Tiff…

I’d done a lot of hard things in the last few days. Watched my best friend die, murdered her killers in a fit of righteous anger, wrestled with the feelings over that, but by far, worse than the second was telling Zeke, Alan, and the rest of the girls that Lia wouldn’t be coming back.

I’d had to go back to work. I had to behave normally, and part of behaving normally when you were a stripper for a living was that the bills stopped for no one and nothing. So I was back at work, and staring at my reflection in the boudoir mirror, thinking I was looking at a ghost.

The girl in the mirror didn’t exist anymore, did she? I mean, she looked the same as ever but ‒ the things I’d seen, the things I’d done. I wasn’t the same and I wasn’t sure how I could keep pretending that I was. The lace mask wasn’t all that effective anymore now that I wore a mask every day for completely different reasons. I had an alter-ego for real now. One of violence, baptized in blood. One of self-confidence that I had to hide behind a veneer of fragility and anxiety that I honestly didn’t feel even half as much anymore.

There was something about killing the man that put you through hell that was a confidence boost like no other. If I could survive Silas Grable, I could survive just about anything.

I turned my head as Alan sat himself down in the chair that Delia had always dropped into to chatter at me from while I fixed my mask and makeup for the next set. Typically, she’d sat there waiting for her turn at the mirror. It hurt, a raw, burning, aching hole in the center of my chest that she would never sit in that chair again. Would never insist I watch her dumb Hallmark movies, or ask what flavor of ice cream sounded good for that night. Would never plan a shopping trip or insist we go out and try some new thing. Last time, it had been a wine and paint night. I’d told her no, I’d had a paper to write. Now I regretted saying no, at not taking the chance to create that memory when I’d had the chance.

“I know that look,” Alan said, leaning in and speaking in a confiding tone.

“What look?” I asked, genuinely perplexed.

He gave a gusty sigh and said, “You can’t stay here anymore, kid. You’re too good for this place, for one, and two, if you tried to stay I’d be afraid of the toll it would take. Delia is too much a part of this place and everywhere you look, she’s going to be there. Besides, your heart’s not in this,” he looked around and sighed heavily. “Which brings us back around to number one; you’re too good for this place. It’s time for you to move on. You’ve got options for that now.”

I stared at him a little wide-eyed and didn’t immediately know what to say, but what I knew not to do was argue because he spoke the truth. Everything he said had been doing lazy circles in my mind all night. My shift was almost up. Nik would be coming soon to pick me up and I straightened up a little and said, “It won’t leave you too short? On dancers, I mean.”

I mean, Lia wasn’t coming back and if I left now… that was two; one girl had come up pregnant and was going to have to knock this shit off once she started to show, which was going to be sooner rather than later with how far along she was. Would have been nice if she’d ‘fessed up to being knocked up sooner so Alan could have started looking sooner but that was how a lot of these bitches were… not exactly long on smarts, never thinking beyond their next payday.

“Not your place to worry about that, kid. I’m the boss, remember?”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” I said and looked down. I opened my mouth to ask for something and closed it, shaking my head.

“Spill it,” he ordered.

“You’re not my boss now,” I said and he grinned.

“I haven’t fired you yet and you haven’t said ‘I quit’ so let me milk it for the last few seconds I can, huh?”

I laughed a little and tried not to get teary. This was more painful than I expected it was going to be. The whole idea of leaving.

“I was, ah, wondering if I could save the last dance for someone special,” I said.

“Depends, is that someone me, Zeke, or a certain tribal-tattooed motherfucker that quite frankly, scares the living daylights out of me?”

I smiled and laughed slightly. “It happens to be that last one,” I said.

“Let me ask you something.” I nodded, listening. “He takes real good care of you?”

“Words cannot describe,” I told him. “It’s everything it’s supposed to be and more if that makes sense.”

He nodded slowly and reached up, tipping my chin with light fingertips. He flicked the pad of his thumb along my jaw in a feather-light touch that was so barely there it might as well have never been at all. The weight of the moment felt very father-daughter like and I kind of held my breath, enjoying it for the moment. I guess, if I had to be honest, even though we weren’t far apart in age enough for him to be my dad, Alan was the closest thing to one I’d ever really had. It added another unexpected layer of ow to the whole I-was-really-leaving thing.

“He treats you the way you deserve, so yeah. You can save the last dance. Just let me know when you want to go on and what song. I’ll let Drake know.” Drake was our DJ.

I nodded and said, “Thanks.”

“Just get on out of here and do well with whatever you do with your life from here on out.” He pushed himself to his feet. “Succeed. That’s all I ask.” He looked me over, his eyes roving over my face and he sighed. “While I’m sorry to see you go, I’m so happy you’re leaving. I really mean it when I say you’re one of the best and far too good to stay here.”

“You make my mascara run, we’re gonna have problems boss.”

He smiled and said, “Not anymore. You’re your own boss, now,” and with that, he walked away, down the hall, carrying on straight before making the turn and the end and heading up the back stair to his office.

“Crap,” I muttered, snagging tissues out of the box on the table and pressing them to my eyes.

There was nothing for it. I cried like a little bitch. At least these weren’t tears of heartbreak, though. Bittersweet, but definitely not broken.