soaked barflies.
'I could always become a full time hooker,' she told herself, 'but that's not what I really want to be.' Instead she settled for an occasional free lance hustling assignment and thus she reasoned, 'I've got the best of both worlds.'
Duane Sholes as it turned out wasn't shooting the shit about his fellow Texans. He told the boys back home about the hottest pair of lips in New York City and Toni Corbin's reputation spread through certain quarters of Dallas society like a brush fire fanned by a hot wind. Toni had no objections to any of this and invited them to come see her dance.
One dude named Edgar Lewis she took quite a fancy to and managed to pump her bank account up a few notches at the same time. It was a Monday afternoon and she was at home soaking in a hot tub with a gin and orange juice when the phone rang.
'Yes, hello?'
'Is this Miss Toni Corbin?' a Texas voice asked very slowly, coming at her like it was exiting from a deep sleep.
'Yes,' she replied telling herself that good old Duane had come through in his promise to do a bit of public relations for his brunette bombshell, 'and this no doubt is a Texas gentleman who happens to be a friend of… ' she broke off leaving her sentence trailing in midair just to see if her supposition was totally correct.
'Duane Sholes, Mam,' he filled her in 'and how did you know I was from Texas?' he asked in genuine bewilderment.
'It's that sexy voice of yours with that panhandle brogue that led me to that brilliant conclusion.
'Well I'll be knee high to a grasshopper,' he added quaintly.
'So what's on your mind, and by the way what's your name now that I've told you I'm me?'
'Edgar, Edgar Lewis.'
'Do your friends call you Ed for short?' Toni asked toying with him, feeling very big city.
'Toni my friends never call me Ed and they never call me short.' There was something in the way he delivered that piece of information that made Toni slip out of her lethargic, soap bubble daze and listen more closely to what was going down at the other end of the line.
'Do you think we might be able to get together for dinner this evening?' he asked.
'Sure, but it'll have to be a late dinner, closer to supper because I'm dancing tonight-that's my line of work you know. Say listen why don't you come down and see me do my act and have a few drinks and we can go on from there?'
'That sounds all right to me. Make it around eleven.' She gave him the address.
'And say how will I know it's you?'
'Oh I'll be wearing a Stetson hat. You know what a Stetson is don't you?' 'Of course I know what a Stetson is. Will you tell me something please?'
'What's that?'
'Why is it that everyone from Texas seems to wear Stetsons?'
'That young lady, is the magical question and tonight you just might find the magical answer. By the way how will I know you when I see you?'
'Oh you'll know me when you see me-you'll know.'
The thing that made Toni different from the other girls who worked the bars and strip parlors of New York was talent. The thing that made that talent exciting was the fact that Toni had the capacity for growth. It was something that was very tangible, it was a maturation process that made everyday an event for her; it was something worth waking up for.
Toni would take a two and a half minute record and turn it into an event; she could transform the most banal of AM pop hits into an occasion of wonder. Toni was inventive and progressive where the other girls were content to.walk through their routines with the minimum of thought and rhythm. Everyone told her she was going places.
Going places meant Las Vegas or acquiring her own strip tease revue. In the microcosmic world of the Forty Second street strip parlors and bars word got out on Toni Corbin and the work flooded in. She was approached several times by shark skin suited men who wanted to manage her career; with promises of stardom and riches and nothing but the best of times to come. She held out against these offers because she wanted to shape her own destiny. The stories that proliferated among the girls about these dubious entrepreneurs and their dealings was enough to scare even the most desperate, star struck teenager away.
Her body went through a metamorphosis as a result of the long hours she spent on her act. She shed pounds and built up stamina and a set of pins that were sleek and powerful for such a petite girl. Her breasts filled out to ample but economic proportions while her tummy inverted itself into a tight but ultra feminine taper. For the most part she avoided excessive drinking and only took pills as stimulants when absolutely necessary. She had to be careful there because she had a marked weakness for getting stoned on Dexedrine and grass and dancing her ass off for hours.
Toni maintained a prolifically ambitious schedule that had her working as the featured dancer at the Tampa Lounge on 47 Street from noon until two o'clock and from ten pm until one the following morning five days a week. The afternoons were open to free lance at other bars and burlesque houses and sub for girls out sick or just sleep, take in a movie or go shopping. It wasn't a bad life compared to the swarm of humanity that brushed against her daily on the streets of New York.
Her arms were flailing above her head in an intricate arabesque under the revolving, fuchsia color spotlight of the dancers' platform-removed from the sea of blood shot eyes and open mouths like some tarnished goddess on a plaster pedestal; thirty seven minutes into her act with her sequined and fringed bikini bottomed ass grinding out a masterpiece of simulated copulation when she spotted the Stetson hat walking through the door.
The combination of high decibel music, the babble of conversations shouted out in relays and the rattle of ice against glass buffeted by a wall of cigarette smoke made Edgar Lewis think he had just stepped into a lunatic asylum with wall-to-wall carpeting. His eyes went to work trying to tie in what his brain was telling him was going on. The first thing he related to was the sweating figure of the girl on the platform humping at the air in frenetic bursts as if she had just received a bolt of lightning between her legs and was throwing it back at heaven. He knew that was Toni Corbin.
Heads swiveled as the tall Texan navigated his way to the bar, 'What'll it be Tex?' the bartender asked and was told Bourbon on the rocks. Edgar Lewis leaned one elbow on the bar, pushed his Stetson off his forehead and took a good look at the electric kewpie doll on stage. Toni kept her body moving and her eyes glued to Edgar Lewis through his first Bourbon and the last four minutes of her routine. She was dancing just for him.
As the last chord twanged off into a thick bass rumble and the spotlight died with a jolt, Toni pivoted and bounced from the stage down into the back room. She was wet with perspiration and her eyes stung from her makeup which had began to congeal at the comers. She took the thick terry- cloth towel from her oversized handbag and wiped the sweat from behind her neck and under her arms. She fluffed her damp hair and reached for a cigarette. She pulled out a robe and threw it across her shoulders and unsnapped the hook of her bra before dropping the slither of her G-string.
Ten minutes later Edgar saw her moving towards him, stopping to chat and receive a few words of praise from the customers, fending off drinks and taking a pat on the ass or two with a good natured smile. She reached just under his chin and looking up to him and his hat beyond she said, 'Hi I'm Toni and you're Edgar right?'
'Right.'
'Well what did you think of my act?' she asked making some kind of a signal to the bartender to which he responded with a glass of orange juice, 'I liked it a lot. You sure can shake like some-thin' else. Damn, how can you keep that up?'
He was a lot younger than she had expected, maybe thirty-two or three and besides his imposing height he was also very good looking with a thick head of curly blonde hair and eyes almost the same color as his friend Duane Sholes. This just might turn out to be an interesting number she told herself shifting her weight from one foot to another. 'Oh you know lots of practice, vitamins and eight hours of sleep every night.'
'Damn, I want to catch that again from the beginning.'
'Stick around for awhile and you will. Hey, why don't I get myself together and let's get out of here. I'm starved and I'm holding you to that invitation for dinner.'
