My gut felt like it was sinking down to the bottom of the ocean as I let Lindsey’s news settle in, and my feet grew heavy like lead weights. What the hell? He couldn’t find the decency to call us and say he was closing up shop?

Instincts told me that it was more than a one and done sort of thing. But that was none of my business. My landlord wasn’t going to care if the FBI or even God himself shut the place down; he wanted his money.

That thought only reminded me that so many people were counting on this money, including me. I had a family, and they weren’t doing too hot on money either. Good thing I had student loans for my schooling, or else I’d be screwed to the hundredth power.

Everyone wandered back into the streets, where they began to head off into different directions. Lindsey leaned on a wall and rubbed her forehead.

“Shit,” she mumbled under her breath.

“What happened? Did the building get foreclosed on?” I was prying, and damn it, I had every right to do so. This was my money too.

“That old ass fart. He wouldn’t tell me. But I bet it’s gotta be pretty bad to get him to close the doors.”

It was over. For real. Just like that.

Lindsey and I were the only stragglers still left at the now defunct club, and a blackness began to creep up the alley, threatening to swallow us. We linked arms and went back onto the main road where the street lamps gave us a bit more safety.

“Well, I guess we could always try to go back to another club with our tail between our legs, like everyone else is probably already trying to do just about now…”

As soon as I suggested it, I realized how dumb of an idea it was, although I had a little hope because Lindsey was always everyone’s favorite, and Lindsey was also one of my best friends. But I also heard Willow’s voice in my ear, scolding me about other opportunities out there besides stripping.

“Not a fat chance,” Lindsey quickly said. “I had a friend looking to start dancing. I knew that Bar Seven wouldn’t hire her without experience, so I called every other club in town, trying to cash in favors from back in the day before I started working at Bar Seven, to help her out, you know? And they were all like, ‘Sorry, babe, we remember your fine tits but we can’t do anything to help you out even if you show ’em to us again for old times’ sake.’”

She made her voice sound like an old perverted strip club manager as she said it, and I cracked up. It was good to laugh even though I otherwise felt despondent. 

“They said, ‘You should be glad you moved up and on while you had the chance because we’re really suffering around here and there’s already such a glut of dancers trying to get enough shifts and hours in between there being so many of them,’” she continues, “‘that we can’t possibly take another one— not even for you, Sugartits.’”

Even though I was upset and disappointed, I couldn’t help but laugh even more heartily at good old Lindsey. Her fake, exaggerated accent was hilarious. As was the reminder of her nickname, “Sugartits,” and how she’d earned it.

Lindsey always performed an act to Pour Some Sugar on Me in which she would literally do just that— or have someone else come up on stage and do it to her. Then she would lick the sugar crystals off her large breasts while she was up stage, sometimes right in front of the face of the lucky customer who had the honors of pouring the sugar on her.

Finally, she’d pour some sugar on her pussy and let all the guys inspect the sparkling white crystals up close as they glistened on stage under the lights. They weren’t allowed to really eat it, of course, or even touch it, but she made a big production out of acting like they could, and pretending she was literally serving up her sugar-laced pussy to them.

She made a lot of money from that act, which was entirely her invention. Guys who were regulars or who had heard about her act— some came for miles to see it— would offer up large tips to all her night long in a bid to be the one called up stage. She’d always do it as her final act so she could string along the mystery of who would be chosen along late into the night, with guy after guy buying lap dances with her and tipping better and better. The more the night wore on, the more they’d drink, and the more they’d drink, the better they’d tip, and the more excited they’d get over hoping they’d be the one she’d choose for her act, which only helped fuel the entire process over and over and over.

It was an ingenious plan and it worked so well that other girls at the club started trying to copy it. She’d go up to them and tell them they’d better knock that off. At first, they’d taunt her by saying, “Or what? Did you file a trademark? Are you gonna sue us over it?”

But then she started saying “No, actually, I’m gonna kill you over it,” while making air movements that pretended to slit their throats. I knew that Lindsey was a peaceful soul who would never harm anyone, but the other girls were scared enough by her crazy portrayal of a crazy person that they actually started to wonder if she was, indeed, crazy.

“Where’d you learn to sound so scary and convincing in your death threats?” I’d asked her once.

“From binge-watching Orange is the New Black,” she’d replied.

I’d laughed, but she’d been serious. Whatever worked, I supposed. I’d always admired Lindsey’s business acumen, as well as her confidence on stage and in every other facet of her life.

Lindsey wasn’t like me or most dancers, who claimed— but I really mean it, of course— to just be doing the whole stripping thing temporarily because we really needed money, and who also claimed to not really like it. Sure, I needed money to live and I was willing to do whatever it took to get it. But that didn’t mean I loved doing it. In fact, the opposite was true. I didn’t really like anything about it, other than the fact that it made decent money.

But Lindsay had always been the one to say, “Fuck this, I own what I do and I’m proud of it,” and she’d always meant it, too. She liked to go off on speeches about how stripping is true feminist entrepreneurship— women using their assets to profit. She would ask why she’s supposed to feel bad about taking her clothes off for money when the guys aren’t supposed to feel bad for paying her money to take off her clothes.

Now, Lindsey stopped sighing and her pretty, dark brown eyes popped back open at me. “Come on, let me drive you home. I know you need the ride.”

“Thanks.”

I supposed there was nowhere to go but home. And at least I had a friend to take me there.