Strip (20 page)

“Was it a wise choice to be in a place like this?” A fresh brunette asked me. She could have made some good money here. Her friend advised me, “Never turn gay,” and another, “How can you work in such a hole and not have a life plan?” then said, “You're a beautiful man.” I tried to laugh it off: unless they were ready to offer me food and rent money, this was where I'd be staying for the time being. True though, they did almost get to me, as in
What
am
I doing in a dump like this?
Having others' pity can be like a drug. But that night, I didn't care. With my cock ring I had finally graduated and was giving the competition a run for the money.

Patrice drove me home without a word. I think he and Steve shared something themselves in the can, either sex or coke. When I got home I gave Patrice a peck on the cheek to secure a few more rides at least, and the feeling that my good fortune was wearing thin disappeared when I saw a reluctant and dirty grin flash across his face.

I put Kent's bracelet beside the bed, and wondered when he would have used it.

 

The next four hours
barely helped, and my new bad habits—too many push-ups, chin-ups, curls, trays of booze held high—and sleeping on a cold floor at night, left my spine lopsided for the first thirty minutes of any day. My body was a battleground between Madame's masochism and my job. Class wasn't going to happen that day. I couldn't let Madame see me so exhausted. I rolled over, fondled the cock ring, remembering the night before, and thought of my new magical powers before falling back to sleep.

At noon, I stepped out onto Sainte-Ursule with a pocket full of tips to get some leather or latex, a vest, pants, anything that could pass as sexy. But in the touristy Old Town, not one place specialized even remotely in sleaze, other than your basic tacky gift shop with edible panties, booby beer mugs and whoopee cushions.

I went back home to bed and didn't wake up until six—fortunately my back came around just in time. The sleep had done me some good. I put on the cock ring and called Kent to come over. I answered the door with my new prize. “Steve blew me yesterday and then I…”

“Blew you?”

“Said the man who's had ten thousand.”

“Two thousand. Don't take this thing too seriously.”

“Look who's talking.”

“You're serious?”

“It's your fault. You gave me the magic amulet. You, more than anyone, know its hidden powers.” He touched his lips to quiet me. “Look I don't have time to be guilty. Will you give me a quick massage?”

“As in…”

“My back is in knots, lots of small ones compared to just one big one, that's all. I almost feel normal.”

“You almost look normal. You've been working out?”

“As much as I can.”

“You took the pickle out of your ass.”

“You did.”

You could say I had something new to put in my dance bag.

 

Several nights, on the
way to the Chez Moritz, I sat diagonally from a guy with a weak chin and a perfect rim of hair like a monk's, but obviously dyed a colour that had turned yellow. We'd done this ride before. He was built; the sleeves of his jacket were tight on him. On one of those rides we played peek-a-boo through the suburbs and into the dark, until the glow from the Chez Moritz came up on the right. When I got up he frowned, but that's life. I remember so wanting anonymous warmth.

As I walked the last hundred yards of freezing highway and watched the bus disappear, I thought about all of us, connected by a place where there was absolutely nothing but a small paycheque and tips. And then we all leave at 3
a.m.
Again I wondered what the hell I was doing. Each week I was getting further and further away from a technique that I had been so privileged to acquire, and to acquire so rapidly. At 9
p.m.
I should have been getting ready for bed with a cup of warm milk and a biography of Diaghilev or Nijinsky, maybe stretching my hamstrings while I waited for the news to come on, or stepping onto a real stage with a real audience, where the show ends at eleven. But now I felt like I had the flexibility of a quarterback and gait of a thug, out on a fucking highway to nowhere.

Did anyone, other than Kent, know where the hell I was at that moment? My parents believed, as had I, that I was working with a small independent company that paid me real money. They'd figure out something respectable to tell their friends as they guzzled their rye and Cokes. If a truck or car clipped me right then and turfed me into the ditch, sometime during the following spring people would have wondered how the hell I got there. They might see the club a half a mile away and put the pieces together. But they would never know it was where I found the spotlight, money, costumes, great music, eye candy and easy sex.

But the thrill of easy sex had risks, like losing my ride home with Patrice. I couldn't get beyond the hand touching, kiss-on-the-cheek stage that he was forcing on me. Like me, he wanted capital-L love and I just wasn't interested. He could tell, and made me wait longer and longer for my ride—he'd have a nightcap, laugh with the bartender, or get into a deep conversation of palm reading with one of the girls—as a punishment. Lucky him, he had nothing to do all day but sleep.

One night after he'd had many drinks, he read my palm and told me that I had to “embrace my stardom.” He said most people have to leave it behind, forget their ego, learn humility, but he said I had to take hold of my star and soar. He said I had to stop hiding within myself. He told me not to give up. I was too young to throw it all away on the circus. Then he placed his hands over mine.

 

The next day, freezing
rain turned into hard snow whipping down Sainte-Ursule. Kent and I sat by my window at the hookers' wrought-iron dining ensemble. Recently Kent never seemed at ease—as if he couldn't sit completely still—until he was in the dark corner of a club and he'd had a beer or two.

“I have tea.” I wondered if his agitation was because sex with me was on his mind. It was on my mind: I finally felt ready to have some fun and easy sex, but I wasn't good with advances.

“Tea would be great.” We stared out the window. I told Kent about Louise throwing herself at me. He told me I was too concerned about them. But I went on. I told him everything was getting to me: Madame's moods, the tight-lipped ballerinas, Bertrand's wackiness, then about the club and Patrice's cold shoulder, pre-show blow jobs, drinks, drunkenness, the cock rings…

“No one likes advice, but you know…”

“Shoot.”

“You seem disconnected. It's kind of weird, I mean, you, your language, you said
penis
when I first met you and now it's all
cock
and
ass
. What the fuck? Everything about you is changing.”

“I've only said
cock
once.”

“That's one hundred percent more than you did before.”

“And that's not good? Didn't you say I should grow up? I mean I have to say
ass
.
Behind
sounds like a jelly dessert or something.”

“I did not say you should grow up. Your innocence is endearing. Was.”

“Well, I'm sure you thought it. I mean, my God,
penis
sounds like it should be wearing a doily, a periwig and a ruffled collar, a tutu or something.”

“It's not even in your nature to grow up.”

“You want to keep me naive?”

“Forget it. You could at least use the word, tool.”

“Tool's loaded. I'm a tool. I feel like I've been a tool for years, in someone else's ballet. I've been useful to others. That's tool to me.”

“Fine, you've made your point, had your rant.”

There was nothing but silence and the wind whistling forlornly at the window.

“I'm bringing my bosses, Brigitte and her husband Alex tonight. They're driving me. They've been before. Don't worry. They know what it's like. You'll be a celebrity yet.”

“Don't forget your opera glasses.”

“I won't need them if you wear that cock ring.”

That night, because of the weather, the place was almost empty. We did our show and Kent's bosses, Brigitte and Alex, loved meeting a real live
étoile de spectacle
star as much as Kent liked introducing me. He smiled like a proud parent.

I danced a string of songs for them. Alex had no reservations about staring at me, while Brigitte seemed preoccupied with women dancing at neighbouring tables. We chatted while I squatted and rubbed my thighs. Kent related my company gossip to them, told them about the hopeful Louise, the narcissistic Madame. I'm not sure what he said when I wasn't there, but I had the feeling he was bragging.

They left after midnight and Kent took up a seat in the dark against the wall. He didn't mind staying until the end of my shift, and I was glad to have him there. He smoked, drank a lot, was quiet and watched me. I danced for him a few times and each time he gave me a different compliment; he mentioned my innocent allure, my Ivy League persona, my strengths, good proportions, my weaknesses, a tendency to retreat into myself… He called me
Doc Sauvage
.
Flash Gordon
.

“What about the you-know-what?”

“Cock looks
formidable
,” he told me.

“Penis, please.”

He touched me in the dark, whispered, “Shit, I'm getting turned on.” Girls were fired for less.

“I confess, I gave it a pre-show workout.” But he knew I was lying; Steve had been the one to do that. I continued, “I just make sure it's not illegally hard. But you know, ballet leaves way more to the imagination, though it is hard to ignore the Bluebird in
Sleeping Beauty
, flying through the air, all gold leaf and blue feathers, checking to see if it's a pickle or a sausage in his codpiece.”

“Ballet it ain't,” he said. But his mood had changed.

 

That night Kent paid
for our cab ride home. I didn't have to think about Patrice's silence and the debt I owed him. Kent was silent. The roads were being cleared of snow—orange and yellow flashed through the cab, across the snowbanks, out into the darkness, and the streetlights reflected off the clouds above, making it an eerily yellow early morning—as we sat staring in opposite directions.

Finally he broke the silence. “It's not exactly the New York City Ballet. You can't do it forever,” he said.

“You're not impressed?”

“It's stripping.”

“And for once it's good enough, even if it is a little side-show shit attraction.” I went on; his attitude had provoked me. “Fuck, it is like some idea of perfection has hounded me all my life. I couldn't please my father so what do I do? Go headfirst into an art form that is all about perfection, all of the time. It was my escape. I'm not perfect—not for the Company or Daniel. Now I'm stuck trying to please you, a stranger, mere months ago. What is going on?” I was drunk, tired and my guard was down. Those were the facts. “I can run, but I can't fucking hide.”

“That's not a bad thing,” Kent said.

“Well it seems I've never pleased anyone.”

“You poor thing.”

“I'll disappoint you, too.” At this point I had slowed down.

“You won't.”

“Other than a swollen dick and a fake blond swoosh, there's not much to me. I have all the attention I want. No one to say I'm so much better than this, other than those self-righteous bitches, or that I'm above it. Truth is that I am no better than this.”

“Fake blond swoosh?” Kent started to chuckle.

“Yes, and taking off my clothes.”

“Won't you have to make some decisions eventually?”

“About my abs and chest?”

“You know what I mean.”

“You've changed your tune.”

“No. You might as well be good at what you're doing. That's fine. But you do have a future. Believe me. The voice of oldness, if not wisdom. Where to next? Is there a next? I can't see you becoming an aging stripper in
vieux
Quebec. Even I have a Plan
B
.”

“I used to think I had a career.”

“Are you too proud to go back?”

“Are you pissed because of my pre-show blow job?”

“I'd give you a medal if I had one.”

“Then Daniel?”

“Daniel's a loser.”

“Well then?”

“Well then. What next?” I was surprised that he cared.

“Maybe this will be all I ever have to offer this fucked up world.”

“That's just laughable.

“Recently it's what I tell myself.”

“Well I, for one, wouldn't let you. You have no idea what you are capable of.”

“Why is it so important to you, anyway?” But I already thought I knew the answer. And maybe that wasn't so bad.

“Sometime I want to show you something at my place,” he said. The cab turned up Sainte-Ursule and he fell against me, reaching for his pocket to get some cash

“You can show me now.”

 

That weekend I ran
my ass off between shows. It excited my customers to have a half-erect man a touch away. The whole thing had finally become easy. I wished that table of bank tellers from my first night would come back.

 

 

Six

The power drawn from
a dancer's gluteus maximus enables everything from a strong port de bras during reverence to providing the source for the
sauté
or a simple
tombé
. The gluteus maximus maintains the line when a dancer does a
tour jeté
or a
saut de basque
. The gluteus maximus is responsible for holding the leg, pressed against a solid lower back, for a remarkable arabesque. The gluteus maximus provides the resistance needed to create momentum throughout a turn. The gluteus maximus curves away from the back to begin defining the lines of the leg. When the male dancer stands with his back to the audience, his right arm extended to support his partner's grip as she
developpés à la second
, they are looking at his gluteus maximus.

 

What the removable stripes
did for my cheerleading, what Kent's cock ring did for my allure, what “Je T'aime… Moi Non Plus” did for my centre, is what Brittany Barrymore did for everything else: the loose ends, the showmanship, the spaces in between. Brittany put the icing on this stripper's cake.

The news on Thursday was that our featured dancer would be Brittany Barrymore. Most of her name was on the Marquis—Br'tny B'more
en vedette
. And by late Friday afternoon the parking lot was full. Men had left work early, called their wives to say they were held up at the office, or picked them up on the way out here and brought them along. Brittany was the draw. One of the circuit girls, she toured the northeast
us
and the Great Lakes while most girls only came from Montreal for the week, and others were stuck with rural Quebec—every town from Lac St. Jean to Trois-Rivières to Iberville to Chicoutimi to Rouyn-Noranda. The circuit girls usually had better moves, music and costumes, though it all got copied, borrowed or stolen. They stayed at the welcome-as-a-bomb-shelter motel beside the Chez Moritz, which was useful since they'd be wasted by the end of the night—a crawl back to their rooms was all they could manage. The only part of day they ever saw, if they were lucky, was sunset after they woke.

Starring—
en vedette
—that week was the perennial favourite, Brittany. She had driven all the way from Detroit in her white Cadillac, following a feature circuit she had blazed for herself. The place was buzzing with waitresses shuttling full trays of drinks from the bar to the floor, as if the demand never subsided. And middle-aged, middle-class couples, some in their Kiwanis and Shriners vests, occupied almost every seat not taken by the nightly regulars. The corps de ballets (as I started to call my co-workers) were happy there was less of their time wasted onstage and more time spent on the floor, and with everyone drinking more than usual, they were making good tips.

There was a mild commotion at the door. I laid down my last tray of empties to take a breather before heading downstairs for our first show. Vasili entered the club, hugging a huge fuzzy cushion, him all puffed up, leading Brittany through the room with a stuffed garment bag over her arm, blonde hair glowing the same unnatural shade as her fake fur jacket. Her small face was lost in all that plush.

In the basement she had the dressing room next to ours. Dressing room? Stained counter. Chipped mirror. Cold concrete floor. A suspended rod of wire hangers. She had respect downstairs, and the girls gave her space. It seemed not one of those women could compete with Brittany, so they made friends with her, trading drugs like baseball cards, with stoned promises of post-show companionship, too.

When I saw her onstage I understood the fuss: Steve announced her to the house,
en vedette
, like a circus emcee, announcing her most recent list of accomplishments: “
Partymag
's Miss January”; performances “live from Detroit via Cleveland, Buffalo, Rochester, Sherbrooke”; and attributes—“the lovely, trés sexy, bad-girl-gone-good, girl-next-door”—as the tiny follow spot swirled across the stage. After the noise subsided and Steve had caught everyone's attention, the rhythmic intro to George Benson's “Turn Your Love Around” filled the room and Brittany Barrymore slipped one long, smooth leg from behind the slit in the red velvet curtain (that curtain hid a space big enough for one stripper or a pile of discarded clothes). She twisted into the light in a tight-fitting blue sequined gown slit to her hip. The whole outfit was lined with silver and was probably worth more than all of the bikinis,
g
-strings, leather miniskirts, hot pants and thongs put together at the Chez Moritz. Every turn, the slit in her skirt flashed the line of her waxworks-perfect legs. In her open-toed Cinderella acrylic stilettos, she floated over the stage, and Steve shone a milky light that made her look like some kind of striptease angel, skin powdery and white.

After all these weeks of slowly becoming more and more used to my lacklustre routine, I finally saw some true professional showmanship. She put us all to shame, but I was the only one who cared. She'd skip a little, or stop and then pull back in her hips, knees together, as much as her tight dress would allow. She made you think she needed someone to satisfy her immediately, but didn't want to give it away to just anyone. She made you think it was you who could save her. She strutted over to some guy at the edge of the stage and got him to reach up to unclip the side of her dress, then she got some other guy to unzip one of the seams until, with a little shimmy, the dress dropped to the ground to show her marble-white body from her tiny round tummy and breasts, to her perfect bum and thighs, to her toes. In a microscopic fringed bikini and still in her heels she stepped out of the pile of dress at her feet, knowing that doing very little was doing enough.

When the music changed to “Still” by The Commodores, you knew you were under her spell. Her hair tumbled off her shoulders, hiding that small face and upturned nose. The paleness of her skin and the white lights Steve used combined to make it seem like she was carved out of the softest marble. She unclipped the centre of her bikini top as she tossed her hair, with perfect timing, to fall over her breasts and her small red nipples. She kicked her large white cushion forward and then relaxed onto it, lying on her front, twisting her legs, knees bent, ankles crossed. She tugged at the tiny elastic of her
g
-string, pulling it down her thighs and calves, and finally over her feet. All this with shoes still on, and the guys up front staring right between her legs. Why not?

All the strippers were staring. The room was mesmerized with this living statue. Finally she kicked off her shoes and playfully wrestled with the cushion. Everything about Brittany was holy. She took you away from your surroundings to a place where sex was pure and fun, and after that you could show her off at the finest of places, in her beautiful sequined dress, not that you would ever be able to. She wasn't like the others. She never got involved with her body. No poking fingers, squeezing breasts or crude clinical examinations with legs wide open. She was as respectful of her beauty as she wanted you to be. At least that's what she wanted you to think. The lights went down and came up again and she was gone.

She brought down the house. Brittany was a
goddess
.

For Brittany's later number she donned a nurse's outfit, with stethoscope and fishnets, to “Doctor's Orders.” But some of the girls had already tired of the Brittany hoopla and were back on their boxes before she even finished.

Brittany revived herself in the in-between time with a cocktail or two, or she'd disappear. Soon the girls were in and out of her room one after the other, not even bothering to hide their nasty habits in the can—hits and lines—while everything got a little messier on those stairs: twisted ankles, broken glass, spilled booze running down bloody legs, over caesarean scars, stretch marks and bruises.

When I got up on the stage, I could just make out Brittany's bleached hair glowing in the shadows at the back of the room. I sensed she was watching, like every ballet teacher who had psyched me out at one time or another. But it didn't matter because the music took over and I had my cock ring. I had “Gloria,” my life's soundtrack. My eyes stung late in the set, when I finally spun myself into that booze-induced trance. But I was sober enough to want to impress her and have her know I was on her team, the team that took itself seriously. But by song three the high was gone and I was trying to remember where I had thrown my clothes. And by the time I had collected everything—a woman holding my new tie in her mouth and someone waving my shirt at the edge of the stage—it was time to race downstairs and get ready for the second feathers show.

Brittany was back downstairs, too. She called out from her room, slurring her words, saying I was really good, saying I had to go for it, not be afraid. I knew what she was saying—only I was hoping she wouldn't have noticed. It's what had held me back, for every moment up to then, from punching Daniel's beautiful nose sideways, to kicking Madame Talegdi's ballerina ass. It's probably what kept me from staying with the Company. It was the decision to stare blankly, or take flight, rather than stay true and focus and fight.

Brittany slurred more, said she had some chocolate. Said she was “not supposed to… eat chocolate.” It didn't agree with her. And as the night went on she sounded more and more wasted, but after our show she was back up there onstage in a Catwoman body stocking for her last number. She earned her pay, goddess that she was, and then went back to being messed up in her room—crawling across the floor looking for her glasses. “I h-a-a-a-d some shoclut. I'm-m-m n-n-n-n-n-not shupposhed to ha-a-a-ve shoclut.” I guess Vasili took her back to her room that night at the motel. I didn't think I'd see her again.

 

The next day, Saturday,
I arrived early. They'd aired out the place so now it still smelled as bad, but it was cold. Marcel's humpy bartender-boyfriend, Fran
ç
ois, was wiping glasses and had hockey on a television by the bar. The place was empty. Downstairs Marcel was fretting about the choreography for one of our numbers. He said he was getting lost onstage. Could I help it if the man was short? He squeezed my forearm. “We should have dinner sometime, talk about the Conservatoire.”

“You're inviting me to dinner, while François is upstairs?”

“It's just dinner.”

Marcel was cute, like dolls are cute. I wondered if I could go for him. He was a classic nice guy with a squeaky-clean dirty side. What is it with nice guys? The nasty ones are the ones we all end up falling for. The Daniels. From now on there would never be another nasty one. Daniels were made to break hearts. Daniels never belonged to anyone.

 

Brittany was early that
Saturday night, at the bar in her faux fur. She drank a soda water, spoke clearly and didn't slur. She didn't even seem to remember the night before, about being out of it, or the chocolate. “I saw your strip last night—on the stage. You were really good.”

“You're the pro.” I knew how to flatter a star. I'd had practice.

She moved closer, all small face and hair, lowered her voice. “But just go for it. Don't be scared of them. Don't hesitate. You're good, but you stand in your way. God I sound like a preacher. But I mean it. Look them in the eye. Tease the bastards. Because that's what they are, bastards. Kill them. Do it
for
them though. You're being selfish, you're holding back. It's not just about your dick. That's what you guys think. You have to scare the audience with commitment. No one here is going to tell you how to be better. They don't give a shit. But I do.”

I nodded. I knew what she was saying. I just didn't want to believe it.

“You're so much like I was.” she said. “Be the fucking master. Don't worry. You'll always do well in a place like this. But you have to be more than just good enough. That's all this place is about. Remember, not just for yourself. Share.”

Kent had said something about good enough, too. It seems that the world gets by on good enough, and I'd stepped into something where good enough wasn't enough for me. She asked me, “Do you still dance?”

“I'm trying.”

“I danced for thirteen years, was in the corps in Pittsburgh. Look at me. Go ahead.” Instead I looked at my fingers weaving and tapping the bar. “No, I mean it. Closely. Literally. Look at my mouth. Look at my teeth. My fingernails.” Her lower teeth glowed in the black light. “Go on, say it. Don't hold back.” He fingernails were shellacked a hard, dark colour.

“I don't know what you mean,” I lied.

“Perfect?”

“Yes.”

“You've been here long enough to know what perfect teeth mean.”

“I have an unfair advantage. My father is a dentist.”

“This face isn't mine.”

“The teeth?”

“The face.” She reached out, touched my tapping fingers. “I was in a car accident, years ago now. Rebuilt.” She laughed. “Like the bionic woman. Down to my pretty little fingertips. Believe it or not, I don't actually have nails.”

I didn't know what to say. “Prettier than the bionic woman.”

“It's funny, those sayings, every face tells a story, and eyes are the windows of the soul. But not this face—it's wiped clean. But my eyes are my windows, that part is true.”

Why would anyone lie about such a thing? I found it hard to believe.

“I've always thought all those damn wrinkles and spots are what tells your story. Dancers fear aging, yet they embrace it like it's their cross to bear. It's all they talk about. Look how fast it happens. The diet. The smoking. We all look like shit by thirty—it doesn't matter—now I'm the one who's ageless.”

“You're beautiful up there.”