The Wild Side

A novel excerpt from Mona LaVigne © 2003

Lorna went to work the following evening, and after her first stage routine, two main floor lap dances, and one ten minute back room private dance, she had a back back room adventure with a young guy who wanted to fuck her tits. Lorna was sure that the kid was gay, but he pounded his cock against her chin and kept saying cheesy shit like, “Oh, you got gorgeous boobs!” and “Soft, milky pillows!” It was all Lorna could do to keep from laughing, but she was glad that she hadn’t, because after he came across her neck, he gave her two hundred dollars in twenty dollar bills. She wiped herself off, gave five of the twenties to Chavez, and went to the dressing room to change so she could go home. She saw Missy, alone at a dressing table, finishing off a line of white powder. She looked up at Lorna and wiped her nose with the side of her hand.

“Coooooooocaine! Want some?”

Lorna had grown used to Missy’s drug use in the dressing room at The Satin Strip, and every time she would see her, Missy would offer some of whatever she was taking and every time, Lorna would refuse. She had learned to ignore it.

“Hey, Missy, can I ask you something?”

“Sure.” Her eyes rolled into the back of her head for a second, alarming Lorna, but Missy righted herself almost immediately and smiled.

“I, uh, I met Charlie Knuckles last night.”

“Ooh, he’s great. Did he introduce you to Mary Benjamin, too?”

“Yeah, he did. But, um, he gave me his business card. Daisy told me that he had given it to you once, too. I was curious... did you call?”

“You bet your ass I called! A rich man like Charlie Knuckles wants me to make more cash? I was into it at first. But I don’t deal with third parties.”

“What do you mean?”

“I called him and he gave me some other number. He was like some pre-screening thing or some shit. And I’m not into that. Are you gonna call him?”

Lorna shrugged. “I think I might. I mean, I have nothing to lose, right?”

“True. Look, Lindsey, forgive me for being presumptuous, but how long have you been dancing?”

“As long as I’ve been working here... less than a year, nine months, maybe?”

“It’s funny, but I’m only 22, and I’ve been dancing here nearly three years longer than you have. Can I offer some words of wisdom?”

Lorna thought this was a little bit rude, but she was the one who had made the initial approach, so she nodded. “Of course.”

“I think it’s totally cool if you call Charlie Knuckles. But just... be careful. He wants to know if you want to make some extra cash. What kind of ‘extra cash’ does a stripper make?”

Lorna flinched. Unwritten Rule Number 53 of Exotic Dancing: the girls are called “dancers,” not “strippers.” As long as she had been dancing at The Satin Strip, she had never heard one of her fellow dancers refer to themselves or others of their ilk as “strippers.”

“Lindsey,” Missy continued, “I’ve been in ‘adult entertainment’ or whatever you want to call it, for a long time and believe me, it can be a really ugly business. I know, you’re thinking, no shit. But I’m telling you, out there, in Charlie Knuckles’ ‘extra cash’ business, there are big, angry men with knives and guns. And you don’t have Buck the bouncer on the other side of the curtain, you know what I mean?”

Mona LaVigne is a former call girl from Paris, France.