by Dolly Dennis
Black Jack, the proprietor, made fun of her, mocking her reluctance. “You know, if you’re gonna work here, even if you’re just a waitress, you’re gonna have to show a lot of skin. Sheer bra and a tiny skirt. Fellows here just want to see tits. I can tell you have nice ones. So you might as well give the guys what they want. You’ll make a lot more dough.”
“I really don’t —”
“Look, I’ve seen a lot of girls like you. Come in here and think, ‘Oh no, I couldn’t do that.’ Well, let me tell you, they all change their minds once they see how much money they can make. So if you’re smart, you should just follow my advice and dive right in.”
Velvet couldn’t believe what she was hearing. Did all the waitresses really end up as strippers? She had a nice body, she knew — guys were always ogling her — and she wasn’t shy about showing it off a little. Her bikini was pretty revealing. But still, stripping was something else entirely. She could use the money, of course.
“Tell you what. Why don’t you come to my office? We can talk some more, take a few photos.”
She felt herself drifting behind him to his office upstairs above the bar.
“Sometimes, my clients are looking for dates. An escort. You okay with that?” he said as they reached the door.
“Just a date?” Her head low, eyes raised in the dusky hall before entering his office.
“If you want more money, arrangements can be made for other, shall we say, lucrative activities.”
“I don’t think so,” Velvet said. “Thanks anyway. I’ll just serve drinks, okay, and then maybe I’ll see.”
“Just putting it out there for you. Think about it,” said Black Jack. “For now, bring that chair over here and pose so I can get some shots.”
Black Jack sighed. “Now don’t be a tease and get shy on me, doll. Your tits are practically falling out of that halter. Take off the top and don’t waste my time. Thought you needed a job.” And he started to walk away.
“Wait. Wait. I’ll be working as a waitress, right? So why do you need naked photos of me?”
He returned to face her. “Policy, doll, you got nice tits. Do you understand? This is a strip joint. First you dance, and if the customers like you, you get to remove your clothes down to the G-string. No waste of time taking photos if we do that now. Time is money. What did you expect? You’re just meat to my customers. You all look the same to them. Ready?”
She vowed that she would make sure the customers didn’t like her dancing so she would never have to strip. Right now, though, she knew she had to take off her top. She swallowed and, shaking somewhat, pulled it over her head.
He manipulated her body in various positions, sitting demurely, hands between her thighs, ankles hooked behind the back of the chair legs, her head resting, hair a mess of knots and tangles as though Black Jack had seen the movie Blow Up too many times.
“Okay, time to take off your skirt.”
“But —”
“Look, you’re really startin’ to piss me off. Do you want this job or not? Guys want to see topless and they want to see you in tiny little panties. You gotta show them what you got. So either you grow up and take off your skirt, or get out of here and stop wasting my time.”
She knew there was nothing more to say. She took another deep breath, pulled off her skirt, kicked off her shoes, and stood there. She wanted to cover herself up but she knew that that would just make him angry. So she stood there, staring at the floor, knowing that his eyes were roving over her almost naked body.
“Nice,” he said.
She felt in a daze, like she was someone else. He had her sprawled on the plank floor, writhing and sweeping the tresses back and forth like a mop, murmuring, her throat gulping for air at each titillating movement of her breasts. She fell in love with the camera; forgot Black Jack; forgot Ryan; and remembered all the models she had worshipped on the fashion covers of magazines like Vogue, Glamour, Vanity Fair. She was Christie Brinkley, Cheryl Tiegs, Cindy Crawford wrapped in one Blue Velvet Coburn. She wondered if maybe she should go to modelling school and become a model.
“Good, good, good. You’re a natural. Good, good. Lovely. Do it again.” David Hemmings photographing Veruschka.
He kept shooting nonstop from various angles, the flash blinding; he, moving closer and closer for the kill.
“Let me see your face, doll.” Black Jack pulled back her hair with such abruptness, it frightened her. He hovered over her face and took aim, his pelvis close to her mouth, and then he caressed her breasts.
“Nice tits, doll. You’re hired.”
She feared the inevitable but he backed away with clumsy steps as though he had unsealed an envelope and realized it was the wrong one for the prize.
“Don’t worry, doll, I love men. Put your clothes back on.”
“Is that it then?”
“Start tomorrow. Night shift, six p.m. to two a.m. when we close. You start serving drinks. Watch the other girls for a couple of shifts. Nice girls. In a week we’ll get you that dance audition. If my customers like you, well, we’ll move you to stripper.”
She signed the contract. No escorting. A deal.
Velvet dressed herself with a shield of mixed emotions, but she had a job that could pay well if she played it right. Temporary. An opportunity to ask around for Ryan. He was bound to show up all apologetic and forgetful as was his way. It’s all the drugs he takes, she reasoned. And, hopefully, he would present himself before she had to strip.
It happens as she is leaving. Frosty is rushing up to the door just as she is on her way out. They collide and she goes flying onto the cement walk.
“Sorry, ma’am,” he says, removing his cowboy hat.
“Asshole.” She struggles to stand up, but keeps slipping backwards on her dress shoes until he catches her.
“Well, well, well. Lookit here.”
“Frosty.”
“What were you doin’ in Black Jack’s? Don’t usually find too many women visiting a strip club.”
“I just got a job here,” Velvet says, feeling rather ashamed to admit it.
“Black Jack hired you?” He shakes his head. “Trust me, you don’t wanna be stripping for Black Jack. Before you know it, he’ll have you whoring for his customers. You don’t want that, do you? No. Stick by me, girl, before you get yourself into some nasty trouble. I can get you a job groomin’ horses at the racetrack. Pay’s not bad. They’s always on the lookout for a pretty girl. You don’t want to work for Black Jack.”
“I can take care of myself.” She thrusts her body past him and is gone, hurrying toward Calgary Trail and a bus back to Mill Woods.
With the late light of summer beginning to wane, Velvet sits on the bench in front of the Complex Arms and reviews her day — work at Black Jack’s tomorrow, the photography session, bumping into Frosty. Maybe by the end of the week Ryan would show up, or maybe she’d get lucky and find a better job. She has no expectations. Only hope.
The sun’s dying rays flatter her. Basking in the light, her face looks radiant and wholesome. Velvet relaxes, absorbing the summer day’s aromatic senses and the city’s sounds.
Suddenly, cool fingers tap her bare shoulders. She looks over her shoulder and there he is. Again.
“You moved in all right? Need anythin’, just holler.”
“Frosty.”
“It’s okay. Adeen don’t need to know we bumped into each other at Black Jack’s. She don’t like me goin’ there.”
“Well, I gotta go there.”
“I told you I can get you something at the track.”
“I don’t think that’s for me.”
“You wanna strip?”
Velvet doesn’t say anything.
“Okay, it’s your life … but you be careful of Black Jack. Like I said, he’s going to want you to do a whole lot more.”
“Like I said,” Velvet replies, “I can take care of myself.”
“What’s your boyfriend going to say?”
�
��Ryan? Who knows.”
Velvet goes on to share her concerns about Ryan, the boyfriend from hell, who has deserted her.
“I want an explanation, and he owes me some money.”
Frosty’s head drops almost to his knees. “Yeah, well, dudes can be that way. I can maybe help you find him if you want. I know practically everyone in town and I know the bar scene. I can ask around.”
She gives him a perplexed scrutiny and says, “Why would you want to do that. You don’t even know me.”
“’Cause I’m a good person. May not go to church on Sundays but I like to help damsels in distress.”
“I bet you do. What does Adeen think of that?”
“Who cares what she thinks.”
But Frosty, for all his faults, is a man of his word, and the next morning before she heads for Black Jack’s, they check several bars and restaurants in Mill Woods, showing a photo of Ryan that Velvet carries in her wallet. Their search widens that week to include the downtown core, Boyle Street, Chinatown, Little Italy, the library, Winston Churchill Square. She is also getting a tour of a city that she currently calls home.
Eventually, they land on Whyte Avenue, where they do a round of all the clubs. Finally, they call it a week at the seedy Commercial Hotel. They sit at a sidewalk table and inhale the smoke from exhaust pipes and weed, shielding their ears against the sputter of deranged motorcycles and old jalopies that should have died a long time ago.
“Don’t want to go back to the Soo. Nothing there. I’m here now so have to keep moving.”
“Looks to me like he don’t want to be found.”
“Maybe I’ll go to Calgary. Said he was going there first. Lots of jobs there, someone told me. Maybe I’ll go to school, get my degree in education … or become a model …”
“And change the world, Velvet? The world changes on its own terms.”
“And you?” she asks.
“Gonna keep writin’ my poetry. There’re different ways to change the world.”
“You write poetry?”
“Wanna hear?” And before she can reply he is reciting four stanzas about his land and how corporations are raping it to dig out its resources; about the corruption of man and the purity of nature.
“I don’t know poetry, Frosty, but it rhymes, so must be good.”
He smiles and orders another beer for each of them. He has a fan.
ADEEN
So hot, Edmonton was hidden in a haze from all the forest fires now burning up north in the mountains. Couldn’t see two feet in front of me. The last couple of days Payton had pealed his bell in the corridors at all hours of the day and night like a small-craft warning.
“Armageddon chasing us. Beware, all you heathens. We will all burn in hell. The end is near.” Payton was a bundle of joy, if you know what I mean.
“For God’s sake, stop that, Payton!” And I ripped his bell from his hands. “You’ll get it back tomorrow,” I said.
That night even Payton remained alert. Come take me, Lord, he would count quotes from the Bible instead of sheep until he was dead to the world. That’s how he fell asleep. Told me to give it a try. Reading the Bible would put anyone to sleep, I guess.
I was getting ready for bed when Mona called. Irene was asleep and doing well, she said. The new medicines were making her docile. I must be a bad mother if Mona could handle and love her like an angel. She wanted to know how I was doing. I have to admit that with Irene out of the picture, I felt a freedom and peace that had been lacking from my life for so long. Even Frosty’s absences no longer bothered me. Not much.
By ten o’clock I had slipped into bed and fallen asleep; an hour later I awoke to feel Frosty’s side of the bed. Nothing there but cool sheets. He had been missing since morning. I had come to terms with his impulsive, irresponsible, cheating behaviour, his characteristic histrionics and self-pity, playing the unsung Poet Laureate of the Complex Arms. Big shit! Nonetheless, I tossed and turned with worry until I eventually dozed off. I didn’t hear the poetic hound, reeking of cigarettes, booze, and weed creep under the sheets beside me.
The back of my head felt damp against the pillow. I had earlier shut off the oscillating fan on the nightstand as the continuous whirling gave me a headache. I heard a dog barking somewhere nearby, perhaps in a neighbour’s yard. Light filtered through the venetians. I was wide awake now and thirsty. I reached over to Frosty’s side of the bed again and screamed, not expecting to find Zita’s husband, Howard, lying there.
He apparently had lost his way to his apartment after an allnighter. In his drunken state of confusion, all the floors and doors looked the same. I had left my door unlocked for Frosty so he would not disturb me when he came home. Howard just walked in and headed straight for the closet in the entrance. Saw his error and shifted toward the bedroom and fell into bed with me, thinking I was Zita. So goes his story. It might have been funny if it had happened to someone else, not me.
“What are you doing here? This is not your apartment.” I was hysterical. I mean, did he try anything while I was asleep? I wanted to know. He apologized and said no.
“You’re in the wrong apartment,” I kept screaming.
“Sorry, sorry Adeen.” He was so contrite, looked pathetic as he shuffled off like a zombie into the living room, the entry closet, in and out, and finally out the door, me cursing behind him, and Frosty, buttoning up his shirt, racing down the stairs from Velvet’s apartment. Who else? Not surprised. I know my man. It was full daylight now.
“And you … you … cowboy, what are you doing up there with that bitch?” I yelled at him, slapping his chest left and right, left and right. Embarrassed. Tenants watching. I didn’t care.
“Nothin’, hon,” he said.
Such a liar.
“Takin’ her on an early search for her boyfriend before she starts work today at Black Jack’s at noon,” he said. “Was comin’ right down to get the car ready. That’s all.” His fine excuse.
And the bitch from the Soo was now at the top of the stairs in her nightie backing Frosty’s version. “That’s right, Mrs. Whitlaw,” she said. “Frosty came to my rescue at Mr. Black Jack’s the other day and said he’d help me find Ryan. We just talked all night about where to look, come up with ideas, and before we knew it, the sun came out and —”
Yada yada yada. The bitch. Only a couple of days here and already she was making a spectacle of herself.
I told her not to come near Frosty ever again and then turned to him with a punch and told him to stay away from me for a while, to just leave me alone, or I’d ditch him just like that. I was getting tired of all his excuses. I knew he was getting it on with Velvet. Did he think I’m stupid?
“Ouch, Adeen, that hurt.”
“Good,” I said.
Since Velvet moved into the Complex Arms, Frosty was never around. I knew where he went. I knew. I couldn’t help noticing how no sooner did she leave, he was right behind. Said I’m not stupid. Then one day, I think it was her first week here, I heard that voice, Bobby Vinton singing “Blue Velvet” somewhere in the building. I followed the music and sure enough it was coming from Velvet’s apartment. I knew that if I went in I would find Frosty there. I didn’t even knock on the door. It was unlocked and what a sight — Velvet, naked, prancing about with a photo clutched to her breast. She stopped dancing when she noticed me watching.
“Is this what girls do in the Soo? Have affairs with married men?”
“Adeen. You got it wrong.”
And I jumped at the naked bitch, snatching the photo from her hands and ripping the thing to pieces.
“Hey, you can’t do that. That’s personal.” Velvet was hysterical. “That’s the only photo I have.”
“Right, I want you out of here as soon as you can get your shit together. Stay away from Frosty,” I spat at her. Felt good.
She simmered down and said, “But that was a photo of my boyfriend, Ryan. Frosty is helping me find him.”
“I want you out of here en
d of the month,” I said.
“You have to give me three months’ notice.”
Well, she was right about that. She did sign a lease, so nothing I could do.
Overkill? I don’t think I was overreacting. Do you? There are no happy marriages. Mona told me back when I was considering marrying Frosty. “Couples,” she would say, “who brag that they are happy with their partners, well, it means they haven’t been married long enough or one of them is lying or has been silenced. It’s usually the woman.”
Who the hell invented marriage? I want to kill that guy because it certainly wasn’t a woman. I forgave Frosty again for being a horny cowpoke. Okay, I’m stupid. And by the way, I never told Zita about Howard sleeping in my bed. I had enough problems already.
Anyhow, that’s the story there.
THE MOUSE INCIDENT
They are both up now, the hostile sun penetrating across the horizon. Frosty is making coffee. Adeen waits like a tear-drop about to descend, hands vanishing behind her.
“So how much money did you lose?”
“Came out even-steven.”
“Who’d you stay with?” Adeen picks up the old newspaper section with the photo of the Complex Arms and the balcony with the child’s tricycle.
No response.
“I asked who you stayed with. You were gone two days.” She tosses the newspaper on the table.
“What’s with the interrogation? I was at the casino. Mario let me sleep there, in his office. I was dead drunk.”
“Good thing you weren’t dead, or I’d be arranging a funeral right now.”
“Should throw that thing out. Old news,” Frosty said pointing at the tabloid.
“Yeah, well.” And she rips the pages into smithereens except for the article about Jan and Nina, keeping it as a reminder of the vulnerability of women who marry the first thing that crosses their world, as though they were unworthy of more.