YES, BUT CAN TUESDAY WELD?

Once again, I’m pulling this stupid gig at the club. Every fucking Tuesday I have to sit in the storefront window next to the club’s entrance, in my skimpiest costume. I don’t even have to dance—although some girls do when they pull this shift. Just sit in a metal folding chair from 2 to 6pm. Like some human hors d’oeuvre. Bob, the club owner, started making all the girls do this at least one day a week, because he is convinced it will pull more people into Round Heels. (The club I dance for.)

So far, it hasn’t been a resounding success…

And mostly, I feel shitty when I have to sit here. Like I’m the Whore of Babylon or something. I know that sounds kinda ridiculous coming from a girl who takes her clothes off for people five, sometimes six days a week. And (mostly) has no problems with that. But in the club, up on stage, I really feel in control of the situation. MY music. MY moves. The men (and women) are looking at me. Only me. Anticipating that with my next shimmy or twirl around the pole I’ll make all their secret, dirty dreams come true. But here, in this grimy window facing High Street, I just feel like I am some alien creature who’s fallen to earth. No one is really looking for me or expecting me as they go about their mundane business—leaving their office; mailing a letter; looking for a good restaurant to eat in. And there are people out there with their families for Chrissakes. This isn’t some restricted red-light district. The worst is when I have to see some little kid staring at me in curiosity and he (or she) is pointing and miming questions. And the parents are pulling them away like they are trying to shield them from a bad automobile accident or something. It just makes me want to crawl back into the darkness of the club every time it happens.

And it happens a lot…

But there’s no way out of this Tuesday shift. If I don’t do it I don’t get to dance my regular shifts in the club. And if I don’t dance, I don’t make rent, etc… So I guess it’s worth the fucking hassle. Really, on good nights in Round Heels I can leave with close to three-hundred dollars in my purse. And I never ever made that kind of money as a cashier at Lowes. Or temping. Ever.

So, I endure being the stripper of the day. Stripper on display. I try not to think about those families walking past me, out in the blazing sun. I usually bring a book along to read, try to concentrate on that, while I sit in this torturous chair. I have a BA in English from the Ohio State University and I probably go through about two or three books a week. (Yes, it’s true.) Right now I am rereading Gulliver’s Travels by Johnathan Swift. That’s a good book. I’ve probably read it like five or six times. It just struck me, this time around. In my situation now, particularly when I pull this Tuesday gig, I feel a lot like Lemuel Gulliver when he was in the land of the giants. (The Brobdingnagians are what they are called.) So fucking small. And subject to the whims and wherefores of these giant monsters. He’s even (at one point) used as a sexual plaything by the women at the Brobdingnagian court, who put hapless Gulliver astride their nipples, etc. etc. (Swift certainly didn’t pull any punches.) Yep, that’s what I feel like sometimes.

Particularly on Tuesday afternoons…

So, it’s Tuesday. About three in the after. I’m up in the storefront window, trying not to go crazy, my head buried in my book. I’m wearing this hot pink mini that has these open slashes across my breasts and stomach. (Leaves little to the imagination.) And a pair of platinum stripper shoes with like six-inch heels. Thankfully, there are not too many people walking around on High Street right now. It’s summer and OSU, where I went to school, is barely in session. (The campus is about two miles north of Round Heels.) And most people are still at work. I have a bottled water and my cell phone next to the chair. Today’s copy of The Columbus Dispatch if I happen to get bored reading Gulliver. And I have my feet propped up on another chair. So, I am tolerable for now. It really begins to suck about five or so when people leave their offices and cubicles. But thankfully, I only have to endure that for an hour or so.

“What are you doing?”

It’s Bob Gleason, the club owner. Checking up on me like he does every hour or so. Every Tuesday we have pretty much the same exchange. It’s like being in the movie Groundhog’s Day or something.

I shake my head and glance over at him, over my dog-eared copy of Gulliver’s Travels.

“Nothing. Working.” I say, indifferently, reaching down and grabbing my Aquafina, taking a lazy swig.

“Looks like you’re maxin’ and relaxin’ to me,” Bob snorts.

There is this wooden partition behind me, a partition that he and his girlfriend Barbara have covered completely in mylar. And there’s mylar on the stage that juts out the window, the stage where I am (supposedly) maxin’ and relaxin’. It looks like I am on the set of Barbarella 2 or something. To the left of me the partition ends, and there’s a small set of steps leading from the stage, through a set of beaded curtains, to the club proper. And that is where Bob is right now, staring at me through the emerald strands of that curtain.

“Sure. If that’s what you want to call it,” I say, taking another small pull on my water.

“That’s what I call it,” he says, gruffly. “Why don’t you get up every once in awhile and dance or somethin’?”

I look over at him, and then out toward empty High Street.

“For who Bob?” I say, patiently. “There’s nobody out there right now.” I put my Aquafina down and pick up my paperback book. Try to read about Gulliver and his wild travels. But Bob isn’t going away. No. Not until we have exhausted our usual Tuesday afternoon exchange.

“Well if you shake it a bit, maybe they will come around,” he says.

“If you build it they will come,” I reply, automatically. I’ve said this same line to him like six or seven times in the past, and he never gets the reference.

“Huh?” he replies.

“Never mind.”

I glance over at him. He truly is one of the ugliest and most loathsome people I have ever met. And he signs my miniscule paychecks of course. He’s about 5’6, 5’7 or so. He has a broad, saturnine face—very heavy, very cruel. And a thick, black unibrow. He usually wears these loud plaid shirts, open almost to the navel. (I guess he needs to show off his werewolf chest as much as possible.) And tight black pants that accentuate his junk.

He has hair growing in his earlobes…

“You know, I can get another dancer in here,” he says. He threatens me with termination about every week.

“OK then,”I say, returning to my book but not really following it. I know Bob is still on the stairs, glaring at me. And will be for a few minutes.

“You seen…Barbara anywhere?” he finally asks. Barbara is his ersatz girlfriend: this thin dyke with short black hair who only goes with him because he owns the club and has money. Really. She’s hit on every single dancer in Round Heels, I believe. Me included. No luck there. I love love being with women. But Barbara’s about as attractive as an iguana. About as smart as one too.

I look at him quizzically.

“Why would I have seen Barbara?” I say. “ I’ve been in this damn window for over an hour…”

“Well if you see her, tell her I’m looking for her,” he says. And without waiting for any further sarcasm from yours truly, he goes back down into the club.

“Yeah. Will do. I’ll put that at the motherfuckin’ top of my list,” I mutter, trying to return to my book. Out on High Street, a young couple (probably students at OSU) walk past. They are both wearing identical Twizted concert tee shirts. Jeans. The guy gives me the once-over, and the girl notices it. Grabs him by the arm and just hurries him along.

Yeah. Salut.

My cell rings. The opening bars to the song “Take Care” by Drake echo through the tiny hot storefront. I smile. That would be Andrea calling me. She always does right after her Tuesday class.

“Hi honey,” I say, answering the phone.

I met Andrea at the club. She’s a dancer too and has been working at Round Heels for close to six months now. She’s a tall redhead with the sweetest, greenest eyes I have ever seen. A smattering of orange freckles across her plump cheeks. Probably would be on her arms too, if it weren’t for all the tattoos. She’s been an ink junkie since she was sixteen. And she’s twenty-two now.

“How’s it going?” she asks.

“Better now that I am talking with you,” I reply. We’ve been living together for about two months or so and—so far—everything has been really beautiful. It might really be love this time…

“Bob been fucking with you?” she asks.

Through the phone receiver I can hear what sounds like a police car or an ambulance pass close, its klaxon rising to a crescendo and then, just as quickly, fading.

“Jesus. Things jumping on campus?” I say. Every Tuesday, Andrea takes a class on the history of paganism. She’s really not working on any degree. She just signs up sporadically for classes that interest her.

“Well, you wouldn’t believe the cops crawlin’ all over this place,” she replies. “Pretty sure it has something to do with that girl..”

I am about to ask what girl. And then, I remember. Some maniac has been grabbing girls in the campus area, raping and then killing them. With a knife. The first one was about six months ago or so. Last night, some twenty-year girl’s body was found in a dumpster behind the Newport, this small theatre where there’s rock groups. This is like victim five or something…

I read all about it in my Dispatch.

“Yeah, I read about that,” I say. The poor girl was found just like all the others. With about thirty or so stab wounds in her chest and stomach.

Jesus…

“Yeah. I hope the cops are able to find this asshole soon. I hate leaving the club alone on Tuesday nights.”

Tuesday nights, since I pull this lucrative window gig, are now one of my few nights off. That’s OK, really, because Tuesdays are slow. But Andrea has to work. Until three in the morning. And I’m with her. I hate hate hate that she has to (sometimes) walk to her car in the dark alone. Even if it is just parked across the street in the White Castle parking lot.

“I love you,” I say, abruptly. I realize that I have never said this before. And what a time to come out with it. While she’s walking across a busy college campus, intent on getting to her car and our little home. And I am up here…

Failing at being a human hors d’oeuvres.

There’s silence on the other end of the phone.

“Andrea?” I say. For some reason, my heart is beating crazily in my chest.

“I…I love you too,” she says. It sounds as if she is crying.

“Are you OK?” I ask. I catch a glimpse of my reflection in the plate glass of the window. I look so outlandish in this mini with the vents in it. It looks like some werewolf came howlin’ around and tried to get at my boobs. And then gave up because the sun came up and turned him back to human…

“I am…now,” she says, sniffing. “What do you…what do you want tonight for dinner?” she adds.

“Whatever you feel like making, sweetheart,” I say, looking down at my cartoon shoes.

“I thought…I thought…maybe the Island shish kebob with the brown rice?”

We are both vegans. I have been pretty much my whole life. I just can’t bear the idea of someone on this planet hurting, killing a living creature. Can’t bear it.

“Sure,” I say. A warm feeling rushes through my body, my thighs. I feel better than I have all day. A kid slowly passes by the window, a graffiti- splattered skateboard tucked under one thin arm. He leers at me and with his free hand flips me off.

I ignore him.

“And after…after,” Andrea says, “Maybe we can watch Treme? Or anything? Until it’s time to go to work…?”

“Sounds like heaven,” I say.

In the club the song “Runnin’ With The Devil” kicks in on the PA system. It’s the first set of the night. Miss Absinthe is on stage right now. Shakin’ her ass for no one.

Sad…

“Yes,” Andrea says. “Well, I’m at my car. I’ll see you when I get home…”

“I love you,” I say.

It really feels good to say it.

“I love you as well,” she says, almost reverently.

I place my cell phone carefully on the stage, next to my water. I try to go back but the words keep coalescing, morphing ito Andrea’s smiling, freckled face. I can’t wait to clock out and get home to her arms. In the club, Van Halen grinds on and on and on. The woofers on the PA are turned up so fucking high that the platform I am on rattles. Like I am under an elevated train track or something.

The beaded curtain to the left of me parts and a pale, thin face pokes through. It’s Bob’s dyke girlfriend Barbara, her blue eyes glinting like two small cold stones behind the filthiest wire-rimmed glasses I have ever seen. Really. And they are ALWAYS like that. Couldn’t she stop for like two seconds in the morning and clean those fuckers?

“You seen Bob?” she asks, anxiously.

“No,” I say.

And I go back to my book.

Michael Walker is a writer living in Newark, Ohio. He is the author of two published books: 7-22 and The Vampire Henry. He has also seen his stories and his poems published in various magazines including Sky Island Journal, PIF, and The Adelaide Review.