A Year Being a Regular: Part III

"Oh my god, I just want him to handcuff me and fuck the shit out of me." The comment didn't faze me in the least bit. In my past few visits, I've picked up on Alanna's unabashed sense of self. Every opinion, every thought, every philosophy she verbalized through her rose-petal pink lips were said with such conviction that it didn't matter if it was all bullshit. We were in a place that sold nothing but fantasy, but her words were truth. "So why's there a cop here?" "Oh, I heard somebody left this club and got shot or something." Alanna said with a matter-of-fact tone. "What? Are serious?" exclaimed Tammi, a friendly co-worker of hers. "I think so. But god, I'm all fucking turned on now and shit." She was too busy oozing sex to care about the potential safety hazards of the job. Tammi threw back her shot glass of a pink-tinted Vodka headache. "May I get another drink, please, Jack?" I started to laugh. "Jesus, what are we, in grade school? So polite." Alanna shoots me a sardonic look. "Well, get her another FUCKING drink then, you asshole. Better?" "Yes and yes." I smirked. It was my third or fourth time spending a trip to the strip club with Alanna, and her relatively sweet and innocent demeanor from that first visit had quickly been shed in favor for this dominant, alpha-female attitude... and I loved it. Another round of drinks arrived at our table and after a few dances, Tammi excused herself to the bathroom. Tammi was an aspiring writer. In two previous visits, we shared rousing conversations about our favorite authors. She favored the horror and suspense genre, obviously admiring King and Koontz, while I had a preference for non-fiction and essays. Like any self-respecting writer, she absolutely loathed everything she had written. The talks eventually shifted to her employment and how much she despised what she was doing. But like most of the other dancers, the money was just too good to walk away from, regardless of the toll it took on her each night she was there. Tammi's personality was more docile. There wasn't a ferocity to her. She shared traits with my other friends that harbored a passion in the liberal arts. Although she would submit herself to the night and don the guise of a sex goddess, between the dances and the flirtations, you could sense her disdain. In my last conversation with her, we both just sat there and wallowed in our respective melancholy. Subsequently, I couldn't bring myself to get another dance from her, but she didn't seem to mind. What passed for a shred of normalcy in this place was enough for the night. She wound up quitting two weeks later, in what I'm told, a very dramatic fashion. Unlike Tammi, Alanna was vibrant and seemingly unaffected by her choice of vocation. She was always in a rambunctious mood, finding fun wherever it was to be had. With Game Two of the Finals over, I leaned in towards her and muttered the three most idiotic letters you could say in a strip club. "V.I.P.?" Alanna put on her trademark sweet smile. "Of course." When Tammi returned, we excused ourselves and made our way to the back. In the beginning, our V.I.P. visits were fairly rote. She'd tell me about the things her daughter did that she found impossibly adorable and I talked about how much I hated my job. I'd miss the light, fluffy banter in the coming months. For the other ninety percent of our alotted time, we'd just make out with the ferocity of two high-school students in a parked car at some undiscerning parking lot. The friction from all the dry-humping could've stared a forest fire. I'd suckle on her natural, soft breast, she'd lift my shirt up to press her body against mine, sometimes even gnawing at my nipples, and every so often, my hands might explore her more delicate lower regions. The mixture of alcohol and desire made for a potent brew. This particular trip, she deviated from the norm. She ripped her lips away and looked me deep in the eyes with a menacing smile. Like I said, she was good. She brought her hands to the top of my jeans and unbuttoned it. For a single, brief second, I invited the thought, but only for that single, brief second. She gripped the zipper and I immediately stop her. I wrapped my fingers around her small hands and redirected them to my shoulders. "No." She gave me a look I couldn't fully decipher. I could once again see the gears grinding in her head, but whatever it was, she quickly dropped it. After a few seconds she leaned in and kissesd me softly on the lips and rested her head on my shoulder. The sound system started to thump out the opening drum beat to Rhianna's 'Umbrella.' She quickly bolted up. "Oh shit." "I fucking love this song." I exclaimed, just as enthused. She frowned and balked at me, "Really? You like Rhianna?" "Hey, I like your shitty pop stuff, too." She gave me a hard slap across the face. "Fuck you, Jack." The burst of violence was suffixed with mutual smiles. As Jay-Z's opening lines made way for Rhianna's voice, we both started to sing along. At that moment, everything else was obscured and the world was put on mute. All the problems plaguing me at that time, all the disillusions, the disappointments, the heartbreaks, the failures, none of it mattered. And for her, the problems that I would later discover she had, the loneliness, the desperation, the insecurities, all lost in that moment. When the chorus hit, we both began belting it out at the top of our lungs. "When the sun shines we'll shine together. Told you I'll be here forever. Said I'll always be your friend. Took an oath and I'll stick it out to the end." In the back of my head, I knew this wouldn't last, but fuck it. At that moment, we were just two kids having fun.