Instead of saying no thanks, I find myself reaching out my hand. I want to share something tangible with her, even if it is just a cancer stick. She pulls out a silver Zippo and lights our cigarettes. She takes small, dainty puffs. I hold the smoke in my lungs until they ache, then exhale long, wild plumes.
When we're done, she takes our butts and places them in an empty mint tin. We stand silently, side by side, for a long while. The sunlight slowly fades, and the gravestones cast longer and longer shadows. When I reach for her hand, she's suddenly shy. She lets her hair hang into her face, obscuring her big, bright eyes.
"I've got to go," she says. "I'm really sorry about your mom."
And then she walks away, a sorrowful angel with a hitch in her stride.
Book 2: The aftermath
Even when I'm dead, I'll swim through the Earth, like a mermaid of the soil, just to be next to your bones.
–Jeffrey McDaniel
Chapter 11: Amity
Almost three years later, Gran is still driving Dad's old pickup. Actually, it suits her. She could be a rancher on her way to inspect a shipment of cattle with her sharp, unwavering eyes. She sniffs the air and wrinkles her nose, as if she smells something distasteful.
"Your mother would be so disappointed," she grumbles.
"What?" I ask all innocence, although I know exactly what she's talking about. We have the same conversation almost every morning.
"The smoking," she harrumphs."Just because I don't see you doing it doesn't mean I can't smell it on you. Your grandfather smoked, and you know where it got him?"
"Dying in a nursing home on a respirator," I finish.
"Your mother was a nurse. She'd be appalled. You're leaving for that fancy college next week. Why don't you quit now?"
I don't think Gran ever knew that Mom was a secret smoker. I wonder if I'm hanging onto the smoking because it's a link to her. Or maybe it's because the girls at work didn't accept me until I began sharing their vice. I let Gran's question hang in the air. I know I should quit, but I'm just not ready.
Gran doesn't give up easily, though. "You didn't start smoking until you got that awful job. Maybe if you got a better job—a decent job—you wouldn't have to smoke."
I groan. "That awful job as you call it is the only reason I can afford to transfer to Adams College. It also paid for your air conditioning this summer."
Gran sniffs. "You don't need to pay for my air conditioning any more, girl. That's why I took that damn job as a cashier at BigMart. It's real, honest work. You don't see me shaking my bare bottom for the whole town to see."
Gran tries to maintain a stern expression; she succeeds for all of a nanosecond. We both dissolve into hysterical laughter. Then Gran grows quiet. I can tell she's thinking of Mom.
"I know your generation sees things differently," she says. "Women can do whatever they want with their bodies, and mostly that's great. But I think your mother would be very sad to see you dancing for men like a wind-up toy. She'd want you to do something with your mind."
"Don't worry, Gran. I'm going to graduate from Adams College, get into to medical school, and become an amazing pediatrician. Maybe even a pediatric surgeon. I'm taking a work study job at Adams. I won't be stripping anymore." Unless, I think, we really desperately need the money.
"I hope not," says Gran as she makes a sharp right at a neon sign that reads The Kat Club: Exclusive entertainment for fine gentlemen. I scan the parking lot for Ethan's car—an ancient red Beemer. I'm relieved that I don't see it anywhere. He's been sort of stalking me ever since I stopped seeing him last year, when he got engaged to his girlfriend. Once he figured out I was serious about giving him up cold turkey, he came a little unhinged. He still sends me ten or so texts every day. I'm proud to say I ignore them all.
What worries me more is that, every once in a while, he shows up at the club and follows me around, offering to take my virginity in a loud, booming voice until the bouncers haul him away. The only upside to his performance is that it usually triples my tips. Men are intrigued by the idea of a virgin stripper. I guess it's the old Madonna whore complex with a few new lyrics thrown in.
Gran sees me craning my neck and frowns. I told her a little about Ethan, just in case he shows up at our apartment. Ever since then, she's insisted on driving me to and from work. She pulls up as close as she can to the service entrance. "Be careful," she says, kissing me on the cheek. "I'm so glad you'll be starting school next week and getting away from this place."
"Goodbye Gran. I l-l-love you." I stammer for the first time in weeks.
I hope it isn't some kind of omen.
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When the deejay asks for Tawny to come out and show her claws, I stalk down the runway to the damaged-girl ballad Closer by Nine Inch Nails. I feel the heat of male desire on my bare skin and smile like a hungry cat. Yes, I'm ashamed to admit it, but I sort of like stripping. I love the freedom of dancing without a limp and the power I have over the audience.
I even love my stripper name. Tawny, my alter ego, is a leopard goddess with sinuous limbs and an insatiable need to be worshipped. I imagine men crawling to her fire-lit temple as I gyrate around the stage and flirt with the pole, whipping the audience into a frenzy. I really hope Ethan isn't in out there. He gets a little extra crazy whenever he sees my act, which is ironic since he's the one who pushed me to work at the Kat Club in the first place.
Now I embrace the pole as if it were my boyfriend. I wrap my arms and legs around it and move my hips in a figure eight. I can practically hear the customers breathing as one huge, horny collective organism. When I finally leap and execute a one-legged spin-and-drop, green bills pop up like crocuses in the spring. I stuff the moist bills—the customers' sweaty offerings—into my garter, do a couple more tricks, and strut off the stage.
The girls greet me in the dressing room with smiles and friendly catcalls. At first, they didn't know what to make of me—a fresh-faced honor student with a tentative way of speaking. We finally got to know each other over cigarettes in the alleyway behind the bar. Now they call me College Girl, which I like much better than Amityville Horror.
As I'm touching up my makeup, Syndy—a tiny woman of twenty-five in a Catholic school girl outfit—taps me lightly on the shoulder.
"We know you're leaving for school soon. The girls and I wanted to give you this." She smiles, revealing a small gap between two white front teeth, and holds out an envelope. "It's a going away present."
I open it and stammer my heartfelt thanks. Inside is the one thing every stripper wants and needs: a thick wad of cash.
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For me, the worst part of being a stripper isn't taking my clothes off. It's interacting with the customers and struggling not to stammer while making the very smallest of small talk. In a lot of ways, the onstage show is just an advertisement for my charms. The most profitable part of my job—for me and the club—is chatting up the customers and encouraging them to buy me overpriced drinks.
When I emerge into the lounge area wearing a slightly less revealing version of my kitty cat costume, I scan the room for my kind of customer. Basically, I'm looking for a shy, quiet man who would rather gaze at a pretty, younger woman than try to have a conversation. He might be an engineer or a software developer or just a guy with bad social skills.
In the dim light of the bar, I spot a likely target. A heavyset man with a rounded, muscular back looms over his beer. His slouchy posture and thick, curly hair suggest a bear just out of hibernation. I slip into the seat beside him and say a breathless hello, mumbling something about being thirsty after my performance. The bear takes the bait.
"What's your poison?" he asks in a voice that's both tough and barely audible. Definitely the strong, silent type, I think.
"Mountain Dew," I say, fake smiling.
Jody, the bartender, delivers my drink with a wink and a genuine smile. She always looks out for the girls, keeping us appraised of po
tential creeps and putting aside our take of the drink bills.
As I expected, the bear sips his beer while his eyes linger over my face, chest, and legs. It's a little uncomfortable to be stared at with such intensity. I tell myself it's no different than stripping for a crowd. I cross and uncross my legs and deliver occasional eye contact the way the other girls taught me.
The bear clears his throat, and his eyes narrow as if he's sizing up a potential combatant. This is not the usual reaction I get from customers, so I turn around to see what he's reacting to and...oh shit. It's Ethan. His hair is matted, and his eyes are wild. He's drunk, and he's probably been drunk for at least a day. I quickly signal Jody.
Ethan puts a heavy, proprietary hand on my neck and addresses the bear. "Did you know this kid's a virgin? A stripper-virgin, can you believe that shit? The Kat Club's own holy fucking Mary."
"Ethan," I say, searching his face for signs of the witty man-boy I once found so compelling. "You have a fiancée. Go home. Be with her."
"Yes, I have a fiancée. A wonderful fiancée. But I also miss my friend. What the fuck happened to you?"
As Jody and the bouncer—a two hundred-fifty pound slab of tattooed meat named Alfredo—close in on Ethan, I murmur, "I grew up."
/////////////////////////
Are you sure you don't need a ride home? texts Gran.
No thanks. I reply. I'm taking a cab to Maggie's place for a late night goodbye gathering.
Be safe! she writes.
I tuck my phone into my bag. I'm already in the back of a taxi. According to Maggie, Ethan is sleeping it off at his fiancée's apartment. I have nothing to worry about stalker-wise—at least for tonight.
At last, the cabbie drops me at Maggie's crumbling rental on Lake Everclear. Summer is ending, and everyone—at least, everyone with a future—is preparing to leave Triple Marsh. Miss Maggie herself will be heading to New York City in just a few days. She's majoring in film, and she's already cobbled together funding to shoot a pilot based on something she wrote for class.
I climb four flights of stairs and slap away clouds of mosquitoes that seem to be breeding in the stairwell. Maggie's door is ajar, and the sounds of a small, happy party reach me at the end of the hallway. When I enter her apartment, I find her holding court in the kitchen, wearing a green velvet cocktail dress. She's the lovely, vibrant center of about ten gorgeous men between the ages of twenty and forty. Her living room is full of couples and pseudo-couples, reclining on cushions and kissing.
This is one of my last nights in Triple Marsh for the foreseeable future. I tell myself I should have fun. I glance at the happy couples and consider peeling off one of Maggie's incredible specimens for a random make out session. No, I think, my heart just isn't in it. It's three a.m., and all I can think about is how, in just a few days, I'm going to be more than a thousand miles from my parents' graves.
I brace myself to spend at least an hour going through the social motions—happy get-to-know-you chatter, catching up with Maggie, introductions to her growing circle of friends—when it occurs to me that no one actually noticed me walk in.
Slowly and carefully, I leave the party and creep back down the stairs. I look up directions to Forever Acres and see that's it's only a mile away. I decide to walk it. The cab to Maggie's has already put me twenty bucks into the hole.
/////////////////////////
A mile on pavement is a shockingly long distance in stripper heels. I can feel the vinyl rubbing against by skin with every step. But I keep at it, and soon I'm rewarded with a familiar sight—the arched entrance to Forever Acres.
I pass through the entryway undisturbed. The guard who mans the kiosk—he must be at least seventy—is snoring lightly. By the bright light of the waxing moon, I make my way to my parents' graves. I haven't been here for at least a month, but I still have that strange feeling of expectation, as if something special—or something life changing—is going to happen to me here.
I know this feeling is ridiculous. It's all because of that guy I met here almost three years ago, right after my parents died. I remember him telling me that he'd lost his mom to ovarian cancer. I also remember how he sobbed on my shoulder, and how I ached with sympathy and understanding.
But instead of talking with him at any length or even getting his last name so I could find him on Facebook, I ran away. I guess it was because I'd just started stripping, and I felt strangely unworthy. Laird—I think that was his name—had seemed so solid and wholesome. Anything I could have told him about myself would have been a disappointment.
Still, every time I visit my parents, I also think of him. I wonder how he's doing, and if I'll ever run into him again. Sometimes I even imaging an alternate reality in which he's the first boyfriend I take home to Mom and Dad. Totally stupid, I know. I watch the stars for a while and then deposit myself on a nearby bench. I say a silent farewell to my parents as the dark night sky lightens slowly into day.
Chapter 12: Laird
I'm standing in a long line of about thirty other men. We're all sweating in the late-summer heat, and we're all eager to get inside, where it's cool and full of shadows. I keep my eyes trained on the pavement, hoping not to see anyone I know. I've avoided coming here all summer. I'm still not sure it was a good idea.
As I wait, I imagine Amity the way she was the last time I saw her, just a month after her parents had died. She seemed young for her age, kind, and slightly awkward. And classically beautiful, with a sweet, open face that concealed nothing. I hope that all this time trying to survive on her own hasn't changed her, but I know that's wishful thinking.
When Amity walked away from me at the cemetery, I didn't run after her or try to get in touch. Any friendship we developed would have been a poor, fragile thing built on a foundation of lies. I don't think I could have brought myself to tell her about my role in the accident that killed her mother. Every minute I spent in her presence would have been a terrible reminder that I was powerless to do anything for her, except hold her hand.
Soon, though, that's all going to change. When I turn twenty-one next week, I'll have access to part of my trust fund. I'll use that money—anonymously, of course—to help Amity's dreams come true. To do this right, I'm going to have to learn everything I can about her—all her hopes and fears and strengths and weaknesses. I want to be sure she'll spend my money on herself and her education, and not on drugs or a greedy boyfriend. My plan is simple and elegant. I'm going to become her friend, change her life, and then get the fuck out of it.
Someone is tapping me on the shoulder. I turn around and see a balding man in khakis and a light blue polo glaring at me. "Hey, buddy, move it along, would ya?"
I realize I've reached the front of the line. "Sorry, man."
I cross a small pathway to the entrance of the Kat Club. The bouncer rolls his eyes at my fake ID, but lets me in anyway. After all, I'm Josiah Conroy's only son—unless he's left a few love children here and there that I don't know about.
Inside, I settle myself at the end of the bar and wait uneasily. I'm not sure I'm ready for what I'm about to see. But I want to get a better understanding of what Amity's life is like, and I believe this strip club will give me at least a big chunk of the whole, unvarnished truth.
/////////////////////////
I barely recognize Amity as she struts down the runway. Her face is heavily made up like an anime doll, and her body is all attitude and aggressive edges. The soft, gentle young girl who mourned her parents is now locked inside a hard protective shell.
Amity's dance routine is more gymnastic than sensual. She works the pole as if it's a sporting event, showing off her strength and flexibility. I admire her athleticism and the discipline it must have taken to develop such long, lean muscles, but I feel no heat, no desire. As far as my body is concerned, she could be my sister. I am enormously relieved. My life is complicated enough already.
My phone vibrates against my leg. I fish it out and read the text.
In town, visiting parents. Want to meet up? Em
Ember is my addiction and my kryptonite. Every several months, I break down and see her. Or, if I wait too long, she gets impatient, tracks me down, and shows up wherever I happen to be. We come together and push each other away in an endless cycle of need, greed, and self hatred. We're not officially together, but I haven't really found anyone else, either. Ember attacks sex with a mixture of passion and desperation that drives me insane. None my college hook ups have ever compared.
I glance down at her text and remind myself how she hung all over my father at Mom's funeral, how our fight on the way to Deegan's house killed Amity's mother, and how she flirted with my father even after I warned her about him. No, I decide, I'm not going to see her tonight.
I look up to watch the rest of Amity's routine, but it's too late. She's gone.
/////////////////////////
When Amity emerges into the lounge part of the club, she seems smaller and more vulnerable than she did onstage. Her big, painted eyes look huge and childlike. Her long, limber legs appear gawky and fragile, like a fawn's. She doesn't belong here, I think.
I hide behind my beer and watch her approach groups of men, obviously encouraging them to buy her drinks. Her smiles are pro forma and do not touch her haunted eyes. It takes her several tries before she finds someplace to land. It shouldn't take an objectively lovely twenty-year-old stripper that long to find a mark. I don't think she's very good at this.
When she doesn't think anyone is looking, she closes her eyes, perhaps to imagine she's somewhere else, someplace safe. I wish I knew where that is.
Amends: A Love Story Page 8
