Chapter 6
Vanessa’s misgivings about the job she’d signed up to do were on full blast in her mind, parading themselves across her brain with unyielding clarity. She had become nothing more than a stereotype, a monstrous hyperbole of the person she always pictured herself to be. With two dead parents and a small, disabled sister to care for, Vanessa turned to the only way she knew to get ahead in life: playing on the sensualities of men who have nothing better to do than to ogle at women on poles.
What choice did she have at this point? Her spat with Christina (or rather, the other way around) and the subsequent passing by of the bus she needed to catch caused her to miss Emma’s appointment. No evaluation from Emma’s pediatric epilepsy specialist meant no application for a grant. It struck Vanessa with such violent force of injustice that a simple piece of paper held so much relief; and the lack thereof caused an insurmountable bulk of strife. That piece of paper meant that she’d not only be able to equip her baby sister with the medical care she needed, but to fill her stomach with nutritious food, put clothes on her back, shoes on her feet, and heat her home in the winter. A flimsy piece of paper, at this point, spelled out the difference between prosperity and poverty.
And because Christina took the time to berate Vanessa, her fate toppled toward poverty.
Grappling with the reality that she was too late for the appointment, Vanessa realized at an instant that she’d be forced into this underworld of a profession alongside Talisha and her unsavory cronies. Before her first night on the job, Talisha had warned Vanessa that she probably needed to buy some new lingerie. The upfront expense would be a hit in the wallet, but it would pay for itself after a night or two of dancing.
“These men are hungry,” she told Vanessa, whose vague expression of distaste didn’t convince Talisha that this was the job for her. “They’re starving, and you want to be their favorite food.”
Vanessa still had the $200 that the CEO of Kümertech had slipped into her pocket two days beforehand. Standing on the street corner, just before she called Talisha, she’d had the idea to use it for a cab across town. She’d be able to pick up Emma from school, then take the busses to her appointment as planned. But then, of course, there was the empty refrigerator at home, mocking her. The bills, layered in various shades of pink distress, were covering the dining room table where the family used to sit down for dinner every night. Vanessa didn’t know what to do with the money, how best to spend it, or if she even had a right to keep it.
In the end, she realized that no decision she made would be the correct one. Vanessa’s life, at this point, felt like a steady stream of lose-lose situations, a lexicon of wrong answers to complex questions. The money wasn’t hers, but the CEO didn’t take no for an answer. She felt bad about keeping it, but then again, a part of her didn’t care. After losing her parents, losing her adulthood, becoming suddenly crushed by the weight of the responsibilities toppling onto her, two hundred dollars falling into her lap was the least of what she deserved. She wasn’t a martyr, not now, at least. Vanessa went shopping for a few cheap pieces of lacy lingerie she could wear on stage: flashy reds and smoldering blacks that would beckon men to slip money in the waistband much more than her ratty old underwear from her teenage years would.
Vanessa had worked out a deal with Jessica, their neighbor, to keep an eye on Emma during the nights that she’d have to work. The arrangement was shaky for the time being, not even Vanessa knew whether she’d be able to keep the gig. Would she be good enough? Would Talisha’s generosity be slammed back in her face by inadequacy? Vanessa felt ordinary, more like the girl who’d clean up the empty tumblers than the woman twisting herself sensually around a pole. With a head full of doubts converging into the tectonic plates of her insecurities, Vanessa made it seem like Jessica would only have to watch Emma for a few nights before the inevitable burnout, the unavoidable firing.
Riding the bus to the strip club where Talisha instructed her to be—the only one in town—at nine o’clock, Vanessa felt more unlike herself than she ever had. It felt as though the sharp, lacy lines of the lingerie were jutting through the simple boundary of her t-shirt, protruding in a way that was obvious to everyone. Her makeup was over the top, her hair was curled in bouncy ringlets. The glitter on her cheeks seemed to spell out HELLO, I AM A STRIPPER to all the bus passengers who snickered her way. Disgusted with herself, with her dead-end decisions, with the house of cards her life had become, Vanessa just glared out the window, counting the street lights once more, hoping that the constant stop and start of the vehicle wouldn’t totally expel her bike from where it was hooked onto the portable bike rack on the outside of the bus.
* * *
The lights seared Vanessa’s skin. The pole was smeared with the grease and shame and grit of other dancers, all cavorting to the tune of their own desperation. The way the men gawked—mouths agape—felt like a different kind of light all its own, casting shadows across her body. It began as a sheepish, timid foray into an underworld that was unknown to Vanessa, a world where sensuality collided with power. In her first few moments on stage, she faltered in how to move, forgetting almost how to walk. But then with a few notes of a new song, something awakened in her. Vanessa harnessed all the pain, the grief, the agony, and the anger of her parents being gone, leaving her with this life, and used it to propel herself forward. She was a powerhouse, turning the tables on the men who felt as though they were the ones who held the lightning bolts in the dynamic.
“Where did you learn to dance like that?” Talisha asked, astonished, in between dances during Vanessa’s first night on the job. “The club’s owner nearly fell over, she was so shocked that I hadn’t brought you in sooner!”
“She?” Vanessa replied, perplexed. “A woman owns the strip club?”
“Oh, yeah,” Talisha said with a smirk. “Don’t get too excited. She might as well be a man, if you know what I mean.”