Shella (6 page)

“I told you, I don’t think I’ll be staying here long.”

“You’re leaving?”

“I don’t know what I’m doing. But I’ll know soon, all right?”

“All right, baby. Whatever you say.”

The next couple of days, I stayed inside. Practicing. I can make myself invisible, kind of. Slow down everything inside of me, so slow I can feel the blood move in little streams through my chest. I go somewhere else in my head. Not far, I’m still me. But someplace closed off. Where I don’t feel things. It just happened one day, when I was a kid—when they were hurting me. Now I can do it when I want to.

One afternoon, Misty asked me to come to her club.

“I’m on television, honey.”

“What?”

“Don’t look at me like that—I don’t mean like on
real
TV. In the window. It’s a new thing. Couldn’t you please do it? Just once. I’d really like you to. I mean, you’ve never seen me … work. I’m real good, everybody says so. That’s why I’m in the window.”

“Is anybody leaning on you?”

“It’s not
that,
baby. Please?”

I went the next night. It was just like she said. The club was just a narrow doorway with a little window on one side. They had a TV set suspended from wires hanging there. Black-and-white, like you can rent in cheap rooms. One long loop, the same stuff. Over and over. I stood there and watched until Misty came on. You couldn’t tell where she was, like in a dressing room or something. She had a regular dress on. The camera watched her pull it over her head. She had a slip on. She took it off. Then she was in a bra, panties, high heels, and stockings. She kicked off the shoes, unrolled the stockings, bending over with her back to the camera. She unhooked the bra from behind, dropped it on the floor. She was just rolling the panties down over her hips when the tape looped to some other girl.

The barker was a greasy little guy in a blue jacket. He didn’t yell and scream like the other ones on the block, just waited for someone to stop and watch the TV, whispered to them.

“They go all the way inside, pal,” is what he said to me. “No cover, no minimum.”

I went through the door. Dark place, the air stung my eyes. I ordered rum and Coke. Don’t mix them, I told the sagging topless waitress. Like I was worried about watered drinks. She gave me a wink like I was a smart guy, knew my way around. I drank a little bit of the Coke, poured the shot of rum into the glass. The waitress came back a little later.

“You don’t like the Coke, huh?”

“Just for a little taste,” I told her. She brought me another. I did the same thing, left her enough of a tip so she wouldn’t make a fuss … but not so much that she’d think about working me for more.

A Puerto Rican girl with a blonde wig was on. There was music, but she wasn’t really dancing. Just shaking her body parts with the music around her. People threw money on the bar. She’d kneel and pick up the bills. When she got enough, she rolled them all into a little tube, held it up so the watchers could see it, kissed the little roll, stuffed it deep inside her G-string. Every once in a while, she’d pull down the G-string real quick. The money was gone. Inside her, someplace. The men applauded, like she’d done something good.

Misty was different. She really danced, like she was moving to the music. The men didn’t clap real loud for her until she got on her hands and knees, crawling the length of the bar, still moving to the music. She took a glass from in front of one man, put one hand inside her G-string, like she was playing with herself, sipped from the glass. Then she poured some of it right on the bar, put her face down, wiggled her butt real hard while she lapped it up. They really cheered for that. Men put money on the bar—Misty crawled over to the ones who put up the most, let them spill their drinks on the bar so she could lap them up again. She crawled off the stage when her number finished, looking back over her shoulder.

When Misty got back, she looked tired. I was watching TV with the sound off, trying to figure out what people were
saying from the way they moved. She just said a quick hello, went in the bathroom. I heard the shower.

She came out with a towel around her head, still a little wet.

“Honey?”

“What?”

“I thought you were coming tonight.”

“I did.”

“I didn’t see you.”

“I was there.”

“Yeah.”

“You think I’m lying?”

“I didn’t say that, honey…. Don’t be mad.”

“Come here.”

She came over to me slowly, her face down. Got on her knees beside the chair. “I’m sorry,” she said.

“On the TV screen, in the window, it was black and white, showed you taking off your dress and all. Everything but your pants. Inside, you were dancing to some song … ‘Fever,’ I think it was called. You crawled around on the bar, licking up drinks they spilled.”

“You
did
come!”

“Yes. You were very good. Dancer, I mean. Much better than the other ones. You move real nice, like a real dancer.”

There were tears on her face. She took the towel off her head, held it in her hands, twisting it like she was trying to get the water out.

“What’s the matter?” I asked her.

She put her head in my lap, her hands behind her back. I felt her teeth on the waistband of the pajamas I was wearing. She pulled the string loose, put her mouth on
me. I patted the back of her head, sleek from the water. When I got close, I pulled gently back on her hair but she just sucked harder until I went off in her mouth.

Friday night, I went back to the poolroom. They gave me a different table this time. Three tables away, a bunch of Chinese guys were playing, but not really, something else was going on. I watched them the way I watch the TV without the sound. Somebody was buying, somebody was selling. I couldn’t tell what.

The red-haired guy came over to my table. “You want to try that shot again?” he asked me.

“No.”

“How come? I’ll give you the same odds.”

“It won’t go on this table. The short rail’s too stiff.”

“So we’ll take the table you had before.”

“I’m here to see Monroe.”

“Yeah, so what? It’ll only take a minute.”

“I’m here to see Monroe,” I told him.

We went through the same door. Monroe was at the table alone this time. I sat down across from him. I could feel the redhead, pushing against a cushion of air just off my left shoulder.

“What?” Monroe said, looking up at him.

“This guy has my money. He hustled me with some trick shot last time he was here. I asked him to do it again, same deal. He wouldn’t do it. I should get a chance, get my money back.”

“How much did you lose?” Monroe asked him.

“A yard.”

Monroe took out a roll of bills, peeled off a hundred, tossed it on the table. “Get lost,” he told the redhead.

“I want it from him,” the redhead said, not moving.

A crackle in the air, all around me. I could feel watchers, like prison. I didn’t move.

Monroe leaned forward. “Don’t be stupid,” he said.

The redhead was so close I could feel the air from his mouth. “I could do it,” he said. “You don’t need some outside shooter, do this job. Way I figure it, it’s a big contract, this guy’s taking my money.”

“Go over there and sit down,” Monroe said. “I’ll talk to you later.”

“Hey, come on, Monroe. This guy don’t look tough to me.”

“Cancer don’t
look
tough either. You’re out of your league. Now, do what I tell you.”

“Hey, fuck you, Monroe.”

Monroe looked at me. “You want to fuck this guy up, Ghost? Little favor for me?”

“No.”

“You don’t do favors for friends?”

“I don’t fuck people up.”

Monroe started to laugh then, a thin, crazy laugh. It sounded like that glass cracking in my hand. Nobody laughed with him.

“What’s so motherfucking funny?” the redhead said.

“You don’t get it, do you, kid?”

The redhead backed away, making a triangle out of me and Monroe with him at the tip.

“Get up,” he said to me.

I didn’t turn around, watching Monroe. “What’s the going rate for assholes, Ghost?” he asked me.

“It’s the same for anyone,” I said.

He laughed again, more juice in it this time. “Okay,” he said.

I got up. The redhead was right in my face. He was staring hard. I moved my eyes around his face, getting his picture. His size and shape, the set of his body.

I sat down again. “Okay,” I told Monroe.