“Evelyn Barns what exactly do you have going on that your brother can’t stay in the same room with you. He doesn’t need to be babysat, he’s a year younger than you. You promised him, and that’s all he’s been talking about for the last month. He even got a job at the mall near there…” my mom added, her voice dropping to a whisper when someone else entered the room.
“Mom…”
“No. Evelyn don’t! You pull this a week before he’s supposed to come up there. You suggested it. He’s all set, so now you deal with it. Don’t be so selfish! We’re paying a lot of money for you to be there yourself…”
“Selfish!?” I exploded at her accusation, my anger stemming more from the fact that my sad excuse hadn’t worked as well as I’d hoped. “You’re the fucking selfish one! Pushing him off on me because you don’t want to deal with him anymore!”
“Evelyn!”
“Don’t Evelyn me, Mom! The only reason I offered him my room is so he could get away from you two. Worst fucking parents ever!” I screamed, pressing my thumb into the end key on the phone a little harder than necessary.
It pissed me off even more that I couldn’t slam it down on her so that she heard ringing in her ears. She couldn’t make me let him live here for the summer! I didn’t want company…Period!
My fingers trembled as I dialed Becca’s phone number, hoping that she would answer. Her voicemail chimed in, and I jumped as a beep sounded at the same time. She was calling me back. I switched the line over, reggae music filling my ear when it connected.
“Becca,” she answered, humming along to the song playing in the background.
“Hey Becca…it’s…”
“Eve…yeah I know… Caller I.D., “ she giggled, mumbling something I couldn’t understand.
“What…?”
“Nothing I was just talking to…a friend… What’s up?”
“Oh…you have company… I was just…seeing if you wanted to chill…but I’ll catch you another…”
“No…! Come on over….” she invited, laughing at something the other person said. “I’ll be free by the time you get here. We can go do something,” she suggested, waiting for my response.
“Sure!” I exclaimed a little too quickly, grabbing my keys before she’d even hung up.
I needed something to take my mind off the argument I’d just had with my mother. Fun was in order.
Chapter 8*
Heading up the stairwell to Becca’s apartment I heard voices coming my way. I didn’t know if I was overreacting or if it was the jitters from taking so much Adderall, but one of them sounded like Jeremy. I froze with one foot up and one foot down, undecided on if I should turn around and go hide in my car until they were gone. I’d decided to forget about Jeremy and his stupid party, but being in this building didn’t help. I’d fretted the entire way over, that I’d see him and now my fear was coming true. Two guys appeared at the top of the stairs, and I looked up with a forced smile, my heart hammering in my chest so loud I could no longer decipher their words.
Jeremy was in back, laughing at something the other guy said, his eyes running appreciatively over my curvaceous figure as they descended. I continued up slowly, turning sideways as we passed, my eyes meeting his for a moment. Jeremy stopped on the same step I did, studying me for a moment while the other guy continued down. His fingers brushed the tip of my chin and he paused, that conniving boyish grin spread on his lips.
“Hey beautiful… What’s your name?” he asked, his attention fully on me now that his friend had disappeared.
He doesn’t even fucking remember me!? Sure, I’ve gained a few pounds, but my face hasn’t change THAT much….
“Go fuck yourself!” I spat out, slamming my knee into his crotch before he could react.
He doubled over, a gurgled scream in his throat as he lurched for the railing to keep his balance. I side stepped up, the smile on my face spread wide as I continued on to the end of the hall. That was definitely worth a few pounds gained. I hadn’t hurt him as much as I wanted to, and certainly not as badly as he’d hurt me, but it still felt good.
I slowed as the door to Becca’s apartment opened, a dark skinned black guy with long thick dreds filling the frame. I could hear Becca’s voice coming from the inside, telling him she would see him tomorrow. I stood aside as he passed me in the narrow hall, my eyes glued to the floor to avoid his questioning gaze. He didn’t even look like he went to college…
What was he doing here…? Her boyfriend maybe….
“Who is it?” Becca called when I knocked twice, my hand already turning the knob before she invited me in.
“Just me,” I smiled as I poked my head into the door, my gaze finding her in the living room, perched on the edge of the sofa.
“Lock it,” she pointed to the door, shuffling through a stack of Ziploc bags on the table.
I did as she asked, moving slowly forward until I stood at the back of the sofa watching her. There were at least fifty different pills filling the Ziploc bags all piled together at one end, and she was sorting them according to color and size on the other. I watched for a moment in silence, moving around to sit on the arm until she noticed me again.
“Summer is shit,” she grumbled, tossing a bag of little yellow pills just in front of me –on the coffee table.
“Are those…drugs…” I swallowed hard, reaching out to pick up a bag of little blue pills that looked just like the one’s she’d given me.
“Adderall…” she pointed to the bag I held, and then to another stack of blue ones. “Blue Devils…stimulates you like E, but brings your heart rate down so far that you won’t be dancing on any coffee tables,” she laughed looking pointedly at me. “Gives you a: Don’t fuck with me kind of vibe, but keeps you mellow enough to not care if anyone does. Those…” She pointed to two different stacks of little white tablets. “PCP and LSD… Both will give you a wicked out of body experience, but once you start coming back you better have some weed to chill you the fuck out because you’ll end up going ape shit on everyone around you. Should be red…for anger,” she smiled, grabbing a bag of little green capsules. “These are my fav,” she paused taking one from the bag and pinching it between her thumb and index finger. “Meth… basically speed with a little extra kick. You think Adderall gives you energy…take one of these babies. You’ll be going for hours and hours instead of minutes. A rush you get addicted to if you aren’t careful. Plus…the hallucinations that come with it…not so pretty sometimes,” she sighed, pulling up the hem of her tank top.
I gasped at the jagged scar that ran from her last rib down, disappearing under the waistline of her shorts. It wasn’t an angry red like the still fresh tiny cuts on my leg, but it was pink enough to stand out against her pale white skin, ruining any chance she had of wearing a two piece.
“I thought there was a worm inside me. I could feel it…crawling through my stomach and in between my ribs. I took a steak knife and tried to cut it out. Almost bled to death….right there,” she pointed to a light brown stain I hadn’t noticed in the carpet –just in front of the coffee table.
“Damn…” I whispered, making a mental note to stay far away from those.
“Yeah…that’s what I said when I woke up in a hospital two days later after receiving two blood transfusions. Damn…” she laughed as she dropped her shirt, picking up one last Ziploc bag. “My best seller…” she opened her eyes wide, her thumb drawing across her throat as if she’d slit it. “Rohypnol…”
“The…date rape drug?!” I questioned, unable to hide the horror from my voice. “Who the hell would buy those…?”
“Guys…lots of them…you’d be surprised. Jocks, nerds, techies…doesn’t matter. They all want to get laid, and this little sucker…” she plucked the bag, dropping it back into the stack with the others. “That’ll make it ten times easier.”
“So you help them…? Men…rape…us…women…?” I barely breathed out, my throat tight as my gaze ran over all the different pil
ls. “You’re…?”
“A dealer, and that’s all I am. I sell for personal use only. What they do with it after the money is in my hands is no concern of mine.”
“But…”
“It pays for college,” Becca interrupted me, pointing to the bag of Adderall I still had. “Five hundred dollars.”
I looked at the bag, trying to count the number of pills in it, before looking at her open mouthed.
“But…you gave me a bag like this with about the same amount of pills…”
“Yeah…I know. That’s how much you owe me for it. Five hundred dollars. I normally don’t do credit…ever…but you needed them, and besides…I know where you live,” she smiled, pulling out a box of rubber bands from a wicker basket under the table.
“Five…five hundred dollars!?” I gasped as I watched her wrap each stack of bags together in a bundle. “I thought… I thought you were just being nice… I thought they were…”
“Free…?” Becca laughed lightly, her head shaking as she tossed each bundle into the basket. “Um…I can’t afford free. I sell because it’s the only way I can pay tuition and still take classes. My cut is forty percent. Not much after he takes his sixty.”
“Who…? The guy with the dreds?”
“Yeah…” she shrugged, folding a blanket on top of the basket so that the bundles were hidden.
“But…I don’t have five hundred dollars. My parents send me a hundred dollars every two weeks, and I only have twenty of that left until next Friday. I…went shopping…” I added, gesturing to the too tight outfit I wore.
The clothes fit a lot bigger when I’d first bought them. The shorts barely buttoned now, but the ballooning tank top covered the slightly mushy belly I sported, perfectly.
“Time for a new wardrobe,” Becca commented, eyeing the red rings the shorts had left on my bare thighs. “Speaking of which… I know a way you can make some money. You could work with me tonight.”
“Selling!?” I squeaked before she could finished, my mouth dropping open as she stood, stretching.
“No…not selling. You’re too much of a good girl for that. Follow me. I think I have some clothes that will fit you.”
In her bedroom I waited while she pulled out various sparkling outfits, all of them made of less material than what I was wearing now. She checked the tags in the last three she pulled from her closet, throwing me a little black two piece number.
“What am I going to do in this?! Strip?!” I exclaimed, holding the sequined bra top over my chest.
“Exactly…” Becca nodded, hanging the rest of the outfits back in the closet –except for a purple one she held up to herself.
“What?! I can’t…I can’t strip! You’re a stripper too!?”
“It pays the bills Eve,” she reminded me with a shake of her head, pulling her tank top off and throwing it on the bed.
I swallowed hard as I stared at her tiny breasts, her long red hair covering pale puffy pink nipples as she bent to remove the shorts she wore. She stood in front of me in just her panties, unashamed that she was practically naked in my presence.
“I’m going to shower, and then you can go. I like to show up completely dressed. Sometimes you can grab an extra spot on stage if you show up in between shifts. Five minutes,” she promised, heading into the bathroom, her hair tossed over her shoulder.
I tried to think of a way to back out of going to work with Becca, but there was no way around it. I owed her five hundred dollars. She was being nice about it now, but I wasn’t so sure she would be that way if I didn’t pay up. An hour later I was riding in the passenger seat of her car, my hair straightened and shellacked into a style I could have never created on my own. Dark black eye shadow smudged my features, my face and body sparkling from the body glitter she’d covered me with me. I’d popped two Adderall before we left, but it was the fat ass blunt we shared on the way there that calmed the butterflies in my stomach. By the time I stepped from the car, the idea of stripping seemed like fun. Kind of…
Chapter 9*
The club wasn’t even full yet, and the scene was loud. Half naked gyrating bodies glistened as several strippers wormed their way up and down shiny metal poles positioned on stands throughout the club. There were four different seating sections, two on either side of a main section of round black tables and chairs that faced center stage. It wasn’t a ritzy club, but it was upscale enough that most of the men here wore suits. We’d entered through the side to avoid the line out front, but Becca was snaking her way through the patrons, heading straight for the bar. I followed, my arms crossed in embarrassment over my bare tummy. The high waist sequined bottoms I wore, dug into the crack of my ass and pinched in all the wrong places when I walked. It was more than uncomfortable. It hurt!
“Eve, Troy, Troy, Eve,” Becca introduced me to a tall dark haired man -dressed in an all black suit-standing at the bar alone.
His dark eyes looked almost sinister as he met my gaze for a moment, his eyes traveling the length of my body before settling on my face again. A smile finally tugged at the corner of his lips, and the menacing features I coward from softened. He was much older than either of us. His perfectly manicured nails, expensive clothing, and professionally done hair told me that he was probably the owner of The Sweet Spot.
“So you want to dance tonight? Give it a try?” he asked, holding his hand out for me to take.
I could only nod as he spun me slowly, admiring my ass for longer than necessary.
“There’s normally an audition process, but I owe Becca a favor. When I said cash in anytime I didn’t expect her to just show up with you…”
“If it’s not a good time,” I jumped at the escape, my gaze slipping to the dancer that had just taken the main stage.
I’d somehow forgotten to mention that I couldn’t even dance, much less work a stage. The dancer was upside down, her thighs gripping the pole to hold her in place while she removed her top slowly. Cat calls and whistles filled the middle of the room, and there was a sudden explosion of green bills floating down around her.
“No…tonight’s perfect actually. I’m short two dancers.”
“Yes!” Becca cheered beside me, clapping her hands before grabbing my arm.
“If you’re any good, I’ll let you come back. But for now…tonight only,” Troy offered, giving us a small wave as Becca pulled me towards the back of the club.
He’d never even asked if I was twenty-one. It was the minimum age posted on almost all the signs outside the club, and even on a few around the bar.
The back of the house was even louder than the front, dozens of women milling about in the halls, talking, laughing, dressing and undressing. Some of them looked younger than I did, so that answered my question of whether it was okay to not tell Troy my age. I still followed behind Becca, only because she pulled me, my feet desperate to run in the opposite direction. All I knew was when they called my name, I was to go on stage and take my clothes off for the crowd of men waiting to be pleased.
In the car, Becca had told me to think of a stage name, but I’d been stumped, the bud so strong that my mind felt numb. My buzz was only starting to wear off now, and I became vaguely aware that the person she was introducing as Eden to everyone, was me.
“Star,” a buxom blonde smiled at the two of us, nodding at me as we passed.
“Simone…”
“Diamond…”
“Delila…”
“Chasity…”
“Lovely…”
“Kiss…”
“Dew…”
I lost track of all the different women, my system of associating their stage names with a feature each of them had, failing before I’d even committed the first two to memory. We walked along the long hallway, passing several closed doors before we entered one, the florescent lighting replaced with brilliant globe like vanity bulbs circling the ceiling.
There weren’t any names on the dressing stations, so I took the empty chair next to the one Be
cca chose, looking at myself in the mirror mounted on the wall in front of me. I hadn’t weighed myself in what seemed like forever, and even though I’d gained more than a few pounds, I still looked skinny enough to me. The double chins were still gone, my cheeks were full, but not pudgy like they’d been when I weighed three hundred and fifty-three pounds. I did look hot. My plain brown eyes popped under the dark shadow, and my skin glowed bright and healthy looking thanks to the body shimmer. I stood and turned slowly, just as I had for Troy, admiring the womanly curves that had filled in since packing on the last few pounds.
“I’m up,” Becca smiled at me, winking as she jumped from her chair.
I hadn’t even heard her name being called.
“Red…that’s me,” she reminded me, tossing a wave over her shoulder. “Back in ten…”
Ten minutes…that’s how long I had to survive on stage naked. She’d skimmed over the rules in the car, and from what I remembered, I’d have a chance to dance on the main stage for ten minutes, and then the smaller stations for five minutes each. There were no paid wages here, so the cash I collected while out there, was what I made for the night, minus the two hundred I would owe the house before I left. The girls went in a rotation, their stage names called over a loud speaker, along with the station number they needed to be at.
“Eden,” I spoke my own stage name out loud, my ears perking when someone named Essence was called.
Right first letter, wrong stage name. I wasn’t alone in the dressing room, but the other women ignored me, some of them stretching on the floor, others changing from one outfit to another. The thump of the music coming from the club was loud enough for me to pick up the beat, so I tried moving my body to the exact same rhythm, my hips twitching awkwardly from side to side.
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