by Lexie Ray
Did Cocoa do anything but work? Besides the out-of-date magazines, there weren’t any personal items—no family photos or pictures of Cocoa with possible boyfriends, no phone lying around, no books or movies or CDs.
Were all the rooms like this?
I sat down on the bottom bunk and crossed my legs. Then I uncrossed them. Then I crossed them again. It was too quiet. Too still.
I always imagined how amazing it would be to live somewhere away from my sisters and las primas and the babies and Jimmy and all of the crew and gang. I imagined that I’d sleep until noon or later, lounge around in a silky teddy without anyone to ogle me, take baths for as long as I wanted, and just generally enjoy myself.
Now I realized that I had become so used to the crowd, clutter, and racket that I couldn’t simply enjoy being by myself. I was fidgety and nervous, wondering how long I’d be in the room.
I pushed myself up off the bunk bed and turned on the television to have a little bit of background noise. When the screen lit up and the cacophony of a sitcom about a riotous family filled the room, I felt a little better. It reminded me of home—the babies squalling, Jimmy hollering about something having to do about the gang, the female contingency squawking at each other and shrieking with laughter.
I missed them. Plain and simple.
Even Jimmy, despite what he’d done. I’d gotten so used to him that it was scary to be in this new situation.
I forced myself back down on the bunk bed and watched the people on the TV flit around from one-liner to one-liner. The writing was pretty snappy and the jokes were crisp, if a little acerbic. I wondered what it would be like to have a laugh track behind everything that had happened back in East Harlem.
SORPRESITA: What’s this needle doing here, Jimmy?
Jimmy looks up, addled and confused.
LAUGH TRACK.
SOPRESITA: You can’t leave this lying around, Jimmy! What would happen if one of the babies got their hands on this?
JIMMY: They’d cry, or something.
LAUGH TRACK.
I shuddered and tried to think of something different, rolling over to face the wall. I closed my eyes for just a minute, and opened them, feeling groggy, when I heard the door creak open.
“Hey,” Cocoa said softly, closing the door behind her. I could hear movement and activity—voices, lots of them—out in the hallway.
“I didn’t mean to wake you up,” Cocoa continued, slipping off her black shoes and sighing as she wiggled her bare toes—each nail painted in a bright red—on the carpet.
“I didn’t mean to fall asleep,” I said, sitting up. The sitcom about the big family had finished God only knew how long ago, and the TV was showing infomercials now.
“Your body probably needed it,” Cocoa said, reaching back behind herself and letting out a breath of air. She slipped her strapless bra out of the bottom of her shirt.
“Is your shift over?” I asked as she rolled her neck around, popping it.
“Yes, ma’am,” Cocoa said. “Lord, what a crazy night. We get them like that, sometimes. No explanation for it. Just all of the high rollers come all at the same time, and we’ve gotta run around, doing everything. People in, people out. It’s all we can do to keep up.”
“We?” I repeated.
“Mama’s girls,” Cocoa said, beaming. “Meaning you, Pumpkin, if you’d like to stay here.”
It wasn’t a question of what I’d like to do. I’d like nothing more than to go back to East Harlem, slip into bed with Jimmy, and pretend none of today ever happened. But I couldn’t do that anymore. Not if I wanted to stay alive. I didn’t have a place to go. It was become one of Mama’s girls—whatever that entailed—or live on the streets.
The way Cocoa smiled at me—sympathetic and knowing—made me realize that she knew exactly how limited my choices were.
“We’re like a sisterhood here,” she said. “We have roommates and everything. You’ve come to the right place if you’re looking to get a new start. Lots of girls—myself included—came here looking for exactly the same thing.”
And did they find it? I didn’t dare to ask, staring instead down at Cocoa’s red toenails. I didn’t want to know whether I’d find a new start, afraid that the answer would be “no.”
“Now that we’re all closed up, Mama wanted me to show you around,” Cocoa said. “Let me take a shower real quick and get on something more comfortable. God, this uniform smells like onions.”
She shucked it off right then and there, making me blush and turn abruptly toward the bunk bed. My sisters and las primas had done it to me often enough, but Cocoa was practically a stranger.
“Oh, you’re shy,” she cooed, giggling. “I’m sorry, Pumpkin. I’ll try to give you more warning next time.”
“Okay,” I said.
“Why don’t you unpack your bag and put it in that spare dresser over there in the other closet?” Cocoa said. “If you have anything to hang up, grab as many of my spare hangers as you need.”
The door opened and shut and the room was quiet again except for the murmur of the television. I turned back around slowly and stooped to pick up my bag.
There wasn’t much in there—a few pairs of jeans, a spare pair of sneakers, and perhaps half a dozen shirts besides a handful of underwear and another bra. There was nothing to put on hangers and barely enough to fill a single drawer in the dresser. It was depressing to see my life reduced to a single drawer. Even with all of their faults, I’d never lacked for much when I was living with the female contingency. Of course things went wrong, but my existence there hadn’t been summed up by a sad stack of clothes in a single drawer.
A tear slipped down my cheek and I hurriedly wiped it away as the door opened again.
Cocoa had, thankfully, changed into her fresh clothes in the bathroom, sparing me another nude show. The skin of her dark cheeks was flushed pinkish, belying the high temperature of the water she’d used to scrub herself.
“Ready?” she asked cheerfully, trading her flip-flops for a pair of worn slippers. She glanced down at the contents of my sole dresser drawer before I could push it shut.
“Don’t worry,” Cocoa said. “We’ll get you everything you need tomorrow. Mama will want to take you shopping, too. You’ll need a uniform and everything.”
I followed Cocoa out into the hallway, which was abuzz with beautiful girls in various states of undress. One girl with pale blonde hair sauntered completely naked down the hallway toward the bathroom.
“Look at this piece of ass!” Cocoa hollered, laughing before she slapped the girl directly on her butt.
She cried out, her eyes twinkling. “Baby, you know just how to give it to me,” the girl said.
“Blue, I’d like you to meet Mama’s newest girl, Pumpkin,” Cocoa said, extending her arm to me. “Pumpkin, please excuse Blue’s nakedness. She just doesn’t know how to act around people sometimes.”
“I was raised in a barn,” Blue said solemnly before breaking into a wide grin. “Wrong. It was a trailer. Happy you’re here.”
“Thanks,” I said, trying to look anywhere except her boobs or pussy, which was next to impossible.
“Aw, she’s shy,” Blue said, wrinkling her nose. “We’ll wear it out of you, baby.”
Walking down the hall, Cocoa continued to introduce me to a number of girls whose names I struggled to remember—Shimmy, Daisy, Cream, Sparkle, Pipes. They all had kind words for me, welcoming me into the fold. Being around so many bodies was making me feel better and better—head and shoulders above how lost I’d been alone in Cocoa’s room. This kind of din was something I was used to.
“So this is the boarding house area of the nightclub,” Cocoa said, stopping at the end of the hall and turning back to look at all the girls hooting and hollering and joking around with one another. “Right now, we have thirty-tree girls. You make thirty-four. That’s good. I like even numbers. Makes roommates easier to pair up.”
“Do you have a roommate?” I asked,
flicking my eyes up to meet hers briefly.
“I do now,” Cocoa said, sweet as sugar. “Mama likes to keep me in a room of my own so I can be available anytime a new girl comes on. I’ve been here the longest, so I can make sure the new girls know the ropes.”
Cocoa pushed open the door behind us to reveal the staircase I’d climbed when I first got there.
“This is the way down to the nightclub’s floor level,” Cocoa said as we descended. “We all live up there, but work down here. Working down here is how we afford to live up there. We don’t pay a cent of money in room or board, but we’re expected to work at least five days a week. Most girls—myself included—work every chance they get. The more you work, the more you get paid.”
The nightclub, which had been buzzing with activity when I first arrived, was dark and quiet. It had an almost eerie quality about it, like something should be happening even though it was silent. I longed to hear some strain of music, just a couple beats of a song, but there was nothing.
“You hungry?” Cocoa asked over her shoulder as we walked across the shadowed dance floor.
“I’m okay.”
“Well, come see the kitchen, anyways,” Cocoa said, pushing open a swinging door. I could still faintly smell food, which made my stomach grumble, but every surface was clean and gleaming, an expanse of stainless steel.
“The nightclub also serves food,” Cocoa explained, touching one of many skillets hanging from the wall. “We have a different chef’s special every night as well as a bunch of tapas. You know what tapas are?”
“Little foods,” I said, nodding. “Like snacks.”
“Exactly,” Cocoa said. “Little foods that we hope keep customers drinking but at the same time soak up the alcohol so they don’t get too wasted. Tapas.”
Cocoa opened one of two fridges. “This is our fridge,” she said. “Mama keeps it supplied with everything you could possibly want to cook or eat. You can also use your tip money on snacks and stuff. Whatever you want. Just put your name on it.”
“So, I keep my tip money?” I asked. Maybe I send some back to my sisters and las primas, to help take care of the babies. Or maybe the gang would just take it, like they took so much already from my family. Or college—I could save for college. The idea of having my own cash flow excited me.
“Anything the customer gives you extra is yours,” Cocoa said. “You’ll turn around and give it to Mama for safe keeping, in her office. She works as a bank there, and you can withdraw money whenever you like.”
“Okay.”
“You ever waitressed before, Pumpkin?”
I shook my head. I’d never actually had a job before. My sisters always told me that Mami and Papi had been adamant about getting my education, so I wasn’t even allowed to think about getting a job until I finished high school.
I’d really dropped the ball on that one.
“There’s nothing to it,” Cocoa said. “The only thing you have to be is pretty and outgoing, and the tips will start pouring in.” She looked at me briefly. “You’ve already got pretty going for you. All we have to do is work on outgoing.”
“I’m kind of quiet,” I said, shrugging. It was my nature, not something I simply chose to be.
“As an understatement,” Cocoa said, snorting. “Now, come on. I want to show you something else.”
She led me out of the kitchen and to another set of stairs partially obscured by a long bar. A beer or five would be nice right about now, but I’d never ask for it. Not in a million years.
“You like to party, Pumpkin?” Cocoa asked, noticing my lingering look at the bar. “You don’t strike me as the type.”
I shrugged. “A little.”
“Some girls like to, here,” Cocoa said. “And never turn down a drink if a customer offers to buy you one. If you really don’t want it, you can take a couple sips and give it to Blue to dispose of. She’s one of the bartenders.”
We started up the steps.
“Cocoa? Pumpkin? Where are you girls going?”
We turned to see Mama emerge from the office, dressed in a terrycloth robe. She’d shed her cocktail dress that she’d worn for the night already, but her hair and makeup were both still intact.
“I’m going to show Pumpkin upstairs,” Cocoa said. “You know. Give her a real tour of the place.”
Mama raised her eyebrows. “Well, as soon as you come back downstairs, why don’t both of you step into my office,” she said, jerking her thumb over her back. Warm light from inside the office bathed the darkened floor, a yellow wedge in the inky blackness.
“Sure thing, Mama,” Cocoa said easily. “Let’s go, Pumpkin.”
I continued to follow her up the stairs, wondering what the exchange between her and Mama was about.
“This is upstairs,” Cocoa said, her voice a little softer than it had been in the kitchen. It was a long hallway, much like the boarding house area on the opposite side of the building, with all of the doors closed. There wasn’t a single sound up there.
I took it that upstairs meant a lot more than simply being at the top of a set of stairs. Her voice was respectful, almost reverent, but there was an edge to it. Upstairs might have been a place, but I suspected it was also a practice, of sorts.
When Cocoa opened the first door, my suspicions were confirmed. It was furnished too sumptuously to be a bedroom for anyone actually staying in the boarding house, velvet curtains obscuring the window, a big bed raised on a platform in the middle of a room, its coverings gleaming in the mood lighting.
This was as good as an office for the type of business it hosted.
“You sleep with the customers,” I said, my voice hushed.
“Smart girl,” Cocoa said. “You’re correct. Upstairs business is part of business. We make the real money up here. Mama gets a cut, of course, but you can make some serious cash.”
I pressed my lips together and kept my face carefully blank. Was this what I’d fallen into? Out of my home with my family, away from my abusive addict boyfriend and into a life of prostitution?
If Mami and Papi of the airport red kisses could see me now. The thought was a bitter, confused one—they wouldn’t likely know who I was if they could see me now. They hadn’t seen me since I was very young—too young to form accurate memories of them.
They’d wanted me to stay in New York to get my education, but instead, I’d dropped out of school to flee from my boyfriend and taken up residence in an apparent whorehouse. The thought of it was so ludicrous and desperate that I wanted to shout and scream and laugh and cry all at once.
But I didn’t. I never made scenes. I was too shy.
I pressed my lips together and looked at the fine comforter, tracing the lines of the duvet with my eyes.
“Pumpkin?” Cocoa prompted gently. “Are you okay?”
“Yes,” I said, my voice barely above a whisper.
“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to,” Cocoa said, her voice grave. “If you don’t want to have upstairs business, you don’t have to. You can make plenty of money downstairs, just not the kind you can upstairs.”
“I’ll think about it,” I said, and turned around to go.
“Just give it time, Pumpkin,” Cocoa said, following me out the door and shutting it behind us. “I know you’re coming from something bad. But give life a chance to get better for you.”
My eyes had been open this entire time. I’d seen the way Mama’s girls dressed, the way they lived, and the way they worked. I observed. It was what I did.
And I wasn’t sure that Mama’s nightclub was going to be the better thing my life was waiting for.
We walked back downstairs and Cocoa knocked on the door to Mama’s office. Mama called for us to enter, so we did. It was a small, cluttered space, ledger books stacked to the ceiling. Mama sat behind a desk covered with papers, counting bills from a money box. She stopped when we entered and snapped the box closed.
“Well, Pumpkin,” she said, looking up at
me and beaming. “What do you think?”
“It’s nice,” I said simply, an ambiguous answer that I learned could easily throw people off of your true thoughts.
“Thank you, honey,” Mama said. “I’ve worked hard to have a place like this my whole life. I keep it up as best as I can.”
“Mama, about the upstairs business,” Cocoa said, clasping her hands and leaning forward earnestly. “Pumpkin wants to take it slow before she gets into it. Give herself some time to think about it.”
Mama’s brown eyes flicked back to me, calculating, shrewd.
“I think that’s prudent,” she said. “Test the waters before you dive in. Give yourself a chance to get adjusted.”
Mama’s eyes fell from my face to my neck, carefully noting the bruises around my throat. I resisted the urge to cover them standing as still as I could.
“Let me ask you something,” Mama said. “Do those marks have anything to do with your decision?”
I swallowed. I couldn’t talk about this. It was too fresh. I didn’t think I could ever talk about it.
“In a way,” I said finally. It wasn’t all the way true, but I didn’t know how else to explain it. I didn’t want to get into the fact that I would be a disappointment to my absent parents, that I missed my obnoxious female contingency, that I wanted to go back to the man who tried to strangle me.
That I thought this was all a big mistake.
“I understand,” Mama said. “We’ll start you off tomorrow night then. You’ll shadow Cocoa to learn the ropes—of the downstairs business, not the upstairs business.”
“Okay,” I said, staring at my feet.
“Mama, Pumpkin is gonna need a few things,” Cocoa said. “She came to us with a few clothes, but she’ll need to go shopping.”
Mama clapped her hands, her eyes gleaming. “Sugar, we’re gonna get you all dolled up,” she said. “Make sure everyone at this establishment knows what a fine ass you have. Cocoa, honey, I don’t wanna knock you off your pedestal, but I think Pumpkin can give you a run for your money.”
“Aw, Mama,” Cocoa said, laughing. “You’re gonna start a roommate rivalry.”
