Tainted Rose

by Abby Weeks

  She lifted her foot and looked at her heel. It was raw and scabbed. Cindy’s feet had obviously been a little smaller than hers and the six-inch pumps cut into her heels painfully. Sometimes she tried to take them off but Murdoch said he preferred it when she wore them. He said they made her look more classy, more professional. She would have liked to ask him how professional it was to wear shoes that didn’t fit but she didn’t dare. There was no point. He wasn’t going to buy her new shoes. He’d never bought her anything with all that tip money he stole.

  She didn’t know how they expected her to dance, to entertain men, without even the most basic things she needed but that was the way it was.

  She took the black lace bra and thong she was going to wear from her locker. They’d also belonged to Cindy and luckily they fit her better than the shoes did. She would buy new underwear when she could but for the time being she was stuck with what she had.

  Rose knew how important underwear was for a stripper. The underwear was everything. It was what created the illusion, the anticipation. She’d seen guys watch her, spellbound, waiting for her to remove her bra and panties. They watched every move she made. They couldn’t take their eyes from her. But once she pulled off the underwear, once they actually got to see what they’d been dying to see so badly, they almost acted as if the show was over.

  Rose understood the importance of suggestion, of creating a hunger in the men who watched her dance and of denying them the pleasure of satisfying that hunger. She knew she had to draw things out. She had to tease them. She had to bring them to the very edge without actually letting them cross over. All of that came naturally to Rose. She understood how to move, how to use her body to fire up the lust in her audience, and it was because of that that she understood just how important it was to have good underwear. A stripper without good underwear was like a biker without a good jacket, or the right tattoos, or the right bike even. It didn’t matter how much of a bad ass he was, it didn’t matter how well he rode or how far he was willing to go in a tough situation, if he wasn’t able to create the right illusion, none of that mattered.

  As far as Rose was concerned, a naked woman was just a naked woman. The art of stripping was all in the imagination of the viewer. You had to get him to see in his mind more than you could actually show him through his eyes. You didn’t just show him your body, you had to make him feel what it would be like to touch it. You had to make his imagination want you even more than his body did.

  “Hey, Murdoch,” she called out.

  “Yeah?”

  “When are you going to get me some new underwear?”

  “Talk to Serge about it.”

  “Serge doesn’t understand me like you do. He doesn’t understand our business. He doesn’t know how important the underwear is.”

  “Tell it to Serge, sweetheart. I aint your pimp. He is.”

  She sighed. She put on the black bra and thong and slipped her feet into the tight shoes. She looked passable. It was the same as she looked every night. She hoped there would be customers tonight. She wanted to feel the thrill of the performance. She wanted to feel those hungry eyes glued to her body. She wanted to feel the power of it, all that desire, all that lust, focused right on her.

  “You think we’ll be busy tonight?” she said.

  Murdoch just laughed.

  *

  SHE WENT BACK OUT TO the office and poured herself some coffee.

  “You dress the same goddamn way, night after night,” Murdoch said as she walked past. He was leaning back so far in his seat he might actually fall out of it.

  “What have I been telling you?”

  “Well,” he said, “tell Serge. He’s the one with all the money.”

  “Fine, I’ll tell him, but think about this. You’re the one who has to watch me parade around in the same outfit night after night. Who’s going to get more pleasure if I get some new things? Me, or you?”

  Murdoch smiled at that. He twisted the bottom of his beard between his thumb and finger. It made Rose sick to have to speak with him like this but she got so lonely in that place by herself. She had to talk to someone.

  “Bend over and let me get a good look at that sweet little ass of yours,” he said.

  “I don’t work for you,” she said and went back into the dressing room to grab her robe. It could get cold in the bar dressed like that, especially if she wasn’t dancing.

  “Come on, sweet cheeks,” Murdoch said.

  “How about you buy me some new underwear and then I’ll give you a show?” Rose said.

  She sighed. What had her life been reduced too? She was flirting with a fat, filthy biker who was old enough to be her father.

  She touched up her makeup and put on her robe and when she came back out Murdoch was out front in the bar. He was grilling a burger and she thought it was for himself but when she went through the bead curtain that separated the office from the bar she saw that they already had a customer. He was a regular, a man called Caribou Bill.

  *

  CARIBOU BILL WAS SITTING ON a stool by the bar, leaning on the counter. He had on heavy work boots and overalls. They were the orangey brown color that always reminded Rose of prison overalls. He was in the middle of telling Murdoch a story.

  “I knew it soon as he walked into the office,” Bill was saying. “They come in all types, these corporate guys. Some of them want to be your friend, some of them want to show you they’re the boss, some of them want you to be scared of them.”

  “What kind was this?” Murdoch said.

  “Regular kind,” Bill said. “He was saying we need to bring down costs ten percent. Same thing the other guy said. He said they’re considering closing down the mine if costs don’t come down.”

  “That would be bad for the town,” Murdoch said.

  “Yeah, but it’s all bullshit. That mine supplies more lithium than any other place in Quebec. The whole world runs on batteries these days. They’re not closing it down. If anything, they’re expanding.”

  “He’s just busting your balls then?”

  “Yeah, looking for an excuse to cut down on overtime.”

  It was the same old conversation Rose had heard a thousand times since coming to the Cat. It seemed all these men wanted to talk about was their jobs and the economy and the rates all the various mines and paper mills were paying to truckers. She supposed it made sense, they spent a lot of time alone in their cabs, thinking, worrying about their futures, about their health plans and retirements and pension funds, but it sure made for boring conversation.

  She cleared her throat to get their attention.

  Murdoch and Caribou Bill looked up at her. She could see the sparkle come back to Bill’s eyes. She was the reason he came to this place. There were other strip clubs along the highway between here and Barraute where the lithium mine was located but he always waited till he got here, the very last bar operated by the DRMC, before pulling over for the night. He had a soft spot for Rose and she knew it.

  “Ah, there’s my darling,” Bill said. He took a long swig of his beer and Rose went over and took the seat next to him.

  “Been a while since we’ve seen you in here, Bill,” she said.

  “Oh, they had me on the Gatineau run for a few weeks,” Bill said. “I hate that run. The girls in those clubs have got nothing on you, darling.”

  “Well I’m glad to hear it,” Rose said. “I thought maybe you’d found someplace you liked better.”

  “I aint ever finding a place I like better than this.”

  Rose smiled at him. It was a weak pleasure, cheap, but she couldn’t help it. She got so lonely being up there with no one but Murdoch to keep her company, she had so little to lighten up her life, that she found herself getting attached to her regular customers in a way that she knew wasn’t healthy.

  She knew it was a sign of loneliness and desperation. But she was still a young woman, she needed friendship, she needed companionship, and she needed the admiration of men,
even if they were just the truckers and miners that came into a place like this.

  She looked down at her body. In her bra and thong there wasn’t much to be left to the imagination. Her breasts were pushed up, plump and firm, and she noticed Bill looking at them with a hunger that was almost ravenous.

  Rose couldn’t help it. She pushed her chest forward, further accentuating her breasts. Bill almost looked sad as he gazed at them.

  “Murdoch,” he said, not taking his eyes from Rose’s bosom, “another beer.”

  Murdoch put another bottle of Labatt’s on the bar and put a plate with the greasy burger next to it. The burger brought Bill back from his thoughts.

  “Thanks,” he said, and picked it up with both hands and took a bite.

  “You want something to drink?” he said to Rose.

  Rose shrugged. “Sure, if you’re buying,” she said.

  Murdoch poured her a vodka and coke. That was usually what she had. She put the glass to her lips and took a long sip. She hadn’t even had any breakfast yet but she liked the feeling of hunger. It made her feel sexier, like a better dancer. And she always got a better buzz off the vodka when she hadn’t eaten.

  She leaned over Bill’s lap to get a napkin from the bar and pressed her hand on his thigh. He was chewing his burger and he wasn’t the tidiest eater in the history of dining but she didn’t care. She wanted the attention. She wanted to turn him on. She needed it to feel like she was still a person, that she was still alive.

  “You going to give me a nice show, tonight?” Bill said.

  “You know I am, Bill.”

  “You been quiet in here?”

  “We’ve been deader than dead. I’d say we haven’t had more than five customers in the last ten days.”

  Bill nodded. He knew that he always got better attention when Rose was lonely, when she hadn’t had many other customers. He liked that.

  “Things will pick up again once the spring comes in.”

  “If it ever comes in,” Murdoch said. “I’ve been dying to get out on my bike but every time I think about it there seems to be a snowstorm.”

  Bill nodded. He put his hand on Rose’s knee. She felt the coarse skin of his hard, rough hand on her smooth leg. There was an electricity to the touch. She felt desired. She looked at Bill and tried not to see all the things that were wrong with him. He was a good twenty or twenty-five years older than she was, he was about a hundred and fifty pounds overweight, his hair looked thin and greasy. His beard had the same tobacco staining around the mouth that Murdoch’s had. Rose knew it was from the cigarettes he chain-smoked while driving. She looked at him and could actually picture him having a heart attack at some time in the near future. If he wasn’t smoking, he was drinking and eating.

  She tried not to think about it, about the fact that she should have been going out on dates with handsome young men in Montreal. She tried not to think about the fact that she was probably as excited about the dance she was going to give Bill as he was. She was so lonely it was painful.

  Bill looked up at Murdoch as he finished his burger.

  “Serge been up here lately?”

  “He was supposed to come today but he’s not coming till Thursday,” Murdoch said, “Why?”

  Rose knew why he was asking. He wanted to know if Serge would be coming by tonight. He wanted a private room.

  “Just wondering,” Bill said, then he took out his wallet and laid a twenty dollar bill on the counter. “I think I’ll take her into the back room.”

  IV

  ROSE LED BILL INTO THE back room by the hand. She didn’t go in there with customers all that often. It was supposed to be where they could get private dances, or a group of guys could party it up with a girl for a prolonged period, but that really only worked when there was more than one girl at a club. Rose didn’t know if there had been a time when the Cat had more dancers but these days it was just her and Murdoch and there usually wasn’t more than a handful of customers. Sometimes she’d go back there with a guy if he was willing to pay for it but usually she just danced up front.

  She had to get the key for the private room from Murdoch’s desk.

  “I haven’t been back here in a while,” she explained to Bill as she unlocked the door.

  “Doesn’t Serge take you back here?”

  Rose looked at him. It was the second time he’d brought up Serge. Most people were too afraid of Serge to even mention him.

  “You’re very interested in Serge today,” she said.

  Bill shrugged. Rose could tell he was hiding something.

  “What is it?”

  “It’s nothing,” Bill said. “I just don’t want to get in his way.”

  “What do you mean? Did something happen.”

  Bill shrugged again.

  “Just tell me,” she said.

  “It’s not a big deal, it’s just, I was at one of the other bars along Route 105.”

  Rose knew the DRMC had a number of strip clubs along that highway but she’d never been to any of them.

  “And what happened?”

  “Well,” Bill said, “I was in a back room like this. That was a busier place, they had four or five girls dancing every night. Anyway, while I was in the room getting my dance Serge and his guys arrived. He checks in on that place every week too, same as here?”

  “And?”

  “Well, you know Serge, he can get pretty crazy.”

  “You weren’t doing anything wrong, were you?”

  “No, of course not. I was just minding my own business. I had my pants on. The girl was giving me a lap dance. Next thing I know, Serge bursts into the room and he’s got a knife drawn. He held it up to my throat and said if he ever saw me trying to get with his girl again he’d cut me.”

  Rose nodded. That sounded like Serge alright. He’d get fucked up on drugs, a messy cocktail of prescription pills and heroine and crack and whatever else he could get his hands on. Next thing, he’d be threatening his own customers. She’d seen it happen at the Cat before. It didn’t really make any sense. Rose was a stripper. She worked for Serge. It was her job to give lap dances and get guys off, but every once in a while Serge would flip out. He’d get confused about the whole thing. He’d get possessive of his girls, start thinking they were his girlfriend and that the men in the club were trying to get with them behind his back. Rose had seen him threaten customers like that a few times before. It didn’t happen often but it sure was bad for business when it did happen. Who wanted to go to a strip club where the owner might pull a knife on you for looking at the girls?

  “Relax,” Rose said and sat Bill down on the leather sofa. She leaned in close to him, rubbing her cleavage in his face. “Serge can lose it sometimes, I’ve seen it happen just like you described, but he aint coming anywhere near this place tonight. You’re safe with me, honey.”

  Bill nodded. He closed his eyes and allowed Rose’s breasts to rub against his face. She felt the coarse stubble of his cheeks against the soft skin on her breasts.

  “You’ve always taken care of me,” she whispered, “and I’ll give you a nice show tonight. Don’t you worry about Serge.”

  Bill began to relax. He leaned back on the sofa and spread his legs open.

  “I’d just prefer not to run into him for a while,” Bill said.

  “Of course you would, honey,” she said.

  She bent over him, sticking her butt back against the door of the booth and giving him a clear line of sight down her cleavage.

  “Why don’t you reach around my back and unhook this bra for me?” she said.

  She was soothing him with her voice, taking him away from this place, from the stress and worry of his life. She was softening the harsh realities of the cold, northerly world they lived in. That was her job. She took men out of the cold, empty places they lived and transported them to a warmer, kinder place, a place that they could only reach when they were with her.

  Bill reached around and opened her bra and it fell o
nto his lap. Her breasts spilled out in front of his eyes, full and ripe and firm. She saw his tongue wet his lower lip. His eyes were glued to her breasts. She didn’t think about everything that was wrong with this situation, she didn’t think about the fact that she was trapped here in this highway strip club a million miles from anyone who could help her, she didn’t think about the fact that Caribou Bill was as old as her father would have been if he was still alive, she didn’t think about the fact that she was a cheap stripper putting on a show. All she thought about was the warm, kind, imaginary place that she could transport Bill to using nothing but her body and her voice.

  “Kiss them,” she whispered.

  Bill looked up at her. His hungry eyes seemed to be pleading with her. He seemed to be weighing what she’d said in his mind, uncertain whether or not to believe her. Kissing was strictly against the rules. Girls would rub there breasts over a man’s face but he was not supposed to open his mouth, he was not supposed to kiss them.

  “Really?” he said.

  She smiled. She reached down and took a breast in her hand and held it up to his face, pressing the nipple against his mouth.

  Bill opened his mouth and took her nipple between his lips. His tongue moved slowly over it, wetting it with saliva.

  Rose almost felt like crying. She didn’t have real feelings for Bill. She didn’t love him. She never would have given him the time of day if she’d still been in Montreal, but it had been so long since any one had licked her, had sucked her nipples so gently and lovingly. She knew Bill had strong feelings for her, she knew he thought about her when he was out on the road, and that was enough for her. She allowed him to suck her nipples for a few minutes even though it was against the rules.

  When he was finished he looked up at her and the gratitude in his eyes was heartbreaking. She wondered what life was like for these men who came into the bar. They spent so much time out on the road, all alone, far from civilization. They transported the raw materials that made modern life possible, bringing minerals and lumber from the vast open spaces to the mills and smelters and refineries that processed them, but they themselves seemed to live outside of society.