For Denise, Susie, and Susan, with love and of course, respect.
***
Rick Laitner slid back into the booth, the cheap, corrugated faux leather making a farting sound against his dress pants. He could feel it more than hear it, his heart still racing a bit.
A strange thought struck him: Someone somewhere has probably died of a heart attack performing CPR on someone else.
The houselights dimmed again and the siren red of the club lights started to swirl. The scene was eerie, surreal. Bad hair metal came over the sound system again.
The ambulance, which Rick had watched squeal off into the rainy night, probably hadn’t made it to Grace Hospital yet.
“Excellent work, my man. All your food, drinks, dances are courtesy of the Pink Stallion for the rest of the night.”
The guy speaking was tan, musclebound, but had more of a car salesman vibe than a strip club manager.
As Rick began to say “that’s not necessary” one of his younger coworkers said “Thanks, Chuck.”
Marty. Of course Marty was a regular here.
Rick hadn’t really wanted to come, but it was Beanzo’s going away party. He had somehow found himself a job as a machine handler at a hospital in Honolulu.
Rick was the only one in attendance not from machines or patient transport.
He had noticed how high the guys at the center table were, saw the red stains under the noses from excessive wiping, heard the conversations collide and spar for attention.
They made so many trips to the bathroom that not even a UTI could explain them.
So it wasn’t really that shocking when one dropped, clutching his chest and vomiting lemon drops.
Rick shook the memory. He had seen worse in the ER and was generally able to elude the unpleasant visions.
New drinks arrived, and with them a girl to dance for the seven guys at the going away party.
The girl dancing for Rick was pretty, a bit bustier than he generally liked, and kept calling him hero.
“Anyone can learn how to do CPR,” he told her.
“Knowing it and giving it to someone who is puking is two different things, sugar doll,” the girl said.
Rick was still looking at the empty table, where the guy had been, wondering how many of his friends would still be doing blow next weekend.
He tried to bring his attention back to the girl gyrating her ass against his chest, sort of an R-rated version of cardiopulmonary massage.
Marty said something to him.
It was half drunkenly slurred, half young suburban slang that Rick wasn’t privy to.
He just threw Marty a half-smile.
The girl dancing for Marty was facing Marty, her black hair cascading over Marty’s shoulders.
She wore a black thong and had a tattoo right below her bikini line.
A serpent wrapped around a book with the forked tongue as the bookmark.
Rick stared at it as it swung away and black hair replaced it in his line of sight.
He sipped his drink. Three times stronger than their first two rounds.
Two hazel eyes in between the manes of black hair looked back at him.
Swinging her butt in Marty’s face, eyes locked on Rick’s, the black-haired girl said “Nice work, superstar. Tony is a regular. Has a one-year-old at home. You saved a little girl’s daddy.”
Rick smiled. He could feel himself putting the brakes on it. The guy still might not make it.
The song ended.
“Another song, hero? The busty dancer asked. “They’re on Chuck.”
“No thanks, “ Rick said. “I’m still a bit wound up.”
“I feel ya, sugar doll,” she said. “That ish was scary. You’re a badass though. Thank you.”
The dancer kissed Rick on the forehead as Beanzo leaned over and shoved a twenty in her silver thong before she walked off.
“Fuck is wrong with you, Laitz? The house ain’t tipping them for us.”
“Sorry. I’m not well versed in Strip Club 101. And I’m a little shook.”
“The real hero is always a hero by mistake; he dreams of being an honest coward like everybody else.”
Rick turned. It was the black-haired dancer, appearing at his left side.
She was examining him with her eyes the way some of his dad’s buddies used to inspect livestock at auctions.
“Shakespeare?” Rick asked.
“Umberto Eco,” she said.
“I don’t know his work.”
The dancer smiled.
“Neither did Shakespeare. Mind if I sit?” she asked and did not wait for an answer.
Rick grabbed his drink, hit it hard. Too hard. He knew he winced.
“Hero drinks. You’ll never get another drink that strong in here...well, maybe you might, as long as Chuck is managing, but no one else will.”
“It’s really not necessary.’
“Well, that kinda thing doesn’t happen here every day, thank goddess. I’m Dakota,” the dancer said and stuck her hand out. Rick gave it a weak shake, not knowing if he was supposed to kiss it or some other etiquette of which he wasn’t aware.
“Rick”
“You have a girlfriend, Rick?”
“Fly fishing.”
“Funny,” Dakota said.”Will Miss Fishing allow you to attend a book reading with me next Saturday at Caught in a Bind?”
Rick felt like time slowed down. This wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.
At 34 years old, it was only his second time in a strip club.
His younger coworkers had cautioned him that despite appearances that might suggest so, the strippers would not, in fact, really like him.
He looked around the table. Beanzo, Marty, Hamilton, all occupied with dancers.
‘Sure,” Rick said “I’d love to. Caught in a Bind is my favorite bookstore.”
***
Rick met Dakota in the coffee shop next to Caught in a Bind.
Beanzo’s warnings that she was just looking for money echoed in Rick’s head.
Rick didn’t see Dakota until she called out to him.
She was in a corner with a gray hoodie, hood up, and sunglasses.
The look took him off guard. He didn’t expect her to be in strip club attire, but Dakota was dressed like she was hiding from someone.
She stood and hugged him.
It seemed warm and genuine, but of course, he wanted it to feel that way.
If she was scamming him or had ulterior motives, she certainly would want to give him the impression that the embrace was genuine.
“I read the book. Don’t think I’m the target audience, but it’s well written.”
Dakota leaned back in her chair and clasped her hands in front of her.
“Wowww, I’m so glad. That’s...I didn’t expect that. Wowww,” she repeated. That’s very...amazing.”
Rick’s bullshit radar went off. It was too much. She was overacting.
“Is SL McCorkle your favorite author or something?”
Dakota smiled, chuckled a bit, sipped her tea.
If she was after Rick’s anesthesiology money she sure was starting off light. He would have met her at Antonini’s or even Prime Avenue.
“Not my favorite, but I appreciate her,” Dakota said.
“I guess I’ll ask her to sign the book,” Rick said.
“I’m sure she’ll be happy to.”
Rick glanced out the window, nervous. He spent more time in the hospital and in the woods than in strictly social situations.
It seemed that people were lining up outside Caught in a Bind.
“Can I ask you what your real name is, Dakota? If you’d prefer to stick with Dakota, that’s okay, but you know my real name and…
“It’s Shannon Leigh McCorkle.”
Rick pulled a wooden coffee stirrer from a small ceramic Beatrix Potter goblet on the table of the little coffee house.
He stuck it in his mouth and chewed on it.
“So you’re...related to the author?”
“I am the author.”
Rick stood and looked out the window. The line of people, without question, was curling into the bookstore.
“You know they’re lined up to hear you read?”
“I’m not reading.”
“Big poster on the south window says “SL McCorkle reads from her debut novel.”
‘You’re the reason I’m not reading, Rick.”
Rick sat down. He could feel his spine compress, like he was slumping. It couldn’t be a good look. He straightened.
“Why did you invite me here? I mean...It’s your book signing, you’re an attractive, articulate person, you didn’t tell me it was your book...I’m sorry….it’s just…weird… now you tell me you’re not reading because of me. It’s just...strange. Doesn’t make sense.”
Dakota/Shannon took off her sunglasses.
“I never even thought of bringing a guest to the book signing. A couple of my high school friends will be here, but as far as a “date” goes, I didn’t think about it. Why bother to bring someone when I’m just going to be occupied reading and doing a Q&A? Ya know?”
“So why did you invite me and why aren’t you reading?”
She sipped her tea, then reached for Rick’s hand.
Rick let her take it. A crescent moon was tattooed on her pinkie finger.
“My mom has been going through a brutal time. Widowed this year, had a radical mastectomy four months ago, anxiety, no purpose, just confined to her house, nothing to look forward to. I was so wrapped up in releasing the book, and I’m working four nights a week, then I just started a fencing class to research my next book. I had basically decided there was nothing I could do to help my mom, so I was focusing on myself.”
Then Tony the loading powder freak has a heart attack and this sneakily attractive guy from table five comes flying over to help a complete stranger who’s flopping on the ground and barfing on himself. It was selfless, is what it was.
Some guys got mad because their table dances stopped, did you know that?
Anyway, I knew right then that I could help my mom, that I could quit being selfish. And I knew that the woman who read to me every night she was home when I was a kid, the woman who could make a whole cabin of airline passengers laugh during an oxygen demonstration, that she’d happily read her kid’s book to the world.”
“I inspired that, huh?”
“You did. One fucking hundred,” Shannon said.
Rick lost his battle to suppress his smile.
“That’s a helluva line of people interested in your book. If you have a best seller are you gonna-”
Shannon shook her head. “I knew you’d ask me that. No, I’m not gonna quit dancing. Indie authors don’t make shit compared to strippers.”
Shannon put her sunglasses on and turned to the window, looking at the growing line.
“Even indie authors who are relatively successful, at least in their home town. And I can write my whole life. While I’m young enough to dance, I’m gonna keep dancing.”
***
Photo by Timur Garifov on Unsplash
I really like this one. It’s an interesting twist.
Wow. I think i've mentioned to you before that you channel some solid Raymond Chandler in some of your stories. Snapshots of real life and real people that come from experience. Well done.