phone. Her small clutch was placed on the table like a colonial flag.
The music ground to a halt and she got back to her feet, wobbly in her four inch heels. She picked up her top and walked to the back to wait for her next song.