The Tease (The Darling Killer Trilogy) (3 page)

“I hope so,” he said.

“Have you ever looked into online communities, or fetish communities?” I asked. “Some people do enact scenes and fantasies in safe settings.”

He shuddered. “I’m not one of those people,” he said. “You always see all these fat people in leather walking into weird places, and I’m not like that.”

I passed on commenting about the judgment. We had bigger things to address.

“Really I don’t trust myself,” he confessed. “It’s like they tell you when you have a packet of crisps or something, to pour out what you want and put the bag away. I’m worried – it feels like I’d be eating one straight out of the bag, and then suddenly the whole bag’s empty.”

I thought guiltily of Grant, and of the bag of blue potato chips I inhaled after rehearsal on Monday. “I know just what you mean,” I said. “Insight is good. It creates the space for change.”

He fidgeted with his watch.

“Are you feeling worried about how to get through the coming week?” I asked.

“A little.”

“Let’s work on a plan for some other things you can do when you feel… a sense of pressure,” I said. “Because we can talk about metaphor and your childhood and all kinds of other things, but I feel like that kind of stirs a lot of things up – which may be fine for next time. This time, I don’t think it’s fair to you unless you know what you can actually
do
in the
real world
to manage those feelings.”

We worked on some breathing exercises, and he made a list of things he could do to improve his mood and restore a sense of normalcy: going to the gym, watching comedies, calling his parents in England. He looked less weighed down when he left, and promised to call if he felt like he was really struggling.

After he left, I pulled out the
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorder,
the bloated, 900-page Holy Grail of insurance-based mental health treatment. I flipped through the DSM to Sexual and Gender Identity Disorders. There was no actual code for necrophilia, just Paraphilia, Not Otherwise Specified.

I opened Max’s file and looked at his chart. I picked up my pencil and hesitated.
302.9 Paraphilia NOS (provisional).
Did I want to put that in ink? Did “provisional,” which basically means, “I’m not entirely sure,” make it okay? What if he requested a copy of his records, or what if the insurance company refused to treat him? I came into therapy with these naïve ideas about a never-ending stream of depressed and anxious people I could heal through the therapeutic alliance and unconditional positive regard.
How much Jung do I have to read to make this right?

I focused on the feeling of my breath coming in through my nose and filling my lungs, exhaling from deep in the low belly.
Inhale and exhale. The present is what we have. Katie is okay.
A warm glow started to fill my chest as I thought of her.
Katie made it. It’s going to be okay.

I jumped at the knock on my half-open door.

“Sorry to startle you,” Jeff said. “How’d it go?”

“It was interesting,” I said.

“What happened?” He came in and shut the door, sitting in the space Max had recently vacated.

“Well. He did say something that turned me off.”

He waited. Silence is a good tool.

“Is necrophilia treatable?” I asked.

T
he Cat’s Meow Theater nestled in the Portage Park area of Chicago, on the opposite side of the expressway from trendy and expensive Lakeview, but still just as tedious in rush hour. Route 90, the major route from the northwest suburbs to the city, always crawled after work, especially on Fridays. I usually took Milwaukee Avenue from my job in Niles into the city and cut through Jefferson Park on my way down to Portage Park. It might be a calf-cramp inducing stop-and-go, but 90 could be a parking lot. Walter kept me company.

Walter Donnelly was the narrator on my National Clinical Mental Health Exam study guide CDs. His pleasant baritone accompanied me through traffic jams, interminable freight trains, late-night trips home through deserted city streets, a few two-hour drives home in snow storms, forays to the grocery store, and generally everywhere except the veterinarian. In the latter case, I’d usually have to turn off the CD after a few minutes of Caprice’s howls drowning him out. Usually, though, Walter would recite different scenarios and ask me what I would assess for, then gravely announce the correct answer. Some CDs were litanies of facts that I could, after seven months, recite along with him.

I arrived at the theater with seconds to spare. I mentally blessed Adam again for having an employee and performer parking lot, slung my purse over my shoulder and across my body, wrestled my leopard-print hanging bag and rolling bag out of my trunk, and headed in through the back door.

The Cat’s Meow was the coolest place nobody had ever heard of. It was a 150-seat theater whose owner, Adam, had lovingly renovated to hearken back to the 1920’s theaters in Chicago. The lobby had a gorgeous, embellished tin-tiled ceiling painted in gold, an old-fashioned popcorn stand, and a bar designed to look like a speakeasy. The bar was in an alcove framed in exposed brick and plaster, so it looked as if someone had taken a sledgehammer and torn down the wall into a hidden room. Old movie posters of Errol Flynn, Bette Davis, Clara Bow, and others decorated the walls.

It was almost too cool to stay open. Apparently, Adam did well, but quirky doesn’t always survive in the city, so I hoped for the best.

The back door took me to an alcove from which I could either walk into the wings of the theater or head upstairs to the offices and dressing room. I hauled my bags up the wooden stairs and arrived in the green room, which was directly above the speakeasy.

I blinked as my eyes adjusted from the dim hallway to the pandemonium of flesh and glitter. My fellow members of the Chicago Cabaret put on their makeup, wiggled into their stockings, and gabbed away. The walls were a sickly shade of green that made every complexion look faintly ill, and the floor was a creaky, dark golden wood. The hideous colors had an upside, though: it was virtually impossible to lose anything you actually liked in the dressing room. A pale counter ran along each side of the room underneath long mirrors. Huge fluorescent globes lined the top of each mirror. There was enough space for five chairs to each wall and, for some reason, a cot next to the shelving on the far wall. I never asked why.

“Hi, Sweetie!” Monica said as I stuffed my rolling bag under the counter. Monica reminded me of those Macedonian Venus statues, all love and abundance. From her lush figure to her wild mane of tiny brown curls, her full lips to her wide-set dark eyes, rhinestone-studded glasses to sequin-seamed jeans, to her cascading laughter, she embodied her mantra, “Go big or go home.” Her complexion was a rich shade of sienna with golden undertones. She delighted in huge flowers for her hair, plump babies, and furry animals.

We air-kissed, and she whispered in my ear, “Tish is in a mood. I haven’t seen her like this since the Boylesque Incident.”

“Oh dear,” I whispered back. About a year before, I was a little too candid with Tish about wanting more diversity in the pro troupe. The scene was drawing out some great male burlesque performers, but Tish insisted they were still in the student troupe because of performance readiness. When I pressed about including dancers who explored lesbigay or transgender issues, and a wider range of ages and body types, she made it very clear that I was just a performer, and she was the troupe leader. So I kept my mouth shut, and performers who didn’t fit her vision stayed in the student troupe or moved on to other studios.

“Yeah. Oh dear.”

I shrugged out of my plum-colored overcoat. It got warm fast back there. “How’s it going?”

“Long day,” she said, “and a dead baby.” Monica was a social worker at a neo-natal intensive care unit. I had no idea how she managed it.

“I’m sorry, honey,” I said, and squeezed her hand.

“It’s part of the job,” she said. “You?”

“The usual,” I said.

Monica hurried off to finish her hair. You’ll often see a token bellydancer in a burlesque show, and after I introduced Monica to the troupe, Tish snatched her up immediately. She was the kind of bellydancer that producers love. She arrived early, she could dance with precise isolations or luscious undulations, and she always got the audience clapping along.

I glanced at the lineup next to the door. CHICAGO CABARET, SCARLET LET HER, BEA LICIOUS, VELVET CRUSH, GIN FIZZY, MONICA THE BELLYDANCER, POLLY WANNA, LOLA GETZ. I’d have two numbers between the troupe number and my solo to change. Transforming from frazzled therapist Anna Zendel to glamorous starlet Velvet Crush in half an hour was always an adventure. People think of the near-nudity of burlesque, not the substantial amount of equipment you need to make it look good.

“Does anyone have a scrunchie?” Lisa asked the room, holding her long red curls back with her left hand while applying blue eyeliner with her right. Some of the other women glanced up; others, intent on the intricacies of fabric tape, false eyelashes, or pasties, didn’t.

I kicked off my heels, hung my overcoat, and unzipped the skirt. In my stockings and blouse, I rifled through my bag for my red leather cosmetics case. I pulled out my silver pasties and swiped the back with spirit gum. They would need a few minutes to get tacky, and even though I didn’t technically need them until act two, they don’t adhere as well on sweaty, just-performed skin. I found the baggie containing my fishnets and gave them a quick once-over for runs. I always check them the day after a show, and again before I put them in my go bag, but it only takes one hole wrapped around a toenail to make you paranoid for life. It really cramps my strut when I feel like gangrene is creeping up my foot.

Next, I retrieved the baggie containing my garter belt. Bra and garter hooks are the natural enemy of stockings, so I stored them separately. I hooked the belt on, sat down, put on my flesh-tone nylon footies so my toes wouldn’t poke through the netting, and slipped the stockings up my legs.

It was always worth the extra thirty seconds to move carefully with fishnets.

I rolled up my pink sweater, tossed my bra into my bag, and swiped my breasts with an alcohol pad to remove any oil from sweat. Then I applied the right pasty, as high on the aureole as I could. Princess Farhana taught me that valuable trick: never go dead center. If the bottom of the pasty just barely covers the bottom of the nipple, it’ll sit higher on the breast, making your breasts look about an inch perkier than they would be without pasties. A little cover-up and powder on the bottom of the aureole, and the audience is none the wiser.

I was a young-looking thirty-two, but every little bit helped.

The door slammed open. “I just
knew
Billy Joel would fuck up my life someday,” Tish announced. She threw the door closed behind her and flopped into the chair next to me.

Tish, the fabulous Lola Getz, was even shorter than me, but you’d never guess it. Her voice was girlish, but she made up for it in volume. Her brown hair was cut in a bob that she used to create 20’s-style curls around her face. That face itself wasn’t classically pretty, but her rosebud lips were made for wicked smirks, and when she wore her dark eye makeup and false eyelashes, her hazel eyes looked almost like an anime character’s. And no one, but no one, could argue about the proportions of her petite body.

“Hi,” I said absently, affixing the left pasty. I hated changing in front of her. As a troupe director and lifelong dancer, I’m sure she’s seen it all, but her figure was so much cuter than mine. She already wore her glittery black corset. “What about Billy Joel?”

“It’s too annoying to talk about,” she said, and considered her manicure. “I don’t know what to do about this guy.”

“The one who didn’t call?” I asked.

“Well, he did,” she said. “But he totally doesn’t understand what we do. He wants me to give him a private show, and that would be, you know, weird.”

“So what did you say?” I started lacing my lightweight corset. I wouldn’t wear something that would press deep indentations into my stomach before a solo, but it had a nice shape, and it was surprisingly comfortable. Once tied, the red laces came to a nice bow in a V at the small of my back. Tying it was the tricky part. Lacing yourself into a corset isn’t always easy.

“I changed the subject,” she said. “Did you put on weight?”

I flushed. “Maybe.” I looked down, feigning concentration.

It’s just her insecurity
, I reminded myself.
Don’t personalize stuff that doesn’t belong to you.
The past two times we’ve launched Chicago Cabaret shows, the reviews mentioned me as a high point. One of them mentioned Tish as a producer, but not as a performer. Ever since then, and especially since the Boylesque Incident, she’s felt the need to get her little digs in. To be fair, I did love my wine and chocolate, so it stung, and I couldn’t say “no” conclusively.

“He said he might come tonight.”

“Does anyone have a scrunchie?” Lisa asked again.

“Lisa, if anyone had a scrunchie, they would’ve said so the
third
time you asked,” Tish snapped. She turned back to me. “I hope she doesn’t do that reverse plough roll in her solo again,” she whispered. “It looks so awkward. You can see everyone wince.”

A knock sounded at the door. “Ten minutes,” Grant’s voice called.

Tish recovered her feet in one fluid motion and yanked the door open. “How’s the sound?” she asked.

I averted my eyes from the door.

“Good,” I heard Grant say. “I thought it would be harder than it is, but it’s really nice.” Adam had just installed a new sound system with wireless controls, which allowed Grant to emcee the show and then run sound from the wings. Tish had been on edge about it for weeks.

“Thanks, Grant,” Tish said, and headed back towards me and sat down. “So anyway, he’s kinda hot, but I don’t think he makes much.”

I hopped up and squeezed past her. “If you’ll excuse me,” I said to Tish, “I just want to catch him about my intro.”