I nod. I so have it.
And I never want it again.
I flee as though the devil's at my back.
~ 5 ~
Monday
I watch the blinking cursor as it flashes above send. My finger hovers, my will along with it. I clench my eyes and tap the mouse with a decisive click. My RSVP floats into the ether to be received by Thorn or one of his lackeys.
Tonight's my first night on the job. My new job.
One grand per night whispers through my head.
I'm exhausted. I worked a full day mending the wounds of others, forcing them toward wholeness. I paid for Mom's care for the first time in cash. I pretended not to notice as the receptionist paused when she took the rolled up money.
Her eyes met mine. “Cash?”
I still have the receipt in my purse. I think I'll frame it when this whole thing ends.
If it ever does.
I slowly walk to the “party room.” I know I've done all that I can to make myself desirable. Ty impresses on me the importance of the “mingle” period. These are men with tastes, he'd emphasized.
I walk in, my ice-blue dress barely covering my rear. Little strings that end in silver beads sway and tickle the tops of my thighs. They cup my ass as I move in four-inch stilettos. The neckline is so low the top of my belly button peeks in and out like a teasing divot.
The men turn as a new girl enters. I imagine their response is as instinctive as flowers turning their collective heads toward the sun. I know I've hit the mark when their conversation stops. Eyes greedily move over my form, missing nothing. Some eyes linger at my breasts, some my long legs, some caress the burnished gold of my hair under lights turned down so low they barely illuminate.
One man never looks at my body but my eyes. They're worth a stare, hidden by a mask of small Swarovski crystals. Only the light gray of my irises show through the slits. My dark blonde lashes are hidden under deep chocolate mascara.
“Two hundred for twenty minutes,” he says. He has deep black hair, a strong jaw, and eyes that might be a greenish-hazel if there was more light.
Voices erupt, drowning his and I fluster, backing away.
My masked eyes meet security.
Just like Thorn promised, he interrupts the bidding frenzy with quietly spoken words. “Five hundred, and she's yours for the virgin session.”
My eyes snap to his, thinking I've been discovered. But no, he simply means this is my first lap dance. Ever.
My shoulders drop, and I relax a little.
The man who said two hundred dollars nods at the security guard. Another man, complete in a tux and tails, brings a ticket on a silver tray, his eyes moving over me once.
It's enough.
I feel dirtier than when I arrived.
The man with coal black hair holds out his hand, and I slip mine inside his. It's warm and dry.
Other girls’ faces meet mine as I slide behind a door bearing the number one. I don't know who they are because they wear small masks as well.
It's okay because I don't know who I am anymore.
“I'm Jay,” he says as he loosens his tie.
I stand there stupidly.
He laughs and sits on a large chair. The plush burgundy faux suede hides a myriad of crimes.
Like the one I'll commit.
“Come here,” he commands in a low voice, his eyes burning into mine.
I walk to him. The beads that made me feel sexy a half hour ago sting like many bugs biting my flesh as I move.
I stand in front of him, and he doesn't touch me. He slowly unbuttons his shirt. Jay takes the loop of the tie over his head and tosses it aside. My eyes roam his muscular torso as he slowly unbuttons his shirt, his eyes never leaving mine. He does serious gym time.
I recognize the look of hard work instantly, my hand was not the only thing I rehabilitated.
I'm sore from my own workouts. A permabruise etched on the inside of the wrist of my bad hand testifies to my two weeks of pole dancing. But pain won't end me. After what I've been through, physical pain is just another obstacle.
It's the mental that's killing me.
“Straddle me,” he says.
I mount him like I did Thorn, my upper thighs quaking. Is it horrible that because it's not Thorn, that somehow it's better?
Music creeps into the room from strategically placed speakers. My eyes flick to the side and note scattered tissue paper, lube, condoms, and a neat pile of sex toys in an antique porcelain box.
Glass.
Rubber.
I turn my face away, tears making me hold my eyes wide so they don't fall.
Jay sets a fifty dollar bill on the end table next to the chair. A cut glass dish holds the bill perfectly. It twinkles in the low light while it holds filthy money.
I move, and he says, “I want to touch your breasts.”
My eyes shift to the money. I swallow and, after a brief hesitation, nod.
He bends forward and whispers, “Keep moving... yeah...,”
He groans as I grind against him, my face averted. I stare at the gilded wallpaper, trying for an out-of-body experience. I memorize the geometric shapes. I feel his fingers push aside the glittering v of my top. A finger brushes my nipple, and I nervously increase my pace. My nipple hardens like a traitor, and my heartbeat speeds up in unrequited fear.
I won't embrace it or I'll scream. This stranger latches onto my nipple and sucks as I increase the friction against him. I gasp a little at the contact. I guess touching my breast can mean his mouth, though I'm not expecting it.
I disassociate myself further, my eyes tracing the fleur de lis wallpaper. My grinding stresses my muscles, my fight against adrenaline exhausts me, and the need for money spurs me forward anyway.
His breathing tells me when it'll be over, and then it is. He presses my naked breasts against his face and shouts into the center of my warm flesh, releasing against a hand towel over his front.
Jay holds me against him as if I'm precious. That's worse than if he’d just let me go. I disengage, scuttling off his lap in an awkward lurch and averting my eyes from his crotch.
He stands up, limp and spent, and uses the little toiletries provided to clean up his inconvenient mess.
I'm numb as I adjust my top and scoop up the fifty, adding it to the five hundred. As I walk out of the room, his eyes commit me to memory.
I realize I never said a word. He doesn't even know my name. Jay didn't ask.
At least there's that.
In the restroom, I gaze into the wall of gilded mirrors. Toiletries, makeup, and wipes of every variety litter the vanity. I put my head in my hands and sit there for moments that become minutes. When I lift my head, I turn on the tap, wait for it to steam, and yelp as I wash my hands raw. Then I unwrap a toothbrush and wash my mouth, brushing viciously. Twice.
I thank whatever's holy that I never kissed him. I couldn't stand that. It's the final insult. No kissing.
Because this is closer to prostitution than dancing. I get that now. I take deep breaths, concentrating on inhaling, then exhaling.
I stand, straightening my beaded dress borrowed from Kiki, and head back out into the room.
They bid again, and I head back into the room of the damned. This one wants to touch my breasts.
I let him.
And leave with twelve hundred dollars.
Only forty-eight thousand and change to go.
~ 6 ~
Present day
“Sir,” someone says to my right, but my eyes are shut.
“Please step away.” The timbre of that voice is commanding, authoritative.
My eyes open slowly as I take in the tactile wave around me.
I hear a low curse, and that warm presence moves. I feel cold, bereft as a beefy man in a navy uniform crouches next to me and smiles. His clear blue eyes scan the street. I hear car doors open and close, sirens cut off. The silence is deafening, a deep well to get lost in. All around me, people's legs appe
ar, like clothed tree trunks.
I'm in the middle of a people forest and it makes a slightly hysterical giggle erupt from my mouth.
That's when I realize I'm higher than a kite.
All the while, the man in blue has been talking to me quietly in soothing tones. My eyes sort of spin before focusing on his. I lift my hand to try and touch him, and I hiss in pain.
A moment of panic tries to rise up in my throat because it's my good hand. Please God, don't let that be wrecked too.
“Shh,” he says.
He calmly takes my struggling hand, and his finger moves to the underside of my wrist. I feel the subtle pressure of him taking my vitals. A loop of transparent tubing swings in my vision. “I've got ya,” he says and I notice his name tag: Johnny.
My body becomes weightless. I feel them place me on a stretcher. My thigh shrieks in pain, and I whimper. The paramedic's eyes move to the needle in my arm, and he adjusts something. I float deeper in the haze of the drugged.
“It's going to be okay,” he says, which fills me with instant dread.
I hear that melodic voice in the background. It grows loud in argument, and I know it's my angel trying to shelter me with his wings.
Johnny the paramedic loads me into the back of an ambulance. I try to move. I have work.
I have to die. I remembered Matthews's words perfectly. The drugs can't soften that.
“Let me through!” the angel says. His face appears above mine, seeking me through the safety of blue men, through the onlookers in the multi-colored forest of people.
They can't save me.
No one can.
But the one who held my hand when I was laid out in the middle of the street takes it again. The sedative works in collusion with the hit to my head as I begin to fade.
His deep brown eyes in a strong face are the last thing I see as the sedative takes me from consciousness like a thief.
That undeniable face is the last thing I see.
Then it hits me: I don't have to deny myself anything. When one knows the hour of their death, it all becomes clear.
It's a kind of relief.
*
Kiki's wide eyes greet mine when I wake up.
“Thank God!” she says in a loud voice, and I cringe a little. She covers her mouth. “Sorry,” she tries to whisper and misses it by a mile.
“Oh my gawd, girl, you had me peeing my pants!” Her anxious eyes scan my face then move down my body. They sweep back up to my eyes again.
I smile a little, and my mouth feels like torn sandpaper, complete with cracked lips and breath like ass. “Water,” I croak.
Kiki slaps her forehead and brings a cup to me smoothly, tipping the bendy straw down to my lips. The water tastes like cold heaven. My eyes meet hers.
“Okay, tell me what the hell happened,” Kiki says, plopping down in the hospital chair next to my bedside.
I want to know where that guy is. The one I saw in my drug-induced stupor... where did he go? But I don't ask.
“I don't really know. I was coming out of the clinic...”
“Seeing the doctor about your migraines?” she prompts.
I just nod. Talking about about my death sentence is a little too much.
Matthews's words come back to me, welling up in the center of my brain: loss of sensation and appetite, issues of vertigo—loss of balance.
I can't have that. I need to keep dancing so there will be something left for Mom when I'm no longer here.
Kiki snaps her fingers. “Y'know, they can't release you like this. You're not all here, Faren.”
Not all here. My memory blinks, and I'm on the lap of one man. Like a camera shutter, it clicks. Then I'm suffering through Thorn and his brand of control. The shutter stalls on my stepdad beating my mom nearly to death.
All because she defended me.
And I think I can go and die?
I close my eyes.
Kiki pushes my hair back. “What is it, doll? I mean, besides the obvious… You look like someone just stepped on your puppy.”
I bark out a laugh. You know the type, full of beaten and contained emotions bubbling to the surface. “I don't have a dog.” Perish the thought; I can hardly handle my own life.
Kiki lifts a shoulder, “Yeah, whatever, but if you did...” She smiles, and I smile back.
After a few moments, she says, “This is what I know. You came screaming—”
“Screaming?” My brows pop.
Kiki rolls her eyes. “Not yelling but bookin'.”
“Oh.”
“Anywho, you come screaming out of the doctor's office and run right into the street.”
I nod. That sounds right. After the wonderful bomb dropped, I just wasn't myself.
I'm not sure when I will be again.
“Then!” Kiki throws up a finger. “A super-hot guy plowed into you with his Harley! Love by bike!” she says with a squeal.
“Kiki...” No matter what I say, it won't work. I'm okay, and she's smitten with the strange circumstances.
“You're okay, Faren.” She looks at my blanket-covered body and snatches the blanket down to my thigh. “Battle scars. You can cover that with foundation.”
We look at the bruise made from the bike, and I realize I'm lucky my leg's not broken.
I watch her dark eyes move to my right thigh and land on my bump and grind bruise. She lays a finger on it.
Kiki doesn't meet my eyes when she asks, “How's the work?”
I don't look up. “It's going.”
“What do you have to do?” Kiki asks.
I give her an accusatory look.
She backs away, her hand coming off my leg. I cover my lower body with the sheet again.
“You were desperate,” she says. “You need the money, and this is the only way, short of dealing drugs, that it's going to happen for you.”
“I don't want a penthouse.”
“I know.” Kiki’s eyes bore into the top of my bent head. “Now tell me why the fuck you ran out of the doctor's office.”
I open my mouth then close it again. I don't know if I'm ready to tell her. I don't even know if I'm ready to accept what Matthews said. I'm going through the stages of grief just fine, thank you very much.
I think I'm hung up on anger.
I hear a noise, and we turn like guilty co-conspirators when the door opens. Someone passes through with a cheesy balloon with 1980s lettering that screams Get Well and a bouquet of carnations. The balloon bobs and wags, revealing a sliver of his face.
Ty, a.k.a. Thorn.
My guts seize, and Kiki gives the man who's effectively pimped me out a dazzling smile.
“Ty!” she says happily and throws herself in his arms.
His dark eyes meet mine over her shoulder, and he flashes a tight smile my way. I press my damp palms into the bed sheets.
“Thanks for covering for Faren last night, Kiki,” Thorn says in an ominous message directed straight at me.
His eyes slide over my form, safely ensconced underneath the hospital covers. “Let me talk to our girl here.”
Kiki nods and turns to me.
I ask, “You did a...” I don't even know what to call it. I settle on the most innocuous word I can muster. “Dances for me?” I squeak, hating owing anybody, even Kiki.
“She sure did,” Thorn's eyes meet mine. “What are friends for?” The question is posed innocently, but I know what he's really asking.
Kiki gives me a light kiss on the cheek and ignores my eyes begging her to stay. She buzzes out with a I'll be back soon flutter of her fingers, leaving me with Thorn.
All pretense of a smile leaves Thorn's expression as his eyes go flat black in an millisecond. “Let's talk, Faren.”
I say nothing, and he begins. When Thorn finishes, I stare at my clenched hands, wanting out so bad I can barely stand it.
Thorn wants me as a regular. He wants me to cover my fresh bruises with makeup, like Kiki suggested. He asked if I can still dance, to whi
ch I only nod.
Hell yes, I'll dance. I have a sudden desire for my mom that's so strong it's like pain that I can't fix, a part of me broken beyond repair. We'd been so close and now I had no one to take her place as confidante. There's no glue for my broken problems.
Thorn's last words flit through my mind. “There's more money if you keep giving me dances. Private ones.”
My eyes travel to his. I'm so engaged with him I don't hear the whisper of the door when it opens and my angel walks in.
Seeing my face changes his expression of contrition to one of darkness. Those large chocolate eyes move impassively to Thorn and noticeably harden.
Thorn jumps to his feet, gathers up the balloon and flowers, and turns to the man who held my hand. Thorn explains nervously, “Wrong room, pal.”
My brows come together in a puzzled frown as they stare each other down.
I swear they know each other. I'm glad that Thorn leaves. I wonder what chased him out.
Who.
He's even more beautiful than I remember him. My eyes take him in with hunger, every moment of my life is hyper-bright, acutely surreal and microscopic. His hair glints, like the deepest copper penny, from the pale light bleeding through the window. His skin is like creamy mocha, and his eyes are so dark they look black.
Except when they look at me, they're molten amber.
“Hi.” He steps forward and stretches out his hand.
I move to put my palm in his, and I notice manicured nails that don't match the callouses on his palm. A signet ring flashes a college I can only dream of attending as his large hand covers mine.
Cuff links peek from his expensive suit sleeve.
Then I see the shoes. A different leather than before but just as supple. Just as distinctive.
My eyes drive up his body and meet his gaze, and a dimple flashes into existence as a smile full of white teeth dazzle me. Those eyes capture me in an embrace of satin chocolate.
“Jared McKenna,” he says, and I know I'm in for it.
I might be dying. I might have a dirty job that pays for the sins of my past. But right then, I know heaven, if just for a little bit, right here on earth.
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