out. My Mom once told me I should go to church and meet a nice girl, but I wasn’t a church-going guy and doubted I’d have much in common with any woman I’d meet there even if I had been. Online dating seemed too weird to me. I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I’d tried a singles night at the local Borders Books one time, and that was a disaster. Turned out women didn’t hang out in the hunting section too much, and I had no interest in chick-lit or poetry or current affairs.
Bars. Churches. Bookstores. There just weren’t many places in York County to meet women.
But now I could add the Odessa to my list.
Thinking again of Sondra, I ate two granola bars and washed them down with a beer. Breakfast of fucking champions. Webster stuck his face in his bowl and sniffed his food. Then he turned his tail up at me and stalked away.
“Fuck you, too, buddy.”
My apartment wasn’t much. Bedroom, living room, bathroom and kitchen—all furnished with stuff I bought from yard sales and thrift stores and Wal Mart. The only really nice things I had were my big screen plasma TV and my stereo, both of which were high end. I’d spent more money on them than I had on my Jeep Cherokee. I had a pretty extensive DVD and CD collection to go with them, as well as complete NFL and NASCAR subscriptions with my satellite provider, and an Xbox and a Playstation. I had a computer that I hardly ever turned on. My email inbox was as empty as my answering machine and I could look at porn and play games on the TV.
That was pretty much it as far as belongings. Everything else was perfunctory. The bare essentials. Bachelor pad 101. The fridge was never full, except for leftovers and pizza and beer. Most of the bathroom cupboards were empty. A few rolls of toilet paper and some toothpaste. There wasn’t even much furniture, really. Most of the rooms seemed bigger than they were, simply because there wasn’t a lot of stuff in them.
It was my home, but it was also the loneliest place in the world.
My crib. My prison.
I finished my beer and then went looking for Webster. I found him curled up on my bed, taking a nap. He opened one eye and looked at me with disdain. Sighing, I lay down beside him and closed my eyes. Webster changed positions, snuggled up against me, and did the same. His fur tickled my nose and his purring rumbled in my chest.
Before I fell asleep, the last thing I remember thinking was wondering where Sondra lived and if she was as lonely as I was when she went there.
six
I went back to the Odessa two nights later, a few hours before my shift started at work. I didn’t tell Yul or Darryl, and I didn’t see Jesse there. I’d thought I might, since it was one of his favorite hangouts. But he wasn’t among the crowd and to be honest, I was relieved. Despite the fact that he came here, too, it would have been embarrassing to run into him. Would have seemed like I was sneaking around. Deep down, I felt like a creepy stalker-type. But it didn’t matter.
I had to see her.
And I did.
Again and again and again. Sondra was my drug of choice and yeah, I was fucking hooked. Jesse and Darryl had been right about my attraction to her. I had it bad. She was more addictive than meth. The Odessa became my new hangout. I went there before work, after work, on the weekends, whenever I had the time and money. Started thinking about picking up another part time job just to pay for all the lap dances and shit. I got at least one every time I went there. I used the time to make small talk with the other girls, to ask about Sondra—what she was like, did she have a boyfriend, how long had she been here—things like that. Most of the dancers were suspicious at first. One even asked me if I was a cop. None of them told me anything useful. But still I tried. And besides—a lap dance is a lap dance.
Jesse ran into me there soon enough. With the cat out of the bag, we started hanging out at the Odessa together. Partners in slime, because despite my libido, I did feel slimy after leaving the place. Still, that didn’t stop me from going back. Sometimes Darryl came with us (but not Yul—he’d felt guilty and admitted everything to Kim, who’d gone ballistic and forbade him to go there with us ever again). Most of the time though, I preferred to go by myself. Being alone in your apartment is one thing. Being alone in a strip club is something very different. I could focus more when my friends weren’t there. Enjoy the lap dances and talk to the girls without interference or being fucked with.
And watch Sondra dance without distractions.
After a few weeks, I guess I was considered a regular. I started showing up even more than Jesse, who still had other clubs he also liked to hang at. Once I’d quit asking about Sondra, the girls warmed up to me. Or at least they warmed up to my tips. Some of the dancers, including Tonya, called me by name and asked about work and Webster and shit like that. Several of the other regular customers recognized me, too. A few even knew my name or shared beers with me. But for the most part, we didn’t interact with each other. We weren’t there to make friends. We were there for one reason only. Women. Still, it was a friendly vibe. The bouncers didn’t glare at me quite as hard. And Otar the doorman would actually return my head nods now when I left. His gray eyes still regarded me like I was a bug, but even a head nod was acknowledgement.
The only two people I didn’t interact with on some level were Whitey—and Sondra.
Whitey was an enigma. I saw him around occasionally, either passing through the club or standing in the rear. I found out he had an office back there, where he spent a lot of time. The Odessa had a second floor, too. I hadn’t noticed it the first time we’d been inside because the staircase was located in the rear, next to the restrooms. Although I hadn’t been upstairs, I was told there were private rooms available where you could go with your favorite stripper and watch her perform the ‘Forbidden Dance’. Turned out Jesse hadn’t been full of shit after all—at least about that part. I was too chicken shit to spring for the Forbidden Dance, and besides, Sondra wasn’t giving them, so there was no point. It was all about her. Even the lap dances I got from the other girls were related to Sondra.
As for the rest of what Jesse had said, I’d seen no indication that Whitey and his employees were mobsters. Hard motherfuckers, sure, but not gangsters. Tonya hadn’t brought it up again and I didn’t ask. The only things I knew for sure about Whitey were that he never smiled, rarely spoke to the customers, and that some of the girls seemed scared of him. Not in a terrified, run away screaming sort of way, but subdued and fearful. Cautious. I never saw Whitey holler at them. In fact, he barely acknowledged them at all. But even so, they seemed to walk on eggshells around him, especially the foreign girls, who outnumbered the other dancers. Dude’s pimp hand was strong.
Sondra was an enigma, too, but in a different way than her boss. Her performances were limited and I sometimes wondered why she didn’t dance more. She only stripped twice a night, fifteen minutes at a time, and when she was on stage, she owned the joint. She interacted with the crowd without ever really getting involved with them. Unlike most of the girls, Sondra didn’t do lap dances or work the crowd when she wasn’t dancing. In fact, you never saw her at all in between sets. She’d disappear backstage and she didn’t appear again until her second set came around. I wondered what she did back there. There was no way I could get backstage to meet her. Two bouncers guarded that area at all times.
Maybe she didn’t need to work the crowd in between her time on stage. She sure as hell made a killing while she danced. Every night, guys (and sometimes women) would rush the stage, crowding around as soon as she came on. They reached for her and she floated just out of reach—an endless ritual. Trying to touch Sondra was like trying to hold gossamer or a cloud. Her admirers were always grasping, never quite touching, fists clenching ones and tens and twenties and more. They’d put them in her g-string. She’d pick them up with her mouth or push her breasts together and collect the bills with her cleavage. And at least once during every set, one lucky individual would get an extra special treat—he’d roll the bill into a tube and hold it upright, and Sondra would squat over it and pick it up that way—not using her hands. The crowd always went nuts when she did this, even though they’d seen her do it before. I didn’t blame them. I totally understood. I went nuts every time, too. I imagined what it would be like to be that dollar bill. I imagined a lot of things.
Was I obsessed? I don’t know. Maybe. Fuck it. Yeah, maybe I was. But if you’d seen her, you wouldn’t blame
