Every other stripper in this club will hate me, but I've got to say it anyways. I like it when I’m on stage. But not for the reason you think. Sure, I’m getting naked and sure I’m getting "rained on." When the customers “make it rain” the club actually changes a $100 bill for them for 100 singles and then lets the customers throw the bills over you, in effect making it rain.

It makes it a bitch to collect though. But I can deal with that.

No, I like being on stage because I don’t have to hustle and work the main floor. I can be by myself. Most dancers—we prefer dancers and not strippers—prefer earning the lap dance cash from the clients one to one. I like being up on stage. Most dancers only use the stage as an advertisement, to catch a man’s eye so when they go down to the floor, people remember them. I wish I could stay up here forever.

Don’t get me wrong. It’s not like I can’t get anyone to agree to a lap dance. It’s actually the opposite. Guys just flock to me. Sometimes they stand in line for me to grind on them.

No, I hate this part of the night because I have zero respect for the guys that come in here.

I mean, if they’re married, what the fuck are they doing in here by themselves? Creeping me out is what they’re doing. I bet their wife or girlfriend will really appreciate them coming home smelling of cheap body spray at the end of the night.

If they’re here in a group, well, that’s slightly better, but still, kinda skeeves me out. I mean, they’re here watching each other get hard as some girl rubs herself on them. Sure, I’m okay to go out with my girlfriends and hit on guys while they’re there. But with women, we know it’s just harmless fun. These guys in the club—they have this glint in their eye and they’re crazed.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not some innocent little virgin who’s never been told the facts of life. I mean, I work in a strip club, right?

But something about the patrons just causes me to want to stay on stage.

Maybe it’s the hundred times a night I have to make sure guys know that they can’t touch me. I can touch them. Or how they’ll try to buck their hips as I’m grinding on them, just so they can go a little deeper.

Maybe it’s because at the end of the day, they’re judging me based on my looks and putting a monetary value on it.

That’s probably it. When I go out with my friends and we talk to guys, I’m not putting a dollar value on how much I’d pay to talk to the guy or flirt with the guy. Even if I make out with him or go home with him, it’s not like I’m asking him how much it costs. But these guys think that they can have me just because they’re carrying fat stacks of $20 notes.

Sure, that’s what I’m here for. Technically, the more I can make them think that, the more money I make, and the more I can pay off the student loans that funded my Art History degree from Yale. The degree that still hasn’t landed me any sort of meaningful job.

It’s been roughly one year since I graduated. I’m now 24 years old, and this is my second month stripping. It got to the point where I had to decide whether not stripping was worth not paying rent and moving out of the city and back home with my parents. I must have sent out at least seven hundred resumes by then. Gone on dozens of interviews. But ended up with nothing.

Not the sexy things you thought were going through my head as I rub myself on the crotch of some 50-ish Wall Street guy with a receding hairline and a pretty big paunch, is it?

I turn my head back toward the guy a little to give him some attention. “You like that, baby?” I ask with a slight pout. Inside, I’m wondering if his wife knows where he’s at. I saw the ring on his finger. I wonder if he has a son or daughter and if he’s put away enough for college. Will his kids have to take out student loans because Daddy gave me their book money this semester?

“Could you, uhm, maybe turn around a little bit, darlin?” Mr. Wall Street asks me, bringing his hands up, but remembering what I said about touching. “I kinda want to see, uhm, your breasts.”

Sure. They all want to see my breasts. They want me to mash it on their faces. They want to stick out their tongues so they can play with my nipples. Whatever.

“I like it just fine sitting here,” I say to him and turn back, grinding my ass on his crotch a little faster.

There have been a few times I’ve made a guy cum just by grinding on him. That’s been funny. He’s had to walk around with a giant wet spot. Especially if his friends were here. Once it was just a guy. He came in his pants. I seriously didn’t even know he did until I felt his pants get all wet. I mean, his cock must have been tiny because I couldn't feel anything. Anyways, he just went back to his table and ordered another beer. Sitting in his own cum. That’s the kind of people that come to these clubs.

“But, your breasts…”

I don't let the man finish. I need to establish who’s boss.

“Do you see that line over there, hon?” I ask him, gesturing my head to the line of guys waiting to ask me to give them a dance. “If you don’t like this, you can go back to the end of the line.”

Surprisingly, Mr. Wall Street has more self-worth than I give him credit for. He pushes me off gently as I feel his hands on my back force me into a position where I’m standing.

“That’s fine,” he says. “Can I have my money back?”

The song isn't even half over and he’s got a legitimate point. But it’s people like him that attract the attention of the floor manager and the House Mom. I know all eyes are on me as I reach into my heels and pull out the wad of cash I’ve collected, peeling off a $20 note and turning around and walking away toward the bar. I can hear the collective groans of at least half a dozen people as they watch me leave. Guys who were waiting their turn to get their cocks stimulated by my hot ass.

Whatever. I seriously don't have any fucks left to give them right now.

I order a glass of wine at the bar, and sip it contentedly for a minute.

“Misty,” a voice says and I don’t even need to turn around to know who it is. “You left a lot of guys unhappy on the floor.”

The face associated with the voice sits down next to me. It’s the House Mom—Yasmine. Every club has a House Mom. We tip her out at the end of the night. In return, she takes care of the girls. She gets us dinner. She makes sure we don't get too drunk. Sometimes she helps with our outfits and tells us when we’re up on the main stage. But more than anything else, she makes sure that we make money for the club.

“It’s not really the best idea to just walk away when you have people lined up for you – especially when some girls have no one to dance for,” Yasmine says again.

I shrug and take a sip of my drink. “I needed a break,” I say.

“You’ve been needing a break since you started, Misty,” Yasmine says, using my stage name again. My real name is Ashley Lane. But on the floor, it’s like I have a pen name. And it’s only professional for her to use it. “Are you sure you want to be here?”

That’s the rub, isn’t it? I graduated cum laude from Yale University. Sure, Art History may not be Engineering, but it’s still Yale. What am I doing at a strip club?

“I need the money, Yasmine,” I say to her for the millionth time. “You know that.”

“Isn’t there anything else you could be doing to make money instead of making yourself miserable every night from 8 pm to 4 am?” Yasmine asks, as she too orders a glass of wine. “This can’t be good for you.”

It’s not a question I haven’t asked before.

But there is one unavoidable truth in America for a woman today that is kind of depressing but still hard to escape.

That truth? Sex will always sell.

No matter what you end up looking like, women can always make money selling some form of sex. Which is basically what I’ve been reduced to because of my financial situation. A sex worker.

“I just wish I could find something that pays like this that didn't involve…” I begin, looking for the proper words, but struggling.

“Having to deal with men?” Yasmine asks, as if she’s in my head. I look up at her because she hit the nail on the head. She smiles at me.

“If I didn’t have to deal with ugly guys all night, I could still do this,” I tell her. “Hell, I could do a lot more.”

Yasmine pauses for a moment, as if thinking to herself. I wonder what’s going through her head.

Finally, she reaches into her bra, and pulls out a business card. I had no idea she kept things in there, but she hands it to me.

“Take the night off, darling,” she tells me as I take the card. “And call these people in the morning.”

“Simulated Pleasures LLC,” I read aloud.

“Same owner as Scorcher’s,” Yasmine says nodding, referring to the strip club. “Only you can work from home and it’s a phone sex line. They could use someone with as much imagination and intelligence as you.”

I look at Yasmine, grateful. This could totally be it!

“Thank you, Yas—” I’m about to say, but Yasmine has already gotten up from her chair and interrupts me.

“Now go home,” she says. “I’m serious. You’re no good here.”

***

It’s nearly midnight by the time I get my makeup off, tip out the DJ, the makeup girls, Yasmine, the waitress, as well as the club.

I’m waiting on 6^th Avenue for a taxicab but tonight, they’re hard to come by. Finally, I see one that stops and I go to get in.

Just as I get inside, the door opens from the other end. A man gets in.

This is my cab! What the fuck!

“59^th and Fifth Avenue, please!” the man literally shouts at the driver. I can tell he just came in from the club.

“Hey buddy!” I yell at him and he turns to me. His eyes widen and he looks at me as if he knows me.

I can’t lie. He’s cute. More than cute. He’s gorgeous. He’s muscled and he’s got a smirk and if he wasn’t coming out of the club, I would totally be crushing on him right now.

“This is my cab,” I manage to finish.

It takes a moment, and finally the guy speaks.

“Listen, uhm, Miss,” he says. “My dad just died and the cab is already on its way…”

Whatever. This is the last time I’m going to have to deal with people from a strip club.

“Just make sure you give me the money before you get out,” I say and pull out my phone.

I put on my earbuds and turn on my music. I would have loved to just stare at the guy, but his stop comes by way too fast—in like 5 minutes—and he hands me a $100 note before rushing out.

“34^th and 8^th,” I tell the cabdriver, wondering what kind of people I’ll be dealing with on the phone sex line.

Regardless of what they’re like, at least I’ll be safe from people like this guy who just tossed me a C-note.

I’m okay if I never have to go inside a strip club again. Or deal with the people who frequent them.

Well, I mean, I wouldn’t mind if I run into the guy who got off at the Plaza again, though.

Just saying.