Cleveland, Present Day:
People sometimes ask if I was scared the first time I got onstage and
took my clothes off. I honestly can't remember. Every time I went to
a new club, I was nervous about being too big or too tatted up for
management to hire me, and I was on edge around the other girls until
I got a feel for the place. But I can't say I was scared of getting
naked, scared of dancing on a man, or even turning a trick. At a
certain point, it just became such a routine, it felt like the
easiest thing in the world.
What I
do know, is that when I started my 'real' job two weeks ago, I was
terrified. I set multiple alarm clocks because 6 AM was an hour I
rarely saw unless I hadn't gone to bed yet. Even though they told me
there was no strict dress code, I wore dress pants and a sweater
thick enough to keep any stray ions of my true self from radiating
out into the air, my true self being the wild, tatted-up,
free-spirited girl who never really felt comfortable with freedom. Oh, and I wore
glasses, because I had it in my head that if I ran into someone who
recognized me from the club, glasses would be an adequate disguise.
I can
say that so far, I love it. And no, even though it pays more than any
of the other 'legit' jobs I've had working in food service or
childcare, I'm not yet earning enough to afford my
tiny-apartment-car-old-enough-to-be-a-seventh-grader lifestyle
without still dancing on the weekends. But I've gotta start
somewhere, right?
Vegas, December, 2009: Ken
slid back into my life with ease, my pockets without even a question,
my heart, well, he'd never really left there. He would come to the
apartment to chill and collect from me, and one time he brought his
close friend, who I'm just gonna call Bay because he was from the
Bay. After they left, I walked to the bookstore. That's when
Mike called me.
