The Jewel Box

by C Michelle McCarty

  “Boring,” I interrupted. “Why don’t you try Tarot readings? Seems more exciting.”

  “You two girls always talk about excitement, but won’t do much about it. Just put all the suits together in this deck and verify the Jack of Clubs is intact.” Beau handed me the cards.

  “It’s two-thirty in the morning, Beau.” I split the deck, knowing which card would vanish about twenty seconds after it fell into his hand.

  Bam! Someone pounded the club door. Kat stiffened. “Saturday nights lead to weird Sunday mornings when drunks and people of bad intent ramble along streets and businesses looking for trouble,” she whispered.

  My belly did flipflops.

  Beau pulled his .44 Magnum from under the bar. “You and Kat stay seated and out of view,” he said quietly before walking to the locked door. “Who are you and what do you need?” Beau demanded in threatening tone.

  “It’s Wesley.”

  “Creepy jackass.” Kat scrunched her nose, making a sour face.

  “So what?” Beau broadcast, this time with less intimidation.

  “Well, I’d like to talk to Jill.” Wesley’s voice echoed through the heavy door. “Apologize. If she’ll let me.”

  Beau looked over at me. “Come back in twenty minutes.” he said to Wesley, apparently reading doubt on my face. Beau then went back behind the bar, put away his Magnum and the playing cards, allowing me quiet time to mull over my situation.

  “Whatever drew you to him, cutie?” Kat stood in her chair to stretch across the bar and retrieve her hidden pint of Bacardi from a shelf.

  “Jeez, I don’t know. I’m self-conscious and he’s smug. Opposites attract. Who knows? Wesley perceives himself as Eros and brags about taking me down transplendent rivers of love, but his pushy drunkenness makes me feel like I’m up bleak creek without a paddle.”

  “Transplendent rivers of love?” Beau let go a hearty laugh. “You read that in some romance novel didn’t you?”

  “I did.” I nodded my head while meeting Beau’s eyes.

  “Why don’t you ditch this character?” Kat poured rum into her Coke.

  “He’s not that bad. And I’m incredibly insecure these days.”

  “No way.” Kat stirred her drink. “You’ve always radiated confidence.”

  “False bravado,” I admitted.

  “That’s bound to backfire on you one of these days, baby.”

  Next thing I knew, I was making excuses for Wesley, saying his behavior was triggered by this shameful job. Beau didn’t look pleased, but listened patiently to my rambling. “I just can’t do this. It’s not for me and would kill my mother if she found out. Well, maybe not.” My chin trembled. “She’d probably refuse to believe her daughter could deviate from such strong Southern upbringing into this sinful job. Or she’d spend the rest of her life praying for my soul.”

  Kat reached over and gently rubbed my shoulders. “Cutie, I’m sorry for bringing you here. It took me a while to get over my guilt, but the money sure helps.”

  I looked across the bar at Beau, who had been unusually quiet. “Sorry, Beau. This is my last night. It was nice meeting you, but I have to say it’s hard for a small town girl like me to understand a person like you owning such an immoral establishment.”

  Kat moaned as Beau leaned across the bar, looking like Rhett Butler mildly irritated by Miss Scarlett’s commentary. His stunning steel-grey eyes weren’t twinkling as usual. “Are you finished talking?”

  “Yes. Sir.”

  “Then do me a favor and listen for a minute, before you leave this immoral establishment.” Beau’s emphasis on the word immoral seemed a tad scornful.

  Knowing Beau well enough to know he needed more than a minute to make any statement, I placed my duffel bag on the bar thinking it would make a nice pillow if he got too long winded.

  “Baby, if you act like a lady, you’ll be treated like a lady.”

  “Oh pleeease.” My pulse rose. “That’s ludicrous! A lady working in a topless club?”

  “What’s wrong with making a living by putting a smile on someone’s face? Men come in this club for many different reasons, ranging from those wanting to deviate from the norm to the curious, lonely, bored, and voyeuristic ones. Believe it or not, we occasionally get some nice, decent men in here. Some just need to be touched and a simple pat on the shoulder after seating them pacifies most and makes them less likely to touch or grab you. I’m not always nearby to defend, so if anyone touches you inappropriately, smack the crap out of them. And if they speak vulgar to you or any dancers, remind them obnoxious behavior is not tolerated in the Jewel Box. To sum it up, if men get offensive, try handling it in ladylike fashion. Don’t let them talk down to you, touch you inappropriately, and for God’s sake, never let them kiss your lips.”

  “Let me get this straight. I can parade around half naked in front of these guys, wallop a punch when necessary, tell them to go to hell if I don’t like what they say, but a kiss on the lips is incontrovertibly taboo.” I shook my head. “I’m sorry Beau, but this job goes against my upbringing.” I struggled to force my aching, swollen feet back into my high heels.

  “Well, I hate to see you go, baby.” Understanding filled his face.

  Moments later Wesley rapped on the door. Kat made another hateful face, but Beau gave me a sincere, almost fatherly smile as he took the keys to allow Wesley back inside the club.

  Wesley thanked Beau, and apologized profusely to me, before making a solemn promise to stop drinking. He tried to humor Kat, but she wasn’t having any of it. Then Wesley urged me to come to El Paso with him the following week, bring Nikki, and forget this club situation ever happened. Kat hugged me so tight I thought she was trying to paralyze me so I couldn’t walk. But being with Nikki and heading west with Wesley seemed preferable to spending another night walking around in pasties and panties. I left with the man in the pinstriped suit.

  4

  Traveling so many hours through West Texas with Wesley was no fun, and the highlight of arriving in El Paso was me finding a Jack of Clubs card at the bottom of my purse. Wesley leased a big house and hired a woman to cook and clean, but the transformation I’d hoped for never materialized as the previously charming guy got more irrational by the hour.

  We hired a bi-lingual lady to care for Nikki five hours a day while I worked at the office. She taught Nikki Spanish phrases as they played games or visited nearby parks, but within weeks our life began a downward spiral. Wesley’s moods fluctuated something fierce as he took control of everything, down to monitoring my soda intake. “Water’s free, hon.” He often stayed late at the office drinking himself comatose, and I soon learned liquor served as a chaser for any drugs he could find. Epiphany, Jill! The damn Tofranil he so valiantly saved me from “getting hooked on” months earlier had gone down his esophagus—not the toilet.

  Wesley spent a small fortune on liquor and narcotics, and then insisted we be financially sensible and maintain only one car. Yep. His Lincoln remained and I never saw a penny from the sale of my Corvair. Totally dependent on his highness for transportation, my optimism vanished as rapidly as my part-time income.

  Mother always disregarded friction with my dad by simply ignoring him, but I lacked her knack for staying silent and composed. One night Wesley came home obnoxiously drunk, and began cussing everything, including characters on Mayberry R.F.D. “Aunt Bee’s a fucking magpie.”

  “Shut it.” I shouted, appalled at his vulgarities entering my daughter’s ears.

  A vase flew past my head and shattered against the fireplace. “You shut up!” his tone, crazy belligerent. “Bitches don’t back talk.”

  “Please,” I begged.

  Nikki started crying. Wesley got angrier. I got a fist in the face.

  “You sorry SOB,” I said as blood dripped from my mouth. “You sorry SOB.” I ramped up my volume.

  Wham! Wesley slammed me into the wall. Nikki started screaming at the top of her lungs. Remembering Mother’s “Silence i
s golden” quote, I inched away from Wesley. In a whisper, I begged my horrified little girl to stop crying. She intuitively understood my pleas and walked wordlessly to her room. Wesley’s rage ended abruptly with him passing out on the sofa as his grand finale.

  The following morning when Wesley saw my body blanketed with bruises, and my right eye severely swollen and clotted with blood, he suggested I stay home from work. The moment Mr. Thoughtful walked out the door, I phoned Ellen, told her things weren’t working out, and asked her to wire money so I could return to Houston. Not only did she agree, she asked no questions. Unlike me, Ellen had absorbed Mother’s quote: “Ask me no questions and I’ll tell you no lies.” I had always been the family question asker. And the vain one who practically lived in front of a mirror, but I disregarded my appearance and walked four miles to Western Union, lugging Nikki on my hip most of the way. Two days later when Wesley left for work, Nikki and I packed our belongings and took a cab to the bus station, leaving the psychopath and El Paso.

  It was my first and last bus trip, but that Greyhound ride felt wonderful. I stroked sleeping Nikki’s hair while allowing Sixties music to flow privately in my head, even though The Beatles Lady Madonna seemed to be on endless loop. By the time we arrived in Houston my black eye was less obvious, but Ellen never asked one question when I asked her to watch Nikki and loan me her car for a few days. I headed straight to the Jewel Box.

  I walked through the door with the same apprehension I’d felt months before. Thankfully Kat met me with a big hug and we walked arm in arm to the bar.

  “Baby,” Beau said warmly. “It’s great to see you.”

  His calling me baby in such congenial and caring tone, almost brought tears to my eyes. “I just dropped in to see if anyone’s filled my white go-go boots.”

  “I’d love to have you back, but you’ve got to stay longer than two weeks.”

  “I promise, Beau. And unlike Wesley, I keep my word. The maniac sold my car, so it’ll take me a while to buy some wheels. Guess you could say I got myself into a worse predicament than waitressing in a topless club.”

  “You’re a hard working girl. Welcome back. This is a peculiar business, but you’ll earn a nice sum of money and maybe become a pretty good judge of men along the way.”

  “Cutie, you might even meet the man of your dreams here.” Kat batted her lashes.

  “Pleeease. What a revolting thought. The last place I’d consider looking for love is here. No offense Beau.”

  “None taken.” He wiped down the bar.

  “Really, Kat. Would you date any of the misfits who stray into this joint?”

  “Never in a million years. I’m just here for the money.”

  “Baby, Laura told me about your problems with Wesley, and I say you’re better off here. Any man who strikes a woman is a savage, and even if he says it won’t happen again, it will. Now you’ve learned expensive clothing doesn’t make a man Prince Charming.”

  “Well, Prince Charming, a.k.a. Marquis de Sade.”

  “Life is an education. Take notes and you might learn more than you’d ever imagined working here. See you tomorrow night, baby.”

  The year was 1969. Nightly newscasts flashed shocking photos depicting the war in Vietnam, angry protestors, men burning draft notices, and a growing divide in our country. Meanwhile thousands indulged in psychedelic experiences with pot, LSD, and other mind altering chemicals. In May the X-rated movie Midnight Cowboy debuted to record crowds. In June the musical Hair opened yet another simultaneous production in Paris, France, and at month’s end, the Stonewall riots in New York City marked the beginning of America’s Gay Rights movement. In early July, scientists discovered the chemical structure of antibodies, and on July 20th “Houston” was the first word spoken from the moon by Neil Armstrong. Civil rights activists were making marginal progress after Martin Luther King’s death. Then came Woodstock. That’s the month I returned to the Jewel Box with a different attitude. A somewhat schizoid “I am woman hear me roar/please God, don’t let my family and friends find out what I’m doing” attitude.

  My garrulous nature blended with anxiety and generated ceaseless babble as I moved through the crowd hustling quarters by asking, “Got a dollar for the jukebox?” I always got at least ten bucks. Maybe it was just the eagerness of the men to get the music going and another half naked girl dancing, but not once did I hear any complaints about the jukebox costing a dollar a song. Jeez, back in Lake Jackson you could get six plays for a quarter.

  As I danced (if you could call it that), I simply absorbed the music and stared dreamily into the crowd of faceless men, thinking anything other than where I was or what I was doing. Listening to I Heard It Through The Grapevine, I often transposed the motley crew into Twain, Whitman, Frost, Burns, and even Ana s Nin, as I recited “Life has no plot,” while turning in circles on the tiny stage waiting for Marvin’s last line. People say “What doesn’t kill you will make you stronger,” but every time I stepped down and slithered into the dressing room, I thanked God I was a full-time waitress and only danced occasionally. Dancers were a different breed altogether, which Beau explained ranged from aspiring Penthouse Pets who had recently left their job slinging hash, to college girls from assorted backgrounds supporting their education, and tattooed motorcycle mamas supporting their old men and drug habits. Beau rarely turned down unattractive dancers, letting them stay to make enough money to move on, which he expedited by padding their nightly pay with twenty dollars more in drink sales than they sold. He said without dancers he’d have no Jewel Box, so he never made them adhere to a schedule like us waitresses. But he kept a vigil watch over them, and fired those caught soliciting prostitution.

  “Amazing Paulette,” Beau said with a hint of intrigue as he watched a gorgeous dancer work the crowd.

  I refreshed my pastel pink lipstick. “I can’t believe that drop-dead beauty is leaving for Copenhagen soon. She sells tons of cocktails and always reminds men to tip us.”

  Beau nodded as Kat leaned toward me. “Paulette’s real name is Paul. Our only dancer with fake boobs is going through steps to become a woman,” Kat whispered. “I don’t know where he hides his jewels since Beau labeled our dressing room off limits and he shows up in work attire, but he/she does it well.”

  “Oh my God.” I bit my tongue in disbelief.

  “Keep mute about it,” Beau requested. “The transgender process has been around for a couple of decades in other countries. Germany and Denmark, mostly. I ran into a few guys awaiting feminization surgery in Vegas, but never one anywhere near this passable. Hell, he’s more feminine than most women.”

  I stood stunned, likely with mouth wide open. Paulette was about five foot two, small boned, and spoke in such girly tones I couldn’t believe she was a he. Men practically drooled over her while digging cash from their wallets.

  “Wipe that shocked look off your face,” Kat said. “And let’s go make the most of her last week here. She’s the prettiest, sweetest, best smelling dancer on board right now.”

  “And my least problematic,” Beau added as Kat dragged me away by my hair.

  During the following week, I scrutinized Paulette for signs of Paul, to no avail. Silky smooth legs led to nothing discernable under the sequined bikini bottoms all employees wore. Kat presumed Paul had never been blessed with a sizable penis. Beau figured duct tape. I envied his delicate beauty, and was bewildered by his almost invisible Adam’s apple.

  I’d earned nearly enough to buy a used car for getting back and forth to Ellen’s so I could sleep with Nikki, but my second stint at the Jewel Box wasn’t going much better than my first. And men like “Slick” didn’t make things any easier. The young, brawny biker-type wore his jet black hair slicked down with grease and dressed head to toe in black leather accessorized with garish chains. This thug who claimed he was a Mafia hit man, always sat at the end of the bar by the waitress station, laying on the charm while asking me or Kat to go out with him. When we refused his ad
vances, he became obnoxious. “Slick’s the kind of guy who could probably spread vaginal diseases just by standing too close,” Kat warned me. Beau occasionally booted his odious butt out the door. Slick usually left growling about us now being on “the list” while slowly caressing his boot at ankle level, as though his hidden Luger would someday settle the issue.

  On the flip side, we had Gabe and Al. These business partners called themselves “trim men,” and Kat and I called them our “Nicer than nicest, nice guys,” because these repeat customers were extremely generous with their money and never tried to cop a feel like most men who came in. But they were hardly saints. With the exception of me and Kat, Gabe immediately attached an unpleasant nickname to every girl in the house, regardless of her chosen alias. The two married men wore T-shirts and faded blue jeans, but in spite of their clothing and slight sawdust smell, they always seemed exceptionally clean from face to fingernails.

  Al was forty-something, super polite and friendly. Elfin-like and slightly graying, he had mischievous eyes, a fuzzy worm-looking moustache on his rubicund face, and cheeks that begged to be pinched. After a couple of beers, his voice jumped an octave, his nose reddened to match his cheeks, and he grinned from ear to ear as his eyes darted from dancer to dancer. The girls loved his amenable behavior and extravagant spending, and Al loved the girl’s attention. So much so that he fell in love every time the moon changed. Many dancers counted on him for a profitable evening and took advantage of his generosity—until Gabe intervened, spoiling everyone’s fun. Most nights when the partners left the club, an excessively maudlin, slightly stumbling Al was calmly guided out by Gabe, who often shook his head and rendered the same expression exasperated parents make when trying to control their unruly kids. One night as Gabe did his ushering bit, he turned to me as the door closed and grumbled, “Everyone knows old men are twice boys.”

  “Was he quoting Aristophanes?” I asked Kat as she flew by.