The Tease (The Darling Killer Trilogy) (4 page)

“Uh, sure,” she said.

I grabbed my heels with my left hand and used my right shoulder to catch the dressing room door. “Grant,” I said, my feet tamping over the black floor.

He turned and smiled. “Hi, Anna.”

Oh God. He smiled.

I had no idea what to say. For the second damn time that day, butterflies overran me. The house lights from the theater spilled over his shoulders, illuminating his face when he turned to me. He was tall and gangly, with thick, dark hair in a messy ponytail, still in torn jeans and a faded t-shirt. His long-lashed eyes were impossibly dark. He had no idea how cute he was. It was adorable.

I need to meet someone I don’t work with
, I thought.
I’m not sure I’m ready, but this is awful.

“Hi,” I said, and decided on selective honesty. “Nothing important, actually. I just wanted to get out for a minute.”

“Gotcha,” he said. “Would you like a hand with that?”

“With wh – oh.” I realized I still held my corset laces with my right hand. “Yes, thank you.”

He stepped past me and I caught a hint of his cologne, spicy with a hint of leather. His fingertips brushed mine as he took the corset laces. I brought my hand near my stomach, clenching and unclenching a fist a few times, as I inhaled the backstage smells of dusty velvet and horsehair.

“How was your day?” he asked.

I barely felt the swift, economical movements of his hands making the bow, but shivered when one fingertip brushed my right scapula.
Stage magic
, I thought.
Card tricks, sleight of hand, juggling. And music. He’s dexterous.

Stop thinking about his hands.

“Long,” I said. “Yours?”

“Good,” he said. Finished with the bow, he stepped to face me again. “I’m actually glad you stopped me; there’s something I wanted to ask you about.”

My breath caught in my throat, and I was momentarily grateful for the dim lighting because I knew my pupils dilated. “Fire away,” I said, carefully pleasant.

“Another theater troupe is doing a production of
Movin’ Out
here,” he said. “You know, the one based on Billy Joel’s music.”

My pulse sped up. Was he about to ask me out? But if so, why would he bring me back to the place we work together?

“So there’s going to be a piano on stage for about three weeks,” he finished

“That explains her – comment,” I said, catching myself before I said “snit.” “Tish isn’t going to like that at all.” I remembered her haranguing a student for forgetting to clear a chair from a previous act. She felt it looked odd to leave the chair unacknowledged during her own act, so she had to incorporate some chair work into her striptease. No one could tell it wasn’t planned, but she liked things to go her way.

“She wasn’t thrilled,” he said. “But if we can incorporate it into the show in some way, then there’s a reason for it to be there, and she’ll be fine. So I was wondering if you’d do a sketch with me.”

“I’d love to,” I said.

He grinned. “Great! I figure I can do one song as filler between two sets, and then if you and I have a good piece, we use the piano twice, so it won’t bother her that it’s there.”

“I’m so flattered you thought of me, thank you,” I said.

“Flattered?” he said. “I like your work a lot. I’ll call you this week?”

Before I could answer, the door to the dressing room flew open, its light silhouetting Lisa’s body. She wore a white, mens’ shirt open over her black lingerie: a simple black lace demi-bra, panties, and garter belt with stockings. No amount of rhinestones would ever make my butt as pert and perfect as hers. “Grant!” she said. She trotted out the door, followed closely by Monica. “Just the man I’ve been looking for. Do you have a hair tie?”

“Uh,” he said. “Just… only this one. You can have it, if you don’t mind I’ve been wearing it.”

“Yes yes yes!” she exclaimed.

He pulled it out of his hair, which spilled over his shoulders. It looked almost black in the half-light. A strand fell in front of his eyes, and I ached to brush it back.

She took the rubber band. “You’re a lifesaver,” she said. “I’m a little bit in love with you right now.”

He sputtered a laugh and looked at his shoes. I knew he’d turned a deep scarlet. “I don’t know how to respond to that,” he choked.

She kissed him on the cheek. “Thank you,” she said, and dashed back into the dressing room.

“Uh,” Grant said, running his hand through his hair and looking at me. I’d never seen his hair down before; it drew more attention to the bone structure of his face. I almost fainted. “I’m, gonna –” He gestured towards the house. “First night with the wireless sound – Gotta – Um.” He pointed in the direction of the sound booth, turned, and fled.

Monica clasped her hands together and grinned, shoulders lifting, eyes closing, almost like a cat in a perfect sunbeam. “He’s so awkward,” she whispered. “It’s totally hot!”

“It is,” I agreed, leaning against the wall. “Too hot.”

“Well?” she said, looking at me. “Say something to him.”

“
You
say something to him.”

“Honey, I would
wreck
him,” she said. “I’m not gonna lie, I kind of want to, but he’s so skinny. There’d be nothing left of him. I need someone a little more solid.”

“You’re awful,” I said.

“I know,” she purred. Then she elbowed me. “You should say something, seriously.”

I shook my head. “I don’t think he’s into me.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Have you seen the way he looks at you?” she said. “If I was you, I’d just crook my little finger and have my way with him.”

I laughed. “You think he looks at me like that?”

“You mean
more
than once per day?” she asked. “Jesus, yes.”

“We work together,” I said.

“So what?” she said. “You could be a hot duet, like the Dresden Dolls, or the Mezmer Society.”

“You know that none of them ended up with each other, right?”

“You could have cute little Vaudeville babies.”

“They don’t even work together anymore.”

“But none of them are you and Grant.”

I thought again of the hair falling into his eyes, the golden house lights spilling around his shoulders, and the way he ducked his head as he hurried to the sound booth.
It is soundproof,
I thought.
I’m going to Hell.

I groaned. “I hate being a girl.”

She looked pointedly at my corset. “No one else hates that you’re a girl,” she said. “C’mon, let’s finish getting ready. If Tish is still talking, we’ll play Count the Histrionics.”

• • •

The last ten minutes before curtain always felt like an hour. Finally, it was time. The first number was a troupe chair piece to a brassy old song called “How to Strip for Your Husband.” Six chairs, three in each row, awaited us onstage. The lights dimmed and we made our way to perch sideways on the chairs. The lights came up, the music started, and the audience cheered.

Burlesque audience interaction is freeing and fun. You can talk about the instant gratification of hearing people cheer for what you’re doing at the moment, or validation, or affirmation, sure. I like the connection, the absence of the fourth wall. Instead of a play where we don’t acknowledge the audience, we’re feeding each other. There’s no other connection like it; just the immediate experience, crackling with energy, communication without verbal conversation. As we danced, the audience cheered and howled, which gave us that extra bit of adrenaline and passion to give back.

In my favorite moment, the girls from the back row joined us in the front row. Lisa and I each had one hip on the chair. We would make eye contact, and our touching shoulders would shrug up and down together. After that, I would get up, and she’d take the chair, knees forward. I would straddle her lap, and she’d put her hands on my bottom. Then I would do a deep, upper body circle to the back, allowing my hair to sweep the stage. Don’t get me wrong, that part was hot too, and I’m certain that plenty of guys liked seeing three pairs of women do it simultaneously. I liked the eye contact and shrug better, though. It looked like sharing a naughty secret.

“It’s a pretty good crowd,” Sasha said in the dressing room.

“They are,” I agreed. I heard Grant’s voice over the tinny speaker as the other girls trooped into the room. He did some stage magic and audience banter to give Pip time to change and the stage hands time to move the chairs.

A good emcee is critical to educate the audience, sustain the performers’ glamor, and keep the show moving. Two of Tish’s beginning students, Trixie and Frenchie, wore cute lingerie and picked up the discarded articles of clothing. I always thought that was a nice touch. I found it depressing when burlesque artists picked up their own clothes after a routine. It totally shattered the illusion of the larger-than-life character.

I moved quickly, struggling to keep my hands from shaking. Grant wouldn’t start the music without me, but I didn’t want to hold things up. Everything about my costume was black, which made it a pain to make sure I had everything in my bag. I slipped off the ruffled panties and pulled a lacy slip over my spangled G-string. I swapped my corset for a lacy bra that allowed the silver pasties to glimmer through, zipped up my skirt, and pulled on my babydoll t-shirt. I added strappy heels, grabbed the faux leather jacket, and made it down to the wings before Sasha danced halfway through her piece.

I craved the solo time for the quiet in my head. When I really connected with the dance, the chatter in my mind stopped, and I was just movement, energy, perfect clarity. That’s what made an off night so frustrating to me. If the music skipped, or if something went wrong with my costume, if I forgot my choreography and couldn’t recover, it wasn’t the embarrassment that got to me. It was being within grasping distance of that silence and not quite catching it.

My dad told me that meditation would give me the same clarity. I hated sitting still and noticing my thoughts going by. I wanted the electric serenity of melding with the music.

Sasha’s music ended. The audience roared. She blew them a kiss and strutted off stage, patting my butt on her way past me. Grant headed onstage and egged them on, amping their energy. I rolled my shoulders up, back, and down, lengthening my spine, feeling the cat-that-ate-the-canary expression wash over my face.

I always put on the character before the audience can see me. You’re not performing just during the music. You need to sustain the illusion the entire time you’re visible to the audience. They won’t buy a dazzling performance if you slouch onstage like a drunken sasquatch.

“I love a good classical tease,” Grant said. The audience cheered in agreement. “I do, I love it. But let’s face it – there’s something great about a really dirty song.”

They howled.

“Next, we have a woman after my own heart—”

You would say that, wouldn’t you?

“Velvet is soft, but – let’s just say she’s good with contrast.”

They howled again.

“Ladies and gentlemen,
Velvet Crush!
”

As they cheered more, he walked offstage. The lights dimmed. He grinned at me and held the curtain open. I squared my shoulders, strutted onstage, and posed, heels of my hands in line with the tops of my glutes, my back to the audience. I drank in the last quiet, expectant moments between the applause and the lights.

Tom Waits’s drawl poured through the speakers, and the lights rose. The drums thunked punctuation, and I bumped my right hip up.

“YEAH!” shouted someone in the audience. Good.

The drums thunked again, twice, as I contracted my right glute and released it while contracting my right inner thigh, which created a sharp lock in my right hip and drop in my left. The song took off, and the audience was cheering, howling, whistling. I rolled my hips as I pivoted so the audience could see me and grinned at them. Then I moved my hand to the zipper on my skirt, and started playing with it, half-unzipping and re-zipping the skirt. I turned to face the back curtains, opening the skirt out so it was flat to the audience, just hiding my butt. I winked over my shoulder, sliding it side to side. They cheered like mad. No one expects you to take the skirt off first. I tossed it aside and strutted towards them, hands on my hips, showing off the lace slip and garter stockings. Next, I slithered my leather jacket down my upper arms, rolling my shoulders at the audience. Looking over your shoulder subconsciously makes people think of a breast’s curve.

A lot of burlesque is in illusion. Dark eye makeup and fake eyelashes make your eyes look bigger, mimicking the pupil dilation of arousal. Blush mimics the blood in your face. And lipstick mimics – well. There are any number of reasons you want your mouth to look good. Despite the illusion, though, there was something sincere about it. I’m a woman, I have a body, and there’s nothing shameful about this moment of sharing it with you.

I started to meld with Tom Waits’s gritty voice and strange vignettes. I tossed the jacket and pulled my shirt off slowly while I spun in place. It took me a long time to learn how to spin in heels, and I could keep it going for forty seconds without drifting, so I did.

I turned so I was in profile, standing with my ankles about two feet apart. Knees straight, I slid my hands down to my ankles. Then I abruptly bent my knees to a ninety degree angle, rested my elbows on my thighs, and bounced my hips to the drums. I always thought that move looked really down and dirty from the side, and the audience agreed, cheering until they almost drowned out the sparse vocals.

It was happening. I was immersed in the music, the audience was engaged, and the chatter, which my dad would call “illusion of self,” started to subside. The quiet burgeoned in my mind, a tiny warm glow gathering its energy.

I grinned out at the audience, and I noticed someone in the fourth row wasn’t moving or clapping. He was leaning forward, chin in hand, studying me intently.

Max.

The glow fizzled.
Oh God a client and he’s seeing me onstage and this is Oh GOD—

Sometimes things went wrong on stage. Sometimes a strap would snap, a pasty would come off, a heel would catch in an uneven stage. That’s part of why I practiced for an hour a day. My fingertips went cold and numb, and I thought my heart would explode, but I kept going. Wicked grin still on my face, butt still bouncing to the music, I let muscle memory carry me through the song.